you need 4 conversions
July 1, 2009
Seti and I were talking through things yesterday and spoke about really wanting to see 4 conversions happening for everyone we meet. Its another way of speaking about growing more and more wholehearted worshipers of the Lord Jesus.
we want to see
1. conversion to Jesus as the Son of God (God’s grace)
2. conversion to the bible as the word of God (God’s government)
3. conversion to the church as the community of God (God’s gathering)
4. conversion to the world as the mission of God (God’s scattering)
it seems to me you can work out in a person how well they have grasped the gospel of Jesus and are appropriately responding by these 4 areas. its helpful for me as I think about how I am going too.
have I grasped God grace in Christ?
do I greet the rule of God through his word?
am I committed to living and serving and learning in the community of his gathering?
having been called out of the world, and am I faithfully living as one sent into the world? am I a missional Christian in my local action and global concern?
the correlates are pretty confronting.
if you love Jesus and hate the church, then maybe you are not really converted.
or if you love community but avoid the word’s authority, you are not really converted.
or if you think you are a Jesus and bible guy but can’t cope with a community of grace, maybe you are not truly converted.
and just maybe, you are yet to embrace the world as the sphere where God’s glory is proclaimed and lived for – then again you haven’t quite got it yet.
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1. Nathan | July 1, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Interesting post Shane, I like it.
Bit confused about the back half though – not sure I understand what you mean by the phrase, “maybe you are not truly converted.”
Do you think a person can be converted (really and truly) but not have “got it” (particularly in regards to church as community and world as mission) yet? Be interested to hear your thoughts…
2. Shane | July 1, 2009 at 4:00 pm
good question Nath
it is a polemical statement that is meant to jar a little.
but I want to say this pretty strongly – our fellowship with Christ necessitates fellowship with his people -as difficult as that might be! you cannot but belong having believed, and if you believe and belong, then there are certain gospel imperatives that are required – like sending or mission.
we need grace for babes in the faith who don;t quite get it yet, but the goal of discipleship must not stop short of being communities in mission and doing mission in community.
do you think it that’s fair?
3. Matt Stone | July 1, 2009 at 11:51 pm
I think its fair to push on this. Ive seen too many people fall by the wayside with churchless Christianity, and too many people wallow in apathy in missionless church. Though I’d be reluctant to say its gospel, its a very important implication, the rejection of which should call a few things into question.
4. Shane | July 2, 2009 at 5:13 pm
thanks Matt
yep I agree
the imperatives are correllates of the gospel indicative.
necessary correlates.
great way of expressing it – churchless Christianity and missionless church.
5. Nathan | July 3, 2009 at 6:57 pm
“Got it”
6. Justin Moffatt | July 12, 2009 at 7:05 am
Good thoughts.
I’m intrigued by this:
conversion to Jesus as the Son of God (God’s grace)
I would have thought that Jesus especially would have been the ‘rule of God’. He is the Messiah and all that. ‘Rule’ is the Son’s big thing! It is the Son who rules, not the Word. The Son rules by the word.
Right?
(I know these things aren’t meant to lock every truth away, but I would have thought that this was significant…)
7. Justin Moffatt | July 12, 2009 at 7:05 am
late response, I know…
8. dave | September 22, 2009 at 10:41 pm
thanks shane.
9. Steph | September 23, 2009 at 8:57 am
It may just be semantics, but hear me out:
I think that you can be regenerated, have experienced the new birth, and not yet have submitted all areas of your heart and life to Jesus’ Lordship. In that sense, you can be “converted” from death to life, but not yet have “converted” all your attitudes and behaviours. In the process that is sanctification, those “conversions” will happen as grace works out its transformative power in your heart and life. But I think there needs to be a distinction between salvation-conversion and sanctification-conversion.
Maybe.
When you are regenerated, when the Spirit removes your heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh, and He illuminates your spiritually dark heart so that it can look upon Jesus and respond to Him as infinitely precious, Lord, God and redeemer…. you are converted from death to life. New life, not new religion.
But it will be a life-long process of daily taking off the traces of the old self, and submitting all areas of your life to the Lordship of Jesus. Working out your salvation with fear and trembling suggests that when you breathe real and true life for the first time, not all areas of your life have been converted to your new self. That’s why the Spirit has to mould and shape us in gradual sanctification. That’s why, as Piper says in his book ‘Finally Alive’, ‘Some unbelievers look like better people than some believers. But that is because some pretty bad people have been born again, and the process of transformation is not always as fast as we would like.’ (p. 21)
But when grace enters your heart, it cannot help but bear fruit. I would agree that all those three additional ‘conversions’ WILL eventuate as part of the transformation that comes from the renewing of your mind.
But to say that salvation is contingent upon them happening first gets the order mixed up, in my mind. I know you’re not talking about salvation, you’re talking about conversion. But that’s why I think I’d need you to clarify what you mean by conversion.
Because, personally, my life is a process of one area of my life, attitude, heart being converted to the cause of Christ and being submitted under His Lordship after another. But that trajectory all stems from the reality of new birth and new life, which comes from the grace that allows me to see Jesus for who He really is and call Him my Lord and Saviour.
Sorry if this was mostly irrelevant. Just something I’ve been thinking over. Really recommend reading Piper’s book.
10. Shane | September 23, 2009 at 9:24 am
thanks Steph, good to hear from you.
The context is challenging those who presume to be mature, yet are immature in one of the key areas.
I actually don’t like language of conversion that much because it suggests you move over a line rather than along a line – the reality is that its both.
finally alive is a good read.
the issues is having grasp justification by faith, we must also come to grips with sanctification by faith. in other words living out our union with Christ by faith – and experiencing not just the grace that did save me, but also the grace that is saving me and the grace that will save me.
so to your concern – I am not suggestion of new order in the way God saves, just rhetorically challenge how deep our grasp of sanctification by faith is… if you know what it mean.
11. Steph | September 23, 2009 at 4:45 pm
yep, gotcha.
and i totally agree that the same grace that saves you will transform you. transformation is the fruit of, the proof of, grace.
so if you’re not being transformed, it is worth asking the question whether or not you actually received the saving grace in the first place. not in a judgemental way. more in a ‘fruit inspection’ way.
hope you’re well, shane!!!!