Rules Based Religion or Flourishing Based Religion

Laura Lacombe in her remarkable sermon on Sunday pointed out that one of the crucial ways you know that God is at work is by the flourishing that goes on. Peter went against his understanding of the Bible in order to follow the Spirit. And the proof was in the puddin’ (so to speak). This is how the book of Acts puts it:

So then, even to Gentiles God has granted repentance that leads to life. - Acts 11:18

Did you notice what the repentance of the Gentiles led to? LIFE! Flourishing, healing, hope, renewal, reconnection - these are all embedded in that word. They were not led into a repentance that produced rules or ‘nice people’ or acceptable habits.

What if, on the journey towards discovering God’s very best for us and for the world, we held loosely to all our rules and interpretations of the Bible and instead head fast to a vision of complete and total human flourishing? This is the picture that comes up so many times in the Bible. For example, Paul writes to the Corinthians about this deep longing we each have to “be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life” (2 Cor 5:4).

Of course this doesn’t mean that we suspend all morality - to the contrary. It means we are radically committed to the kind of life that Jesus lived, living for the good of the world (which includes ourselves) - because God is so very good and the life God brings is true and flourishing life.

What is the Spirit saying to you about shifting your focus onto this kind of life?