Brand New

I finished reading Velvet Elvis last night. It was really thought provoking and I definitely recommend it.

Rob Bell is the founding pastor of Mars Hill which originated in Michigan.
I attended Mars Hill a few times in Seattle and everyone at campus seemed to have an opinion about it - they either love it or hate it.
I didn't mind it, I didn't see anything that stuck out as crazy and blasphemous, but I suppose its all in the politics. Mars Hill is supposedly with a new group of churches called "the emerging church" which is a new outward focused idea.

To the extreme I think it wants to revamp the idea of church...instead of what can I do for my church its what can my church do for the community and the world? Bell talked about not always focusing our attention on: "how do I get to heaven" but instead the goal should be: how to get heaven here. As we live today and go about our own business Bell pointed out that many around the world and even our neighbors live in "hell on earth" and challenges us to think how we can help change that.

"True spirituality then is not about escaping this world to some other place where we will be forever. A Christian is not someone who expects to spend forever in heaven there. A Christian is someone who anticipates spending forever here, in a new heaven that comes to earth.
The goal isn't escaping this world but making this world the kind of place God can come to. And God is remaking us into the kind of people who can do this kind of work" (Bell 150).

I went to the Renaissance Festival with my mom yesterday and I bought a new ring. I spent forever picking it out and got my mom's expert opinion and now I am completely satisfied. It's that feeling when you get something new. Don't you feel energized? More empowered, confident...everything seems a little bit brighter? Maybe its just me, but especially when I get a new ring or a new hair style its excitement...renewal from the routine. I was thinking of this while reading Bell's chapter titled "New." He talks about how we are a new person when we submit to following Christ. How each day I can wake up and no matter how I messed up yesterday or strayed from the path I am brand new today in Christ and I'm going to try again. It's like getting a brand new ring everyday. I love that feeling.

"It is not that we are perfect now or that we will never have to struggle. Or that the old person won't come back from time to time. It's that this new way of life involves a constant, conscious decision to keep dying to the old self so that we can live in the new. Paul describes it as Christ being our lives" (140).