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One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow

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Scot's latest book is subtitled "Jesus Calls, We Follow." He reclaims Jesus' Kingdom message from modern disinterest and reveals its rightful glory and centrality for today's followers. I relished fresh challenges from Jesus' life and ministry in virtually every chapter. Some (out of context) snippets from several favorite chapters:

- Peace - "peace is a result and not a goal" and "anyone who loves others and serves others will bring peace into the world"
- Wisdom - "the most important posture for the one who wants to be wise is to be receptively reverent toward those who are wise"
- Church - "somewhere along the line kingdom ceased being society and became spirituality" and "I owe my primary commitment to my local church, not because it is what I want and not because it is the ideal place, but because the only way for Jesus' dream kingdom to take root is when local people commit to one another to strive with one another for a just, loving, peaceful, and wise society, beginning at home, with friends, and at their local community of faith."

Thought-provoking insights in chapters on Sex, Vocation, Love, Eternity (he talks about hell!), God, and more. He successfully weaves stories of his personal life and his students' lives with liberal scripture quotations (not merely references). Bravo!

I recently finished reading David Platt's "Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream" and Floyd McClung's "Follow: A Simple and Profound Call to Live Like Jesus." Scot's "One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow" fits very well as another excellent wake-up call to slumbering, complacent or bored followers. Is someOne talking to me!?

I can't think of a better refresher for North American Christians, on the eve of the new year, than McKnight's latest offering: One.Life.

He begins by shooting down the sub-par version of Christianity that's so prevalent in Western evangelicalism: that being a Christian means accepting Jesus and engaging in private acts of piety to separate yourself from the world. Being a Christian includes that, to be sure--but it's much, much more. For McKnight, being a Christian is far more simple and engaging:

"A Christian is someone who follows Jesus."

The rest of the book examines what it means to follow Jesus in every area of the one life we have to live. He tackles big issues like Justice, Peace, and Sex. No area of our one life is exempt from Jesus' call to follow him.

His chapter on eternity is particularly interesting. After making it clear that he believes in heaven and hell (because Jesus did), he draws a sharp contrast between the Dante-styled version of hell made popular in the middle ages and the Biblical images of decay, fire, and darkness. While avoiding dogmatism in the details, he slipped in an interesting endnote about Gregory MacDonald's work on evangelical universalism. While I found his honesty refreshing, I'm pretty sure he'll come under fire for this!

My only qualm was his tendency to use gimmicks. The book is sprinkled with terms like "One.Life" and "Kingdom.Life". He also regularly broke the prose up with strings of bulletless sentences to make his point. This evokes the feel of a preacher pausing after an important point. While I'm sure some will enjoy it, I found it mildly distracting.

If you're frustrated with the lack of passion in your Christian life and are looking for a good motivational jolt, give One.Life a try.

Disclaimer: A free review copy of this book was provided for me by Zondervan.

"Followers of Jesus follow Jesus." I don't think the ground just slid out from underneath you; nevertheless, this is one of Scot McKnight's base premises in his new book One.Life: Jesus Calls We Follow, "a manifesto of the Christian faith."

One.Life, a book intended "for people who really do think a Christian is someone who follows Jesus and for those who want to focus once again on what Jesus meant when he said, `Come follow me,'" largely came out of McKnight's Jesus of Nazareth class at North Park University (197). The book, beginning with a vision to spend your One.Life on "Jesus' Kingdom dream," systematically encompasses characteristics of the Christian life. McKnight utilizes the first eight chapters to build a working definition of what it means to be a Christian. Ultimately, he defines a Christian as,

"One who follows Jesus by devoting his or her One.Life to the kingdom of God, fired by Jesus' own imagination, to a life of loving God and loving others, and to a society shaped by justice, especially for those who have been marginalized, to peace, and to a life devoted to acquiring wisdom in the context of a local church. This life can only be discover by being empowered by God's Spirit (106)."

In One.Life, McKnight helped clarify two great things for me. First, "there's a difference between focusing on being right and focusing on being a follower of Jesus" (47). McKnight used the parable of the good Samaritan as an example. The Levite and the priest passed by the mangled man because it would be ceremonially unclean to engage him. They were "right," but not right enough. The Samaritan was ultimately right because he extended love. McKnight summarizes this point well: "Being right for Jesus meant a kind of Bible reading and a kind of theology and a kind of behavior that led to loving God and loving others" (48). Second, McKnight points to the communal characteristic of following Jesus. "When I hear Christians describe the Christian life," writes McKnight, "as little more than soul development and personal intimacy with God...I have to wonder if Christians even read their Bibles" (60). Though he's writing sharply, McKnight's point is that we too often miss the forest for the trees. We treat intimacy with God as an end in itself and consequently miss Jesus' Kingdom vision.

While McKnight challenged my thinking in these areas, he lost me in others. For starters, this "manifesto" is more like an arbitrary assortment of McKnight's convictions of what following Jesus means. I had the hardest time weaving any sort of thematic thread through his book which covered topics ranging from Jesus parables, to sex, to eternity, to wisdom. McKnight's writing was also troubling. In many cases, McKnight takes hot topics in the faith and writes his own "You have heard it said...but I say" discourses (pp. 65 includes a classic example). McKnight also writes with lofty lingo that is hard to follow. The "Jesus'-Kingdom-Dream" rhetoric was hard to follow as it was rarely defined and repeatedly mentioned.

Furthermore, it baffled me that McKnight pieced together a working definition of what it means to follow Jesus but never mentioned that a Christian is a witness who verbally proclaims the Gospel. Much was said about the actions of a witness and only one example at the end of the book was given about sharing the Gospel with others.

The last troubling facet of One.Life was one of McKnight's premises. McKnight establishes his premise via a question: why did Jesus come to earth? I love the question. When I read it, it got me thinking. However, McKnight narrowly answers the question by citing Luke 4:16-21 (Jesus reciting Isaiah 61). Initially, I thought McKnight might expound on other Scriptures, but he stuck only to one. He neglected other Scriptures that didn't fit with his "Justice.Life" theme. While I understand McKnight was trying to debunk the blindly stated, "He came to die for my sin," he neglected important Scriptures such as John 10:10 ("I came that they may have life and have it abundantly") and 1 John 3:8b ("The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.") Or what about John 9:39, John 18:37, or 1 Tim 1:15? It seems unfair to say that Jesus only came to earth to fulfill a justice mission.

I am thankful for Scot McKnight. I regularly read his blog. However, this book was troubling to me. I am still rattled as to how Bill Hybels could've read this book and concluded, "After reading One.Life, I made a silent covenant with God to read everything Scot writes from this day forward."

I have long admired Scot's blog and enjoyed reading some of his other books. But One.Life may well be Scot's best work yet. His love for God and love for others comes through repeatedly in the book. When offering needed critiques to aspects of evangelical Christianity, it is always done with prophetic insight and a pastoral heart. Much more than needed critiques, Scot's dream and vision that people experience the life and mission of Jesus is found on nearly every page. This book is driven by the confident faith that Jesus' way manifests itself in every area of life.

So many books today reduce following Jesus to an exercise of the head, or a cause to embrace, or a "spiritual" inner life. This book integrates all areas of our humanity and calls us to live with Jesus in every area. I highly recommend this book to pastors, young adults, and anyone hungry to discover who Jesus really is and how he can help you live your best one.life.

One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow

One.Life is a very timely and a very important book. Written by Dr. Scot McKnight, One.Life "invites you to discover what Jesus meant when he announced the arrival of God's kingdom, and why his message had such a profound impact on his listeners."
I believe this book is timely and important for several reasons; first, is the primal call it illustrates in its subtitle: "Jesus calls, We follow." This is the foundational summons of Jesus' gospel message; "The kingdom is here and the kingdom is coming... Follow me to become part of it."

A second reason this book is important is the present day and age which we now live in serves us a reduced gospel. The kingdom message of Christ is a "high bar" message; it costs the recipient their One.Life if they choose to become part of the kingdom in full. Just today (illustrating the timeliness of the book), I was deeply saddened by a blog post that (in my opinion) depicted a very reduced gospel. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a transformative message that alters and radically changes individuals in the kingdom today as well as the kingdom tomorrow. This is further supported through the chapters of One.Life as McKnight takes the reader through elements of the kingdom today life depicted in example areas of love, justice, peace, wisdom, church, commitment, sex, and vocation.

"Followers of Jesus follow Jesus. Those who aren't following Jesus aren't' his followers. It's that simple. Followers follow, and those who don't follow aren't followers." (p.70)

Another reason the book is timely and important, and this somewhat compliments the example of the reduced gospel I mentioned in the previous paragraph, is people's refusal to enter the through the "narrow gate" of the kingdom Jesus describes. Jesus pronounced himself as the Gate to the kingdom; entry was through him alone. The way to "go through him" was/is through (1) repentance, or turning 180 degrees from our present way of doing things (2) denial of self (3) taking up our "cross" - sacrifice of ourselves for the sake of others. This way of the kingdom is very distilled, but the essence of the distillation can be summed up from Philippians 2:5-7 and 1 John 2:6. The reason people do not see radical transformation in many, many professed followers of Christ... many, many have never taken the first steps into the kingdom, much less have qualified as followers.

I appreciate the candor and honesty that Scot writes with in One.Life. I am reasonably sure there will be some (maybe much) push back to the message of the book. There are some very definitive statements made in some of the chapters that do not leave room for the reduced gospel. This One.Life speaks about transformation in the here, in the now, and in the eternal future... the limitations to the transformation are "self" imposed limitations. If I read McKnight correctly, he says where the Spirit takes over a life, that life becomes a transformative instrument of the Creative and Transforming God. He illustrates this with a brief commentary on Pentecost:

"God's kingdom happens when human beings are empowered by God's Spirit to do God's kingdom work in the shape of a new community. That is, when Pentecost happens, the Spirit of God... Transforms human abilities, and Transcends human inabilities, so Transformed people can participate In God's kingdom community in the here and now." (p.100)

Personally, I am exceedingly thankful for this book. I don't think there is anything that I read in it that has revolutionized my thinking. I read the Bible and the gospels in particular and come away with very similar convictions as written throughout One.Life. My gratitude comes in the way of being encouraged, inspired, and affirmed. Living, proclaiming, writing, and preaching the "love the Lord your God, with all your heart, all your soul, all your might, all your strength... and love your neighbor as yourself" sold-out-for-jesus-creed-one.life is not easy. It is not popular and it takes daily self-denial. It is costly as reminded by so many saints that have preceded us. So, I am thankful for this book. It comes to me at a time when I am need of encouragement and my convictions need a "shot in the arm." This is a wonderful book and I recommend it highly. If you read it and are encouraged to truly answer the call of Jesus to "Follow Me" you might also try a few of Scot McKnight's other books. I would also highly recommend The Jesus Creed, A Community Called Atonement, and Praying with the Church. These books have been very helpful to me and continue to serve as discipling tools in my life and the lives of many others.

My first introduction to the work of Scot McKnight came in an undergraduate class in which his book, Interpreting the Synoptic Gospels, was assigned reading. As the title suggests, Interpreting the Synoptic Gospels is a primer for serious study of the text of the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), which showcases the gifts for which Scot initially became known to many: he is a New Testament scholar who specializes in teaching others how to read scripture faithfully and fairly. McKnight's work in this and other reference books has shaped me in many ways, transforming the way I read scripture, the way I teach and preach scripture, and the way I think about God.

Perhaps of even greater benefit, though, has been the multitude of works which have resulted from McKnight's persistent efforts to share with the church in an accessible way the fruits of his labor as a scholar. One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow is the latest such offering from McKnight. One.Life opens with a brief autobiographical glimpse into McKnight's journey of faith. Specifically he chronicles the significant transformation that occurred in the way he answered perhaps the most important question anyone contemplating or claiming faith in Jesus can ask: "What is a Christian?"

To many, the answer to the question "What is a Christian?" will seem to be self-evident. McKnight's brief autobiographical account, however, demonstrates clearly the degree to which the answer to this question is anything but self-evident. Regardless, though, whether one thinks the answer to the question is self-evident or not, the book serves to provoke in its readers critical reflection which will help them clarify the way they will answer this very important question, "What is a Christian?" Weaving together personal anecdotes from his personal life and his teaching career, stories of students and friends, thoughtful reflections on scripture, and thought-provoking questions, McKnight offers a proposal for how the key question "What is a Christian?" ought to be answered.

His proposal begins with an exploration and explanation of Jesus' preaching of the kingdom. He then attempts to rekindle the imagination of readers by helping them read and hear Jesus' parables in a new way. The next four chapters flesh out the themes of love, justice, peace, and wisdom by reflecting on the ways Jesus talked about and embodied them. These chapters are followed by a chapter deconstructing what has become of "church"--consumer-oriented, individualistic, special-interest-driven--and reconstructing an understanding of church rooted in the notion of community, particularly as such communal faith is described in Acts. McKnight then surveys the all-or-nothing expectations Jesus communicates to anyone who wants to follow him, setting the stage for a discussion about how Jesus' kingdom vision aims to shape both the sexual ethics and the work lives of those who would follow Jesus. As the book enters the home stretch, the focus shifts from life in the present to life in eternity, as McKnight seeks to strip away the accumulated misconceptions about heaven and hell (rooted more deeply in ancient literature, pop culture, and hymnody, than in scripture), and articulate an understanding of eternity that is as clear and concise as possible, while preserving room for mystery. McKnight closes the book with chapters that focus on God's love, which he contends opens the door to a life of genuine confession, and repentance, which he insists leads to a life that is cross-shaped.

I suppose one might wonder about McKnight's rationale for choosing to highlight love, justice, peace, and wisdom, specifically. One might wish McKnight had chosen to flesh out the implications of Jesus' kingdom vision for other areas of life besides sexual ethics and vocation, for instance family life or recreation. Perhaps, though, someone else will be inspired by this work to explore those aspects of life more fully than the space of this book would have allowed. At any rate, focusing on such questions or quibbles is like fussing about the distance of a walk-off home run.

From the very beginning of One.Life, McKnight's awareness of the moment, his sense of urgency, which is always just beneath the surface of the book, is apparent as he reminds readers, "You have only One.Life to chase, find, and live your dream. Let your One.Life be consumed by the dream." It is as though he realizes the outcome of the game is on the line, and it's his turn to step up to the plate. It is this sense of urgency, combined with McKnight's pastoral sensitivity, ability to articulate Jesus' vision clearly, and the humility with which he writes, which lead me to the conclusion that if you only have the opportunity to read one book which will shape the way you live your One.Life, then you've got to read One.Life.

Pastors live in strong gospel crosswinds. One wind is created by those who are stridently trying to keep alive the reduced gospel spawned by market-driven evangelicalism. The growing crosswind is offered by those who yearn for and discern the robust gospel of Jesus Christ anchored in Jesus' vision of the kingdom of God. One gospel says "accept Christ" and the other one says "follow Jesus." One aims at getting people to heaven when they die. The other aims at getting heaven actively involved in history now. "Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth." One gospel wants to create a new people of God. The robust gospel sees the people of God partnering with God in proclaiming and living Jesus' resurrection newness as it is breaking out in the whole universe.

As a pastor, I am thankful to have a scholar-friend-author like Dr. Scot McKnight. In his newest book One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow (Zondervan), Scot expresses his gratitude for the reduced-gospel tradition from which he came, but he dares to push against the confining smallness of America's popular gospel. "Here's our problem today. Not only do we not like ultimatums, but we have too many Christians who have accepted Jesus into their hearts and who have been baptized and who have confessed their sins and who have joined the Church and who are in Bible studies and who are absolutely 100 percent convinced they are going to heaven, but are not followers of Jesus...The mark of a follower of Jesus is following" (115-116).

The reduced gospel has produced a wobbly community of Christians. What does wobbly mean? Scot lists several symptoms and here is one: "American Christians can worry themselves into a lather about the gay marriage debate and do nothing for the 26,500 children who die daily from preventable diseases" (58-59). The reduced gospel cannot stand against the person and teachings of Jesus about whom "nothing was wobbly." Many people who attend our churches were assured that heaven was theirs based on "accepting Jesus into their hearts." With the big issue of eternity settled, why not hunker down into the wrecked consumerist, material culture, be nice, make a living, avoid sin, create Christian bubbles to live in, learn in, buy in and wait until Jesus comes back (or we die)?

Pastors deal with the Bible a lot. Christ-centered pastors are in the Gospels a lot. Scot McKnight admits that his calling as a university professor has allowed him to saturate his heart, soul, and mind in the Gospels and rest of the New Testament. He is stunned that the reduced gospel promoted as the "real thing" is not ever found on the lips of Jesus. Scot and other scholars and pastors discern a robust, kingdom-of-God-gospel thundering through the New Testament. We may be able to accept the tidy steps of the reduced gospel. The robust gospel can't be accepted. It is too immense, too intense, too explosive, too adventurous. The robust gospel is a hurricane into which we step and find the loving, large, active heart and hands of God at work in the world now. Could anemic churches be the product of the reduced gospel? Jesus' robust gospel created a courageous, robust church. I am grateful for One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Follow. The church will be better for it.

On a recent Sunday morning, a middle-aged woman in our church approached me and said, "I read it! I read the book." She was referring to Scot McKnight's, One.Life.

Just days after reading the book, I ordered copies for my two adult daughters and then began recommending it to others.

Why?

The book grapples with some very important questions: "What does it mean to really follow Jesus? What would this look like in our day and culture?" This could be very helpful to a variety of readers but I suspect that young adults might connect particularly well with it.

Not only does Scot McKnight take Jesus seriously but he also takes the call to discipleship very seriously. I think this book will resonate with seekers, both those who grew up in churches and are trying to find their way and those who are new to following Jesus. The book is theological, inspirational, and very practical.

There are fourteen chapters, including chapters on the kingdom, love, justice, sex, and vocation. This is a clear call to live intentionally as followers of Jesus. Scot McKnight lays out the vision of Jesus for life and then challenges the reader to take seriously this call to love God and love others in response to that vision.

Perhaps the chapter on wisdom is one of the best. Scot discusses seven elements of Jesus' wisdom. This discussion alone may be worth the price of this book. In this chapter, he challenges the reader to ask, "What is the wise thing to do?"

We gain this wisdom by investing in Jesus' life and teaching. McKnight gives the reader seven elements of Jesus' wisdom. These seven elements include suggestions such as, "Orient each day toward God" and "Discover who you are by loving others."

I expect this book will be read widely and will be valued by many believers who are serious about following Jesus.

We bought copies of One.Life for everyone in our church.

Scot McKnight is a prolific writer who has written several outstanding books. In my mind the top three are Jesus Creed, Blue Parakeet, and One.Life. If you have not read anything he has written I recommend that One.Life be the first, followed by Jesus Creed, and then Blue Parakeet.

One.Life is a book about Jesus -- what's important to him and what he wants you/us to do about it. McKnight gently deconstructs some of the traditional evangelical definitions of spirituality -- definitions which dance around but don't really engage with Jesus' kingdom mission. That is, this is a primer on what it means to be a Christian -- following Jesus and his kingdom dream.

Each chapter addresses a theme associated with kingdom living -- biblical themes that McKnight ties back into Jesus' own teaching on his kingdom -- imagination, love, justice, peace, wisdom, church, commitment, sex, vocation, eternity, God's love, and cross/resurrection. His discussion of hell and heaven in the eternity chapter is extra intriguing and might be good fodder for an evening in the pub.

McKnight's narrative approach to writing makes One.Life accessible and engaging. But this is not dumbed-down theology. It is sophisticated and transforming material that may just recalibrate your spiritual thermometer.

"Every time the single-moment act of accepting Christ becomes the goal instead of the portal, we get superficial Christians. And every time personal practices of piety wiggle away from the big picture Jesus sketches before his followers, it becomes legalism."

In his newest book, Dr. Scot McKnight wants to help us move away from these shallow ideas of what it means to follow Jesus. One.life: Jesus calls, we follow (Zondervan, 2010) could easily be called, "Your idea of discipleship is too small. Wayyyy too small."

McKnight is the rare Biblical scholar who is as adept as communicating with popular audiences as he is writing for his ivory tower'd academic peers. His Jesus Creed blog has long been a mainstay of my online spiritual diet - this site's wide-ranging, intelligent and wholly civil discourse about everything from theology to Crocs is a model of what it can look like to have a thoughtful, gracious online conversation. In fact, I won my copy of One.life by participating in a contest on his blog. (Yes, the cranberry-chocolate chip ribbon cookies did it for me once again!)

But I would have probably purchased this book. It is that good - and is desperately needed. The premise sounds simple, but the ideas in One.life are anything but simple. McKnight explores what it means to follow Jesus - and shows us that the call to discipleship will require a "yes" from every area of our lives - heart, soul, mind and strength. There are 14 chapters in this 200-page book covering themes including commitment, justice, church, sex, vocation, eternity and more. Instead of creating a rah-rah, you-can-do-it, go-team call to discipleship, McKnight instead builds his case the way that Jesus did - by inviting people to experience his kingdom, insisting that the usual definitions of kingdom used in most corners of evangelicalism these days are selfish, small copies of the real thing. He notes, "This word kingdom is being used so often today it's getting muddled and fuzzy. It has been internalized by some into an inner experience, it has been socialized by others into a program for ending poverty and creating better laws and saving the planet, and it has been downsized by yet others into little more than a personal spirituality."

The sorry truth is that few of us want to give our lives to something smaller than us - and these ways of presenting the kingdom have shrunk it into something we think we can manage. Each chapter in One.life attempts to unhook our popular notions about how the kingdom works in order to show us that the kingdom is so much bigger than any of these wee components. McKnight closes each of the first few chapters of the book by developing a working definition for the kingdom invitation that is firmly rooted in the words and works of Jesus. Between each chapter is a one-page "interlude" section designed to do kingdom work by busting the invitation out of the pages and into our heart, soul, mind and strength.

Though this book would be an ideal gift for someone in their twenties or thirties, I believe readers of all ages will benefit from possibly having a few of their own sacred ideas challenged about what kingdom life is. This would be a great book for a study group to tackle as well. Recommended.