As I began to read Hearing the Call, a collection of Essays by Nicholas Wolterstorff, I came across a
paragraph that struck me as the description of the Christian life. Over the past 5 or so years, I have been going through a transformation. I have been going from pride to fall, from narrow to open, from arrogant to convicted, from teenage to adulthood in my Christian walk. The paragraph comes in story form as Wolterstorff depicts his life in light of grace that shaped his life. He is talking about Calvin College and it being grace in his life:
Here too nobody was offering evidences for the truth of Christianity, arguments for the inspiration of Scripture, proofsfor the resurrection of Jesus, best explanation accounts of Christian faith. the challenge set before us was to interpret the world, culture, and society in the light of Scripture — to describe how things look when seen in Christian perspective, to say how they appear when the light of the gospel is shed on them (Wolterstorff, Hearing the Call, 2011, 10).
My immaturity in the faith has been maturing by going through the journey described above. This journey was one from proving Christianity was the best way of life to actually living as a part of God’s kingdom. The former is not a bad place to start, but I have to admit, it is only a starting point. The point of proving Christianity as the best way of life is not as major of a contribution to the world as it is to oneself. We feel as though we need to stand up for God to prove he exists. This may be the task for some, but it is majorly for getting use to being a Christian. We have to prove to ourselves that Christianity is the best way.
Going from this way of Christianity to the latter way has given me life. It allows me to both rest in Christ, yet work vigour sly for his kingdom. At this point we can “embody Christ in culture” (Wolterstorff, 9). The former way we are fighting with the world as we would envision “aliens and strangers” to do (1 Peter 2:11). In the latter way we have a chance to form the world from within it. We live as a part of the world and yet shed the light of the gospel as we go. This is the true meaning of “whatever you do, in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col 3:17).
Now I go back to reading. I think I am going to like reading this guy’s thoughts.
For His Kingdom 