If spiritual formation is, to use the words of Robert Mulholland, "a process of being conformed to the image of Christ for the sake of others,” it is no surprise that a significant portion of American Christianity is averse to cultivating incarnational living and implementing incarnational ministry. The contemporary culture is saturated with the mentality of instant gratification and the Church is often guilty of conforming to that culture by sanctifying its many vices, rather than transforming it through showing forth the presence of Christ in the world.
There is a shallowness about our lives if we are not in Christ. This is true, of course, for regular unbelievers. But it is also, and especially, true for "believers" who have become satisfied with a form of religion that stops short of union with Christ. This shallowness is far more dangerous than the shallow folly of "intellectual atheism," because it manifests itself in a form of outward godliness which lacks the inward power of the Spirit. It is a shallowness that contents itself with outward appearances but lacks inward holiness. Christ, having not been inwardly formed, cannot be outwardly manifest. Thus, what is manifested outwardly is "only a shadow of what is to come" (Colossians 2:17a, RSV). Such a faith lacks "the substance [which] belongs to Christ" (Colossians 2:17b, RSV).
This is the shortcoming of American evangelicalism. It is comfortable with having a form of godliness but denying its power. Its approach reflects the rigid legalism for which Christ rebuked the church in Ephesus (Revelation 2:1-7). It lacks the substance necessary to encourage the deeper life in Christ, out of fear of violating some doctrinal norm. But union with Christ is supposed to be the norm, not the exception. Until we are one with Christ, our faith will lack substance. It will only be "a shadow of what is to come." Many who may have started strong in the faith will fall away because they will not be able to hold fast to "the Head," that is, Christ, who is the substance of our faith. Only in Christ does one's faith grow and mature for the ultimate benefit of the whole body (cf. Colossians 2:18-19).
The absence of mystery is a shortcoming of Western worship (particularly within the Reformed tradition), so much so that many Western Christians see worship as nothing but a routine or a form of religious entertainment to give them some vague reason to carry on with life for another week. If worship is truly worship, there must be a strong element of mystery. The Risen Christ is present in the midst of the worshipping community. That is a mystery, but it is nonetheless a profound and ultimate reality. It is the defining experience which draws the community together, shapes it by the Word and Holy Spirit, and empowers the Church, corporately and individually, for incarnational living and incarnational ministry.
Incarnational living involves something much deeper than merely "following Jesus' example." The question, "What would Jesus do?" is a good and basic starting point. But it only scratches the surface of the awesome reality that is incarnational living. Incarnational living joins both individual and community with Christ in the whole of his salvific work: his miraculous birth, his life and ministry, his suffering, his death on the cross, his resurrection, and his glorification. In Christ, believers experience all these things as a pneumapsychosomatic reality. The believer's spirit, soul, and body are one with Christ's spirit, soul, and body. This is no mere abstract concept. It is a part of the ultimate reality which is the deepest longing of every believer.
In order to enter into a mystery as profound as the Incarnation, one must cultivate a contemplative life. This is another obstacle to overcome in an instant gratification culture. But Christian tradition is very clear that the Incarnation is not only at the center of the Church's historic faith, but also ought to be at the center of the believer's life.
The clearest picture of the Incarnation, "the Word made flesh," is offered by John. In the prologue to his Gospel, he vividly describes this awesome mystery.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.Incarnational living must begin "in the beginning," Thus, John's prologue provides us with an excellent starting point for that which "begins" our life in Christ, namely, the New Birth. If life "in Christ" is, at its root, incarnational, that is, believers somehow partaking of the divine nature and participating with Christ in the whole of his salvific work, then such a life must encompass everything Christ accomplishes "in the flesh." The New Birth, then, is not something we must experience in order to come to Christ but, like everything else associated with our salvation, it is something we experience in Christ and with Christ. John's reference to "children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God" is, then, a reference to the New Birth which is experienced by "all who received [Christ]" and "believed in his name." While John may not mention Jesus' miraculous birth explicitly, there can be inferred a connection between Jesus' birth from a virgin via the agency of the Holy Spirit and the believer's New Birth via the agency of the same Holy Spirit. The inference is even stronger in Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus.
There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.
The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-14, ESV)
Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him." Jesus answered him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." (John 3:1-8, ESV)"Born again" in the original Greek means literally, "born from above." After Nicodemus asks, "How can a man be born when he is old? Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb to be born," Jesus elaborates on his original statement. "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit." To be "born again" or "born from above" means to be "born" of the Spirit. Only then can one enter the kingdom of God. As Jesus later says to the woman at the well, "Yet a time is coming and has now come when all true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth" (John 4:23-24, NIV).
This is what life "in Christ" in the kingdom of God, that is, incarnational living, is all about: God's "true worshipers" worshipping him "in spirit and in truth." But if our worship is to be in spirit and truth, we must heed the truth told to us by Jesus: we must be born of the Spirit. Jesus was literally "born from above," as has already been pointed out. He was born of a virgin via the agency of the Holy Spirit. What Jesus really means when he says, "no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again," is, "To enter my kingdom you must share in my birth." But this is a physical impossibility, as Nicodemus pointed out. How are we to experience "birth from above" the way Jesus did? The answer is very simple, yet deeply profound.
"I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. (John 17:20-23, ESV)Jesus' prayer for complete unity is fulfilled not in some interdenominational merger, but through believers becoming one with him. Through sharing in his Incarnation, we are incorporated into the deeper mystery of the Trinity whereby we begin to share in the very nature of the Divine.
Many believers, particularly in contemporary American evangelicalism, place such an emphasis on the New Birth that they miss out on the deeper experience of life in Christ. But life in Christ not only involves birth. Death to sin is also a crucial element in incarnational living. For there can be no resurrection to eternal life before that which is opposed to life is put to death. But what within a person is opposed to life? The sobering reality is the whole person is opposed to life, because sin has corrupted the whole person. Therefore, the whole person must be put to death. Paul testifies to this when he writes, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:19b-20, ESV).
The experience of being "crucified with Christ" must be understood from a whole person perspective. Death to sin is not "spiritual only." Paul does not say, "My spirit has been crucified with Christ's Spirit." That would negate the somatic dimension of death to sin and, by implication, the physical necessity of Christ's crucifixion. Paul says, "I have been crucified with Christ." Paul understands his death "with Christ" to be a whole person experience. To be "crucified with Christ" is to participate in person with the actual death of the second Person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ the Son of God. Thus, when Christ was crucified, so was Paul and so were we. When Christ died, so did Paul and so did we. Yet, how is it that Paul still appears to be alive? The Apostle makes it clear who it is that gives life to his mortal body: "[The] life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God [literally, "in faith which is of the Son of God"], who loved me and gave himself for me."
There is no escaping the personal nature of Paul's experience. His whole person was transformed from being opposed to life to being life itself, through "faith which is of the Son of God." That which was opposed to life has been caught up, swallowed up, and raised up by him who is life itself. Paul's life "in the flesh" is a testimony to the power of the Risen Christ. Paul sees his life as a continuation of the life of Christ, a life which never ends. Paul's whole person is now wholly in Christ, that is, the Risen and Glorified Son of God, who submitted himself--spirit, soul, and body--to death on the cross for the redemption of our whole person--spirit, soul, and body.
Here the connection between incarnation and sanctification becomes clear. Paul and other New Testament writers often use such terms as "spirit," "soul," and "body" in vaguely interchangeable contexts with regard to redemption and salvation. However, only in speaking of sanctification does Paul use all three terms together.
Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it. (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24, ESV)Here, Paul uses "spirit, soul and body" as an unmistakable unity of personhood which is saved, redeemed, sanctified, and, at last, delivered whole into the presence of God through Jesus Christ, whose suffering, death, and resurrection make it possible for all persons to have eternal life.
The end of incarnational living, that is, the hope of all who live in Christ, is the resurrection to eternal life. Scripture does not give us much latitude for speculation concerning this deeply profound mystery. Many have tried, however, and have inevitably fallen into error by attempting to be overly specific. Only through the lens of incarnational living is the necessary continuity between the resurrection of Christ and the resurrection of the dead to eternal life become clear.
And as they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them, greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. (Acts 4:1-2, ESV)In the above cited passage, Luke makes a very important point. "The resurrection of the dead" is, according to the Apostolic proclamation, something which happens "in Jesus." The resurrection of Christ cannot be taken in isolation from the resurrection of the dead. Both are two parts of the same whole. In rising from the dead, Christ has abolished death's stranglehold on humanity. The resurrection of Christ is the kairos moment through which all of history can be understood. Christ is Alpha and Omega, First and Last, Beginning and End; who is and who was and who is to come. Hence, all who were dead, are dead, and will be dead in Christ were raised, are raised, and will be raised.
The hope of all believers--past, present, and future--is that in Christ and with Christ, we have been, are being, and will be raised to eternal life. In Christ, our whole person--spirit, soul, and body--is saved, redeemed, sanctified, and glorified; and with Christ we shall dwell forever in the presence of God.
Incarnational Ministry: From Contemplating the Mystery to Manifesting the Presence
Incarnational living must necessarily yield incarnational ministry. Contemplation of the mystery of life in Christ must become outwardly manifest as the Church shows forth the presence of Christ in the midst of the world as the visible agent of the kingdom of God. Each individual believer, having been uniquely gifted by God, must share in this incarnational task.
In the Gospel accounts of Jesus' baptism, there emerges a paradox which can only be understood within the context of the kingdom of God. John the Baptist, the fiery prophet who is nevertheless humble enough to recognize his own insignificance, boldly takes on the religious establishment, calling them a "brood of vipers." But then he proclaims that someone greater than he is coming, "whose sandals I am not worthy to carry; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire" (Matthew 3:11-12, RSV).
Yet, right in the middle of John's stern warning about the One who is coming in judgment, Jesus himself steps through the crowd, into the waters of the Jordan River and says to John, "Baptize me!"
John has been preparing the way for Jesus to come in judgment against sinners, yet Jesus identifies with those very sinners. His is a judgment of separation. The wheat will be separated from the chaff. But the standard of judgment will not be how "religious" we are (as the example of the Pharisees makes clear) but, rather, how closely we identify with the Christ who identifies with us.
John's proclamation of fiery judgment is tempered by Jesus' humble act of identification. God's judgment is real and very much imminent. But if we are to proclaim it with integrity, we must identify with the sinners, acknowledging that we ourselves are chief among them. Those we invite into the kingdom may, in fact, enter ahead of us.
This is the actual (as opposed to the merely theoretical) tension in which we live as citizens of the kingdom of God. It is the tension between incarnation and identification. As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are to live as the ongoing incarnation of Christ in the world and for the world. But part and parcel to incarnational ministry is identification with those whom "respectable society" would call "sinners." With deepest humility, we must recognize that there is no one who stands in greater need of redemption than ourselves. But we do not look to ourselves for that redemption. We look to Christ and, when we look to Christ, we look to One who calls us to live by his example. He was without sin, yet became sin on our behalf. Thus, the tension between incarnation and identification actually defines the life and ministry of Christian disciples. As we incarnate the presence of Christ in the world and for the world, we proclaim the message of the kingdom of God. That proclamation includes the often stinging call to repentance. Yet, identification with sinners is also par and parcel to living out the incarnation. Even as we call sinners to repentance and invite them into the kingdom, we must identify with them in their brokenness. That is what Jesus did, even enduring the same temptations all "sinners" face, yet being without sin (cf. Hebrews 4:15).
Calling sinners to repentance, however, is not without its pitfalls. Suffering is an inevitable consequence of incarnational ministry. Just as we identify with sinners in their brokenness, so we also identify with Christ in his suffering and death. Absent such identification, we lose all sense of imminence regarding the kingdom of God and the hope of resurrection and final vindication. This is an area of incarnational ministry in which the Church in America is sadly lacking. The culture of instant gratification to which American Christianity has been conformed teaches that pain and suffering are to be avoided at all costs. This cultural accommodation is given theological cover through the novelty of dispensational eschatology, which corrupts the hope of Christ's return into an escapist fantasy, teaching that Christians will be "snatched away" to heaven before a period of untold suffering begins on earth. The prevalence of this error has been a devastating blow to genuine incarnational ministry within the American church. It may indeed be the case that a season of suffering is precisely what is needed to shake the church out of its complacency.
It is no coincidence that Jesus himself is most emphatic about the imminent nature of his return when addressing the comfortable, complacent, and compromised church of Laodicea (Revelation 3:14-20). It is an imminence not only of time, but also of space: "I stand at the door and knock!" These words ought to be a wake-up call to the church today which, like Laodicea, has become comfortable with the world.
Incarnational ministry keeps this sense of imminence at the forefront, for it is a reminder that ours is an urgent task. Neither we nor the persons to whom we minister are guaranteed the next moment. God's judgment--swift, sure, and decisive--will come when we least expect it. The most humbling truth about such judgment is that it begins "with the family of God" (1 Peter 4:17). When Jesus speaks of judgment in Matthew 24 (also Mark 13, Luke 21), his primary target is the Temple and the elite religious culture which had grown up around it. That culture was utterly destroyed some forty years after Jesus' prophetic declaration, "Do you see all these things? I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down" (Matthew 24:2, NIV). When judgment comes, it is the religious culture, not the secular culture, which bears the brunt of God's wrath. We cannot allow ourselves to fall into the trap of comfortable complacency offered by the myriad of speculative eschatological schemes which either confine the significance of Jesus' words to a past generation (preterism, particularly hyper-preterism) or delay their fulfillment until a future generation (futurism, particularly the aforementioned dispensationalism). God's judgment is not only an imminent possibility, but also an imminent and sobering reality of which we must constantly be aware as we proclaim the kingdom of God through incarnating the presence of Christ in and for the world. If we are not sincere, God will see through our masquerade. It is not enough that we be merely religious. Incarnational ministry requires that we be Christ for the world and, in so being, we actively participate in the ongoing fulfillment of the eschatological kingdom toward which all of history is moving.
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