Dialogue before deleting. Seriously!
Jesus meant what He prayed.
The Father prioritizes and answers the Son’s prayer.
The Holy Spirit is serious about drawing attention to Jesus.
Any doubts about any of those statements? I am more and more convinced by the day that Jesus means business. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are 100 percent aligned in prioritizing Jesus’ heart cry in John 17.
Experience or Scripture?
I’m sure there are people receiving this who I’ve never met or talked to. But I’m also confident that the vast majority of you would consider yourself Protestant (as differentiated from Roman Catholic or Orthodox). Therefore, very few would disagree that the Scriptures have final authority over experience. Phrased differently, the Bible helps us interpret our experiences more authoritatively than our experiences shape our interpretation of the Bible. At least that’s the goal, am I correct?
Wherever you live in the USA, I dare you…
I dare you to prayerfully consider all three of these challenges:
First challenge: Don’t let experiential discomfort override the authority of Scripture.
Second challenge: Watch this movie trailer.
Third challenge: If you possibly can, take a friend (or several), and see the movie in a theater near you, across the country, on May 19 and 20. If you live in Tucson, a group of us from J17 Ministries are attending on 5/19 at 6:15pm at El Con Theater. Get tickets HERE.
Get used to uncomfortable
For many of us, the older we get, the more God stretches us. And I can tell you for certain that my biggest stretching has come from taking the Bible more and more seriously, not through diminishing its authority in my life. May I be so bold as to say that Jesus’ New Commandment (love one another the way I have loved you… John 13:34-35) is intended to make us uncomfortable? If it isn’t stretching us, are we taking it seriously or are we watering it down?
If loving someone causes you to downplay something the Bible teaches, that’s experience trumping the Bible. But if instead it helps you see something the Bible taught all along, that’s the Bible shaping your experience and helping you grow and mature. Jesus made most of the religious leaders in His day supremely uncomfortable. Apparently only a few managed to work their way through it.
The first (of three) huge dividing walls of hostility
In terms of sheer volume, I would guess that in the USA, there are three areas that divide more members of the Body of Christ than any other. And how cool is this… the movie I mentioned above hits two of them!! Protestants would call the first the Catholic question. (And for Catholics, it would be the Protestant question. Pope Leo recently addressed in January how John 17 taken seriously would likely make other Catholics uncomfortable.)
I’ve been doing citywide John 17 unity work for 15 years, praying about when to address this one the entire time. It’s that divisive. This movie can help. If the trailer already made you uncomfortable, I invite you to do what I did when I watched an advance screening copy. I listened for any statement in the movie that I believed failed to reflect the whole of the Scriptures.
The second (of three) huge dividing walls of hostility
I’ve seen the wall between Evangelicals and Pentecostals lower dramatically in the last generation or two. But that’s often because we’ve agreed to not divide over one particular phrase: “the baptism of the Holy Spirit.” Ding ding ding! The movie hits this one, too! And same song, second verse: join me in listening for anything that doesn’t line up with the Bible in your current understanding.
How did I get an advance copy, the curious ask?
The developers of this film are friends of mine. I’ve prayed and worshiped with them, and we love the same Jesus. The same Jesus, in fact, who says that loving each other is how we love Him. I’m sure there are some theological points where my new friends and I don’t agree. If He’d said, “A new commandment I give you – keep hashing out all your Biblical and theological disagreements until they disappear,” well… I wouldn’t be recommending this movie. In fact, I never would have met my new friends!
The third dividing wall of hostility?
Tune in next week. It’s an upcoming BIG event that several of you have asked me to address… though in opposing manners!
Because Jesus is worth it!
Dave Drum, Founder of J17 Ministries
PS Tucsonans, save the date! Sunday evening, May 24, Tucson's first public steps toward 2033!