Radical

I'm into Radical books right now.  That's radical with a capital "R".  I have been on a mission of late to challenge every notion of my comfortable, middle class, WASPy, American faith.  The strange part is that this all sort of began by happenstance.  Or so it has seemed to me.  Probably not..... As I just typed that phrase I got the whisper "I think not!".  Seriously.  That just happened!

What I am trying to say is that just a few encounters, just a few exchanges of words with someone much further along in their journey than I, shook something loose inside of me and made me think.  And think.  And think some more.  Sort of like Pooh " think, think, think!".  One new way of looking at something then lead to another, and then another, and soon everything seemed pretty much up ended to me.  This is both thrilling and scary at the same time.  It was a bit like being Alice down the rabbit hole!  Soon I was unable to sleep, or waking up at night  with the strongest urge to read the Bible that I have ever known.  Totally unlike me.....

Fortunately, I have had someone to sort of bring me along and answer my incessant questions.  Plus, some very powerful books have made their way into my hands.  The first one was Crazy Love by Francis Chan which  I am THRILLED to see is on the NYT Best Seller's list!  Way to go Francis!  This book is life altering and I do not use that word lightly. If you read but one Christian faith related book this year, let this be the one.  I was so inspired by Crazy Love that I went straight into his follow up book The Forgotten God.  Equally awesome!  Francis is my new superhero author!

"The Land in Between" was next, followed by Bill Hybel's book "Whispers from God".  Both about the notion of a radical life changing way to live our lives as opposed to the tepid half obedient way we sort of do.  More fuel for the all consuming fire...

Am now powering through The Christian Atheist, and have already downloaded the next in line for obsessive reading- entitled approrpriately  "Radical- taking back your faith from the American dream"  Now there is a book I can hardly wait to dive in to!

So what is the end result of all this reading, talking, writing, wrestling with all of these difficult life questions?  I don't know yet because the process is on going, but what I do know for sure is happening is transformation.  The old is being stripped away. Something new is being created.

For what purpose I do not know yet.  Right now is just the equipping stage.  God is teaching me great big, new, radical ideas.  And what's more- they make perfect sense to me.  I'm not reading them and saying "this is silly- no one can actually live this way!".  I am reading them and saying "sign me up!  I'm ready! Bring it on!"

So no,  this could never have happened by happenstance.  I stand corrected.  This is the intentional act of God in my life right now for His purposes.  Why me? Why now? I don't know.  Really I don't.  I suspect, however, that it all began with one small act of obedience. That small act has yeilded unbelievable spiritual bounty.  So if anyone is reading this, I would say to you this:  the next time God presents you with something He wants you to do, say yes.  You just might end up somewhere radical....Shalom!