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Rejesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church

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Amidst all the latest fads and "movements" within contemporary Christianity in the West, Frost and Hirsch's "ReJesus" is a clarion call to recalibrate our lives to the one that gathered us together and sent us out in the first place - Jesus.

In their own words, "this book is dedicated to the recovery of the absolute centrality of the person of Jesus in defining who we are as well as what we do."

What I appreciate so much about these two authors is that it is clear that the motivation behind their penetrating and sometimes uncomfortable critique of pop-Christianity is stemmed in their deep love for the Church. While this book has a rich bibliography from such theologians as N.T. Wright, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Jaqcues Ellul, and Jurgan Moltmann...both Frost and Hirsch have chosen to step out of the ivory tower of academia and into the streets of everyday existence as they paint a vivid picture of what it means for someone's entire life to be re-focused, re-calibrated, and re-centered on Jesus.

While Frost and Hirsch are both excellent writers and engaging to read, I found this book reading me even after I set it down...it really got deep inside of me.

If you are interested in going beyond a mere admiration of Jesus to a pervasive imitation of Jesus in every area of your life - this book is for you.

As a pastor, but more importantly as a follower of Jesus Christ, this book couldn't have come to me at a more pivotal time. When I first became a follower of Jesus 8 years ago, a friend and mentor reminded me to never forget my first love - Jesus.. Over the years, however, my first love has been smothered by the trappings of comfort, success, and maintaining the status quo. I have devoured books on how to be a better pastor, a better leader, and a better Christian through the latest trends and fads...

This book, however, is unlike those. As the authors of "ReJesus" say, "it is time to recalibrate the church around the person of Jesus rather than around marketing ploys developed for a shallow consumeristic age."

Thanks to both Frost and Hirsch for helping me remember my first love and providing a re-invitation to follow Jesus in every area of my life.

This morning I finished reading ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch. To start with, I want to thank Hendrickson Publishers for sending me a copy of this book. It was very kind of you and I pray the best for you and your business.

I figure the best way to do book reviews is to write excerpts from the book that stood out to me. I am not sure what you the reader likes to read, so I will just put parts of this book that I like to read and that caused me to think. The following are excerpts from ReJesus that I hope inspire you to move and to order this book.

"How can we call ourselves Christian unless what we are doing is built squarely on the rock of Jesus and takes it's direct agenda (and direct cues for its organizations and lifestyle) from him." Pg. 65

"Observers should be able to encounter Jesus in and though the life and community of his followers. People observing us aught to be able to discern the elements of Jesus' ways in out ways. If they cannot find authentic signals of the historical Jesus through the life of his people, then as far as we are concerned they have the full right to question out legitimacy." Pg. 79

"Jesus reveals God to us. God does not reveal Jesus to us. We cannot deduce anything about jesus from what we think w know about God; we must deduce everything about Godfrom what we know about Jesus." Pg. 132

"We need to pickle ourselves in the gospels. They must become out primary stories and reference point. There is no truer way to encounter Jesus afresh than prayerfully cycling through the Gospels and asking God to give us fresh insight into the remarkable person we find there. We must give our hearts, minds, souls, to the one around whom history turns." Pg. 162

"To be sure, we do not like gatherings (speaking of church services), of strangers who never meet or know each other outside of Sundays, who sit passively while virtual strangers preach and lead singing, who put up with second rate pseudo-community under the guise of connection with each other, who live different lives from Monday to Saturday than they do on Sunday, whose sole expression of worship is pop-style praise and worship, who rarely laugh together, fight injustice together, eat together, pray together, raise each others Children together, serve the poor together, or share Jesus with those who have not been set free." Pg. 172-173

As you can see, this book is about ReJesusing the church of Christ. It is a challenging look at how we are living out our faith in Jesus in our daily lives. I really liked this book. It is a bit technical, but it will carry you and open your eyes to the Church that Jesus prayed for and died for. I hope you enjoy.

ReJesus, by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, is a book about seriously studying the Gospels in order to reform the Church into the image of Jesus Christ. Too often, especially in the USA, the Church has been made into the image of predominant culture. The same can be said of Jesus Himself. We create God in our image. in ReJesus Frost and Hirsch confront us with the Jesus of the Gospels, who is wilder than our Judeo-Christian culture would like. The Jesus of the Gospel means business.

I recommend this book. The illustrations and comparative studies in the lives of radical Jesus followers are also to be commended.

The church is much like a jet airplane. There is an enigmatic power about a jet as it roars across the sky using its power to accomplish its mission, to reach its destination. Now imagine that jet, with all of its power, suddenly void of its instruments, void of its compass. In that scenario, not only does the jet become useless, it becomes dangerous. The church minus Jesus is like the jet minus its instruments. Sadly, this is the state of much of the church today--useless and dangerous. The church, as strange as it may sound, is in need of Jesus. In ReJesus, Michael Frost & Alan Hirsch provide the church with exactly what it needs...Jesus.

In a quick two hundred pages, Frost & Hirsch weave together theory, stories, examples, and diagrams that cause you to think, listen, dream, and pray. Above all, they cause you to question the place of Jesus in your ministry. Is Jesus the center of all that you do? Is he the source of mission? Is he the life of your community, or has Jesus been pushed to the margins in favor of other lords, such as religion or Christ-less theology? Having read previous books by both authors, I'm convinced that this book is the most important because it is about the most important topic of all. For those interested in missional church, this book serves as a welcome reminder that apart from Jesus there is no mission nor church. I will be using this book for years to come as we train leaders and church planters for mission.

My pastor Toli Morgan inspired us recently when he said "Jesus really is amazing" and went on to tell us why. I loved the passionate appeal of Jesus that he portrayed.

It interests me the different pictures we have of Jesus. One of my earliest pictures of Jesus came from my Nana - a literal framed picture of Jesus. You would probably recognise the picture. Do you recall bearded lady Jesus on a Sunday School wall? With blue eyes and blond hair unlike anyone born in Palestine for hundreds of years before or after, this Jesus looks into the distance with the sun shining on his face. He looks inoffensive, unflappable, even spooky. It's a "break-glass-in-case-of-emergency" domesticated Jesus.

I am getting a different picture of Jesus from rereading the gospels and reflecting on Frost and Hirsch's new book ReJesus. It's a picture of Jesus that is radical, wild, dangerous, mysterious and with an agenda that is often quite different from mine.

"What Would Jesus Do (WWJD)?" becomes a very challenging question when I think about the sorts of things Jesus did. (Unfortunately, "WWJD?" can become narrowly used only in relation to personal morality, and I prefer asking "What is Jesus Doing?" so I can join in with what the risen and alive Jesus is doing.)

ReJesus takes a fresh look at Jesus and invites us on a quest to get Jesus back to the centre of church life. In the face of hypocrisy where terrible things have been promoted in Jesus' name, when Jesus is too often in our hearts but not our actions, where churches can tend to overspiritualise Jesus or trivialize him into a spiritual accessory, and in seeking "new ways of doing church", missional leaders Frost and Hirsch urge refounding, recalibrating and rebooting around a fresh understanding of Jesus.

I appreciated its passionate appeal, the heroes of faith scattered through its pages, the outline of historical depictions of Jesus, and the reminder that we serve a God who calls for our ultimate loyalty, beyond any sacred-secular divisions.

I have read lots of books on church over the last few years. The next three years I am keen to read more on Jesus, starting with a fresh engagement with Jesus in the gospels that ReJesus points me towards.

(Originally reviewed in 2009) Witness: The Voice of Victorian Baptists, (April), Exclusive Web Content, accessible at [...])

Like everything by Frost and Hirsch, this is a great book, and well worth reading. However, I didn't give it five stars for one tiny reason - the subtitle was misleading.

Maybe it's just me, but the subtitle of the book "A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church" led me to believe that the book would show the wild side of Jesus in the Gospels, and how we, as followers of Jesus, can live more like Him in our world.

The book did a great job explaining why we should study the gospels and learn to live like Jesus, but didn't do a great job explaining how Jesus was wild, or how we could study the gospels to discover the wild Jesus.

Glimpes of the wild Jesus did come through. On pages 109-110, for example, they retold the story of Jesus confronting the demoniac near Gadara. It got my blood racing as I realized how wild Jesus really was in that situation! This is what I thought the book was going to contain.

Once I realized what the book was really about, I really enjoyed it, and would highly recommend it. The message it contains is sorely needed in Christianity today.

And who knows? Maybe Frost and Hirsch will come out with another volume entitled "ReJesus: reReading the Gospels for a Missional Church."

This book is from the authors of "The Shaping of Things to Come." "The Shaping" dealt with the practical methodology of missional outreach. "ReJesus" builds on this foundation with more of a theological framework. The major premise of the book was the need to "reJesus" the community or the world. The authors mean by this that a restoration of the true image of Christ must be presented to people. The authors feel that culture has made Jesus into a weak figure, and the missional church must reclaim the forceful Jesus of the Gospel. The chapters are interesting, especially the section about the development of artwork portraying Jesus throughout the centuries. There was also great insight into the nature of Jesus in regards to the nature of man. A person's concept of Christ is often tied to baggage from the past or misconceptions of the nature of God. A great quote is "Tell me about your Jesus, and I can tell you about yourself." There is a lot of truth to this. We too often make Jesus in support of whatever we deem important. This book might not give more ideas on doing missional evangelism, but it will provide great material and support for some of the missional projects within the congregation. An interesting read.

This book is a difficult read for many. The authors could have made it much easier to deliver the same message. That being said however, it is an amazing book and like The SHACK is a life changer for those caught up in the formality and chains of organized religion. This book will forever change how you view the God-Man called Jesus and if you are not a follower already you will be if you have an open heart. In today's world of instant gratification and "me" mentality Jesus is a real person you can connect to. If you have avoided the traditional idea of church, if you are a rebel at heart but believe inside there is a God you will fall in love with the "Wild Messiah" Jesus Christ.

At first glance Re-Jesus appears to be in the same realm as the other edgy postmodern books sold at hip emergent conferences. But the reality is, you can't judge a book by its cover. The book should have been better called "A return to Christology: a study of the central doctrine of Jesus." The cover should have had some boring painting of Jesus and I should have been required to read it in seminary. It's THAT kind of book.

Not that the book is boring like a text book - it just reads like a text book. The authors made the reading very linear and very weighted, so it's not an easy read; certainly not devotional material. I would assume that the "famous Christians" inserts, the cover and perhaps even the chapter titles were all "add ons" later by the publishing house in an attempt to make the book appeal to a younger audience. I don't know if "A wild messiah for a missional church" is the best sub-title, the book touches on those things, but it's certainly not the crux of the book.

Oh, you want to know if I liked the book? Yea, I did, but it's a hard book to recommend. I would almost say the Jesus Manifesto by Sweet and Viola is an easier read or Christianish by Mark Steele. Not that you need an easier read... I'm just saying there are options.

Re-Jesus is certainly not like any book I have ever read on the subject, there is a lot in there to devour and it would certainly preach well with the right amount of delivery. There is a great chapter in there on Jesus in art, and the last chapter on the church is probably the best in the entire book.

Finished reading "ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church" by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch. This book is different from other books that I have read by these authors. It is a call for the church to recover a biblical view of Jesus that is stripped of the entrapments of western thought. In a way, the authors engage in their own "Quest for the Historical Jesus." In doing so they blend practical with theological and a bit of indepth biblical scholarship. I, personally, found the inclusion of several annotated biographies of what the authors call "little Jesus" inspiring and helpful in keeping the thought of the book tied together. There is also a decent bibliography included, which is a little unsual for this type of monograph. Recommended