Move Toward the Mess: Curing Boredom in the Christian LifeSample

Jesus Wasn’t Boring

If Jesus had been boring, the Pharisees wouldn’t have had him killed. There would have been no crowds. There would have been no controversy surrounding His life. When He said to the disciples “Follow me,” they would have politely declined. The Gospels wouldn’t have been written because nobody would have remembered what He said or did.

But Jesus wasn’t boring. He was incredibly engaging. Thousands of people hung on His every word. He created tension in His talks that set people on edge. He said things that were unexpected. He spoke with authority and courage. Two thousand years later, His words are still reverberating throughout the world.

And it’s not just what He said. It’s what He did. He did crazy things, things that nobody else had ever done. Ever. These things left people dumbstruck and sometimes scared. “Who then is this, that he commands even wind and water, and they obey him?” What’s remarkable about all this is that we have a chance to live like Jesus did.

We’re not necessarily talking about miracles here. We’re talking about living in a way that is engaging, that is memorable, that makes a difference. You and I might never be involved in commanding the wind to stop. But we could be involved in building houses for homeless people to protect them from the wind. We might never raise someone from the dead. But we might be able to help somebody’s dead marriage come back to life. We might need more than five loaves and two fish to feed people. But we can still feed people in Jesus’ name. Figuring out how to live that way is what this book is about.

The reason I feel passionately about this is because my Christian life used to be boring. And that was the problem. It was my “Christian life,” separated from the rest of my life, so much so that it was like some sort of useless appendage. It was there, but it didn’t have much to do with anything outside of itself.

But something happened. God broke through the walls I’d built around my religious life. He did it through a man named Darrell Johnson, the high school pastor at the church I attended after I became a Christian. Darrell started showing up at my school. He came to my games and concerts. He refused to stay inside the church building. He got involved in my messy high school life. In doing so, he modeled for me what Jesus did two thousand years ago.