WEEK NINE PRESESSION NOTES -- PP. 227-240

EPILOGUE

1. Keller is hopeful that some readers will have read to this point in his book and are "ready to explore what it means to put ..... faith in Christ" (p. 227). He emphasizes to such readers that "motivations are always mixed" (p. 227). What is in context the importance of knowing that.
1. A person can't wait to seek God until his motives are wholly pure -- simply because they never are. One who is intrigued by the possibility of faith must begin at a real time and place, not an idealized time/place. 2. The appropriate motive for the Christian ultimately is (and will be as one grows in faith) to honor and serve God, not selfishly to have our needs met. But again, we start where we are -- with our own needs -- and grow to where we in time will be. Amazingly, wonderfully, when we do that our needs are infinitely more than met.


2. "The one thing we have no right to do is to respond to him (Jesus) mildly" (p. 230). Why? (Hint: The Bono interview on p. 229). Jesus has unquestionably changed the world and cannot be ignored. And his claims are so great that either he is God incarnate or a "nutcase." Either way, he must be encountered and dealt with as being very significant for everyman.

3. In talking about Flannery O'Connor and her view of Jesus, Keller asserts that there is "no use just saying you (believe) in Jesus unless you let that change your life and affect your view of everything" (p. 230). Relate that to the Bono interview just referenced and put its truth into your own words. (Hint: "Redemption is meaningless unless there is a cause for it in the acutal life we live ......... " (p. 230-231). Nominal Christianity (faith in name only) is dishonest. Again, the option to believe in him "mildly" is not an option. Yet that is what one does who says he believes in Jesus but whose life is unaffected by faith.

4. "Most important of all, remember that becoming a Christian is not simply a matter of ticking off a list of things to believe and do" (p. 232). What does he mean? What is the essential thing which transcends believing and doing? Christianity is finally a relationship with a living Redeemer. There are things one must do, but the defining element in Chrisitanity is knowing Jesus Christ.

5. To what question is Keller's answer, "I can't tell, and it doesn't matter." (p. 232)? Is someone who was raised in a Christian environment -- but who left it and is now returning to it -- becoming a Chrsitian or being restored as a Christian.

6. Why might even "diligent involvement in church and religion ..... need to be repented of ....." (p. 233)? If the motive for the involvement was to put God and others in our debt.

7. Explain the following statement: "Strong faith in a weak branch is fatally inferior to weak faith in a strong branch". (p. 234). To cling confidently to politics or money or anything which ultimately cannot sustain us is infinitely less valuable than clinging with weak faith to that whidh can sustain us in all things.

8. What relationship is there between Keller's assertion that "Hearts are unruly things" and his advice that we "join a body of believers" (p. 236)? Our lives are always a struggle. We battle ourselves trying to do the right and avoid the wrong. We do best when we are surrounded by others who are engaged in the same struggle.

9. It can actually be dangerous to urge someone to "seek out a church" to which to belong (p. 236-237) because (Keller believes) not all churches are faithful. But he does so urge because to him "there is no alternative" (p. 237). Why? We simply cannot live the Christian life without the encouragement of others. And the institution (not the best word) which provides the only environment where this can happen is the church.

10. What is meant by the phrase "the trauma of grace" (p. 237)? Grace understood creates a traumatic experience where we see our worth and our worthlessness in a single experience.