The Theology That Matters

I attended George Fox University, and Corban College……..

and then there was……..

Lane Community College.

Quite the contrast, and if you have ever lived in Eugene you will know what I am talking about. They say Portland is the brain, Salem is the heart, and Eugene is the lower intestine. I went from George Fox to Lane C.C. I realized then and there that all my theology was fake. It was simply a structure in my mind. My life had little impact on the world, and the world was having big impact on me. I felt like the guy being ground and pound in a UFC bout. Why?

I realized everything I was taught only worked around “churched” people. I then realized the theology that matters is not the theology we profess, but the theology we practice. Don’t take that as me saying a Christian doesn’t need to know how to share the gospel, but rather no one is going to listen to you if they do not see your theology fleshed out. No one will want to be discipled by you if your life is categorical.

John Stott has said, 
“Our static, inflexible, self-centered structures are “heretical structures” because they embody a heretical doctrine of the church. If our structure has become an end in itself, not a means of saving the world, it is a heretical structure."

What does gospel-centered community look like? It might look like this.

• seeing church as an identity instead of a responsibility to be juggled alongside other commitments.
• celebrating ordinary life as the context in which the word of God is proclaimed with “God talk” as a normal feature of everyday conversation.
• Running fewer holy huddles and more time sharing our lives with unbelievers.
• Starting new congregations instead of trying to grow one huge one.
• preparing Bible-talks and sermons with other people instead of always studying alone at a desk.
• Having churches that are messy instead of churches that pretend to be “dialed”