"radical" revisited

Five and a half years ago, before Eden was born, I wrote briefly about the books Radical by David Platt and Crazy Love by Francis Chan. I had intended to post updates as we began to work out how to apply more biblical principles to our lives, but 5 days after writing that post I gave birth to Eden. My intentions were lost in the whirlwind of the next few years.

For Christmas 2010 I bought the book Radical for Mason, and I later wrote that it was "changing everything about the way he, and consequently we, want to live." I am finally about to finish the book myself, and reading it is in some ways like a review of our past five years. It's huge what God did to my husband's heart through that book. Platt quotes a lot of Jesus' words, so it's easy to check his sources. I was absorbed in adoption/orphan care literature during the time that Mason was reading Radical, but the two went hand in hand since orphan care would be the area in which God would first move our family to take radical action for him.

Platt's premise is that "we desperately need to explore how much of our understanding of the gospel is American and how much is biblical." He cautions against spiritual deception on the dangerous "religious road that makes grandiose promises at minimal cost." He systematically, boldly, lovingly, and accurately deconstructs the American dream using the words of Jesus. The gospel and the American dream, he says, "are clearly and ultimately antithetical to each other. While the goal of the American dream is to make much of us, the goal of the gospel is to make much of God." He expresses concern that we "have blindly embraced an American dream mentality that emphasizes our abilities and exalts our names in the ways we do church."

Platt highlights the global purpose of God, which is "to bless his people so that all peoples would glorify him for his salvation." The message of biblical Christianity is not just the sad, self-centered "God loves me." It is this: that "God loves me so that I might make him - his ways, his salvation, his glory, and his greatness - known among all nations."

God used this book to help us "trade in the American dream for a dream that extends far beyond the country and culture" in which we live. We're learning, as Platt says, that "success in the kingdom of God involves moving down, not up." Platt also discusses discipleship and challenges us to reproduce rather than merely receive God's Word.

Perhaps the most challenging chapter to American Christians is the one that discusses the glaring blind spot so many of us have: materialism. "We look back on slave-owning churchgoers of 150 years ago and ask, 'How could they have treated their fellow human beings that way?' I wonder if followers of Christ 150 years from now will look back at Christians in America today and ask, 'How could they live in such big houses? How could they drive such nice cars and wear such nice clothes? How could they live in such affluence while thousands of children were dying because they didn't have food and water? How could they go on with their lives as though the billions of poor didn't even exist?'" Mason and I now understand that we, like every Christian, need to "wrestle with what Jesus is calling us to do with our resources as we follow him."

After Mason read Radical and we examined Scripture with eyes open to our cultural blind spots, we concluded that we don't have time to waste our lives on an American dream. What it promises is nothing compared to what God promises to those who radically abandon every part of their lives to him.

Platt closes with this powerful truth:

"You and I have an average of about seventy or eighty years on this earth. During these years we are bombarded with the temporary. Make money. Get stuff. Be comfortable. Live well. Have fun. In the middle of it all, we get blinded to the eternal. But it's there. You and I stand on the porch of eternity. Both of us will soon stand before God to give an account for our stewardship of the time, the resources, the gifts, and ultimately the gospel he has entrusted to us.

When that day comes, I am convinced we will not wish we had given more of ourselves to living the American dream. We will not wish we had made more money, acquired more stuff, lived more comfortably, taken more vacations, watched more television, pursued greater retirement, or been more successful in the eyes of the world. Instead we will wish we had given more of ourselves to living for the day when every nation, tribe, people, and language will bow around the throne and sing the praises of the Savior who delights in radical obedience and the God who deserves eternal worship."

If you haven't seen Francis Chan's red rope demonstration, you can watch it below right now. It's 3 minutes of your life that might just change the rest of your life.