RevoDevos – Day 6

Saturday, June 28^th
Read: Galatians 2:17-21

“But if, in seeking to be justified in Christ, we Jews find ourselves also among the sinners, doesn’t that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not! If I rebuild what I destroyed, then I really would be a lawbreaker.
“For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the graces of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

Discuss your questions about this passage. Here are a few to help you get started:

“If I rebuild what I destroyed, then I really would be a lawbreaker.”- What does Paul mean by this? What did he destroy?

How do we die but still remain alive?

Note what some of your own questions are, and talk about them:

“If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.” –Emma Goldman

This is a revolution of rocks and trees; of people and places; of freedom and spirit. The text states that we are crucified. Why do we always want Jesus to come into our hearts if our whole life is crucified? The movement of Jesus followers is much larger—it is no longer about what we get out of it. We are swept up into a freedom song, and marching to a freedom beat that creation has been groaning. This isn’t just about trying to correct ourselves from sin— because sin has distorted everything on this planet. Even our societies and systems have become sick with sin. Where can we beat our breasts and ask God for mercy on the world’s behalf? We are swept up into the song that is reality at its most basic, and we are asked to dance. We are part of the Kingdom of God, a Kingdom of people and systems.

It’s not about us and our interactions with Jesus, but us as part of the movement of the Kingdom. This Kingdom has ways of doing justice, economics, poetry, languages, and whole systems of working, like our societies.

That is what being crucified with Christ is about. It’s no longer about ourselves or even how Jesus affects us— buts it’s about Jesus living through us, it’s about getting swept up into something larger. Also it’s about seeing that the movement and way of Jesus is good in and of itself. Jesus’ way isn’t good just because we gain from it— but it’s good because of the way of Jesus is. It’s good because of how we as humans are meant to live. Getting crucified into His Kingdom means that we, like Paul, live this life by faith in the Son of God.

Process:

– Where have we been too narrow in our thinking of the Kingdom of God? What broader things can we see it doing here?

– Have we as community been rebuilding anything that has been destroyed? What societal sins can we ask God for mercy for as community?