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Increasingly, within modern American Christianity, Jesus has come to be seen as a sidekick rather than a Savior—someone who affirms and celebrates us, but hardly challenges or shapes us, let alone saves us.

In this sense, the “good news” simply becomes “good job.”

In this piece, I’d like to examine the limits of such thinking, utilizing a sermon clip I encountered on social media and a ’90s-era bumper sticker slogan. Coming along with me on this conversation are Andrew Root’s books Churches and the Crisis of Decline and Evangelism in the Age of Despair, as well as Mildred Bangs Wynkoop’s A Theology of Love, as I ask this central question:

What happens when Jesus becomes a sidekick rather than a Savior?

A Sermon About a Trans God

Recently, I came across a clip shared on social media from a sermon given by an Episcopal priest. I’d rather not highlight the social media account because my intent here is not to shame or belittle the preacher, the Rev. Flourish Klink, but rather to quibble with some elements of Klink’s theology and seek to draw out broader implications for progressive Mainline churches.

Thanks to ChatGPT, I was able to find both the full video of the sermon from the church’s YouTube page, as well as the full text of the sermon provided on Klink’s website.

I’ll put links to the video and sermon text here: [VIDEO] & [SERMON TEXT]

Klink is an Episcopal priest who uses they/them pronouns and is currently Assistant Priest at Christ & Saint Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Manhattan. The sermon was delivered March 21, 2026, at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York City during its Celebration of Trans Joy and Resilience. I’ll mostly reference Klink by name rather than they/them simply for readability.

In the full sermon text, there are some interesting theological claims. While I’ll share some of them here, I want to reaffirm that my aim is not to belittle or mock Klink as a clergyperson, as I think the original social-media clip I first saw was attempting to do—and why I am not sharing it here—but rather to parse out some of the implications of what Klink claims.

The “headline” is this: Klink explicitly argues that God is nonbinary and trans and connects the Resurrection to transition.

“God is trans. It is not even a particularly convoluted theological statement to make.”

I found that statement a little confusing because, within the same sermon, Klink also asserts that “God is beyond human categorizations like gender” while then arguing that “God is non-binary,” which to me seems itself a human categorization.

Klink then argues that Mary “assigned a gender at birth” to Jesus. Klink also asserts that to deny that God is trans is to deny the divinity of Christ, which seems like a fairly significant leap to me.

Now, I’m going to stop here because my point in this blog isn’t really to argue with Klink’s interpretation, but rather Klink’s theology. And yes, for my purposes here, I am arguing that the assertion that God is trans is an interpretation that stems from Klink’s broader theological perspective.

And lest it seem that I am particularly seeking to pick on Klink, there are things in the sermon I would absolutely affirm—namely, that God cares for the downtrodden and abides with those who suffer.

Klink says:

“God promises us life, joy, beauty, dignity. God made us joyful and beautiful and authentic and wise.”

But Klink doesn’t leave it at that and, in fact, goes further. God does this “…because our God is trans.”

And this is where I would pause.

Must God Be Like Us to Love Us?

Let me say this first: I’m not particularly troubled by the idea that God is beyond human categorizations like sex and gender. Nor does the idea that “God is trans” itself cause shivers to go up my spine. As I’ve stated above, I feel like that statement is somewhat contradictory—but that’s not what I want to focus on.

Rather, what I want to take issue with is the idea that “God promises us life, joy, beauty, dignity. God made us joyful and beautiful and authentic and wise” because God is trans.

A question immediately comes to mind:

Must God share our identity in order to love us?

Perhaps this is where context is helpful. Again, this sermon was given during a Celebration of Trans Joy and Resilience at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine around the time of the Trans Day of Visibility, so context does matter. Klink is speaking these words as encouragement to a particular audience that likely included trans people, or at least those who know and love trans people.

But the more I sat with it, the more I kept coming back to a quote from Andrew Root:

“Religion does not want a living God—who is alive in speaking both a yes and a no—it wants an object to use of its own individual meaning making” (203).

I’ve often seen the statement “God is queer AF” within progressive Christian spaces. Again, I struggle to understand how this is not using human categorizations to define God, but perhaps this is my own shortcoming.

Nonetheless, to further my argument, let me use a far less controversial statement that has similarly been shared far and wide: “God is my copilot.”

God Is My Copilot

While the prevalence of “God is my copilot” bumper stickers has greatly decreased since the late ’90s or early 2000s—I recently wondered with my kids why the prevalence of bumper stickers in general has declined so much—the idea of “God is my copilot” gets at what I’m trying to say here.

If God is my copilot, I’m still the pilot.

(For what it’s worth, I do remember hearing critiques of this logic even back then.)

And increasingly, within modern American Christianity, we do not want a Savior. We simply want a sidekick—someone who affirms who I am and what I’m about rather than someone who rescues and redeems me from my own brokenness.

And this is not simply a progressive problem. “God is my copilot” certainly wasn’t a slogan born out of progressive Mainline Christianity. The broader temptation is to make God into someone who accompanies and affirms the life and identity I have already chosen for myself.

Talking about the divine-human interaction, Wynkoop writes:

“if God is limited by man’s experience, something is said about God that puts an impossible limitation on Him in the Christian view” (224).

And this is why I increasingly struggle with “I am enough” language being used within many Mainline church contexts.

If “I am enough” means I am already everything I need to be, I certainly do not need a Savior. At most, I need someone who encourages me and supports me in the struggle. I need a sidekick, a good friend maybe, but certainly not someone who will challenge and confront me or call me to account.

(Perhaps there is also a lesson here for modern friendships and relationships.)

Here again, Wynkoop is helpful as she notes the danger in a philosophical perspective that assumes:

“man is a projection of Deity, or the finite projection of Deity, or the finite experience of Deity…Every man is a spar of the divine nature. He is a ‘lost’ fragment of God whose ‘salvation’ consists in merging again into God” (224).

We Need a Savior

This is not to say that God does not deeply love us and seek reconciliation with us. A beloved passage tells us that God takes extraordinary efforts on our behalf.

As we read in John 3:16:

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

There are a couple of interesting things there, but most importantly for my argument, Jesus makes clear that what humans need is not a sidekick, but a Savior.

We need rescuing from something.

And I think the larger conversation with Nicodemus makes the point even clearer. Nicodemus comes to Jesus under the cover of darkness, and Christ’s invitation to him is not simply, “You’re fine as you are.”

Rather Jesus tells him: “You must be born again.”

In Root’s Evangelism in the Age of Despair, Root notes how EASY it is to find “friends,” those who will support us when things are good. But when life really hits the skids, a sad-face emoji may be all that can be counted on—real life actions are just too much.

God, however, is a minister—something Root writes about in Faith Formation in a Secular Age—and we evangelize not by telling someone they are fine and good, or even merely that God affirms them for who they are, but rather that in the midst of their pain, suffering, challenge, and brokenness, God is with them seeking to bring rescue (my words).

One other thing I want to highlight from Jesus’ encounter with Nicodemus is that Christ’s invitation to Nicodemus is the same as it is to you and me, regardless of our gender or sexuality: be born again.

And that invitation is not dependent upon God sharing our own gender or sexuality.

God loves trans people not because God must first be trans, but because God is love.

And if I may add this: If I don’t share someone’s identity—or insist that God does—can I still share good news with them, or anyone else?

I believe I have good news to share with every person I meet, not in and of myself, and especially not because God is like them, but precisely because God loves them, I can proclaim the good news to them; “God forgives you, and God is here for you—whoever you are.”

Good News or “Good Job”?

Perhaps I’m out of bounds here, but increasingly I see within some expressions of progressive Christianity—which I think Klink’s sermon illustrates—a theological move toward telling people, “You’re all good, and Jesus is here to affirm that within you.”

Again, Jesus becomes a sidekick, but not a Savior.

And perhaps unsurprisingly, people are like, “Nah man, I’m good.”

Increasingly, I’m convinced of this: people aren’t looking for someone to tell them they are special. They want someone to tell them they are loved and forgiven.

And you want to know what the real good news is?

If I may be so bold, it’s not simply “God made us who we are.”

It’s that God loves us in our brokenness—and comes to rescue and redeem us, no matter who we are. That is as true for me as it is for Klink or anyone else.1

A sidekick affirms the story I’m already telling about myself.

A Savior loves me enough to enter my pain and brokenness, speaks a gracious yes and no to me, rescues me, and transforms me.

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An Unexpected Point of Agreement

As I’m writing this, I’ve recently interviewed two authors who are perhaps on opposite sides of the theological spectrum. Yet, in my conversations with them for Future Christian, I think they both made essentially the same argument, just in reverse.

, in her new book In Defense of Evangelicalism, basically argues that Evangelicalism IS and SHOULD BE something other than what many people have come to associate with it: racist, judgmental, and so forth.

Obviously, there are exceptions, and one could disagree with some of her points throughout the book about how evangelicals should live out their faith. But I think she’s ultimately trying to make the point that Evangelicalism has an identity and a set of convictions worth maintaining/recovering, rather than simply abandoning the tradition because of its failures.

In a similar, but reversed way, in a recent podcast conversation I had with Dr. Francisco Herrera, he made the point that Mainline traditions can and should be evangelical.

We were talking about an article he had written for The Christian Century, “Donald McGavran’s Complicated Legacy.” Herrera was explicit that he is a progressive Christian and certainly has his bona fides in that space. But he was equally insistent that evangelism matters, saying in our conversation:

“It stupefies me that whenever I mention the importance of evangelism or church planting, or how important it is to bring people to Jesus, a lot of my colleagues look at me funny.”

Herrera’s article was quite intriguing and worth a read—I’d recommend checking it out.

Becoming Who We Already Are

I guess what I’m saying is that I think both writers—in different ways—are calling their respective traditions to be what they are and should be. Neither is arguing that their tradition needs to become something else, but rather that each has lost sight of something essential to its own identity.

This is one of my favorite things about doing the podcast—talking to writers and thinkers from so many different perspectives, and sometimes discovering surprising points of agreement.

Neither of these episodes is out yet. Bonnie’s will be released in about three weeks, with Herrera’s coming the week after. So I suppose it will be interesting to hear them one after the other.

A Late-Night Addition

I’d already scheduled this post and was trying to settle into bed when another thought popped into my head (added the next day).

I think both Kristian and Herrera are also fighting back against implicit claims within their respective traditions—such as, in the case of Evangelicalism, that one can be a good Christian without being concerned about racial and systemic injustice.

And this is where the connection to Herrera’s article is especially intriguing, because he argues that many Evangelicals took McGavran’s work and used it to justify their lack of racial integration or concern for racial justice.

Yet, as Herrera notes both in his article and in my conversation with him, what ultimately drove McGavran toward the Evangelical world was the strong resistance he encountered to evangelism and church planting within his (and my) denomination, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), as well as the broader Mainline context.

So, I guess what I mean to say is this: I think both writers are pushing back against the sort of poison pills that have taken hold within their respective contexts—that Evangelicals can’t care about racial justice, and that Mainliners can’t care about evangelism. Neither of those things should be true. And yet, somehow, we’ve come to treat them as though they are.

As always, if you haven’t already, please listen and subscribe to the Future Christian podcast.

In Other News

My new book, The Church as Community Hub: Sharing Spaces to Help Neighborhoods Thrive, is now a month old!!

The book offers practical guidance and real-world examples for congregations seeking to use their buildings, relationships, and resources to support neighborhood flourishing throughout the week.

You can order directly from Church Publishing using code HUB20 for 20% off. Bulk-order options are also available for churches, cohorts, classes, and other groups.

One BIG request: If you bought a copy of the book on Amazon already—thank you!—would you please take a moment to write a review for the book there? Reviews really do help other readers discover it.

And I am still offering a promotion where new paid subscribers to this Substack can get a copy of my book.

Well, that’s it for now. Nothing too complicated this week, just some things I’ve been thinking about.

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This past Sunday I had the pleasure of guest-speaking at a friend’s church. I was in town for a conference and stayed a day longer so as to guest-speak at the church.

You can read my full sermon via the link at the bottom, but for the purposes of this blog, I’d like to share again the close of my sermon. Because as sometimes happens in preaching, one of the more interesting conversations came afterward.

That conversation got me thinking more about what actually gets me through the door of a hospital room—and, more fundamentally, what I understand myself to be doing there in the first place.

What follows here in the text box is the close of the sermon:

Providing dignity to patients who are not wearing pants.

After the sermon, I heard from another chaplain who mentioned that he too was quite introverted. What helped him—and the same advice he offered to other chaplains—was remembering that in entering hospital rooms, we are providing dignity to patients because we have to ask permission to enter.

He joked that most people in the hospital aren’t wearing pants—“we are!”

I shared how I’d heard something similar from another chaplain friend of mine, who herself took solace in the fact that she gave patients “the ability to kick me out of the room.”

I certainly appreciated this other chaplain’s feedback, and it was somewhat helpful. But the more I thought about it, the more I found it ultimately unsatisfying, for this reason: I’m a chaplain not simply because I want to provide people with dignity. Not that I don’t want to provide people with grace and dignity, of course. But what gets me through the door is not the hope that I might provide people with a modicum of respect, but that I might be able to share good news with people.

To be clear, I recognize my role is not to proselytize. I have no intentions of walking people through the Romans Road or the ABCs. That would be both inappropriate within that context and, in my opinion, untrue to what evangelism really is, at least as I have come to understand it through people like Andrew Root and his Evangelism in the Age of Despair book.

But more than that, I consider myself an ordained minister over and above my role as a chaplain.

To say it differently, I often say that I bleed the gospel of Jesus, not denominational brand colors, when people question or find curious my dalliances within many different denominations and contexts.

And this gets at something I sometimes find frustrating about the chaplain profession. Not too infrequently, I hear other chaplains lift up a sort of milquetoast, pluralistic, “all-roads” approach to spirituality. I’m not meaning to say they are wrong, but rather that this approach is wrong for me and for my calling and ordination as a minister of the gospel.

As recently shared in a post he wrote about the creation of a liturgy for hospital chaplains and others involved in medical assistance in dying procedures, he too wondered whether the CPE-type approach has become too formative of the role of ministers and chaplains, rather than the other way around. He writes:

the idea that pastoral care both normatively and descriptively can be separated from moral or doctrinal judgements…is what I have called the ‘CPE-ification’ of pastoral care, in which a set of techniques developed in the context of multifaith hospital chaplaincy — techniques quite appropriate in their place — come to be seen as the entirety of Christian pastoral care.

But this ideal of judgement-less pastoral care is a very strange and attenuated understanding of pastoral care from a Christian perspective, because Christian pastoral care is aimed at bringing people to deeper intimacy with Christ, to a deeper knowledge of God’s love for them, and to a life marked by love of God and neighbor. That is, the goal of Christian pastoral care isn’t just to help people find peace and meaning, or something like that. Rather, it is to announce to them, in myriad different ways, the good news of Christ’s death and resurrection for their specific situations and to invite them into new life in him. Such a pastoral presence certainly should be loving, kind, and make use of helpful chaplaincy techniques, but pastoral care isn’t reducible to this.

Ben asks—or at least implies—a sort of interesting question in his full piece, and it’s one we should consider given that many chaplains are ordained: Are we ministers of Word and Sacrament first? Or are we first and foremost institutional chaplains?

For me, the answer is fairly clear.

I’m an evangelist first and foremost. My role as a chaplain is one of the ways I practice that task of bringing good news.

Let me finish with this.

Not long ago, I entered the room of a patient who was in significant distress and had been physically restrained in the hospital bed.

I willingly entered that room, not because I thought I could offer some measure of dignity—frankly, I’m not sure how much dignity one feels while strapped to a hospital bed—but because I wanted to remind this patient of the love and grace of God.

I wanted, in whatever way the moment allowed, to share with this person, God’s love and forgiveness.

In that visit, the patient was not particularly receptive to my presence. I prayed silently myself and left the room when the opportunity arose.

On another occasion, I entered the room of another patient who was also physically restrained. This time, I had been paged by staff because the patient had begun raising spiritual questions.

Again, I wasn’t sure how much dignity my knocking on the door could offer to someone strapped to a hospital bed. In this instance, it was a bit nerve-wracking based on what I had been told about such questions. But I knew why I was willing to enter—because I wanted to share the love and grace of God. And I trusted that God was already out in front of me, in that room.

During our conversation, the patient began talking about how difficult it was to forgive oneself.

To which I said, “Receiving God’s grace is sometimes the hardest part.”

In both instances, in good CPE fashion, I did not try to force an agenda. I did not walk into either room determined to manufacture a spiritual conversation or get someone to respond in a particular way.

But neither did I enter purely to provide dignity or a calm presence.

I entered in the hope that, in whatever way the moment allowed, I might share good news with someone in crisis.

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Draw Near With Faith

Woe to a church that calls evil good

A few months ago, the Anglican Church of Canada released for trial use a document entitled “Pastoral Liturgies at the Time of Death in Contexts of Medically Assisted Dying.” This is a liturgy for use by Anglican priests at the bedsides of those who will be shortly intentionally killed by their doctors. I am an Anglican priest serving in the ACC and some…

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a month ago · 63 likes · 6 comments · Ben Crosby

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Philippians 3:4-14 NRSV

If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: ⁵circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; ⁶as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. ⁷Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. ⁸More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ

⁹and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. ¹⁰I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, ¹¹if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead. ¹²Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. ¹³Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.

Excited for a new shirt

Have you ever had an item of clothing, perhaps a new shirt, a jacket, an outfit that you’re really excited to wear on a first day of school, first day of work, for a social event, only for that outfit to be spoiled before you could get to events.

When I was growing up, in my family money was kind of tight, so shopping at second-hand stores or getting hand-me-downs was a fairly regular occurrence. Now I didn’t really know any different, so it didn’t really bother me. That is until one day in fifth grade.

I attended a Christian school where my mom taught, and another family, perhaps knowing we could use them, offered us some hand-me-down clothes.

Again, I had nothing against hand-me-downs, and for me the excitement of getting something new, whether it was technically new or just new to me, overwrote any sorts of unease I might have about it belonging previously to someone else.

And in this particular bag I found a real treasure.

A crisp white Colorado t-shirt.

I remember it.

I remember seeing it had Colorado emblazoned across the front, I think in turquoise letters with perhaps a mountain background, but best of all, it was my size.

So I grabbed it and I was excited to put it into my drawer, in my dresser drawer, and put it into my weekly rotation of wearing to school. A few days later I put it on and I felt proud. I felt confident.

I felt like I looked the part.

Then at recess, a girl walked up to me and said:

That used to be my shirt.

Every bit of confidence left my body.

I didn’t know whether she had told anyone else, but honestly it did not matter.

Fifth grade me had just discovered that the shirt I had proudly worn to school had been once a girl’s shirt. No offense. Girls, females in the room.

Somehow, somehow, I made it through the rest of the day. I went home and I took off the shirt and I stuffed it deep into the recesses of my dresser.

Never, never to be worn again.

The thing I had been proud and excited to wear had suddenly become a source of shame and embarrassment. The shirt itself had not changed.

What changed was that I had been found out.

For a few hours I felt confident, I felt like I belonged, I felt like I looked the part. Then one sentence changed something, exposed something that I did not know I was hiding.

That used to be my shirt.

Have you ever experienced something like that?

Have you ever worked hard to appear confident, qualified, worthy, all while fearing that someone might expose you or discover you as lacking?

What if someone sees through the surface? What if someone finds me as lacking?

What if I’m found out?

Looking the Part

The same fear I think can creep into our Christian faith.

Growing up myself as a conservative Christian, I learned that looking the part often meant being a good kid. Not cussing, not listening to secular music, certainly not smoking or drinking. Being a good Christian meant not doing certain things.

But beneath all those rules was a fear of being found out.

What if I made a mistake? What if I did something wrong? What if people discover that I’m not nearly as good as I’m trying to be?

Now that I find myself more often in progressive Christian contexts, the expectations may be different, but I think the fear is remarkably similar.

Looking the part can mean using the right language, supporting the right causes, condemning certain actions. And once again, the fear is being found out.

Except now, when your fifth grade classmate walks up to you and says, “That used to be my shirt,” she’s not just telling you.

She’s also taking a video of it and blasting it all over the internet for you to be publicly shamed.

You may not be merely found out, you might be publicly also called out.

What if I say the wrong thing? What if I’ve not kept up with the right language? What if people discover that I am not on the right side of an issue?

In one version of Christianity we fear being exposed as sinners, in another version of Christianity we fear being exposed as being on the wrong side.

I think the expectations are different, but I think that the anxiety is remarkably similar.

What if people discover that I’m not nearly as good, faithful, or righteous as I’m trying to appear?

We work so hard to look the part, I think, because we’re afraid of being found out.

Now again, the point is not that avoiding destructive behavior is bad, nor is the point that pursuing justice is unfaithful. The problem is when we expect those things to establish our righteousness, to assure us that we’re good enough on our own.

Because there will always be another rule to follow, there will always be another statement to make, there will always be another way to be found lacking.

And no matter how good the appearance becomes, the fear remains:

What happens if I am found out?

Paul Looked the Part

The Apostle Paul was writing, as I read this morning, to a group of early Christians. In the passage we read, he’s pushing back against some teachers who insisted that following Jesus meant looking the part through practices such as circumcision.

In verse 2, before the section we read this morning, Paul is actually suggesting that such practices can become destructive.

Paul then lists all the ways he looks the part. He came from the right family, he went to the right schools, he advocated for all the right causes.

If anyone’s credentials could withstand scrutiny, it was the Apostle Paul’s. If anyone could be confident that they would not be found lacking, it was Paul.

Yet he said that none of those credentials could give him what he found in Christ.

Compared with knowing Christ, Paul considered it all rubbish.

Looking the part could establish Paul’s reputation, but it could not establish his righteousness. What mattered to him was gaining Christ, knowing Christ, and sharing in Christ’s suffering.

But if we’re not careful, we can turn even this into yet another requirement, a religious performance, another way of looking the part.

We can stop trying to look righteous through the law and instead begin trying to look righteous through the strength of our faith.

But still the same fear remains.

Have I believed strongly enough? Have I been faithful enough?

But what if I am still found lacking?

The Faith of Christ

And this is where another reading of the text I think becomes intriguing.

In verse nine, the NRSV in the footnotes suggests that the passage that the righteousness comes not from the law but through faith in Christ.

Now again, I think at first glance this can sound like yet another requirement. Now I need to believe hard enough. I need to have enough faith.

And once again, how do I prove that I have enough faith?

Through my own actions.

But as the footnote in the NRSV suggests, that same phrase can also be translated, the faith of Christ.

And I think this is helpful, at least to me, because it is so easy for me to read what follows as yet another encouragement for me to press on, to try harder, to look the part, to not be found out.

Now, to be clear, faith in Christ is not a wrong translation, but many of us have been taught, including myself, to hear Christian faith primarily in terms of our own efforts.

Like I remember seeing Philippians 3:14 as motivational posters at my Christian school posted on the wall.

I press on towards the goal.

The message I received was kind of simple.

Work harder.

Keep trying, become a better Christian.

Not bad things per se. But Paul says that his righteousness comes neither from following the law or from believing hard enough.

It comes through the faithfulness of Christ and what Christ has already accomplished.

Now this may seem like a small distinction, but I think it changes so much.

Because if righteousness depends on our actions, on our ability to perform, our ability to press on, then Paul is simply exchanging one set of rules for another.

And we are left with the same exhausting fear that we might eventually be found lacking.

But our participation in Christ does not depend on our own efforts alone. It begins with Christ’s faithful action already completed within us and at work within us.

How does this happen though? How does this happen within us?

How does the life of Christ become active within our lives?

Permeation

Again, as I shared when I was growing up in church, I heard Paul’s instructions to press on as another way of looking the part.

Growing up Baptist, we would have never said that salvation is something we had to earn.

But sometimes we lived as if we need to prove that we were truly Christian and to make sure we were never found out otherwise.

Like I don’t think this is what Paul is saying. He’s not telling us to try harder to look the part.

As one commentator writes, God’s agency accompanies and interpenetrates human agency.

Another source describes this like:

Permeation.

Permeation is what happens when a fluid spreads through and penetrates something, sort of like a wood stain.

A good wood stain does not merely rest on the surface. That’s paint.

A wood stain moves through something and throughout something and soaks in.

And I think this image can help us grasp what Paul is saying here.

Christ’s faithfulness is not merely painted over us, the life of Christ is now at work within us.

Our righteousness does not depend on maintaining surface appearance.

Christ has made us his own, and the life of Christ is now permeating our lives. Christ is at work within us, beneath the surface, transforming us from within.

And to me, this is really good news.

Because we may be afraid that once the layers of our surface level are pulled back, we will be exposed as lacking, our inadequacies will be exposed.

And while beneath the surface there will be imperfections, blemishes, knots even.

God’s grace is not a paint that can be simply peeled away.

God’s grace has soaked into the grains of our lives.

And when the surface is stripped away, what is revealed is not our imperfections. What is revealed is Christ already at work within us.

Christ has made us his own.

Christ is permeating our lives.

And this is why pressing on is not another religious performance. We’re not manufacturing faithfulness. Christ is producing faithfulness within us.

And because Christ is still at work within us, we are still in process.

On the Other Side of the Door

As Dennis shared, I work as a part-time hospital chaplain. Every [week I walk the halls of a hospital in Colorado] as a chaplain.

Now as someone who is fairly introverted, how about the other chaplains in the room? But speaking for myself, walking into a room of strangers is not something I enjoy at all.

But I am helped by the fact that I somewhat look the part.

From when I began my chaplaincy training, even as recently as a month ago, I am sometimes mistaken for a doctor.

Now certainly that reflects some measure of privilege, but I will take whatever help I can get.

Because for me, walking into a room full of strangers, dealing with pain, suffering, and trauma is not my idea of a good time whatsoever.

And it’s even more so scary when the door is closed.

There’s something about an open door that makes the whole thing feel far more invited. When the door’s open, again I don’t know about y’all here, but when the door is open, you know, I can kinda walk by, peek inside, get a sense of what’s going on in the room.

And if I really need to, I can take another lap around the unit to work up some courage to go in.

And then I can walk in.

But when the door is closed, that is like an entirely different story.

Most of us here, and obviously our fellow chaplains, have spent some time in the hospital. And I don’t know about you, but I imagine that if hospital doors are anything like they are in Colorado here, they can be quite imposing, especially when they’re closed.

And my job requires me to walk up to one of those closed doors, knowing only the slightest bit about what might be happening on the other side of that door, and enter in the hope of offering some measure of spiritual support.

A few weeks ago I was paged to support a family after death.

It was about ten thirty at night, and I had just begun settling down into the sleep room. I changed clothes, I think I was sitting in bed, and all of a sudden the pager went off.

Beep, beep, beep.

Something like that, right?

I called the nurse and learned that someone had just passed.

Put my clothes back on, walked upstairs, and checked in at the nurse’s station. The nurse pointed me towards the room.

And sure enough, closed door.

Say some portion of the prayer of Saint Francis:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

I rub some sanitizer on my hands, I knocked, and I slowly enter.

“Hello, my name is Loren. I’m a chaplain here. I’m sorry for your loss and I’m here to support you in any way I can and offer you some guidance as you navigate the next steps.”

Part of, for me, what makes that closed door so intimidating is the fear of being found out.

What if I don’t know what to say? What if I can’t provide what this family needs? What if I’m not as capable or qualified as my badge makes me appear?

Looking the part does me very little good once I cross the threshold.

A badge, title, or professional appearance cannot itself give comfort to a grieving family. The closed door strips away the appearance and exposes my own limitations too.

But I think it also reveals something else.

That I don’t enter that room alone.

I trust that Christ is already at work within me and that God is already present on the other side of that door.

I’m not carrying God into that room.

I’m entering a room where God is already at work.

And that knowledge and certainty alone gives me confidence to enter quite scary rooms.

…

Yet I walked in not trusting my own appearance or my own capacities, but that I carried Christ with me and that Christ was already active within that room.

Certainly looking the part gets me to the door.

But it cannot carry me through the door.

What carries me through is not the confidence that I will never be found lacking.

What carries me through is the promise that Christ is already at work both within me and within that room.

And the trust that when my limitations are exposed, as they most certainly will be, Christ will still be at work both within me and within that room.

Because Christ has made me his own.

Christ is already at work within me, and God is waiting on the other side.

And that’s what I believe it means to press on.

We press on not because we look the part.

We press on not because we will never be found lacking.

We press on because Christ has made us his own, and Christ is already at work within us.

Thanks be to God, thanks be to God for this unspeakable gift.

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Former Disciples of Christ missionary and missiologist Donald McGavran became famous—and infamous, especially within more progressive Mainline Protestant spaces—for his “Homogeneous Unit Principle.”

Basically, McGavran argued that church leaders should focus on building churches through homogeneous units—groupings of people whose shared language, culture, and values make it easier for the gospel to spread through communities.

While this philosophy became widely influential within Evangelicalism, McGavran and his methods receive nary a mention in many Mainline seminaries—even those within his (and my own) Disciples of Christ tradition.

But I’ve increasingly wondered:

What if, despite rejecting the implications of McGavran’s framework, progressive Mainline Protestants are repeating some of its most problematic elements—only under a different name?

My argument is thus:

Affinity groups are the new Homogeneous Unit Principle.

To be clear from the outset, my concern isn’t with affinity groups within churches. It’s with affinity becoming the basis for forming churches.

Because if Mainline Protestants believe something is ecclesiologically problematic about intentionally building churches around people who are already alike, changing the category of similarity from race or ethnicity to interests, identities, experiences, class, or politics doesn’t necessarily solve the underlying problem.

McGavran’s Complicated Legacy

I’ve always been intrigued by the legacy of Donald McGavran, and especially his Homogeneous Unit Principle, which came to dominate the so-called “church growth movement” that was highly influential within much of Evangelicalism beginning in the latter half of the twentieth century.

McGavran was a third-generation missionary to India for the Disciples of Christ who eventually established the Institute for Church Growth at Northwest Christian College in Eugene, Oregon. Four years later, McGavran and his colleague Alan R. Tippett moved to Pasadena, California, where they launched the School of World Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary. From there, McGavran’s ideas became enormously influential within the emerging church-growth movement.1

In the June 2026 edition of The Christian Century, Francisco Herrera wrote an intriguing piece on the “complicated legacy” of McGavran, asking how someone whose life was “full to bursting with intercultural adaptation and anti-racist struggle” eventually became “the darling of White segregationist Christians.” Herrera offers a nuanced portrait I appreciated.2

Upon his family’s return to Indianapolis in 1958, for instance, McGavran boldly chose to join a Black church and wrote an “open letter to the 49 White DOC churches in the city, lambasting their total segregation from the city’s two Black churches.”

More, Herrera notes:

“He also wrote in full support of then nascent Black theology in his fascinating work The Clash Between Christianity and Cultures, published in 1974. He agreed that Black theology rightly denounced ‘Caucasian Christianity’ and its ‘mixture of affluence, white dominance, inherited privilege, [and] sex standards’ as flawed. He also praised ‘black idiom and thought forms’ for how they motivated in Black churches ‘a desire to live justly and to oppose oppression,’ perspectives perfectly concordant with the Bible which needed to be taken seriously.”

Herrera is considerably less charitable toward McGavran’s famous Understanding Church Growth, which he calls “bigotry-enabling” and accuses of “leavening the reactionary politics of the anti–civil rights movement.” Herrera quotes the dissertation of Jesse Nathaniel Curtis, who argues that McGavran’s ideas:

“gave white evangelicals theological justification and cultural analysis to recast their segregated churches and ongoing appeals to white identity as faithful evangelism rather than racism.”

That’s certainly difficult to ignore. I’m not a church historian, so I’m hesitant to offer much resistance to that historical assessment. And Herrera himself doesn’t reduce McGavran to a simple villain. Instead, he describes him as:

“a classic case of the good kid falling in with the wrong crowd. Worn out after persisting through decades of mainline indifference to his evangelistic ideas, and maybe even slightly humiliated, his persistence may well have eagerly warped into pride, a pride that sealed his ears against all dissension and insisted that he was right.”3

Herrera ultimately adds that “despite evangelism’s bad reputation, we still must share the gospel.”

I wholeheartedly agree.

While I think Herrera makes a bit of a leap connecting McGavran’s ideas all the way to those storming the Capitol on January 6, I also think McGavran would have been well served to take seriously the criticisms regarding the potential consequences of his framework—or at least the ways it was being put into practice within White American churches.

One particularly important distinction for McGavran Herrera points out was between “discipling” and “perfecting.”

“Perfecting” was where the “bringing about of an ethical change in the discipled group” would lead toward “holy living,” including commitments to “social, racial and political justice.”

The problem is that, in practice, this part often never got implemented in many White American churches.

Again, I appreciate Herrera’s nuance:

“This makes sense: some changes in the heart take time and should be made neither a requirement nor an obstacle to baptism.”

But Herrera is also right to worry that an “‘eagerness for quantitative growth’” can allow churches to sidestep the ethical dimensions of Christian life:

“Jesus never intended that after we profess to love God, our obedience to the command to love our neighbors should be postponed to a later, more convenient time. They must go together.”

I might quibble somewhat with Herrera here. I want to trust the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit and the proclamation of the Word to move even young disciples toward greater Christ-likeness.

But I certainly agree with his broader point: an eagerness for church growth can tempt us to accommodate existing social divisions rather than allow the gospel to challenge them.

And this is where I think McGavran’s complicated legacy suddenly becomes remarkably contemporary.

Because the sociology behind the Homogeneous Unit Principle hasn’t disappeared.

People still find it easier to gather with people who are already like themselves.

The question is whether the church should organize itself around that reality.

Affinity by Another Name?

And it’s for these very same reasons that I find myself increasingly uneasy with the idea of elevating “affinity groups” as a sociological organizing principle for new churches—especially within progressive and Mainline Protestant Christian spaces.

To begin, what do I even mean by “affinity groups”?

In an interview with Luke Edwards titled “Lessons from the Fresh Expressions Movement” from the Lewis Center for Church Leadership, it is noted that these new “communities form around particular interests, activities, or affinities.”4

Edwards offers some examples of what this might look like:

“a golfing group… group that goes out on a lake to paddleboard and to meditate… a group for older adults…”

To be sure, these aren’t meant to be simply social clubs. The groups are spiritually focused; Edwards explains that leaders intentionally:

“introduce spiritual conversations to these groups. They pray together. They seek to be a new form of church together.”

And I want to be careful here. My concern isn’t with Christians golfing together or paddleboarding together or older adults gathering with other older adults. Churches have always had smaller groups organized around shared interests, identities, ages, and experiences. I co-lead a parents of teenagers small-group.

My concern is what happens when affinity moves from being a group within the church to becoming the organizing principle for the church.

Because using different words—perhaps McGavran’s words—we might say these are very homogeneous groups.

A golfing group is a homogeneous unit.

A stand-up paddleboarding group is a homogeneous unit.

A group organized specifically for older adults is, at least in one important sense, a homogeneous unit.

The terminology has changed. But has the underlying sociology?

McGavran recognized something that remains obviously true: people find it easier to form relationships with people with whom they already share something significant.

Affinity-based models begin from essentially the same observation.

And there are obvious practical advantages to doing so. I recently invited my un-churched brother-in-law to another small-group I’m a part of because he fits the group—a bunch of software engineers and techies—better than I do.

But that was precisely the practical appeal of McGavran’s principle too.

Which raises the question I think proponents of affinity-based church formation need to answer:

What makes organizing a church around a shared affinity ecclesiologically different from organizing one around a homogeneous unit?

I may be wrong—but I don’t think there is much of a difference—and simply calling one an “affinity” and the other a “homogeneous unit” certainly doesn’t establish the theological distinction.

And this matters because Mainline Protestants have largely rejected the Homogeneous Unit Principle not because its sociology was necessarily wrong, but because they saw what happens when that sociology becomes an organizing principle for Christian community.

People naturally gather with people like themselves.

But should the church?

The Sociology Is the Same

This concern becomes more significant when we consider which affinities actually form communities.

It’s no secret that Mainline Protestant denominations are in something of a death spiral, with some denominations like the ELCA projected to become virtually nonexistent in the coming decades, according to Dwight Zscheile.5

As a result, Mainline Protestant leaders have spent much of the last decade-plus desperately looking for methods of innovation and opportunities for growth. Andrew Root has written extensively about the dangers of this impulse in books like The Church After Innovation and Churches and the Crisis of Decline.

And I worry that Mainline leaders may be attracted to affinity-based models for essentially the same reason Evangelical leaders were attracted to McGavran’s Homogeneous Unit Principle:

Growth.

Again, the sociology works.

People are more likely to gather around things they already enjoy, people they already understand, and communities where they already feel comfortable.

But affinities aren’t socially neutral.

It’s also no secret that church attendance is increasingly skewing toward higher-income and more highly educated people. And this makes examples like golfing and stand-up paddleboarding particularly interesting.

Golfing and paddleboarding aren’t inherently upper-class activities. But they do require some combination of disposable income, equipment, transportation, leisure time, and access.

And increasingly, having discretionary time and disposable income is itself a luxury.

So you can create a community that never says, “Lower-income people aren’t welcome here,” while nevertheless organizing it around an activity that disproportionately attracts people of a particular socioeconomic class.

Nobody has been intentionally excluded—but the affinity itself has already done some of the sorting.

And isn’t that precisely what should make Mainline Protestants uncomfortable?

Remember Herrera’s central criticism of McGavran’s Homogeneous Unit Principle? It allowed existing social divisions to determine the picture of Christian community. Rather than challenging those divisions, churches could simply build around them—then conveniently forget to move beyond them.

My point is that affinity-based ecclesiology risks doing something remarkably similar.

Sure, the categories may be different; instead of explicitly organizing around race, ethnicity, or language, we organize around hobbies, interests, or identities.

But the sociology is the same: people who are already alike find one another, and then we build Christian community around their existing similarity.

This doesn’t mean affinity can never be useful. Shared interests can provide wonderful entry points into relationships. Again, see my own examples above.

The question is what happens next.

Does affinity become a doorway through which people enter a much larger and more complicated Christian community?

Or does affinity itself determine who the Christian community becomes? Does it ever move people beyond “golf church?”

Because if it doesn’t, we may have changed the language without changing the underlying ecclesiology; McGavran’s fatal flaw remains.

When Affinity Becomes Ecclesiology

And this brings me to what I think is the more obvious—and potentially more consequential—form of affinity within progressive Mainline Christianity: politics.

We are increasingly seeing progressive Mainline churches turn toward political activism as a primary driver of congregational life and discipleship.

My own denomination—the same denomination as the late Donald McGavran—recently introduced, from it’s New Church Ministry, what it calls “Disciples Movement Initiators” focused on:

“Contemplative Action, Prophetic Advocacy and Faith-Rooted Organizing.”

To be clear, I am NOT arguing that churches shouldn’t ever engage in political advocacy, resist injustice, or organize around issues that impact their communities.6

The question is what happens when those commitments become the primary basis around which Christian community itself is organized.

With the ever-increasing political polarization within our nation, sacralizing political action as the ultimate expression of discipleship and faithful Christian living offers some obvious—and perhaps immediate—returns.7

One’s existing political passions can be “neatly” grafted onto Christian action.

As Dwight Zscheile and Blair Pogue note:

“Political activism became in subsequent decades for some churches on the theological left a primary way to discover energy, purpose, and identity in an increasingly secular culture.”8

The political conveniently becomes both deeply spiritual and faithful. Political partisanship become acts of piety.

But if affinity is already capable of sorting us by socioeconomic class, political affinity can sort us even more efficiently.

This is where I find myself returning to McGavran.

One of the central criticisms of the Homogeneous Unit Principle is that it allowed White Christians, in particular, to build churches around people who already looked, talked, thought, and lived like themselves—and then call the resulting community church.

But couldn’t political affinity accomplish essentially the same thing?

Consider a Christian community explicitly organized around “prophetic advocacy” or a “study group to peel back colonial layers.”

Again, I am NOT against resisting racism or colonialism.

But I do wonder: Who is likely to show up?

And perhaps more importantly: Who would feel that they could belong?

With my own “Disciples Next” framework, I can’t help but wonder how much a MAGA-supporting Trump voter would actually be welcomed into the fold.

My guess? Not much.

And to be clear, I could reverse the example. We should ask the same question of a conservative Evangelical church whose identity has become intertwined with Republican politics:

Could a progressive Democrat actually belong there?

Not simply visit, not remain silent about their commitments, but actually belong.9

This comes back to where I disagree slightly with Herrera. I want to trust the power of the gospel to transform hearts and minds. And it’s for this same reason that I get nervous when the gospel essentially gets translated into advocating for a predetermined set of progressive—or conservative—political policies.

Because if McGavran’s Homogeneous Unit Principle can be criticized for letting White Christians off the hook—for allowing them to remain comfortably surrounded by people like themselves—doesn’t organizing Christian community around political affinity risk doing the same thing?

We may even tell ourselves that our particular affinity is different because ours is morally correct and “justice-seeking”

But presumably the people within every homogeneous group have reasons for believing their boundaries are justified.

And that’s where affinity stops simply being a useful tool for gathering people and starts becoming something more consequential.

Affinity becomes ecclesiology.

The community is no longer simply using a shared interest or concern to build relationships. The shared interest, identity, or ideology begins determining who the community is—and perhaps who can belong to it.

At that point, I think Mainline Protestants need to ask ourselves an uncomfortable question:

Have we actually rejected McGavran’s Homogeneous Unit Principle—or have we simply changed which homogeneous units we consider acceptable?

A Community Affinity Cannot Explain

This brings me back to what I think is the fundamental problem with the Homogeneous Unit Principle—and why I’m increasingly uneasy around the idea of affinity becoming an organizing principle for church.

Mainline Protestants have largely rejected the Homogeneous Unit Principle because a church organized around racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic similarity fails to fully embody the reconciling character of the gospel. Yet some contemporary approaches to church formation increasingly organize Christian community around affinity—shared interests, identities, experiences—and especially politics.

The categories have changed, but has the ecclesiology?

Again, I’m not arguing that affinity itself is bad. Affinity is perfectly normal. Of course golfers like spending time with other golfers. Young parents want to know other young parents. People experiencing similar struggles benefit from relationships with people who understand those struggles.

Affinity can even provide an important doorway into Christian community.

But I don not think affinity is enough as the organizing principle of a church.

Because the church—or at least the gospel that the church proclaims—should be capable of creating relationships that affinity alone cannot explain.

A golfing group doesn’t need Jesus to explain why golfers gather.

A progressive advocacy organization doesn’t need Jesus to explain why progressive activists gather.

A conservative political organization doesn’t need Jesus to explain why conservatives gather.

But what about a community where people who would otherwise have little reason to associate with one another gather around the same table?

Rich and poor.

Black and White.

Republican and Democrat.

People with different interests, lifestyles, experiences, and backgrounds.

People who might never have chosen one another, yet somehow learn to worship together, bear one another’s burdens, forgive one another, and call one another sisters and brothers.

We should want to know how and why this has happened.

And perhaps this is where my trust in the transforming power of the gospel becomes especially important.

Christian community isn’t simply supposed to affirm the affinities we already possess.10 Through the presence and activity of God, it should also transform us—including our relationships with people we might never otherwise have encountered, much less loved. Isn’t that what was so revolutionary about the early church? Jew and Greek, slave and free, rich and poor?

This is ultimately why I remain uncomfortable with affinity becoming ecclesiology.

If the affinity is the organizing principle—what’s to say the church will ever move beyond that affinity? In fact, McGavran’s legacy suggests it will not.

Said differently, if the church simply gathers people who already look alike, earn similar incomes, enjoy the same activities, share the same experiences, and of couse, vote alike—then the church risks becoming another expression of the social sorting already happening everywhere else in American life.

And SURELY we believe the gospel of Jesus calls us to more than simply that.

So perhaps the question Mainline Protestants should ask isn’t simply whether affinity-based communities are effective at gathering people.

McGavran already taught us that homogeneity can be effective.

The more important question is what kind of people our ecclesiology is forming us to become.

If we believe something important happens when rich and poor, Black and White, young and old worship together, why wouldn’t we also believe something important happens when people without shared interests, lifestyles, politics, or experiences are formed into community together?

Maybe the church is most recognizably the church not when it gathers people who naturally belong together, but when Christ creates belonging among people who otherwise wouldn’t.

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“They want me to preach harder at them,” she said. “They want me to make them feel guilty and tell them what they should do…”

A few weeks ago, I was having a conversation with a mainline pastor.

Initially, I was puzzled. Who wants that? Who goes to church hoping to feel worse about themselves?

As someone who grew up in conservative Baptist contexts, where guilt and obligation were often readily available, I can assure you it wasn’t particularly enjoyable or life-giving.

How odd, I thought.

Then I remembered another conversation I’d had several months earlier.

I was talking with a member of a mainline congregation about their new pastor and what the church was hoping for from this new season of ministry.

The response surprised me.

“We’re ready for him/her to push us harder.”

That conversation had struck me at the time, but hearing the pastor say something similar brought it back to mind. And I found myself wondering why.

Why do people seem to want things to be harder?

Why do so many of us want to be challenged, pushed, and told what we ought to be doing?

When I mentioned the earlier conversation to the pastor, she responded with a simple observation:

People want law, but really they want grace.

I’ve been thinking about that comment ever since.

Law & Gospel

Partly because it connects with another line of thought I’ve been exploring recently.

In a previous post, I suggested that Critical Theory often functions a bit like Martin Luther’s understanding of the Law. It identifies injustice, exposes where we fall short, and calls us to do better. In that sense, I think it can be tremendously valuable.

But one of Luther’s key insights was that while the Law can diagnose, it cannot save.

The Law can tell us what’s wrong. It can reveal our failures. It can expose our need.

But the Law cannot forgive us.

Lately I’ve found myself wondering if something similar might be happening in many of our churches. Not just progressive churches, but especially among those of us in the mainline.

What if we’re actually quite comfortable with Law?

What if challenge feels more concrete than grace?

What if being told what to do feels more productive, more tangible, and maybe even more spiritual than simply receiving forgiveness?

And perhaps most importantly, what if we’ve become so suspicious of cheap grace that we’ve forgotten what costly grace actually is?

Which brings me to Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

The term “cheap grace” comes from Bonhoeffer’s book The Cost of Discipleship, published in 1937 while Bonhoeffer was witnessing the rise of the Nazi regime. He looked on with horror as so many of his fellow German Christians unquestioningly aligned themselves with Hitler.

He wrote:

“Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”

By contrast:

“Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. It is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”’

I think the reason so many liberal or progressive Christians want “harder,” more challenging, “tell me what to do” preaching is because they have never experienced costly grace.

In short, grace is not prescriptive enough because grace is illogical. It’s foolishness, as Paul says.

Which raises a question for me: If costly grace is so transformative, why do so many of us seem to prefer challenge over forgiveness?

The story of the lawyer in Luke 10 comes to mind:

²⁵On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

²⁶ “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

²⁷ He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’^[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’^[b]”

²⁸ “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

²⁹ But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

Seeking to Justify Himself

I want to focus in on those words:

“But he wanted to justify himself...”

In the book Law and Gospel, , William McDavid, and Ethan Richardson write:

“Works righteousness—the attempt to justify yourself by works of the law (be they actions or attributes)—is the default mode of human operation, not just the select few who identify as religious.” (66)

And I think that’s especially helpful in naming what might be happening in this story.

Often, the lawyer is interpreted as trying to avoid being a good neighbor to others, as if to say, “So-and-so isn’t my neighbor, therefore I don’t have to help him.”

Maybe.

But I’ve begun to wonder if it’s actually the opposite.

What if the lawyer wanted to know who his neighbor was so he could detail all the ways he was already helping his neighbor?

What if he’s not looking for an excuse so much as looking for validation?

After all, Luke tells us he wanted to justify himself.

The Liberal Temptation

And I wonder if this is what many white liberals are trying to do.

To be clear, I don’t mean that cynically.

I think many white liberals genuinely want to know where injustice is happening and who is being harmed by it. They want to help. They want to advocate. They want to stand in solidarity. They want to do works of justice and mercy.

All of that is good.

But—and this is my key point—I wonder if their action is sometimes much like that of the lawyer.

Not avoiding being a neighbor.

Trying to justify themselves.

Like the lawyer, they want to demonstrate all the ways they are fulfilling the law and living out justice.

Not because they are trying to avoid justice and mercy, but because deep down they feel the need to prove that they are doing enough.

That they are good enough.

That they are on the right side of things.

That they are justified.

And that’s the thing. Like the lawyer, they feel the need to justify themselves because they haven’t really experienced costly grace. Instead, grace remains something that must somehow be earned by fulfilling the law.

I wonder if this is part of the challenge within mainline Protestantism.

Middle- and upper-class white Christians generally don’t think we’re that bad. We tend to assume that sin is primarily ignorance or imperfections, something we can educate our way out of, rather than outright rebellion, failure, or brokenness.

We know we’re imperfect.

We know we’ve made mistakes.

But we don’t often experience the sort of desperation that makes grace feel like relief.

And if we don’t think we need much grace, then what we need instead is improvement.

Growth.

Progress.

One more thing to do.

A Big Relief

Recently, I was interviewing David Zahl for the podcast about his book The Big Relief. I asked him about atonement and why that word is often seen as embarrassing, unnecessary, or even offensive among liberal mainliners.

He mentioned that for people who have really done wrong, people who have really failed, atonement is, to use his words, “a big relief.”

That struck me.

In the book he writes:

“Guilt is more a default state of being, exerting constant pressure and wreaking havoc on mental health. In left-of-center circles, many people feel pressure to demonstrate their contrition and regret over cycles of injustice.” (83)

And later:

“Atonement may be a religious-sounding word, yet it takes many nonreligious forms. Some of these forms are constructive, and some are not. ... On the healthier end, activism can be a form of atonement... Unfortunately, this kind of perpetual atonement can become enslaving if it offers no completion, or what theologians would call satisfaction... There is always one more good deed to do, one more apology to give before the slate is wiped clean. Partial atonement wears us out.” (86)

That sounds remarkably similar to Luther’s Law.

There is always one more thing to do.

One more injustice to address.

One more apology to make.

One more thing to learn.

What Costly Grace Produces

The pastor and former white supremacist Caleb Campbell comes to mind as someone who seems to have experienced costly grace and, as a result, seeks to share that grace. He considers himself a “missionary to Christian nationalists” and urges conversion rather than confrontation. He believes hospitality and kindness, rather than arguments, can lead people away from the fusion of God and country.1

St. Patrick comes to mind too.

After experiencing the grace of God, he returned to Ireland to share that grace with the very people who had kidnapped him.

What strikes me about both Campbell and Patrick is that when they experienced costly grace, they didn’t simply feel compelled to prove themselves.

They felt compelled to share what they had received.

Theologian Willie James Jennings says it this way:

“A disciple of Jesus is someone…ready to enter the stories of those to whom she is sent by God…Evangelism, offering witness to the gospel, is quite unavoidable if one seeks to yield to the Spirit of God” (Acts, 88-89).

Because they had received grace and recognized it as such, they knew they had to share it with people who desperately needed it.

In Campbell’s case, that includes Christian nationalists, white supremacists, and skinheads.

Grace or Self-Justification?

This feels like a very different move from what often happens in white liberal Protestantism.

And before anyone misunderstands me, I’m not saying marching, protesting, voting, or advocacy are bad things. They are not.

But I do wonder how often these activities become ways of demonstrating righteousness rather than extending grace.

Can we imagine white liberal Protestants regularly entering spaces filled with MAGA activists or Christian nationalists in hopes of winning them over through hospitality, kindness, and the good news of Jesus, a la Campbell?2

Honestly, I struggle to imagine it.

And I wonder if part of the reason is that we still feel the need to justify ourselves.

As Zahl, McDavid, and Richardson write:

“We long, with every fiber of our being, to save ourselves.” (16)

Costly grace is sort of the opposite.

Costly grace is unmerited, undeserved and overflowing.

The kind of grace Patrick and Campbell received in such abundance that they knew they needed to share it with others who were also desperately in need of it.

Again from the Law and Gospel book:

“American Christianity now is in crisis in large part because people have marketed it as a religion of good people getting better, when in fact it is a religion of bad people coping with their failure to be good.” (12)

What’s wild and perhaps a bit illogical is that many pastors in white liberal Protestantism spend a great deal of time assuring people that they are good enough and beloved.

And to be clear, they are beloved.

But I wonder if that message sometimes feeds the very anxiety it seeks to relieve.

“I’ve got to prove that I’m good enough.”

“I’ve got to show that I’m one of the good people.”

And so the cycle continues.

People want law, but really they want grace.

Maybe that’s why the pastor’s observation has stayed with me.

People want law, but really they want grace.

Law gives us something to do—Grace tells us what has already been done.

Law lets us justify ourselves—Grace tells us we don’t have to.

And perhaps that’s why grace is so difficult to receive.

Not because it is cheap.

But because it is costly enough to take away our favorite project:

saving ourselves.

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Conversations in the Car

A few years ago, I started noticing something whenever my kids and I were in the car together: they were far more open to a real conversation than when I was sitting directly across from them.

They would say things that I might never hear face to face.

I’m, um, already seeing some nodding heads in the congregation.

There’s something about standing shoulder to shoulder, moving in the same direction that makes it easier to be honest.

I encounter this dynamic often as a chaplain.

People will tell me things as I sit aside their hospital bed, that I might never hear sitting face to face with them in an office setting or some other context.

For the last year, I have not been preparing messages.

I’ve been listening to the people they were meant for.

Sunday May 31st was the first time I had preached in a church in over a year.

And in that time, I’ve been sitting in the pews like a regular person, listening, talking, interacting, listening with people and their stories.

And from what I’ve gathered from their conversations, there seem to be two overarching questions that people seem to be asking.

First of all, is this God thing even real?

And if this God thing is real, does it even matter beyond Sunday morning?

Because they’re not entirely sure that it does.

And the more I listened to people and their stories, the more I began to wonder if the real challenge facing the church is simpler than we make it to be.

We spend a lot of time talking about doctrine, formation, even compelling preaching.

But I think the more basic question that people actually wrestle with is:

Does any of this actually matter?

Life Works Pretty Well Without God

Throughout his Ministry in a Secular Age series, Andrew Root argues that people have become convinced that life works pretty well without God.

Ryan Burge, a sociologist, has noted that church has increasingly become a luxury good, something nice, but something we don’t really need, much like a country club membership.

People have become convinced that if church disappeared tomorrow, they’d probably be fine.

I mean, remember, that’s what literally happened right during COVID.

It’s not that people reject or are, uh, hostile to faith, but rather they’ve learned that they don’t really need God.

Religion has become obsolete, says sociologist Christian Smith.

And in its place, they’ve made religions of work, sports, especially politics.

And for many, that seems to work.

Until, that is, they find themselves or a loved one in a hospital bed.

The Corinthians Thought They Had Arrived

That’s why I find Paul’s words to the Corinthians so compelling, because Paul seems to be speaking to people who had similarly bought into an alternative religion, perhaps we might say a gospel of acquisition.

And while written to people two millennia ago, I swear, Paul could have written these words to the average American churchgoer today.

You can practically hear the sarcasm dripping from his voice:

Already you have what you want.

Already you have become rich.

Quite apart from us, you have become kings.

In other words:

You’ve made it.

You’ve arrived.

You have everything you need.

Paul keeps laying it on thick:

You are strong, but we are weak.

You are held in high honor, but we are in disrepute.

You are well fed, but we are hungry and thirsty.

At first hearing, it sounds absurd.

Who in their right mind would want to trade places with that?

And yet, by the end of the passage, something really interesting happens.

Paul and his crew, the self-described rubbish of the world, dregs of all things, seem to have something going for them.

After all:

When reviled, they bless.

When persecuted, they endure.

When slandered, they speak kindly.

It’s as bizarre now as it was then.

Maybe more so.

Why Are We Still Searching?

And I think this is Paul’s brilliance.

Because beneath all the sarcasm, Paul is asking a question.

If you’ve arrived, why are you still searching?

If you’ve become kings, why are you still so restless?

If more really delivers, why are you still looking for something else?

Paul never comes straight out and says it, but he lays out the contrast so clearly that his hearers, both then and now, can’t help but wonder:

Maybe these morons know something that the kings don’t.

And maybe I should listen.

Life Before Death

Now, friends, I know we’re preachers.

We care about doctrine.

We should.

We care about theology.

We should.

We care about compelling preaching.

We should.

These things matter.

But if I may be so bold, if this stuff doesn’t have real life implications, then what good is it?

And after a year of sitting in the pews and alongside hospital beds in the ministry of presence, I’m increasingly convinced that what keeps people awake at night isn’t orthodox theology.

Maybe I’m wrong.

But what I think keeps people awake at night is their loneliness, their broken relationships, their seeming inability to stop scrolling and buying and drinking as much as they know they need to stop, but they can’t.

And if our preaching, if our presence doesn’t speak to these things, then what good is it?

The good news can’t just be about life to come, but this life now.

It’s got to offer not just life after death, but life before death.

And you know what the good news is?

It does.

It absolutely does.

The gods of More

The foolishness of the cross is that when we stop chasing salvation through status, through stuff, through success, we discover God meets us precisely where those things fail.

And man, that is good news.

As Andrew Root writes, the gods of more demand that humans do better, be better, acquire more.

But our God...

Our God comes to the brokenhearted, loves the lost, gives rest to God’s children.

And man...

If that’s true, let’s preach that.

Let’s come alongside people and show them not just good theology, but how to live this life now.

The Secret Hope

See, here’s the thing.

While the folks in the pews, I do think, are questioning whether this stuff really matters, whether it’s actually true, I think they’re secretly hoping it really is true.

Like they really want it to be true.

And I think it’s a bit like Paul is doing with the Corinthians.

Calling them rich.

Calling them kings.

Buttering them up in such a way that deep down they know it’s not true.

Like the Corinthians and many of our hearers today, they’re drowning in debt, their relationships are in tatters, their kids won’t return their calls.

And eventually they start wondering:

Maybe I’m not really a king after all.

And that’s where the gospel becomes good news.

Because beneath all this status, all this stuff, all the success, there remains this longing:

I want some good news.

I need some good news.

And Paul says, not that you can have your best life now, but rather:

Even when your life doesn’t look that grand,

Even when you’re quite clearly not a king,

You may in fact be experiencing a bit of the life to come right now.

How foolish.

How moronic.

But when the voices around us insist that fulfillment is found through acquiring more, the gospel says otherwise.

And to borrow from our host, David Zahl:

What a relief.

Because people don’t need more information.

They need good news.

Thanks be to God, we have some.

Amen.

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Rethinking Romans

It’s a well-known movie trope.

Two characters stand facing one another.

One warns the other about what is coming. Maybe it’s revenge. Maybe justice. Maybe consequences long delayed.

The warning is brushed aside or mocked.

And then comes the line:

“That’s not a threat—it’s a promise.”

What makes the scene memorable is that it shifts the conversation.

We move from possibility to inevitability.
From warning to certainty.

And honestly, that’s often how Christians have approached Paul’s Epistle to the Romans.

Short of the book of Revelation, Paul’s Epistle to the Romans—or simply, Romans—has to be one of the “scariest” books of the Bible to read, or especially, to hear preached on a Sunday morning.1

Depending on the Christian context we come from—or perhaps no Christian background whatsoever!—we may carry stronger or weaker associations with this book of scripture.

In many conservative Christian contexts, Romans is often presented through what is called the “Romans Road”—a step-by-step evangelistic method using key verses from Romans to explain salvation.

The Romans Road often begins with Romans 3:23:

“All have sinned and fall short of God’s glory.”

Then moves to Romans 6:23:

“The wages that sin pays are death, but God’s gift is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

The fourth stop is Romans 10:9:

“Because if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and in your heart you have faith that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

And the Romans Road often concludes with Romans 5:1:

“Therefore, since we have been made righteous through his faithfulness, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

There are other variations as well.

Now, to be clear, I don’t think the Romans Road is entirely wrong.

But often, at least in my own experience, it can feel like mostly threat and very little promise.

Because of this, in more liberal or progressive Mainline contexts, Romans is sometimes avoided altogether—or at least approached cautiously—because it has become so associated with coercive or fear-based forms of evangelism that seem more concerned with securing decisions or winning arguments than sharing the love and grace of God made known in Jesus.

As a Christian, pastor, and preacher—and especially because of my experience with the Iowa Preacher’s Project—I’m increasingly convinced that the gospel is fundamentally about good news for us.

That is, after all, what the word gospel literally means.

To say it differently:

The gospel is about promise.

And Romans, I believe, is ultimately a promise—not a threat.

Take Romans chapter 8 alone.

In this one chapter we encounter at least eight promises:2

#1 No condemnation

“So now there isn’t any condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (v. 1).

#2 Nothing can separate us from the love of God

“Nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord” (v. 39).

#3 Freed from the power of death

“The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death” (v. 2).

#4 We are adopted children of God

“You didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children” (v. 15).

#5 We are led by the Spirit

“All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons and daughters” (v. 14).

#6 Both the Spirit and Jesus are praying for us right now

“The Spirit comes to help our weakness” (v. 26). And also:

“Christ Jesus… is at God’s right side pleading for us” (v. 34).

#7 God is working all things for our good

“We know that God works all things together for good for the ones who love God” (v. 28).

#8 Nothing coming against us can ultimately win

“If God is for us, who is against us?” (v. 31).

That sounds a lot more like promise than threat.

And so, through the weeks I’ll be preaching in June and July, I’ll be spending time with the Revised Common Lectionary readings from Romans.

My hope is not simply to explain Romans, but to hear it again—not as a weapon or warning—but as good news.

A promise, not a threat.

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As a chaplain, I am an evangelist: Matthew 28:16–20

What if I told you that when I work as a hospital chaplain,

I see my role not primarily as an supportive presence
or crisis responder

but rather as an evangelist?

For those of you in this room who have experience in chaplaincy or hospice settings

—or even my now-colleague and former CPE supervisor, Janet Barriger—

perhaps some alarm bells are already going off in your head.

Stay with me for a moment.

It’s not that I misunderstand the role and function of a chaplain.

Rather, it may be that we don’t fully understand what it really means to be an evangelist…

The E-word Problem

The E-word, evangelism, is a problematic word in many mainline church contexts.

After all…

--Evangelism has become intertwined with abuse, oppression, and injustice

--Faith has been weaponized rather than shared,

--Christianity entangled with coercion and fear.

Likewise, many of us have encountered forms of evangelism that felt harsh, pushy, or judgmental

—more concerned with winning arguments or securing decisions than embodying the love and grace of Christ.

And yet, in other contexts, evangelism has been reduced to branding and marketing—

graphics, giveaways, & curated social media presence.

I’m sure we’ve all seen that sort of thing.

If this is what it means to practice evangelism

—or to be an evangelist

—no wonder we’re so averse to the word and the practice.

But what if much of what passes for evangelism is anything but?

In rejecting harmful evangelism, we may have forgotten how to offer good news.

So let us hear again the Gospel reading for today…

¹⁶Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. ¹⁷When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The Great Commission and God With Us

In the reading for this Sunday, we encounter what is often called
“The Great Commission,”

where Jesus sends out the remaining disciples to “make disciples” and “baptize… in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

As commentator Meda Stamper writes,

“Matthew ends with the words of Jesus… his voice, his commission, and his promise of presence move the narrative into a future shaped by the good news of the kingdom—a future not only for the disciples in the text, but for all disciples always.”

There’s a LOT happening in this story,

as Matthew is tying together several loose ends from the broader narrative.

--The naming of the eleven disciples reminds of Judas’ painful betrayal and despair.

--The mountaintop setting recalls both Jesus’ temptation and the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount.

--The worship and the doubting point back to the magi in the birth narrative and to the women who have already worshipped.

Among those many callbacks—or perhaps “Easter eggs,” as we might call them today—is this:

Jesus says,

“Remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Even here, in those few words, is another callback

—a reminder of the birth narrative,

in which Joseph is told by the angel

that the child shall be called Emmanuel,

meaning “God with us.”

Quite literally, at the beginning & the end of the story,

the message is the same:

You are not alone—I am with you.

Of course, between those two pronouncements lies the rest of the story.

A story filled with terror and heartbreak, challenge and temptation, wisdom and teaching, betrayal and great suffering.

The in-between, we might say.

Or the now and the not yet, as we say during Advent.

And much of what Jesus encountered, we still face today.

--Terror and heartbreak?

Herod’s violence and the holy family’s flight into Egypt sound less like ancient history and more like recent headlines.

--Temptation?

We see the temptation toward outrage, tribalism, and aligning Christianity too closely with political parties, as though the gospel belongs to one side.

--Betrayal and suffering?

We know these too through war, displacement, and communities living beneath the shadow of violence.

But amidst challenge and suffering,

God was with Jesus—because God was and is Jesus.

And even as Jesus prepared to leave our physical realm, he promised his disciples

—and us still today—

that in the midst of pain and sorrow we would not be abandoned.

The Spirit would come so we would never forget:

We are not alone.

Listen again to Jesus’ words:

“And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Consolation and Evangelism

This promise of divine presence—God with us, even still—reminds me of theologian Andrew Root’s understanding of consolation.

He writes:

“This God … arrives with the consolation of God’s name and the promise of God’s presence” (147).

Yet God does not enter our pain and struggles merely to sit with us in misery.

As Root also shares,

“God enters all sorrows for the sake of redemption” (25).

And this, I believe, is part of the task Jesus calls us to in evangelism.

As Root writes:

“To accompany another in their… sorrowful goodbye is to evangelize, because in walking with the sorrowful we’re directed [to God] in and through the goodbye.

The church is called not to fix the sorrow but to journey with the one who bears it” because “our goodbyes are the place where God chooses to work” (233, 268).

And lest one wonder what this has to do with Jesus’ call to make disciples, Root adds:

“Evangelism and discipleship are fused.

Evangelism is the invitation to receive consolation, to receive ministry. [It] is the reception of care that places a person on the path of encounter with the divine…

We are Jesus’ disciples when, having received consolation, we go into the world to give consolation to others” (Root, 2).

Behold

We might wonder then, what does this actually look like?

I noticed, while preparing this sermon, that the word translated as “remember” in Matthew 28:20 is the Greek word idou,

which means “to see, to perceive, to realize.”

In some Bible translations, the English word behold is used.

Behold means to perceive, to realize, to truly see.

When we behold God’s grace in the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit we find ourselves saying yes again and again.

As Meda Stamper writes:

“Jesus tells his followers to reenact his story in the baptism of new believers, enfolding them in the life of the Trinitarian God, with the Son as their Immanuel, the Father loving them as their own, and the Spirit descending like a dove to lead them out.”

Evangelism, then, is following Jesus into sorrow

—not trying to fix or solve anything—

but helping others to see.

Behold.
God is with you.
You are not alone.
And God can redeem even this.

My task as a chaplain is not to fix or solve anything,

but to be a physical reminder, a vessel, of God’s loving presence.

See—God is here. God is with you, even to the very end.

A Different Kind of Evangelism

As Episcopal priest Natalie Hall puts it:

“Proselytizing is leveling a threat; evangelism is offering truth.

Proselytizing is making a demand; evangelism is presenting a gift.”

Proselytizing is often driven by anxiety—as though the Holy Spirit is absent or ineffective.

But evangelism trusts that God is already at work.

The gospel, Hall reminds us, is

“constantly coming after us, being offered and given to us.”

And when people ask,

“For me?”

The gospel says:

Yes. Again and again.

This past weekend, my wife and I took a trip to the eastern plains,

staying at a small bed & breakfast.

While there, we enjoyed dinner with another couple staying at the inn.

As these things often do, conversation eventually turned toward work.

“It’s complicated,” I said.

“I’m a chaplain, I work with a Christian nonprofit, I write, I podcast—I do several things.”

Wine was flowing, and the woman leaned in.

“Wait,” she said, “I thought I heard you were a pastor. Is that true or not?”

“Well,” I said, “I’m not currently employed by a church.”

She then told us about her brother-in-law,

who was also a pastor—and, in her opinion, a bit of a Bible thumper.

“He always has a Bible within five feet of him,” she said sarcastically.

I quickly replied that I did too—which, to be fair, wasn’t entirely untrue,

as I had brought one along for the trip and it was back in our room.

We laughed together.

She then shared how, on a previous visit to this same place,

they had walked to the nearby Catholic prayer garden featuring the luminous mysteries.

Her brother-in-law had insisted on running back to retrieve his Bible so he could read the corresponding scriptures at each station.

He was, she thought, a little overzealous.

And honestly, I agreed.

“I’m more ecumenical,” I said.

“I’ve heard that word before,” she replied.

“What does that mean?”

“It means,” I said, “I try to get along well with all Christians.”

And so we kept talking.

Eating. Drinking. Laughing. Sharing stories.

Thankfully, Corinna, not me, is quite engaging!

Eventually, the conversation turned toward something more tender

—their concern for a young grandson whom they sensed might be gay or trans,

and their hope that he might find a school where he would be welcomed & accepted.

Through it all, I did not say very much.

I nodded.

I affirmed their fears and concerns.

I empathized.

But more than that—I believe—

I evangelized.

Not in the command-and-control kind of way.

Not in the trying-to-force-an-outcome kind of way.

But in trusting that, by simply being present,

God was already there—in the midst of them—

working, redeeming, bringing new life.

And trust me, I felt the temptation to do more,

say more, be more—evangelistic.

Later that night, back in our room,

I told my wife that I had briefly considered

praying before dinner.

I’m not sure how that would have landed.

But what I hope I was able to do was something else.

To help this woman behold.

To help her see.

God is with you.
God is with your grandson.
Even to the very end.

And that trusting that God is already at work

—and doesn’t need me to make something happen—

gives me courage to enter some of the hardest rooms.

The Sidewalk

A few months back,

I was called into the hospital for a challenging situation.

Self-harm, I was told, and I’ll leave the details imprecise.

The staff asked me to come in.

The family was acting hysterical, I was told.

I immediately got in the car and started praying.

“God, this is a lot.

But I believe that you’re out in front of me,

already in that room with that woman.

Help me remember that.

Help me be a vessel of your love and peace.”

About five minutes from the hospital,

I saw a police cruiser pull a U-turn

and begin following me.

I bet we’re headed to the same place, I thought.

Walking into the hospital,

the social worker met me at the door

and started explaining the situation.

I’d never had that happen before.

Then security came over.

We walked to the window and saw a woman

sitting on the sidewalk, officers hovering over her.

She had apparently made some veiled threat, prompting alarm.

“Let me go see her,” I said.

I walked outside and did the only thing I could think to do.

I sat down with her on the sidewalk.

I had been praying for more opportunities to share the gospel.
I hadn’t specified how.

And upon reflection, it struck me:

In that moment, I was an evangelist.

Eventually, the nursing staff invited us into the room.

It was uncomfortable, tragic, painful.

But as I stood there beside that woman,

I stood there not with the burden

that I needed to fix something

or make everything better,

but with the assurance

that I was simply trying to be a visible reminder

of God and a vessel of God’s love.

Behold.
God is with you.
You are not alone.
God is with you to the very end.
And God can redeem even this.

The Final Commission

When I enter a room filled with pain and suffering

—or come alongside a loved one in crisis—

I am not trying to fix things,

redeem the situation,

or even bring immediate relief to pain.

Rather, I am simply trying to be a visible reminder

of God and a vessel of God’s love.

I trust that when I enter the pain of another,

God is already at work.

All I need to do is show up.

In that way,

I am an evangelist.

Evangelism is entering the sorrow of another to help them behold:

God is with you.
You are not alone.
And God can redeem even this.

“Behold,” Jesus says,

“I am with you—even to the end.”

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The Two Religions—Still on My Mind

This week I attended an ordination service within the Mainline tradition.

I’m going to try to be intentionally generic here. My aim is not to belittle or insult the newly ordained pastor or the church involved.

But earlier that same day, I had listened to an ordination sermon from , and I couldn’t shake how drastically different the two services felt.

In Micheli’s sermon, he boldly declared that Jesus was truly risen from the dead—something that, if I’m honest, I suspect at least some clergy in the other service might question or at least hedge around. More than that, Micheli proclaimed that the resurrection was not merely the resuscitation of a corpse, but that “God resurrects not his remains, but Christ’s entire life,” and that “Jesus is alive and exactly because he lives with death behind Him.”1

It was strikingly different from what I heard later that day, where I repeatedly heard phrases like “Mystery untamed” and “Companion Jesus.”

And sitting there, I couldn’t help but think about a blog post I’ve had sitting in my drafts since last summer—one I wasn’t sure I actually wanted to publish.

But after experiencing those two ordination services in the same day, I keep wondering if maybe that original essay was onto something.

Again, I hesitate to say this. I generally dislike the online hot-takers who constantly trash progressive Mainline churches and pastors. So I say all this with some humility and hesitancy, recognizing I may be wildly wrong.

Faith in Jesus, or faith of Jesus?

I recently read Ben Crosby’s essay Reconfessionalization, Rechristianization—an awkwardly titled but deeply thought-provoking piece arguing that Mainline Protestantism still lives in the long shadow of the liberal-fundamentalist battles of the early 20th century.

One idea in particular has stuck with me: Crosby’s distinction between the “faith in Jesus” and the “faith of Jesus.” In the post, Crosby discusses J. Gresham Machen’s book Christianity and Liberalism and argues that “our churches at present suffer from insufficient attention to the core Christian message of incarnation and redemption.”

But what has really stuck with me since is his—and Machen’s—claim that these are two different religions.

Here’s the quote I can’t shake:

“On the other hand, there is what Machen calls liberalism: a form of religion which rejects the specific historical claims made by Christianity as untenable in the face of modern science and history, and instead sees in Jesus an ideal of a life lived in conformity to the will of a (possibly-impersonal) God. The goal is not, for liberalism, faith in Jesus but the faith of Jesus, generally understood as a nondogmatic, experiential commitment to the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.”

“While Machen admits that he is treating these two religions as ideal types, and in the actual lives of mainline clergy and laity some combination of ‘liberal’ and ‘Christian’ beliefs are often held together, he argues that the two religions cannot ultimately coexist within the same ecclesial structure” (my emphasis).

A Canadian Case Study - Faith Without a Mediator

Crosby’s words stirred a memory of a trip to Canada a some years back. While there, a local pastor took us on a tour of Toronto’s historic downtown churches.

We visited three cathedrals: Anglican, Catholic, and United Church of Canada:

The Anglican cathedral was alive with music and people—an organ rehearsal filling the sanctuary with sound.

The Catholic cathedral was also buzzing with activity: people praying, a small funeral service underway, and a steady stream of visitors.

But the United Church sanctuary was eerily quiet.

A beautiful old Methodist building—now part of the UCC2 since the 1925 merger—it stood nearly empty. Aside from the few of us visiting, no one was in there.

As we drove back, I was told that in one nearby region alone, 8 or 9 United Church congregations had closed since the early 2000s. The idea, at least as I heard it, was that the UCC had leaned heavily into what Crosby might call the “faith of Jesus”—a vision of Christianity that, while morally commendable, ultimately made the church feel optional.

What I found compelling in that observation—and what echoes Crosby’s concern—is that once Christianity becomes about living like Jesus without believing in Jesus and his work through the church, then the church becomes an “unnecessary overhead.”3

This aligns with something I’ve been convinced of for a while: people want to give themselves over to something bigger than themselves. For a time, big institutions like the United Church carried that kind of magnetism. But as trust in institutions has eroded, newer generations have found little compelling about a declining and seemingly irrelevant institution that offers nothing unique or revelatory—only “unnecessary overhead” getting in the way of doing “the work.”4

The Church Matters—Because Jesus Does

This way of thinking stands in stark contrast to voices like Andrew Root and Dwight Zscheile, who emphasize that Jesus and salvation are mediated through the church.

Root puts it boldly:

“The church’s only purpose is to proclaim to the world that God acts in the world for the sake of the world’s salvation.”
— Churches and the Crisis of Decline

“Christian faith is impossible outside the church.”
— Faith Formation in a Secular Age

And again, I struggle with this idea that we’re talking about two religions, but I’m reminded of the words of Zscheile and Pogue:

“Late-modern Western culture assumes every individual’s path to meaning and purpose is equally valid. It rejects any ultimate public framework for truth other than its own secular relativist one. Many faithful members of local churches have been shaped by this cultural ideology without even recognizing how deeply it contradicts the gospel of Jesus.”

What Is Actually Happening at the Table?

I say this not as a right-wing hot-taker—or at least I hope not to be—but as someone still deeply committed to the Mainline and its often awkward but important mixture of inclusion, liberalism, academia, history, and faithfulness.

I was reminded this week of my own ordination into a Mainline denomination more than a decade ago, a burden and responsibility I still take extremely seriously. So my aim here is not simply to tear down institutions. Rather, I find myself wondering: are we unsuccessfully trying to hold together two fundamentally different understandings of Christianity within the same institutional structures?

UMC pastor and author Jack Shitama has repeatedly told me that human sexuality was never really the central issue in the UMC, but rather the most visible expression of a much deeper divide—namely, how we understand scripture, theology, and the faith itself.

I’m increasingly beginning to understand his point.

Not that everyone in the UMC or progressive Christianity5 is basically a wannabe Unitarian-Universalist.6 That would be unfair and inaccurate. But I do think Shitama is right that there are, at times, genuinely irreconcilable theological differences underneath the surface.

For my own part, I’ve chosen to remain within the more liberal branches of Christianity because, as much as they frustrate me at times, there are so many good, faithful pastors and churches whose ministry I deeply respect—plus I’ve found the faithfulness, discipleship, and spiritual fruit of many LGBT Christians impossible to simply dismiss, among other things.7

But I also don’t think this tension is merely about denominational distinctions or sexuality debates.

What struck me in the ordination service was not a disagreement over transubstantiation versus consubstantiation, to use a historical example. The deeper issue seemed to be whether communion was actually mediating something real—or whether it functioned primarily as a symbolic moral encouragement, a small spiritual and emotional boost to inspire us to do better.

By contrast, in Micheli’s sermon, he quite literally declared that “Jesus is on the table, because the table is in him.”

That is a radically different theological imagination.

Certainly, some traditions understand the Lord’s Supper more as remembrance than sacrament—I’m reminded of my own Baptist roots—but even there, what is being remembered is still death and resurrection, not merely a vague story about Jesus inspiring love, inclusion, or human flourishing.

Is What Happened in Canada Happening Here?

I’m not Canadian, nor do I have deep expertise on the United Church of Canada. But if those observations are accurate—and they resonate with what I’ve seen in similar contexts—it seems to me that an embrace of cultural ideology over theological identity can leave churches empty, both literally and spiritually.

Churches without theological confidence often become churches without people. A Christianity without creeds eventually becomes a Christianity without a congregation.

And once again, I return to Crosby’s unsettling but important question:

Can these two religions really coexist under one roof?

And this is where I come back to those two ordination services. Because, even as I sat as an observer in one, I couldn’t shake the feeling that, though the institutional words spoken over the ordinand asking their commitment and promise to serve the church and the ministry of God, there were two starkly different visions of Christianity at play.

Like, in Micheli’s vision of ministry, the pastoral role is about giving one’s life to Christ, and probably even more boldly than that—subsuming our life into the life of Christ.

In the other ordination service, the vision of ministry was something like helping people find their “divine spark” and “encounter mystery beyond themselves.”

I just don’t know how these don’t end up being two wildly different forms of ministry and quite obvious why the Mainline church is in such a state of disarray.8

A Final Hesitation

And this is where I keep finding myself torn.

Because on one hand, I genuinely do not want to become one of those cynical internet commentators constantly taking shots at Mainline pastors and churches. I know too many faithful, thoughtful, compassionate clergy within these traditions to simply dismiss them. More, I recognize my own limitations, biases, and blind spots. I may very well be wrong about all of this.

But at the same time, I can’t shake the growing sense that something deeper than “style” or “emphasis” is at stake.

When one ordination service centers on the risen Christ who conquered death, and another speaks primarily of “Mystery untamed” and “Companion Jesus,” it begins to feel like we are not merely describing the same faith with different language.9

It begins to feel like we are talking about fundamentally different religions.

Again, I hesitate even writing that sentence.10

But if Mainline Christianity becomes primarily about activism, inclusion, and human flourishing11 detached from concrete claims about who Jesus is and what God has done through him, then I think we would all be better off with the Unitarian Universalists, rather than the “embarrassing God” of Christianity.12

And perhaps that is precisely what Crosby and Machen were trying to warn about.

Not that liberal Christianity lacks sincerity or compassion.
Not that progressive Christians are bad people.
But that at some point, the theological center shifts enough that we are no longer talking about the same thing.

Maybe I’m wrong.

Honestly, part of me hopes I am.

But I also increasingly wonder if the emptiness of so many Mainline churches is not simply about demographics, secularization, or institutional decline.

Maybe, at least in part, it is because people intuitively sense that a church unsure of what it believes about Jesus will eventually become unsure of why it exists at all.

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Draw Near With Faith

Reconfessionalization, Rechristianization

I’ve been thinking even more than usual over the last few days about ‘reconfessionalization’ and ‘confessional Anglican,’ both what we mean by them and what their promise for our church might be. Draw Near With Faith is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber…

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a year ago · 25 likes · 14 comments · Ben Crosby

Mainline churches grew by going where people were—once rural America. But as populations shifted to cities and suburbs, many denominations failed to follow. The result: underrepresentation in population-dense areas, continued decline, and missed opportunities. The challenge now isn’t just survival—it’s whether churches will realign resources to reach people where they actually live today.

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Mainline Churches Aren’t Where the People Are

What if the biggest problem facing Mainline churches isn’t theology, attendance, or even leadership—but geography?

What if, quite simply, we’re not where the people are anymore?

I really need to write something up about Andrew Root’s new book Baal and the gods of More plus of course my podcast partner ’s new release on Anne Boleyn: Reputation, Revolution, Religion, and the Queen who Changed History.

But in the meantime, I just finished a short but important book from United Methodist leader that’s worth highlighting:

An Aura of Hope: United Methodism’s Next Chapter in the United States.

I won’t get into the whole book here—I have an interview scheduled with him for the podcast—but there was one piece of data that stuck with me.1

How Methodism Grew (and Why That Matters)

Weems notes that part of what fueled early Methodist growth in America was Francis Asbury’s commitment to send preachers to where people actually were.

At the time, that meant rural America.

Which is why, to this day, you see Methodist churches scattered across small towns all over the country.

But here’s the problem:

The population has shifted.

And now, the counties where two-thirds of Americans live have the fewest United Methodist churches.

A Problem Bigger Than One Denomination

This hits close to home for me.

Right now, I’m living in two worlds—attending a UMC church, but ordained in and still very connected to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

And as the data shows, the Disciples aren’t far behind. We’re also underrepresented in high-population areas.

Which makes sense historically. Like Methodists, Restoration Movement2 churches were highly evangelistic—planting churches where people were at the time: rural communities.

The problem is, we haven’t followed people as they’ve moved.

Why This Matters

Looking at Weems’ data, it’s not surprising that Mainline Protestantism has struggled while non-denominational churches have held steady or grown.

Outside of Black Protestant churches, non-denoms are most widely represented in population-dense counties.

That’s where the people are.

And as Weems puts it:

“from the 1970s onward, the misalignment of denominational efforts with the new demographic realities led to immediate and continuing decline.”3

In other words, we’re not where we need to be.

UMC churches, he notes, are “least represented among the populations we most seek to reach.”

A Hard but Practical Solution

So what can be done?

Weems’ answer is pretty straightforward: reallocate resources.

That likely means fewer resources going to struggling churches—and more investment in larger churches located in population-dense areas.

That’s not a new idea.

What’s compelling is the data behind it: larger churches are simply more likely to reach more people.

If we’re serious about engaging unchurched communities, we have to think strategically about where and how we invest.

And this isn’t just about growing white, suburban churches.

Those same population-dense areas are also where younger and more diverse populations live.

The Reality Check

Of course, this is much easier said than done.

It’s likely more feasible in a connectional system like the UMC than in a congregational one like the Disciples of Christ.

And none of this is to say small-town churches can’t be vital.

Last summer I heard from someone at a small DOC church in tiny Frankford, Missouri—stories of baptisms, growing children’s ministry, and real community impact.

Those stories matter.

But the broader reality still holds.

As Ryan Burge has pointed out elsewhere: if we could take all those rural church buildings and drop them into major cities, we probably would.

Of course, we can’t.

So the question becomes: what can we do?

Two Takeaways

First, Mainline leaders should give ourselves some grace.

A significant portion of Mainline decline is tied to demographic shifts outside our control.

But second—and this is harder—we’ve done a poor job adapting to those shifts.

As Burge and others have shown, moving is one of the biggest factors in people leaving church.

And when they finally consider returning to church in their new community…

What do they find?

Non-denominational churches.

Not Mainline ones.

Final Thought

For anyone who cares about the future of the UMC—or the Mainline more broadly—Weems’ book is worth your time.

Because this isn’t just about decline.

It’s about alignment.

Methodism (and the Restoration movement) grew because it went where people were. The question now is whether the Mainline is willing to do the same again.

Not in theory.
In practice.

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Friday evening, around 11:30 p.m.—23:30 in hospital time—I got a page.

I called back, and the nurse said, “She could benefit from a visit, if you have time. Now or later.”

It was the middle of the night. I had just fallen asleep.

But this was a new hospital—shorter drive, better compensation—and and it felt easier than it might have at another hospital. I grabbed my pillow, headed in, and planned to sleep in the on-call room after.

Around midnight, I entered the patient’s room.

An older woman lay in bed, clearly uncomfortable—shifting, fidgeting, groaning, trying to find relief.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to do.

I offered a few quiet, empathic words; “I’m sorry,” “You’re really struggling.” She grimaced in response.

It didn’t feel like a moment for conversation—I was hoping to help her drift off to sleep. So I did what I often do when I don’t know what else to do.

I sat in the silence.
I prayed.
I trusted that the Spirit was at work.

And, I tried something new.

Because it was early Holy Saturday, I read only the four Gospel accounts of the in-between time—after Jesus’ death, before the resurrection.

There’s not much there. Just fragments. Silence, mostly.

Joseph of Arimathea “went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body” (Mark 15:43).
They “wrapped it in linen” (Matthew 27:59).
They “laid him in a tomb cut in stone” (Luke 23:53).
A stone was rolled in front (Mark 15:46).
”Because it was the Jewish day of Preparation… the tomb was nearby.” (John 19:42)

That’s it.

No triumph, no resolution; just burial, stillness, and waiting.

Earlier that week, I had read a reflection from chaplain and author —someone who has become, at least from a distance, a sort of mentor to me in this work.

Her writing has a way of naming what I often experience but don’t yet have language for.

In that post, she wrote:

“That Jesus returned from death changed and carrying his wounds as a divine wounded healer teaches us that discipleship requires the courage to see and witness the wounds of others as well as our own. It is through this honest witnessing of suffering rather than ignoring it that individuals find the strength to walk out of their own hidden rooms to move past their own Holy Saturday.”

That’s what I was trying to do that night—to see and witness her wounds.

But I’d nuance it just a bit.

I’m not sure it’s our honest witnessing that gives us the strength to walk out.

I think it’s the One who walked out.

Andrew Root, in Evangelism in the Age of Despair, puts it this way:

“The heart of evangelism is consolation.”

To follow Jesus is to follow him to the cross—to enter the sorrow of another and remain there.

“It seems like you’re carrying quite a load,” Root writes, is the first step.

Not fixing.
Not solving.
Not producing an outcome.

Just entering the sorrow.

That’s what I was doing in that hospital room.

It was not particularly impressive. It was not strategic. My impact was not even especially clear in the moment.1

I was just sitting, praying and being present—trusting in the Spirit’s presence.

One of the gifts of chaplaincy is this:

Sometimes I can recognize when Jesus shows up—usually after the fact. Even in a secular age that often breeds doubt. And slowly, I’m learning this: my work isn’t to produce anything.

Evangelism isn’t something we manufacture.

Which brings me back to Holy Saturday.

I suspect most of our lives are lived in Holy Saturday—
in the space between death and resurrection.

Between what has been lost
and what has not yet been restored.

We live in the quiet of Luke 23:56—resting, waiting, wondering what’s next.2

The mistake we often make is this:

We think the miracle depends on us.

That if we say the right thing, do the right thing, act at the right moment—we can bring resurrection.

But resurrection is not our work, it’s God’s work.

Our work is presence. Or, as Root says in another book, to bear witness a different realm and reality—the kingdom of God.

So much of following Jesus is simply this:

To sit in the silence.
To witness the wounds.
To remain in the in-between.

And to trust that even when we cannot see it—
God is still at work.

Just like that first Holy Saturday

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After years of uncertainty about hospital chaplaincy, I’ve come to see it clearly: I am not just offering presence—I am proclaiming good news. Again and again, I meet people hungry for forgiveness. In hospital rooms, at the edge of life and death, I am reminded that I am still a minister of the gospel.

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More Than a Chaplain

For someone who presumes himself to be smart, I can be pretty stupid sometimes.

My journey into hospital chaplaincy began in 2014. I was the solo pastor of a small, aging church that had high expectations of pastoral care from their minister. Recognizing my own inexperience, I suggested I complete a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) at a local hospital.

They liked the idea.

So I worked six days a week, splitting my time between church and hospital—about 24 hours a week at each site. It was intense. The Monday after my unit ended, I was back at that same hospital having my appendix removed.

As they say in CPE: “The body keeps the score.”

My next venture into chaplaincy was in 2021. About three years into a new church start—and having slogged through the brutality of Covid, BLM, and the rest of 2020—I did the math and realized I needed to supplement my pastoral income.

Never quite getting the timing right, my second stint in CPE began in the summer, just before the brutal “second wave” of Covid. The church plant ended—perhaps mercifully—that spring. Even working only 28 hours a week in the hospital, the crush of Covid patients was brutal and exhausting.

Embarrassingly, through all that training, I still wasn’t sure it was for me.

I felt deeply called to the church (I still do). I carried this foolish notion that I wasn’t making much of a difference. I didn’t fully connect what I was doing in hospital rooms with my ministerial calling as a pastor.

After CPE, I returned to parish ministry. Then I worked a couple years in the social service sector. Neither role quite landed. So when the opportunity came to shift again—taking a mix of part-time roles, one of which included on-call chaplaincy—I took it.

Around that same time, I read Walk with Me, a sort-of memoir by about her experience in hospital chaplaincy. Something clicked.

Until then, I had subconsciously thought of chaplains as short-term religious therapists—there to offer a little prayer, a little comfort, a little presence in a crisis.

But reading her book, I realized something obvious and yet profound:

Chaplains, just like parish pastors, are ministers of word and sacrament.

Subtle but Enduring

While she shares gripping stories, mine tend to be quieter. Subtle. Enduring.

I am rarely “preaching a sermon.” And yet I often recognize that I am unmistakably sharing the gospel.

Just yesterday, I told a young man:

“God loves you. God forgives you. Receive God’s forgiveness for yourself.”

Sometimes I wonder if patients’ honesty is simply the result of being “hopped up on pain meds,” as a nurse once commented—or whether it’s something deeper. I’d like to believe it’s the latter. Hospitals, I think, force people to confront mortality in a way few other places do.

And in that confrontation, something opens.

I’m reminded of words attributed to Pope Francis—not a viral quote, but a verified one from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops:

“I feel in my heart the ‘blessing’ that is hidden within frailty, because it is precisely in these moments that we learn even more to trust in the Lord; at the same time, I thank God for giving me the opportunity to share in body and spirit the condition of so many sick and suffering people.”

Hospitals are liminal spaces—fixed between life and death. Human beings enter through birth and depart through death, often within the same walls and at the same time.

Perhaps that’s why, in this secular world where we’ve neutered nearly every aspect of the divine from daily life, I find myself drawn to crisis. I enter rooms aware that I am stepping onto holy ground.

A Title That Fits

I’ve grown to appreciate the title chaplain.

It feels less threatening than “pastor.” It allows me to honor my calling and use my degrees, while still wearing my faith openly. When I talk with nurses and staff, I make religious comments. I’m the chaplain—I can get away with it.

Before entering a difficult room, I’ll say to a nurse, “Pray for me.” Sometimes to lighten the mood. Sometimes to simply normalize talking about faith in a clinical environment.

But the deeper realization is this:

More than a chaplain, I am an evangelist.

I am sharing good news again and again.

“May I pray for you?”
“God loves you.”
“God forgives you.”
“God’s peace be with you.”

It may be anecdotal, but as a chaplain I keep encountering the same reality: people are hungry for forgiveness. Many have tried to persuade themselves they don’t need it. The effort itself seems to deepen the burden they carry.

I am a minister of the gospel—in word, and sometimes in sacrament.

I still hope that someday an opportunity may arise to serve again in a church in a professional capacity.

But for now, I am grateful.

Grateful that in hospital rooms, at the edge of life and death, I get to share the good news of God’s love.

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John 14:6 may not primarily be a statement about who gets into heaven, but about where life actually is. In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ claim to be “the way, the truth, and the life” is ontological before it is soteriological. All salvation is Christological in origin — if anyone comes to the Father, it is by Christ. But that does not automatically define the final scope of who may participate in that salvation. This reading preserves the strength of the text while allowing for a hopeful soteriology.

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What if you can’t accept that 90% of the world is going to hell?

The other night, I was in a church small group and the discussion moved to John 14:6.

Now, it’s important to note that in this church, I don’t serve in a pastoral role. While members of the group know I serve as a hospital chaplain and I think some may know that I am ordained or have served in pastoral roles before, I really try hard to just be a member of the group. Especially when complicated or potentially divisive topics come up, I try to be another voice, not an authoritative one.

I even have awkward conversations at times with pastoral staff about titles. I’ll refer to them as “Pastor Bill,” but I don’t want them referring to me as “Pastor Loren.” For me, at least, the title of pastor represents spiritual authority. In that church, I don’t hold that authority. I am submitting to theirs.

So back to John 14:6.

One week, a pastor preached about John 14:6, heaven, and inclusion. Later that week, the topic came up in small group. When the question was posed about what we had been taught about that verse — or who would be in heaven — my mind went immediately back to my formative years as an Independent Baptist, especially my time at Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Missouri (now Mission University).

Two memories stand out.

The first was a freshman missions class taught by Professor Lingo. He challenged us with a blunt question: would “unreached people groups” who have never heard about Jesus still go to hell?

His answer was unambiguously yes.

The reasoning went something like this: if you tell them about Jesus and they reject him, you’ve now sealed their fate. Better ignorance than rejection I guess?

The second memory was when I realized the math of fundamentalist Christianity was something I could not accept.

We were taught that about 33% of the world identified as “Christian,” though many of those were Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Pentecostal, or what I would later become — Mainline Protestant. Missionaries from our Baptist circles regularly went to heavily Catholic or Orthodox countries assuming there were no “gospel preaching churches” there. Chapel speakers often preached evangelistic sermons assuming not everyone in the room was even saved.

Eventually, the equation formed in my mind.

If our narrow theological lane was correct, then something like 90% of the world was headed for hell.

I couldn’t accept those numbers.

That realization eventually led me into the mainline world, into seminary, and toward a more progressive version of Christianity. And yet, even as I’ve discovered the limitations of progressive theology, I still wrestle with how to interpret texts like John 14:6 without either reverting to my old framework or dismissing the text entirely.

To be honest, I’ve found that many progressive interpretations of the verse feel too thin. One I heard recently suggested Jesus was simply saying we should “be like him and love others.”1 But to me that doesn’t really take the text seriously.

Jesus does say, in Greek, ego eimi — “I am.” And John does record him saying he is “the way, the truth, and the life.”

So the other night, lying awake and ruminating, I grabbed my phone and opened ChatGPT. I often use it as a thinking partner when I’m trying to pressure-test an idea.

And I wondered:

What if John 14:6 is not primarily a soteriological claim — about who gets saved — but an ontological one?

An Ontological Reading of John 14:6

In the Gospel of John, Jesus is not introduced as a religious option among many. He is the Logos — the one through whom all things were made (1:3), in whom is life (1:4), the true light that enlightens everyone (1:9).

That matters.

John 14:6 is one of the great “I am” statements in John’s Gospel — and those are not casual metaphors. Many scholars recognize them as echoing God’s self-revelation to Moses in Exodus 3. When Jesus says “I am,” Jesus is making a theological claim about divine identity.

So when Jesus says:

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

He is not first giving directions to heaven.

He is identifying himself as:

• the embodied access to the Father

• the unveiling of divine reality

• the very life of God made present

Even the Greek of “except through me” (εἰ μὴ δι’ ἐμοῦ) can be rendered quite literally as “if not by me.” Grammatically, it emphasizes mediation.

It does not say, “Only this group will be saved.”

It says, “There is no coming to the Father if not through me.”

That is a claim about source.

If anyone comes to God — anywhere, at any time — it is by Christ.

All salvation is Christological in origin.

That is explicit.

What it does not explicitly define is the final scope of who may participate in that salvation.

And I think that distinction matters.

A Hopeful Soteriology

This is where something often called “hopeful universalism” becomes relevant. Chat GPT tells me this is associated most famously with Hans Urs von Balthasar. Hopeful universalism does not assert that all will certainly be saved. It says we may hope for the salvation of all because Christ’s saving work is universal in mediation and intent.

There is no salvation apart from Christ.

But Christ may not be absent where he is unrecognized.

That preserves the force of John 14:6.

It intensifies Christ’s centrality.

It simply refuses to turn the verse into a census.

Christ is the ontological center through whom any salvation that occurs — occurs.

Judgment passages in John can still stand. Light exposes. Law reveals. But Christ is the remedy and the fulfillment.

This reading keeps the text strong without returning to the theological math problem that once troubled me.

It locates life.

It does not calculate percentages.

A Final Word

I’m still thinking about all of this.

I don’t offer it as a settled conclusion or a new doctrinal hill to die on. Part of what pushed me here was simply lying awake, wrestling with the text, and then grabbing my phone to use ChatGPT as a thinking partner to pressure-test ideas. For me, that wasn’t outsourcing theology — it was interrogating my assumptions.

I’m not certain.

I don’t know the final shape of salvation. I don’t pretend to see the full scope of Christ’s work. But this ontological reading of John 14:6 — this idea that the verse locates the source of life rather than drawing a tight perimeter around heaven — feels closer.

But, what I do think is:

It keeps Christ central.

It keeps the text serious.

And it leaves room for hope.

I welcome pushback, refinement, and conversation. I’m still learning.

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In the temptation narrative, Jesus refuses to prove himself through spectacle or self-assertion. Like Elvis never needing to call himself the “King of Rock & Roll,” Jesus doesn’t loudly declare his divinity—he embodies it. The Gospels don’t offer anxious self-promotion but invitation and revelation. If someone has to constantly announce they’re the GOAT, they probably aren’t—and Jesus didn’t need to.

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It’s the first Sunday in Lent, and in many churches the lectionary gives us the temptation of Christ from one of the Synoptic Gospels.

This year I heard a strong sermon on Luke’s account. My pastor noted how Jesus resisted the temptations of control, domination, and spectacle. The devil’s offers weren’t random. They were invitations to seize power, prove himself, and shortcut suffering.

Jesus refused.

After church, my family headed to lunch at Chuy’s—a Tex-Mex restaurant nearby so we could stay close and pick up my daughter returning from a youth retreat. I’d never been there before, but walking in, I immediately noticed the Elvis décor. An artistic piece near the entrance. Menu items like The King’s Memorial Combo. I ordered the Famous Steak Burrito, though I’ll admit I was tempted by the King.

And then a random thought hit me:

Did Elvis call himself the King of Rock & Roll—or was that title given to him?

A few days earlier I had read one of those Substack essays from someone who I only know how to refer to as an “exvangelical anti-apologist.” The argument was predictable: Jesus never explicitly claimed to be God. The Gospel words can’t all be traced back to him. Cue the usual references to the Jesus Seminar.1

That line of thinking was rattling around in my head during the sermon when something clicked.

In Luke’s temptation account, the devil keeps pressing Jesus: “If you are the Son of God…”

Prove it.
Demonstrate it.
Perform it.

But Jesus doesn’t take the bait.

My pastor observed that Jesus felt no need to justify himself. He was secure in his belovedness within God. There was no anxiety in him. No need to perform divinity on demand.

Back at the restaurant, waiting for my food, I looked it up. Sure enough, the title “King of Rock & Roll” was reportedly given to Elvis in 1956 by a reporter, Bea Ramirez. And in 1969 Presley himself deflected the title, referring to Fats Domino as the “real king.”

Elvis didn’t need to call himself king.

And that reminded me of Jesus’ words in Mark 10:

“Why do you call me good? No one is good—except God alone.”

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus regularly deflects premature or triumphal titles. When Peter confesses him as the Christ, Jesus immediately begins speaking of suffering—and when Peter resists that path, Jesus rebukes him: “Get behind me, Satan” (Mark 8:33). When crowds try to make him king by force, he withdraws (John 6:15). When demons identify him publicly, he silences them (Mark 1:34). When asked for a sign, he refuses to perform on demand (Matthew 12:38–39).

He redirects. He questions. He reframes.

Not because he isn’t who the church confesses him to be.

But because the recognition must emerge in the reader (or hearer).2

The devil wanted spectacle.
His critics want explicit self-assertion.
Modern readers want airtight transcripts.

But the Gospels don’t operate that way.

They invite.

They provoke.

They reveal—if you have eyes to see.

And that’s why I find those tired “Jesus never claimed…” arguments so elementary. They assume that truth only counts if it’s loudly self-declared.

But if I’ve learned anything in life, it’s this: anyone who has to constantly announce they’re the GOAT probably isn’t.

The King of Rock & Roll didn’t need to say it.

And the King of the universe didn’t either.

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I invited one friend back to church using gentle “I” statements, and they showed up. I invited another person at my son’s soccer practice way too strongly, and they disappeared. These two moments reminded me that evangelism works best through presence, patience, and trust—not pressure.

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Part 3 of my series on Evangelism, MI, and Questioning People’s Answers

If Parts 1 and 2 of this series (see below) explored frameworks—Keller’s idea of “questioning people’s answers” and MI’s posture of curiosity and presence—this installment is simply about the awkwardness of trying to live it out in real life.

And a reminder for context: I’m not pastoring a church right now. I attend as a regular congregant. Which means when I invite somebody to church, it’s not a pastoral duty—it’s just me trying to be a normal Christian who believes church matters.

The Invitation I Thought I Messed Up (But Apparently Didn’t)

A friend of mine hadn’t been to church in a while. Life had piled up, and church quietly slipped into the background. Something kept nudging me to reach out, but I didn’t want it to sound like:

• “You should really come back…”

• “You need this…”

• “Your life will improve if you…”

So I used “I” statements instead:

• “I’ve missed seeing you there.”

• “I’m obviously biased towards church.”

• “I really think church matters.”

All “I statements.” All relationship-based. No pressure.

The friend even commented on some of the things they didn’t like about church.

“I hear you,” I said.

Honestly? I thought I bungled the conversation. I even said something like, “I hope I’m not coming on too strong—I don’t want this to feel weird.” Smooth.

But then guess who I saw the next Sunday?

My friend.

Not because I had the perfect words.
Not because I argued them into it.
Not because I solved their spiritual ambivalence.

I’d like to think they showed up because a gentle, relational, honest invitation nudged something that was already inside them.

That’s MI.
And it’s evangelism—not as selling, but as presence.

And Then… the Invitation I Absolutely Botched

Now for the opposite story.

I was at my son’s soccer practice, reading Jonathan Haidt’s book. A woman noticed it and we chatted. I told her I was reading it for my daughter’s school group and said, “You can have it when I finish it next week!”

Totally normal interaction.

Except the next week, I forgot the book.

And instead of just apologizing, her husband approached me and asked about it—and suddenly I transformed into an overeager Christian:

• I asked for his number.

• I texted him a Substack post I’d written about the book.

• And THEN I added:
  “Just a heads up—it gets kind of religious at the end. But hey, we’re in a church gym, so that’s probably okay.”

Reader—understand this—it was not okay.

I haven’t seen them since.

I blew the moment by:

• coming on too strong

• moving faster than the relationship allowed

• assuming openness that wasn’t there

• forgetting the book entirely

• and trying to give away yet another book that is now sitting abandoned in my car

This is evangelism when enthusiasm outruns trust.
It’s also a good reminder that “too much too fast” rarely bears fruit.

What These Two Moments Teach Me

1. Presence > persuasion.

2. “I” statements land better than “you” statements.

3. Relational trust builds slow—don’t sprint ahead of it.

Andrew Root is right: evangelism shaped by consolation is not about controlling an outcome. It’s about being with someone in ways that leave room for the Spirit to move.

Sometimes that movement looks like a friend showing up on Sunday.
Sometimes it looks like learning to leave a soccer-practice couple alone.
Sometimes it looks like letting a book sit in your car until the right moment actually comes.

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Case Study 1: The Polyamory Conversation

A few months ago in a church small group, someone shared that a friend in a troubled marriage was considering polyamory as a solution. The friend telling the story was confused and distressed.

Predictably, someone else in the group immediately pushed back — not against the polyamory itself, but against the very idea that we should even consider whether polyamory might be wrong. To them, discerning moral choices at all felt inappropriate or judgmental.

This is the cultural conflict moment Smith and Root describe — no one should ever morally judge another’s actions. But it’s also a moment perfectly suited for MI.

Because beneath the surface of “I’m considering polyamory” could be something like:

“My marriage is a wreck and I don’t know what else to do.”

Here’s how that might play out in a pastoral MI posture:

Friend: “I’m thinking about opening the marriage might help, but honestly… it might make it even more chaotic.”

You: “It sounds like you were hoping this would fix something, but instead you’re feeling even more overwhelmed.”

Friend: “Exactly. I am trying to make the relationship work. I don’t know what else to do.”

You: “What part of this feels hardest right now?”

Friend: “Honestly? Feeling like I’m losing myself. And feeling like nothing’s getting better.”

You: “That’s very brave of you to name that.”

Friend: “So what am I supposed to do? Everyone keeps telling me not to judge myself, to ‘explore what feels right.’ But I feel worse than before.”

At this point, most people are tempted to give advice — sometimes very strong advice. But MI encourages you instead to reflect the obvious inner conflict, Keller-style “questioning their answers”:

You: “So part of you wanted healing… and part of you is realizing this isn’t actually leading toward healing.”

Friend: “…Yeah. That’s it.”

Now the door is open to gentle pastoral guidance — not force, not moralizing, but accompaniment:

You: “Sometimes when we reach this point in life — when our own solutions aren’t working — it can help to consider surrendering the situation to something bigger than ourselves.”

At that point — and only then — comes the gentle pastoral invitation:

• “Have you considered telling God how lost you are and asking God what to do?

• “What do you think the Bible might offer here?”

• “What might Jesus be inviting you toward?”

Not pressure.
Not judgment.
Not moralizing.

Just presence — which is exactly what Root argues is where Jesus meets people.

Even if they respond: “I don’t think a 2,000-year-old book can help.”

You still respond: “I can see why you’d feel that way. No matter what, I’m here with you.”

That’s evangelism as consolation — not control.

Case Study 2: Youth Sports as a Functional Religion

Smith and Root observe that youth sports have become a kind of moral good — essentially a rival religion. As a dad at soccer practice reading theology books, I often overhear parents talk endlessly about busyness, schedules, and what sounds to me like burnout.

And because we don’t want to come across judgy, Smith says pastors are often reduced to saying, “We’ve missed you — hope all is well.”

But pastoring demands something more — and frankly something harder — because as Root notes in his books, we’re pressured to produce results fast. But, what if we resisted that pressure and instead opted for a patient MI approach?

Instead of “Hope all is well,” an MI-shaped approach begins with:
“I’d like to hear how things are.”

If a pastor could get the parent to slow down for a real conversation, nine times out of ten I bet they’d eventually say:

“Wow… I’m just so busy.”

And that’s the moment where an MI-shaped approach gives the pastor something to work with—not a lecture, not judgment, but gentle reflection:

Pastor: “So… you’re saying things are really busy—and I can hear the weariness in your voice as you say that.”

Parent: “Wow, you’re right. I didn’t even realize how tired I sounded.”

Pastor: “It sounds like you’ve been running on empty for a while.”

Parent: “Yeah. I mean, we’re in three sports right now. Practices every night. Tournaments on weekends. I barely know what day it is.”

Pastor: “What part of all this feels most heavy to you right now?”

Parent: “The feeling that we’re doing all this for the kids, but no one’s actually… happy. They’re stressed. I’m stressed. We’re all exhausted.”

Pastor: “It takes courage to admit that. A lot of parents feel the same way but rarely say it.”

Parent: “Yeah… it’s hard to say out loud.”

Pastor: “So part of you wants to give your kids opportunities—and part of you is wondering whether this pace is actually good for any of you.”

Parent: “That’s exactly it.”

Pastor (summary + gentle invitation): “So you love your kids, you want what’s best for them, but something about this rhythm feels off. It sounds like you’re trying to figure out what a healthier life might look like for your family.”

Parent: “…Yeah. I think I am.”

And here comes the pastoral “I wonder…” — gentle, not pushy, MI with a Gospel imagination:

Pastor: “I wonder if some time in worship or prayer — especially as we move into Advent — might give you the clarity and grounding you’ve been craving. Advent’s rhythms and rituals really do create space to reconsider what matters.”

This is where Keller’s “question their answers,” MI’s evocation, and Root’s consolational presence all converge — not pressure, but invitation.

So Why Does This Matter for Evangelism?

Because many Christians — especially in Mainline traditions — feel embarrassed, uncertain, or awkward about sharing Jesus.

But here’s the truth:

If we truly believe the Gospel matters and that Jesus really transforms lives, then we can approach evangelism with patience, relational presence, and deep listening. (And I realize that within Mainline circles, not everyone actually holds this conviction — which, honestly, is part of the problem. If we’re not sure the Gospel is transformative, then evangelism becomes incoherent by definition.)

We don’t have to argue anyone into faith.
We don’t have to win.
We don’t have to pressure.

We simply help people hear themselves, question their answers, and gently offer Jesus as the one who meets them in the tension they’re naming.

It’s Keller’s insight.
It’s MI’s posture.
It’s Root’s consolational evangelism.

And maybe — just maybe — it’s a way forward in a culture exhausted by pressure, individualism, and endless self-invention.

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Twenty-five years ago, I walked up to a stranger and asked if they knew the Ten Commandments. I had been trained to believe this was evangelism. Today, that approach wouldn’t just fall flat—it would be incomprehensible. Something profound has changed, and we’re all feeling it: the old scripts no longer make sense in our secular age.

I was recently reading the late Tim Keller’s book How to Reach the West. In the book, Keller makes a simple but rather profound observation. He writes:

“Helping non-Christians recognize they have a problem that requires salvation will mean questioning people’s answers… by ‘people’s answers,’ we mean the working answers to the big questions of life that everyone must have” (17).

Notice what Keller is saying here: we need to answer people’s answers with questions.

This is especially relevant given that evangelism has been a bugaboo in Mainline Protestantism for decades — maybe even the central existential crisis of the whole project — that Mainline Protestantism isn’t sure there is anything uniquely transformative about the Gospel.

Reading Christian Smith’s Why Religion Went Obsolete, he highlights Jay Demerath’s claim that liberal Protestantism’s values — individualism, pluralism, emancipation, tolerance, free inquiry, and the authority of experience — essentially made liberal Protestantism irrelevant (102).

Andrew Root spends six volumes in his Ministry in a Secular Age series making a similar point theologically. Smith summarizes it well:

“When religion becomes a ‘concept’… rather than one’s identity, life, and salvation, it generates less commitment and investment” (116).

And bluntly:

“One of the theological sources of the moralization of religion is a certain stream of nineteenth-century Protestant theological liberalism” (108).

We all know the cultural zeitgeist has shifted. Smith lists example after example, and we all feel it intuitively.

The obvious implication:

Twenty-five years ago, you could ask someone if they’d broken the Ten Commandments.

Today, that approach would NEVER work.

So what might work instead?

Keller’s phrase — “questioning their answers” — immediately made me think of Motivational Interviewing.

Motivational Interviewing (MI): A Culturally Appropriate Tool

Here’s how Wikipedia defines MI:

“A directive, client-centered counseling style for eliciting behavior change by helping clients explore and resolve ambivalence… MI is defined not by technique but by its spirit as a facilitative style for interpersonal relationship.”

In short:

MI is collaborative, relational, and designed to help people uncover their own motivations for change.

Not convincing.
Not lecturing.
Not debating.
Not pressuring.

Just helping someone hear what’s happening inside them.

MI uses four core skills — OARS:

O – Open-Ended Questions
“What would you like to see different?”

A – Affirmations
“You’ve clearly put a lot of thought into this.”

R – Reflective Listening
“It sounds like you’re feeling torn between ___ and ___.”

S – Summaries
“So it sounds like you care about X, you’re tired of Y, and you’re wondering if Z might help. Did I get that right?”

The spirit of MI rests on two convictions:

• Autonomy — people change because they choose to

• Evocation — people already have seeds of change inside them

Of course, these principles don’t align perfectly with Christian theology. Ultimately, we don’t believe people change purely by self-determination, or that goodness simply lies dormant inside us waiting to be awakened.

But MI gives us helpful language for what Christians have always called the work of the Holy Spirit — that quiet prompting, that movement in the human heart, that nudge toward truth and honesty. MI’s language isn’t theological, but it can help us name what God is already doing in people. Which is why MI reminded me not only of Keller, but of Andrew Root.

Keller, MI, and Root Are All Saying the Same Thing

Here’s the connection:

Keller: Question their answers.
MI: Help them explore their ambivalence.
Root: Evangelism is consolation — sitting with people in their sorrow, not controlling them.

Root writes in Evangelism in the Age of Despair:

“Evangelism… is not bound in what we do but in who we can be for our neighbor and how we can be with them. Period. To console is never to control another but instead to share in their sorrow” (22).

That might as well be a paraphrase of MI.

And theologically, we’d say that the “decision to change” — the turning — is the work of the Holy Spirit. MI doesn’t replace the Spirit; it simply creates a human posture where the Spirit can be heard.

Next: What This Actually Looks Like in Real Life

This is all lovely in theory.
But how does MI-shaped evangelism look in practice?

In Part 2, I’ll walk through two real-life examples — one involving a friend considering polyamory, and the other involving youth sports as a rival religion — and show how Keller, MI, and Root converge in a pastoral conversation.

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Too often, people think of the church—or organized religion—as a box turned upside down: a structure with its lid sealed shut, keeping everything inside contained and everyone outside excluded. But the church was never meant to be a closed box. It’s meant to be a container with an open top—something that can hold and shape what’s inside while remaining open to what’s above, to God’s Spirit, and accessible to those outside it.

James Fowler’s Stages of Faith outlines how people’s spiritual understanding evolves over a lifetime, from Primal Faith in early childhood to Conjunctive Faith in adulthood. Each stage reflects a deepening awareness of faith shaped by cognitive growth, emotional maturity, and life experience.

I somehow ended up with two copies of Fowler’s book, and when I first read it several years ago, it was both enlightening and instructive. But in the time since—especially as others have written their own “stages” frameworks, like Brian McLaren—I’ve noticed an assumption creeping into progressive Christianity: that healthy spirituality inevitably means leaving the institution of religion altogether.

I’ve written before about how, in my view, progressive Christianity often moves people out of church. I won’t repeat those arguments here (I’ve linked a few related posts below, including one that’s been read over 17,000 times). The point is this: we’ve misunderstood what Christianity—or “organized religion”—was meant to be about.

In Hunting Magic Eels, Richard Beck writes that “the ultimate test of enchantment” is “how we discern the spirits—sacrificial love, giving yourself for others” (225). Beck isn’t explicitly talking about organized Christianity, but it’s clear that this “enchantment” of self-giving love is what he has in mind. He warns that when enchantment becomes something we choose for ourselves, it turns “narcissistic” (214). When “we’re baptizing everything we already think and believe,” Beck says, “we’re worshiping ourselves rather than God” (220).

Andrew Root makes a similar point in Evangelism in the Age of Despair, calling it “demonic” to remain closed off, sitting alone within our pain and sorrow. In The Church in an Age of Secular Mysticism, he contrasts that isolation with “the mysticism of confession and surrender,” which “places the self in a position of reception. Only in a life of reception can the immanent frame be opened and the self made attentive to the arriving of revelation” (216).

Sticking within my metaphor, Root is saying two important things: first, the top of the box needs to stay open; and second, confession and surrender—while not limited to institutional religion—find their shape and rhythm in the life of the church. Christianity, in this sense, provides the framework, or “box,” that helps us keep the lid open.

It’s when we assume we can close up the lid upon ourselves that we get in trouble. As Root puts it elsewhere, “Faith rests solely and only in a life of reception, in an openness to receive. Faith is only and finally a gift; faith can only be received” (214).

Maybe this is the challenge of what Root calls the “immanent frame.” We’ve flipped the box over, assuming that faith is what happens only beneath the lid—what we can see, measure, or control. But perhaps what we need now is to flip the box back right side up: to rediscover Christianity as a vessel, not a vault. A framework that offers shape without sealing us off. Boundaries that protect us while keeping us open to the Divine.

The church was never meant to be a lid—it was always meant to be a space for grace.

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into Letting Go