All of this from The Barbarian Way by Erwin McManus. Just some things to think about. Let me know what you think.
The original call of Jesus was so simple, so clean, so clear: “Follow Me.” He wants us to surrender our lives to Him and follow Him into the unknown. And if it means a life of suffering, hardship and disappointment, it will be worth it because following Jesus Christ is more powerful and more fulfilling than living with everything in the world minus Him (p. 49).
A world without God cannot wait for us to choose the safe path. If we wait for someone else to take the risk, we risk that no one will ever act and that nothing will ever be accomplished (p. 53).
Do not procrastinate; do not hesitate; do not deviate from whatever course of action He calls you to. But I want to warn you, the closer you walk with Christ, the greater the faith required. The more you trust Him , the more you’ll risk on His behalf. The more you love Him, the more you will love others. If you genuinely embrace His sacrifice, you will joyfully embrace a sacrificial life. Your expectations of Jesus will change as your Intimacy with Him deepens. When you begin to follow passionately after Jesus, you will inadvertently find yourself innovation. After all, Jesus is
transforming lives, writing history, creating the future, and unleashing the kingdom of God (p. 53)
We look at Jesus not to fulfill our shallow longings or to provide for us creature comforts. We look
to Him to lead us where He needs us most and where we can accomplish the most good (p. 54)
No matter a person who is genuinely following God does, you find a reason to disdain him (p. 60)
God steers us in the direction of His kingdom , His purpose, His passion. His desire is not to conform us but to transform us. Not to make us complaint, but to make us creative. His intent is never to domesticate us, but to liberate us (p. 64).
To have the Spirit of God dwelling within the heart of someone who chooses a domesticated faith is like having a tiger trapped within a cage. You are not intended to be a spiritual zoo where people can look at God in you from a safe distance. You are a jungle where the spirit roams wild and free in your life. You are a recipient of the God who cannot be tamed and of a faith that must not be tamed. You are no longer a prisoner of time and space, but a citizen of the kingdom of God – a resident of the barbarian tribe. God is not a sedative that keeps you calm and under control by dulling your senses. He does quite the opposite. He awakens your spirit to be truly alive (p. 66)
When you join the barbarian tribe, you begin to live your life with your eyes and your heart wide open. When the Spirit of God envelops your soul, your spirit comes alive, and everything changes for you. You are no longer the same. And to those who cannot see the invisible, to those who refuse to believe it exists, the path you choose, the life you live may lead them to conclude that you are not simply differ but insane. People who are fully alive look out of their minds to those who simply exist (p. 69)
The more your identity is rooted in God’s value for you, the less you are controlled and limited by what others think of you. If only fools fall in love and people who are in love act like fools, then those who are changed by God’s love really do become fools for Christ (p. 70).
When barbarians travel together, they do not march in a single file. There is no forced conformity. They are not required or expected to keep in step. They walk together as free individuals joined not by standardization, but by spirit (p. 71).
The civilized build shelters and invite God to stay with them; barbarians move with God wherever He chooses to go. The civilized Christian has a routine; the barbarian disciple has a mission. The civilized believer knows the letter of the law; the barbarian disciple lives the spirit of the law. The religiously civilized love tradition; the barbarian spirit loves challenges. The civilized are satisfied with ritual; the barbarians live and thrive in the mystical. For the civilized disciple, religion provides stability and certainty; for the barbarian, a life in God is one of risk and mystery (p. 79).
Our goal must not be to populate the Christian religion but to bring people into a genuine relationship with God. We must make a clear distinction between the religion of Christianity and the revolution that Jesus began two thousand years ago (p. 91).
(Ezekiel 36:22-23) God made an emphatic declaration that He will prove His God and He is holy not though His action but through the actions of His people. A civilized faith relates to right and wrong as a moral obligation. A barbarian faith loves good and hates evil. There is no obligation fueling the actions of His people. They are passionate about the very things that are on the heart of God. Their motivation is not external, but intrinsic. They are moved from the inside out (p. 92).
(Ezekiel 36:26-28) From the moment we become citizens of the kingdom of God, we become aliens and strangers in a world that chooses to live absent of God. From the first step taken to follow Jesus, we are out of step with the rest of the world. Once your life is in sync with the story of God, you become out of sync with any story that attempts to ignore or eliminate God. You are a stranger to them, an alien among them, a nomadic wanderer who, while refusing to be rooted in this life, seems to somehow enjoy it the most (p. 93).
Everyone who hears he barbarian call of Christ and chooses to aollow will become a foreigner and perhaps even an outcast in the time and place in which we live (p. 94).
(Joel 2:28-29) God’s ultimate end for our transformation is to unleash the untamed faith within. When His Spirit is poured into our lives, we are inspired to an extraordinary level of living. Barbarians never exist simply to survive. Barbarians never just get through the day. Barbarians wake to live and live life fully awake. To be filled with the Spirit of God is to be filled with dreams and visions that are too compelling to ignore. Live or die, succeed or fail, barbarians must pursue and attempt such dreams and visions. The barbarian spirit dreams great dreams and finds the courage to live them. The barbarian call confronts us with all we love and all we fear. We resist love to avoid pain and squelch our dreams out of fear of failure. For the Spirit of God is fueled by love. Every conversation to be had with God challenges the boundaries of our imagination. When we turn to God, His love transforms us and ignites a new passion within us. All that we have love is consumed by the passions with us. All that we have loved is consumed by the passions of a new heart. We discover the power and force of love in its purest form. At the same time, when we turn our hearts toward God, all of our fears are consumed by one fear. We are called to fear only God. there is an important reason for this. What we fear is what we’re subject to; our fears define our master. Where there is no fear, there is not control (p. 100-101)
When we fear God and God only, we no longer bound by all other fears that would hold us captive. The fear of dear, the fear of failure, the fear of rejection, the fear of insignificance – all of the fears that know us by name and haunt us in the dark of the night become powerless when we know the fear of the Lord. And if this is not enough, we discover that perfect love cast out all fear. Not even God will hold us or control us by fear. When we fear Him, we in essence begin to live a life where we are fearless (p. 101-102).
When the church becomes an institution, people are nothing more than volunteers to be recruited. When the church is a movement, our stewardship becomes the unleashing of our God-given gifts, talents, and passions (p. 102-103).
There is a metamorphosis waiting to happen within every one of us. A part of the metamorphosis is discovering your divine destiny and knowing for the first time who you were created to become. When the Spirit of God comes to live within you, you strangely become aware of your inadequacy and your extraordinary potential. When you choose the path of civilized religion, any change that is worth noting is at best incremental. It is only when you choose the barbarian way that the result is revolutionary (p. 104).
To be born of God is to be made a citizen in the kingdom the kingdom with Paradise. Salvation is not reentry into a Paradise Lost; it is enlistment in the mission of God (p. 108).
Domesticated Christians are far too willing to abdicate the battle for the soul of the world. Civility focuses our energy on all the wrong places. We spend our lives emphasizing our personal development and spiritual well-being. We build churches that become nothing more than hiding places for the faithful while pretending that our actions are for the good of the world. Or we choose political and secular vehicles to try to advance our cultural values, strangely attempting to make unbelieving people act like civilized believers (p. 108-109).
We discover the painful reality that even God’s people, when we become civilized, are more than willing to crucify God. When we choose a civilized faith, God becomes, at the very least, an irritant and, at worst, an enemy to our faith. We find in Jesus that the hostility of God turns toward empty religion and the mercy of God turns toward the outcast and the sinner. The way that Jesus called the masses to choose was far too barbaric for those who held the positions of religious leadership. The claim that He must become the sacrificial Lamb who would take away the sins of the world was an insult to their sense of piety and self righteousness (p. 112).
Two thousand years ago God started a revolt against the religion He started. So don’t ever put it past God to cause a groundswell movement against churches and Christian institution that bear His name. If He was willing to turn Judaism upside down, don’t think for a moment our institutions are safe from a divine revolt. I am convinced that even now there are multitudes of followers of Jesus Christ who are sick and tired of the church playing games and playing down the call of God. My travels only confirm that the murmurings of the revolution are everywhere. I am convinced that there is an uprising in the works and that no one less than God is behind it (p. 114).
The driving purpose of this barbarian revolt is to liberate every person who longs to find freedom in God. Like barbarians destroying civilization, they are to remove every nonessential obstacle between God and man. Let no one remain captive to the nefarious schemes of religionist who attempt to hold God for ransom. Let nothing prevent you or hinder you from providing mercy and forgiveness to those living under the burden of guilt and shame. Who could have guessed that a message of love could incite so much hostility? (p. 115)
The suffering of Christ glorifies God because it elevates love. Compelled by love, God would go where He knew suffering was certain. Love always moves to sacrifice, which is exactly where he calls us to go. We shouldn’t be surprised, then, that to follow Christ is to abandon the luxury of safety and security. If we are to be like Him, we must always risk for love. We are invited to follow Him with reckless abandon. The call of God is more than a leap of faith; it is a life of faith. Even when it seems beyond our abilities, we should not be surprised when God tells us to jump (p. 116)
The civilized Christian does what is right out of fear; the barbarian does what is right out of love. The Christian civilization is held together by rules and rituals; the barbarian revolt is fueled by the passion of God and guided by the mission of God (p. 121-122).
It may seem counterintuitive, but the more civilized we seem to become, the more detached from the pain of others we end up finding ourselves. The most civilized churches have really no practicial concern for people outside their congregations. The brokenness of a lost and unbelieving world is not enough to inspire the painful changes necessary to make the church relevant to the world in which we live (p. 123)
History again and again reveals to us that we are less likely to do good when we perceive ourselves a part of a larger crowd than if we make the choice standing alone when we are in a crowd, we are most prone toward acts of evil or at least compliance to evil. For some reason the civilized can rationalize apathy and feel themselves absolved from personal responsibility. Good needs to be done, but someone else will take care of it (p. 124).
When we are born again, we are dropped not into a maternity ward, but into a war zone. Our birthplace is less mother’s womb and more battlefield earth. Maybe the first word we hear should not be “welcome,” but “jump.” There is no trial run, no practice life (p. 126)
The barbarian revolt is an insurrection that defies treaty between civilization and the powers of the dark world. We will not stand by and watch humanity sell its soul to gain the world. We will not be seduced by the comforts offered us if only we would compromise. We cannot pretend that all there is, is what we can see. Barbarians know the world of spirit. We know there is a darkness that subversively corrupts the hearts of men, and to do nothing is to be complicit. We are born into a war. We may feel like children, but we are warriors (p. 127).
Barbarians, on the other hand, are not to be trusted. They respect no borders that are established by powers or principalities. They have but one Kind, one Lord, and one mission. They are insolent enough to crash the gates of hell. For the sake of others, they are willing to risk their own lives and thrust themselves into the mist or peril (p. 128).
We need to let ourselves become the unique individuals that God created us to be. we need to stop trying to be what everyone else wants us to be and stop worrying about what everyone else thinks. Civilized people measure one another by their robes and signet rings. The barbarians measure only heart ad actions. Barbarians live as if they are naked before God and naked before men. They have nothing to hide; they do not waste their energy pretending to be someone they’re not (p. 133).
One barbarian wandering through civilization can be discarded as nothing more than an oddity. But when members of the barbarian tribe line up across the battlefield, side by side, something amazing begins to happen. Dark kingdoms tremble; the dungeons and prisons that hold men, women, and children captive crumble; prison doors open; chains unlock; and multitudes come to freedom, whenever the barbarians of Christ pass through civilization, the oppressed and forgotten are soon found dancing in the streets (p. 134).
The expansion of God’s invisible kingdom is the result of those of us who are passionate followers of Jesus Christ moving together united in heart, mind, and spirit. Jesus’ description that “the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it” (Matthew 11:12) is a call for tigers to move together, not for our untamed faith to be domesticated (p. 136).
I was surprised to learn that a group of buzzards waiting around together to feast on leftover carnage is called a committee. Just this one insight is worth the price of the whole book. This explains so much of what’s going on in churches – a lot of committees waiting around to live off human carnage (p. 137).
Rhinos moving together at full speed are known as a crash. Even when just hanging around enjoying the watershed, they’re called a crash because of their potential…That’s what happens when we become barbarians and shake free of domestication and civility. The church becomes a crash. We become an unstoppable force. We don’t have to pretend we know the future. whoe cares that we can see only thirty feet ahead? Whatever’s at thirty – one feet needs to care that we’re coming and better get out of the way. We need to move together as God’s people, a barbarian tribe, and become the human version of the rhino crash. The future is uncertain, but we need to move toward it with confidence. There’s a future to be created, a humanity to be liberated. We need to stop wasting our time and stop being afraid of what we cannot see and do not know. We need to move forward full force because of what we do know (p. 138).
There’s a world that desperately needs God, a world filled with loneliness, hopelessness, and fear. We have somehow become deaf to a cry that reaches heaven coming from th souls of men. But God hears (p. 139).
Like Israel, who longed for Egypt because the journey was more difficult than the people expected, we must be aware of the temptation to return to the captivity from which we were freed. There is but one path to freedom. There is no easy road made available . we cannot claim to know Christ and to honor Him if we refuse the path He calls us to follow. Do not insist on binding Him or associating Him with a domesticated or civilized faith is a life without risk. This war has no room for pomp or pretension.
Jesus leads us into the heart of the dark kingdom, into to the soul of what is most evil. He takes us where mankind has chosen to live. He calls us to where the darkness has made those who wander there desperate for light. he leads us as warriors of light to risk our lives for the deliverance of others. Again, our own weapons are love, hope, and faith, and they are our only defense. Yet we above all know that they and only they liberate us and fulfill the deepest longings of our souls.
If you choose to live your life in this way, if you make the insane decision to live your life for the sake of others, if you choose to follow the One whose barbarian path led Him to the brutality of the Cross, and if you embrace His invitation to take up your own and follow Him, then it has begun. If you dare allow God to unlock your primal spirit, He will unleash the raw and untamed faith within. Then you will know you have chosen the barbarian way out of civilization (p. 140-141)
