Room for Violence

Matthew 11:12

“From the days of John the Baptist until now the Kingdom of Heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.”

I’d encourage you to check out the context of this verse. Commentaries proved helpful to me…

It is no mystery what Jesus demands from those who follow him. Here’s a glimpse: violence. Since I’m sure that word strikes you with all sorts of negative connotations as it did me at first, allow me to elaborate…Think about who Jesus claims to be. Think about what Jesus claims to be able to do. He is the Son of God, the Maker of Heaven and earth. He has the power to forgive sins, raise the dead, heal the sick, bring sight to the blind, make the lame walk again. Jesus is everything. He is all in all. Becoming a Christian means recognizing all of these things, it means recognizing our sin and our need therefore for a Savior. People who are genuine about all this stuff aren’t joking when they ask Jesus to come into their lives and change everything…because he can. But that’s just it. If we don’t believe this, then we’re not going to let him change us..we’re not going to let him re-order every aspect of our lives.

The violent understand that. They’re ready, they’re willing to be radically different, to make radical changes. Right? People who ask Jesus into their hearts just to “get that out of the way” kind of make him like their secretary. Here, Jesus, take my calls, schedule my appointments, but at the end of the day, what I say goes, and you will answer to me.

This weekend I had the opportunity to volunteer at a Dare2Share conference just outside the city. It is a gathering that teaches 5,000+ teens how to effectively share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with their friends and family. It was so Christ-centered, and the music (Shane and Shane) was awesome.

During one of the sessions, speaker Greg Stier told the teens to write at least 3 names on their hands of people who don’t know Jesus. Later he had them take a picture of their hand and send it to him. A slideshow was made of all these hands. The teens watched on the big screen as the names of their friends and family were prayerfully recognized. It was such a powerful moment to cry out to the Lord to reveal himself to those individuals, that one day their names may be written on his hands.

I’m not big on conferences that are all about emotional highs..but that’s why I loved this one so much. It wasn’t about raised hands and alter calls (although these have their places in worship). The main focus was on the responsibility of Christ’s followers to let him be the God that Christians claim he is, and to let him display the power that we claim he can. The kids were given a portion of the conference to call the names written on their hands, and to go out into local schools and work places in order to share the good news of Jesus with others. It pushed them to be “violent” in a sense..to step out in faith and to give the Gospel the chance to do what they claim it can. Francis Chan once said that he desires to live a life so dependent on the Holy Spirit that if the Spirit doesn’t show up, he’s screwed. That is how the “violent” in this case live their lives. They know everything must be about Jesus..They know that their lives must be devoted to seeing him glorified, and to daily refusing to gratify the desires of the flesh that only lead to death..and to the Christian reputation of hypocrisy.

At the conclusion of the conference one of the speakers said “This is not a conference. This is a runway. Go.”

May this be the attitude that we have toward all seasons of our lives. Jesus sends. Are we willing to be sent?