More Ready Than You Realize

After reading a lot about Christian thought and theology recently, I felt that I needed a sort of break from it. So instead of trying to finish ‘The History of Christian Thought’, I decided to read something more practical. I picked up ‘More Ready than You Realize’, by Brian McLaren, and started reading it about one week ago. Now that I’ve finished it, there are a few insights that I would like to note down.

Firstly, McLaren points out that when we do evangelism (or disciple-making), we Christians are converted too; as much as we think that we are trying to convert another person. We learn and we grow even as we share the good news with others. McLaren points to the example of the conversion of Cornelius, where Peter experienced a conversion himself when God showed him that He accepted the Gentiles.

Secondly, we need to learn to view the conversion experience as a process rather than an event. We always talk about ‘accepting Christ as personal Savior’. This event is determined by a specific point in time when a person utters the sinner’s prayer or something similar. We classify people into two groups, either they are ‘in’ (saved, born-again, Christian etc), or out, based on whether the person went through this event. However, things might not be so obvious for certain people. Some people just end up following Christ slowly, after a long process. For people like these (including me), it is difficult to determine when they moved from being a non-Christian to a Christian. And it is not always clear whether a person fits into our categories of ‘saved’ or ‘unsaved’, because there are many in betweens as well. I think this is a good way of looking at conversion, where it is part of the continual process of discipleship and growth, rather than a specific event.

Some interesting quotes from McLaren in ‘More Ready than You Realize’:

I wonder if apologetics should take a different approach. Instead of defending, perhaps apologetics should begin with an old-fashioned apology: I’m sorry we Christians have so often put roadblocks up for spiritual seekers through our narrow-mindedness, our failure to bridge racial and cultural and class barriers, and our lack of acceptance. I’m sincerely sorry. Please don’t blame Jesus for our failure to live up to his teaching and example. And be assured that we’ll try to do better, with God’s help.

To be spiritual friends, I think we will find ourselves attending a lot more recitals, soccer games, movies, festivals, parties, and concerts, which will mean we might have to cut back on some of our church activities. But then again (don’t tell your pastor I said this, okay?), I think a lot of us would become a lot better Christians if we spent less time at church.

And his summary of the entire book:

1. Count conversations, not conversions
2. Listen to their story, share your story, and share God’s story, not just propositions and formulas
3. Expect conversion to normally occur in the context of authentic Christian community, not just in the context of information
4. See disciple-making as a holistic process and unending journey, not just a conversion event
5. Believe that God is at work ‘out there’ in everyone, not just ‘in here’ in the church
6. See evangelism as part of your own discipleship – not just the other person’s
7. See evangelism as recruiting people for God’s mission on earth, not just people for heaven
8. See evangelism as one facet of our identity as servants to all

Whenever we converse about God, we must remember that we are just human beings trembling between an ox and an ass, beholding mysteries too wonderful for words, too wonderful for minds, so wonderful that they threaten to make our hearts explode with wonder. And so we dance. We dance in service, in gratitude, in hard work well done, in prayer, in game, in tilling the soil and crafting the poem, in hiking and sailing and flying, in hanging out, in sharing a drink of coffee or beer or wine or cold water, in joy, in sorrow, in hope, in disappointment. We dance. Sometimes, we dance with our eyes closed, dizzy, spinning, with tears streaming down our faces. Sometimes we dance with such joy that we feel like our hearts are going to explode! And when we open our eyes, we see that we do not dance alone, but that others have joined us, and the dance we share is beautiful, because the music that moves us resounds with the holiest mystery of all. So shall we dance?