The Last Word and The Word After That

Finished this book at the weekend and just lie the other to in the trilogy I came away feeling inspired, excited and also with a great deal of questions. Brian McLaren through his character Pastor Dan explore the subject of hell and how if we believe in a good loving God the whole idea of a big, fiery eternal pit fits into it all. I wont try a summarise all of the points or perhaps any of them as this book does it so eloquently.

I love the way that the book made me again reflect upon the vocational sense of my faith in God. As a paid employee of a church I fall into the trap often of trying to fill each minute with 'proper work' and forget the true sense of viewing each aspect of my life as being an important part of building up God's Church. I think that if Christians start to view themselves as urban, suburban, rural missionaries in the contexts within which they find themselves in then the Church has exciting times ahead. The term missionary is sometimes unhelpful but what I'm talking about is holistic mission which seeks to help people emotionally, physically, socially, psychologically as well as spiritually.

I've heard it said recently that the Church doesn't want to turn into social services. I disagree wholeheartedly with this. The place of the Church is to be at the centre of a community, a place where people of all ages, races, sexual orientations can come and find support and friendship. This I believe is what's at the heart of Jesus' mission. Seeking God's Kingdom on earth as in heaven is about fulfilling his calls to tackle injustices.

I know a lot of people are saying this stuff and are probably much further down the line in living it out as a community. I'm still working through it and working out how I begin to do this in my local context.