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Cargando... Subversive Jesus: An Adventure in Justice, Mercy, and Faithfulness in a Broken Worldpor Zondervan
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When Jesus left the most exclusive gated community in the universe to come live with the people he loved and gave his life for, he turned everything we know and believe about life on its head. Jesus said that he came to bring good news to the poor, but most Western Christians remain disconnected and isolated from the poor and their contexts of injustice. Even our churches echo society's pressure to isolate ourselves from the margins (e.g. by moving to a better suburb) and instead teach us how to be "nice people" who worship a "nice Jesus" and don't disrupt the status quo. Convinced that Jesus places love for the poor and the pursuit of justice central, Craig Greenfield has sought to follow in Christ's footsteps by living among people at the edges of society for the last fourteen years. His quest to follow this Subversive Jesus has taken Craig and his young family from the slums of Asia to inner city Canada and back again. This is the story of how Jesus led them to the margins: initiating the Pirates of Justice flash mobs, sharing their home with detoxing crackheads, welcoming homeless panhandlers and prostitutes to the dinner table, and ultimately sparking a movement to reach the world's most vulnerable children. This book is a strong and potentially controversial critique of the status quo too often found in our churches, but it offers an inspirational and hopeful vision of another way. While readers may not relocate to a slum, they will certainly come to view their lives and ministry through a fresh lens-reconsidering how they are uniquely called by Jesus to subversively love the poor and break down systems of injustice in their sphere of influence. No se han encontrado descripciones de biblioteca. |
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Google Books — Cargando... GénerosSistema Decimal Melvil (DDC)248.4Religions Christian Devotional Literature and Practical Theology Christian Life; experience and practice Christian LivingClasificación de la Biblioteca del CongresoValoraciónPromedio:
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T240_360_book-1913-coverhen when he was twenty-two he went to Cambodia where an interaction with a beggar outside a Khmer Rouge genocide museum sent him on a path where he re-thought and re-examined who Jesus really was, why he came and what it means to follow Him. Subversive Jesus tells the story of Greenfield, his Cambodian wife Nay, and their family as they walked the subversive ways of Jesus. Greenfield journey takes him from New Zealand to the slums of Cambodia, to Vancouver's Down-Town Eastside and to Cambodia again. Greenfield shares the insights he gained from other theologian/practitioners, notably folks like Charles Ringma, Dave Diewert, and Dave Andrews; yet this book is primarily about what Greenfield and his family learned as they followed their subversive Jesus by challenging empire, practicing radical hospitality, and loving and advocating for the marginalized.
Greenfield shares about hospitality and community, learning the place his children had in mission, living vulnerably and non-violently in the midst of a violent neighborhood, and sharing with and including neighbors. Their family would have a community meals where participants cooked together and shared life around a table. Greenfield maintained a hospitable and welcoming stance toward neighbors and friends, yet he also recognized the need for proper boundaries to sustain life and ministry. Dave Andrews phrase, "Bizarre Behavior is okay. Abusive Behavior is not okay," became a community rule (56). Greenfield observes that in the culture-at-large, the opposite is usually true (the bizarre are shunned and the abusive are praised for their strength).
Sometimes we may be tempted to think that being a Christian means being a good citizen of our country. Greenfield lives a more robust form of discipleship believing Jesus came to challenge empire and the powers of this age. This has led him to take counter-cultural (subversive) stances and the practice of resistance. Greenfield helps us see away to act faithful to God and governing authorities while resisting laws and aspects of culture that are unjust (submitting to the consequences of our resistance to unjust laws, is still submitting to government authority). For him this includes taking lemonade to drug dealers, organizing flash-mob-protests, starting community gardens, and building relationships among the marginalized.
I like this book a lot and loved hearing Greenfield's story. This is a thoughtful, theologically rich and biblically sound account, but it is also a story of what it means to follow Jesus in broken places and a call or us also to live more courageously as we seek to follow our subversive Jesus.
One episode that was intriguing was the time, Greenfield's community painted a pentagram as an act of worship to God and love for their neighbor. Yeah, It is terrible for me to give you that little detail without describing what actually happened or the events leading up to it. I guess you will just have to read the book yourself. I give this five stars. ★★★★★
Note: I received a copy of this book in exchange for my fair and honest review. ( )