But the base question underneath John’s inquiry remains crucial for us today: Is the vision of life Jesus offers a better one, or should we pursue another? If, during the first century, one were to ask a Roman soldier, a Jewish religious leader, and perhaps a dishonest money changer if becoming a Christian would better their lives, such persons might honestly reply, “Absolutely not!” Likewise, today there is vehement opposition to Jesus’s understanding and revelation of what is good for us and how to discern it in our individual and social circumstances. Still, no other ethical philosophy has yet been found or created that either matches or exceeds the moral knowledge representative of Christ’s life and teaching. Jesus’s teachings remain the solitary beacon of hope for eliminating the elusive, cyclical crises of human existence and thus represents the crucial first step that will lead humanity toward achieving the life without fear and want that fulfills our desperate search for human flourishing.
CITIES OF OUR GOD
Lest anyone consider this work advocacy for a new form of the “social gospel,” a fuller articulation of the “prosperity gospel,” or even an argument on which to base a new, better, or reformed platform for virtue ethics that seeks the “general welfare” or “holistic prosperity,” let us put these claims to rest. We are simply recalling, reminding people of, and pursuing what both the Hebrew scriptures and New Testament seek, articulate, and instruct in the very old and elusive reality called shalom. It is the enduring and encompassing experience and expectation of restful, secure, holistic well-being, which every individual and culture has struggled to find or create and maintain throughout human history. Shalom is what Yahweh promised Abraham would be his, a blessing of God that would flow through him to all the other nations (Gen. 12:2; 15:15).
Likewise it is crucial that God’s sufficiency and plentitude be manifested and experienced in the lives of those called by his name. Christians must eat their own cooking, follow their own teaching, and understand their own ideas. Judgment must begin with the house of God (1 Pet. 4:17). This encompasses the final hope of this work: to bless, equip, inspire, and encourage those leaders dedicated to working with Jesus in furthering the cause of the kingdom of God within the key institutions and structures of our society. It is crucial that a gospel powerful enough to save is also powerful enough to deliver us from evil. The local church must be moved from simply advocating understanding of or professing belief in the availability of life in the kingdom to demonstrating and manifesting a broader expression of what the gospel can accomplish when brought directly to bear on the weighty matters of our social realities. These matters are crucial and eternal, for they deal with the eternal souls of those individuals within our families, our neighbors, our society, and finally the world at large.
A very small percentage of those in the church stand behind a pulpit or sport certain kinds of identifiable clothing. The actual leadership roster of the church includes disciples ministering in every arena of life, in business, law, medicine, education, the arts, sciences, government, and religion. The objective of Jesus’s church-growth strategy was not to build a single, behemoth social institution with a limited set of ordained authorities. Instead, his Spirit was to be poured out on all flesh to effect a widening, deepening base of influence within every nation, worldview, and social institution.
Today, we as disciples of Christ have the same opportunity and responsibility to abide in, and then manifest, shalom as a blessing for others as well as for ourselves. This is a significant aspect of what being a “light” to the world entails (Matt. 5:14). In everything we do and say, in word and deed, in worship and work, in politics and play, truly in all things—not just religious things—we are blessed to be a blessing to others around us, leading them toward shalom. And until this occurs, our world surely groans as it waits for just such a reality to be revealed (Rom. 8:18–23). It is these leaders, representing and maintaining the wonderfully rich and robust example of integrity of character in fulfilling honorable duties, who exemplify and testify to the truth and goodness of God in a way that promotes, establishes, and maintains shalom for the benefit of all. If there is to be a next stage to the so-called spiritual formation movement, this must be it.
In 2 Chronicles, God says:
If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. (7:14)
The Chronicler reveals a significant result when God’s people seek righteousness—the land is healed. The entire land. From sea to shining sea, one could say. Not just believers, not just God’s faithful, but everyone in the land reaps the benefits of God’s faithfulness to his people.
The scope of this blessing is what separates this work from the earlier books in this series. They necessarily focused on the individual realities of life with God, depicted primarily in Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount. This work focuses on the responsibilities and opportunities inherent in the communal life that will come to the fore once the Sermon on the Mount has been applied. This new life is intrinsically tied to our relationship to our neighbors, our communities, and by extension our global community. It is the public “other,” the ethnos or nations, those in all ethnic groups and from all walks of life, who can and must taste and see the eternal quality and quantity of life that is available in the manner and means God provides. The tasting and seeing of God’s goodness in tangible, discernible ways is intended to lovingly woo people into willing obedience. Jesus wishes to bless all, everyone, at all times and in every condition. Such is the nature of the Good Shepherd.
Reaping the benefits and dividends from the applied ethos of the kingdom of God requires neither profession of faith nor understanding of how or why such blessings exist. God loves the world regardless of whether he is known or appreciated. Yet Christian leaders throughout society can never move forward into the areas of responsibility for manifesting the good life Jesus provides until there is a settled resolve regarding who we as disciples are called to be and must become. This is the arena of personal character formation from which all other activities of the good life are intended to proceed, first individually, then into and through our communities.
DISCOVERING MEANING AND VISION
Our world faces an overwhelming and unswerving epidemic of existential impotence, which can only be caused by an equally sweeping malignancy. The problem—our problem—lies in the shadows of the human heart. Unless and until the human heart absorbs and employs the sovereign goodness of God, the flourishing our societies seek will remain elusive, and the very means used to attain prosperity will end up only hastening our demise. As the writer of Proverbs predicts, we will return, again and again, to our regurgitated schemes (Prov. 26:11; 2 Pet. 2:22). Someone, somewhere, somehow, must break the cycle of moral relativism that creates substitute plans for human salvation and instead attempt to apply the answers in the vision God has provided. That this is widely assumed to have already taken place is a primary indicator of the depth of the problem Christian leaders must develop the courage to face.
This work endeavors to sketch a framework from which those who are ready and willing to take up the cause of the general welfare and flourishing of the public at large can proceed. To accomplish this, we have organized this work around the areas of society to which Christian leaders must turn their attention and influence in order to manifest the kind of flourishing God desires for all people. These areas can be defined as the institutions of government, education, business or commerce, the professions, and ethics. When these areas and their leaders come under the influence and direction of God, we can and will experience the kind of healing and flourishing human beings have searched for, longed to experience, and died trying