In our consumerist culture, the good news about God's Kingdom - the invitation to love our enemies, the vision of communities beating their weapons into agricultural implements - has been turned into a product.
An expansive gospel has been reduced to a privatized salvific experience, single-serving sized and commodified.
In the scriptural narrative, I continually see a call for human beings to bring into alignment everything that is bent, to protect the vulnerable, and to contribute to flourishing. It means we should actively support human flourishing in all its forms wherever we see it.
When the gospel is reduced to a highly individualized and highly privatized experience, we lose the larger picture of God’s plan to make all things new. We see our part in God’s mission exclusively through the lens of producing a convert, not restoring the cosmos.
If the gospel were only about words, then I suppose it could be wrapped in packaging and sold. But its nature is cosmic and its purveyors are organic.
It defies the easy reduction to a sales pitch. If the mission of God is the renewal and reconciliation of all things – people, planet, and powers – then the people of God need to be about the activities of God.
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