radical, crazy love

Radical, crazy love sounds pretty awesome doesn't it? In fact they're 2 book titles that are floating around our house right now - not hot off the press by any means, but Mason and I aren't the most avid bookworms around so it takes us a little while to get our hands on worthwhile reads. Our Sunday morning Bible study leader first mentioned "Radical" by David Platt during a series of lessons on the early church in the biblical book of Acts. I gave it to Mason for Christmas and it is changing everything about the way he, and consequently we, want to live. Along the same lines is "Crazy Love" by Francis Chan which both his and my groups of friends are starting to study together this week. Both call for change in American Christianity, which has insidiously deviated away from biblical Christianity in favor of pursuing the American dream: comfort, prosperity and isolation from the rest of the world. The messages are challenging and each idea certainly needs to be tested against the plumb line of biblical Scripture, but I'm excited to see if and how this movement among some American Christians may eventually revolutionize the church in this country and impact the world more for Christ. I recently read Richard Wurmbrand's "Tortured for Christ," which is also a call to action for Christians in the West (it was written a few decades ago during Communist occupation of Romania), but this one to help the persecuted church in the East. Some of the world scene has changed since the book was written, but the fact remains that Christian brothers and sisters are at this very moment being tortured, killed or oppressed JUST because of their faith in Jesus Christ, still and especially under Communism in countries including China and North Korea. The author himself was in prison for sharing his faith for over a decade. What are we to do? I'm not sure yet, besides pray about what to do. But I'm grateful to God for moving us first to awareness and then to action about things like this that we, like MANY American Christians, rarely hear about at church. One thought from the first chapter of "Crazy Love" that is sticking with me is that our concept of God can be very warped. Everyone seems to feel they have the right to question him, but the Bible states clearly that he does as he pleases, that he is holy and good and just. Instead of asking God pointed questions like "if you are a loving God, why are there so many people starving in the world?" Chan poses that we should rather be asking OURSELVES why there are so many people starving. Aren't we the ones he put here to do something about the suffering around us? Radical stuff indeed. As we read, pray and implement more, I'll post updates, infrequent though they may be with my due date being next week.