1 - Introduction - Living like a real Christian FAITHFULNESS | Page 5

met with a similar response. Think of Elijah who, when he challenged the 450 prophets of
Baal to the competition on Mount Carmel in 1Kings 18, the response of the crowd would have
been, “Elijah, why do you have to be so radical?!” Nehemiah too, would have met a similar
response when he endeavoured to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem among people who were
disheartened and in spiritual depression. They too could have said to Nehemiah, “We like your
idea Nehemiah, but why do you have to be so radical?” They would have said the same thing
to John the Baptist and to many others who would have named the name of Christ. The
Pharisees too would have said the same of Jesus,“Jesus surely the law is good enough, why do
you have to change everything? Surely you don’t need to be so radical!”
I believe today, that the true concept of Christianity could well be in jeopardy. Our glorious
faith has been commercialised, institutionalised, rationalised, emotionalised and above all
(and worst of all) trivialised. Where the critics have made our faith less than it is and made
Christianity something that is comfortable and easy to fit into our lives without it challenging
too much our way of life. I believe too that we have sold the gospel cheap in many ways; that
by leading people to believe that if we just say the words of a prayer, that that will make
thema Christian. The truth is that it may or it may not, but I fear for those who have been led
to believe that, as a result of this prayer, they are unconditionally welcomed into the family of
God. Scripture teaches us that a true disciple is not one who just prays a prayer in a moment
of emotional upheaval, but is one who intentionally lays down his life for the cause of God. I
do not believe for one moment that Jesus left the glory of Heaven and came down to this sinsick planet and allowed people to abuse him, beat him and then put him to death to give us
some grey, nebulas, powerless, religious experience. I love the radical terminology in our
reading today,where it speaks of the church prevailing against the gates of hell; this is not
some comfortable, inoffensive group of people, but a group of people whose mandate is to
turn the world upside down for the Kingdom of God.
Suffice it to say, today maybe, it would be good for you to review your place in this Kingdom
and make sure that you understand conditions of service. I believe that we need to stop
playing games and being satisfied with this grey, religious experience and allow ourselves to
be challenged by God, to live out the faith for which Jesus intended; a faith that, in the eyes of
the world, will never truly be understood, because the teachings of this Kingdom are just too
radical.