John Perkins Bible Study #1

John M. Perkins and Wayne "Coach" Gordon shared from the stage yesterday morning about the centrality of God's Word and about being born again into the family of God.

Perkins talked about how we cannot separate faith and works.  He talked about the dichotomy that came about when we preached only to save people's souls and left their bodies behind.  This lean on proclamation without demonstration accommodated racism, injustice, allowed people to live in poverty, addressed the soul of a person and not the "whole" of a person.

On the other end of spectrum, it's good to remember that good works will not save us.  It is not by works of righteousness...

"We got a lot of people doing CCD without redemptive work. You gotta be born again.  You must be born again.  Gotta be born into the family of God.  The families of the earth failed.  They couldn't do it.  Old Testament families failed to father justice, to reflect God's Kingdom, they killed the God of glory.  You're not going to save the world through your good works.  We have a Redeemer.  The just for the unjust."

I had the privilege of running into Dr. Perkins at Starbucks this morning.  We had a brief conversation about where I'm from, and then Dr. Perkins shared a few words with similar flavor to today's Bible Study.  He talked about his speaking schedule, the critical times we're living in, and though he thinks he should slow down his travel itinerary at 84 years old, he finds it too crucial to be out encouraging the multi-ethnic church plants happening and to instill in them a CCDA DNA so that they don't become so one-dimensional (that one dimension being the worship service). He then jumped to the other end and talked about how those churches can't just go be about works righteousness, either.  I asked Dr. Perkins, "Why do you suppose we tend to keep falling into the polarized places?"  His answer, "It's because we try to remove the struggle.  We try to remove the struggle."  

I love this man.  He embodies the Good News of Jesus and is a living, walking testament of his own words, "We are to be the outliving of the inliving Christ."