Love the Lord your God…and love your neighbor as yourself.
Jesus
On September 4, 2015, I received an email from a ministry friend in Budapest, Hungary. He wrote to share a sad report of Syrian migrants flooding his city—those who had recently fled their home country to find asylum throughout Europe. Minutes later, I stumbled upon news video of the refugee crisis. Some 4 million Syrians had been forced to flee for their lives. A very small fraction would qualify to be resettled somewhere around the world. It’s the worst humanitarian crisis since World War II.
Our hearts broken, my wife, Tiffany, and I talked and agreed that we had been “blessed to be a blessing.” We wanted to be part of a solution for any families arriving in the United States and our city. I contacted a friend who was the Executive Director of World Relief Fort Worth, a branch of one of only nine resettlement agencies in the country. He told me that a family of 8 Syrians was arriving in Texas the following week. We agreed to be their adoptive support family when they arrived at their new home.
I posted about their upcoming arrival on social media and, instantly, dozens of people in our church jumped into action. Over the next six days, donors purchased new kitchen utensils, pots and pans, dishes and glasses, bed linens and pillows for eight, towels and washcloths, hygiene products, cleaning supplies, toys and books, a high chair, six child car seats, clothes, diapers, lamps, tables, beds and several weeks of groceries. The outpouring of generosity was overwhelming.
On September 11, the anniversary of the terrorist attacks on American soil, we met our travel-weary, Muslim family at the airport and helped them get settled in their new apartment. Over the next months, we helped our new friends get oriented to American culture. My wife accompanied the mother to the hospital for a check-up. We have helped them get their children enrolled in school. Each week since, I have been teaching the father English.
Because of the political animosity toward Muslims in America, several people—even Christians—have questioned the reasonableness of our efforts. Our response has been simple and biblical: “These are our neighbors.” If we, as the church, miss caring for those in our own community, whether they have come by choice or by crisis, we have lost the mission of the church.
When Jesus charged His disciples to be His witnesses “in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8), He was describing concentric circles of influence. Jerusalem was the capital city of Judaism, filled with devoted, God-sensitive people who would be easy for the Jewish disciples to connect with. Judea was the surrounding region, largely Jewish, and a natural area for ministry. Samaria was filled with nominal half-Jews who had compromised their religious convictions decades earlier. And “the ends of the earth” included a Gentile population. The disciples started their ministry in their own neighborhood first. Then they moved outward, in concentric circles of influence.
The missional church and missional disciples begin with their nearest neighbors, impacting people in their immediate community. When the teacher asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:29), Jesus replied with a parable and the lesson that a “neighbor” is anyone who is close enough for us to help.
Christ and Culture
Unfortunately, too many churches do exactly the opposite of reaching their community. This isn’t a recent problem. In 1951, Christian ethicist Richard Neibuhr wrote Christ and Culture, exploring the various ways that the church connects with the community around it.
Among his five paradigms, two are relevant to this discussion. Some churches hold to a “Christ Against Culture” model, which puts the church in continual conflict with the pagan civilization around it. Adherents point to verses such as 1 Peter 1:15, “But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do” or 1 John 2:15, “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” The Christian is to be set apart, uncontaminated by the evil in the world.
The result is that many churches view themselves as fortresses. Christians arrive on Sunday and are ushered into the retreat of biblical community. They enjoy “safe” music, “safe” teaching and “safe” relationships. The church barricades its doors, blocking out the contaminating and threatening influences of the world. The church fears the world or hates the world and, thus, positions itself against the world.
Evidence of this fortress mentality is subtle. Churches retreating from culture are so busy with activities that their members have no time to build relationships with their neighbors.
These churches never open their facilities for community use. They rarely, if ever, provide resources to their community such as health clinics, disaster relief or food and clothing to the poor. Members may hear sermons instructing them to associate only with other Christians. Pastors preach with “insider language,” assuming all those attending their worship services are people of faith. And, when needs arise, the community never imagines the church as the most likely source of help.
Neibuhr’s paradigm of “Christ Transforming Culture” is opposite of the paradigm of “Christ Against Culture.” In this model, the church views itself as a powerful change agent in the community. Rather than retreat from its community, Christians immerse themselves in their community to speak and show Gospel grace. This is the model we see in the early church:
The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade. No one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people. Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number. As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter’s shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. Crowds gathered also from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those tormented by impure spirits, and all of them were healed. (Acts 5:12-16)
Notice that the early Christians operated under the power of the Holy Spirit, performing signs and wonders that validated their testimony. They did not manifest a cavalier spirituality so that unbelievers easily joined their ranks. Rather, the church grew through its ministry to its community. In fact, the church had such a positive reputation that unbelievers brought their sick and laid them in the streets with the hopes that Peter’s shadow might pass over them and they be healed. The word “shadow” in this verse is the same word Luke uses in his Gospel when Mary is told that the Holy Spirit would “overshadow” her so that she would conceive the Christ (Luke 1:35) and when he writes about the clouds that overshadowed the disciples at Jesus’ transfiguration (Luke 9:34). So, Peter’s shadow wasn’t some magical phenomenon. It was nothing less than the power of God working through Peter to heal the sick and set people free.
Don’t miss this important principle: The church is the shadow of God’s presence and power in the world. We don’t possess original light. We are simply the reflection of Jesus who is the light of the world. As Jesus transforms the church, the church transforms the world. We are “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9).