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For some of us, this series has seemed a bit harsh or that my criticisms are unnecessary. While we can appreciate that there is a difference between the blueprint for the Church that Jesus initiates, and what the modern world experiences as “the church”, we struggle with why we need to change our tradition and return to a purer experience. I’ve heard this feedback many times. It always comes on the heels of a believer who says: “My church is different.” Of course that is true. Every church is different.

Within each of these traditional frameworks exists the remnant of Jesus’ true Church, where his Spirit embodies those in faith and gifts them for service to others. My point is not that your experience of proximity to God within these frameworks is not valid, but that such an experience is not a byproduct of the tradition, but of those who in faith, hold Christ as the head of the Church body. For those who grasp this nuance, the tradition is only a preference, it’s a mere container. For those who want to prop up this traditional container, be my guest, but we must stop conflating modern church with Jesus’ blueprint.

We’ve been camped out in Matthew 16 and exploring the Church Jesus said he’d build. So far we know that it begins with an ontological watershed, then we learned that Jesus’ Church is not a building, but a people being built. Next, this community of people being “made more able” is placed directly within the “living Hell” and that this “ontological hades” is “not able” to keep this community within it and death itself does not stop this community’s existence. Last week we looked at the “keys to heaven” and how we each play a role in binding and loosing Heaven by what we do here on earth. The implications of this blueprint radically challenge the cultural conventions we’ve come to know as the church. If Jesus’ design were followed, his Church could never have been institutionalized, it could never have become another world religion, and the world would know the Church as the living, breathing, body of Christ, imbued with the power to heal, liberate and transform our culture, and restore the world.

So how does a person join this community? Is Jesus’ Church comprised of only those people who have converted to Christianity? If so, how do we explain the early Church (Acts 1-9) being comprised of Jews, Samaritans, and people of all tribes and tongues? Paul himself wasn’t so much “converted” as he was “completed” by his experience with Christ through blindness. So even the biblical revelation stands in contrast to our modern understanding. What are we to do when the scripture prescribes something contrary to our tradition?

The answer of how people come to be a part of this “assembly” or movement is that joining does not come from tradition nor institutional power…it comes solely from Christ himself. So why does joining a church today involve so much attestation, verification, and approval from those in power? In fact, Jesus provides a clear path in Matthew 16, immediately following the discourse we’ve been studying.

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?  (Matthew 16:24-26)

In the exact same way that Jewish traditionalists, or Jewish tax collectors, or noncompliant working class fishermen, or Samaritans, or Centurions, or Roman leadership, or Ethiopians, or Kings from the East, or Lepers, or prostitutes, or thieves, or adulterers, or pagans could and did “follow Christ” in the biblical narrative, so Christ followers today can be from every world religion, or from no religion at all. It must also be mentioned, that Jesus himself tells his “students” (disciples, followers) that not all the people who follow him and do his righteous work, possess a conscious awareness of him as the Christ.

“And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’” (Matthew 25:39-41)

Christ following is not joining or converting to a religion. Christ following is not limited to Jesus. This is proven by how the “anointed One” leads and delivers “the people of God” throughout the Hebrew scripture. The Old Testament has many Christophanies. Paul’s christology is revealed when he teaches this nuance in 1 Corinthians 10:1-4. Paul proves that Christ following took place by those who didn’t know Jesus and who were of a completely other religion:

“…and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.”

Christ following, not the modern religion of Christianity, is the biblical but not traditional path to God. Churches today will tell us that if we don’t convert to Christianity (as defined by tradition) then we go to Hell when we die. In other words, only the Christian religion is valid and capable of saving us. The biblical revelation says something very different. Rather than saying only one religion gets us to God, the Bible reveals to us that no religion gets us to God, but rather, if any person, of any time ever has an encounter with God, it is because Christ has exclusively made that experience possible. This is what Jesus meant by his famous quote in John 14:6:

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Following in Christ’s footsteps is not a spiritual escape from our life or this world, but is the conscious awareness that our very life, in this flesh, is a living testimony, a “retelling” of the Christ story. Christ following is the curious sense of awe and wonder that our life is not incidental, or a mistake, or on a dead end course, but that our experiences of suffering, rejection, alienation, marginalization, loneliness, betrayal, and chronic pain and fatigue, are not “like” the experiences of Christ, but actually “ARE” the experiences of Christ in and as our very life. It takes a special set of eyes to see it, what Jesus’ calls in his Gospel “giving sight to the blind” (Luke 4:18). This, rather than religion, is what it means to know Christ. It’s experiential knowledge, not “knowing about.”

So how do we get this spiritual sight? How do follow this voice that calls us out of our captivity to institutional power into a life of freedom and authenticity? Jesus said it starts with self denial.

Self denial is more than just putting other people first…although that’s a good start. Self denial is laying down our right to self define, to make a name for ourself, to be what we want be, do what we want to do, and instead, trust that the only authority with the power to name us is our Maker, not some principality or power on earth.

Our world is extremely dark and confused, and religion hasn’t led us into the light. Our confusion is primarily over “who we are“. Most people simply do not know who they are, nor do they desire to know. Jesus made it very clear that whoever wants to clutch to or save the life or identity of who they think they are will ultimately lose it. We are back to the ontological watershed. We must lay down our life, we must put that false self to death or how Jesus put it, “take up our cross“. Thus the entry into Jesus’ Church commences the moment we have enough self awareness to doubt ourselves and explore who we truly are hidden in Christ and found in God.

This type of self denial doesn’t have to come from a religious manipulation nor tradition. This self denial is a portal through which we enter transformation. Cross bearing is how we follow and show ourselves to be a member of Jesus’ assembly or Church. Our humiliation of our false self could come from addiction or therapy from childhood trauma, it could come from a million possible places. We are wrong about a lot of things, we are far from perfect, when we are humbled by that broken relationship, failed business venture, betrayal, our weakness, or physical sickness or decline, it is at this point where we are most proximate to experiencing Christ as real, as our life. If we lean into this experience or “double-click” in this moment we discover that the suffering of life is not meaningless...it’s Christ loving us in and as our suffering. Of course, non of us start there. The church of self denial is a process or a burden carried, it is true cross bearing events which we at first we seek to avoid in life, but later emerge as a shared universal human experience which means none of us can go through life and miss God. Cross bearing stands as a polar opposite of being comfortable, entertained, and over appraised by modern church philosophy. Jesus church was not comfortable.

For those who insist on doubling down on their own power or insist they are their own source of strength, or who seek to be propped up by the power of the State or religion or some institution, then all I can say is that these fictions are not a part of Jesus’ Church. Death will come to us all, and the proud all discover their limits. We are either in self-denial, service of others, and cross bearing, or we are bowing at the temptation of Satan as he offers us the fiction and inability to obtain all the kingdoms of the world and their greatness.

This post should have opened up a number of new portals through which you can begin to decode the world and find true freedom if you so desire. Perhaps now you can see why my critiques of the contemporary church are so severe. It’s not that I want them to disappear, I want them to be restored so the gospel of Christ can be experienced by all comers, not used as a threat for behavior modification or tribal manipulation. A revolutionary call for change doesn’t mean it’s heresy, it just might be prophetic. I’m convinced these critiques have more fidelity to Christ and his message, than what is commonly preached each weekend.

Now you can prayerfully consider them too.

I understand that few pastors can or would ever teach this. I wouldn’t have been shown this had I remained enslaved and over-identified to the institutional power for the last twenty-five years. Instead, God had another plan for me, and perhaps He has another plan for you too. The question is whether we will self-deny, and follow Christ in a self-emptying service to our broken world, or insist we adopt our pseudonym and clutch to the power of our beloved institutions. Just as it was in Jesus day, it is today: Ascend or Descend…religion or God…tradition or Christ…fake ID or know one’s true name.

God bless you as you contemplate these things.