Jeff McLain

Lead A Quiet Life | Recovering a rooted Christian way of life through the Lord's Prayer, ancient habits, and simple Jesus communities.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

The Lord’s Prayer is an ancient practice that is confessional, reorders our priorities, provides a theological trellis, roots us in the way of Jesus, and connects us to the global and historic Church. I am recovering a rooted Christian way of life at https://t.co/BJq13vWz36.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

In the Kingdom of God, wealth is invested by giving away, and lost by holding on.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@HEPennypack1 @nerdadampunx I assume you have researched inaugurated eschatology?

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@JohnRushemeza @WilliamWolfe That’s fine. You asked why it’s a controversy. I gave a thorough response: and basically it’s not for the reasons you set up.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

That’s a good word. I saw that understanding at work in your classes at @fullerseminary. Thank you for the reminder and for the formative message. I want to do better—and must do better—at this.

I agree: we have become fundamentalists who have neglected the fundamentals. The community gathered together must have the permission and space to release and share their gifts and become vehicles for the work of our Trinitarian God.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I’m increasingly convinced the church needs more than a better strategy for “fixing” the church. Discipleship, missiology, APEST, and new models can still reproduce the business-driven, platformed church they’re trying to repair. These worlds are full of coaches, book deals, and paid programs.

The church has been used by God in my life, and I’ve served as a pastoral leader within it. However, I’m increasingly convinced we need to ask a deeper question: Are we actually becoming the church Jesus intended, or simply getting better at doing platform church?

More than ever, I think we need to wrestle with Jesus’ words, “where two or three are gathered in my name” (Matthew 18:20), and his instruction, “Freely you have received; freely give” (Matthew 10:8).

Maybe the question isn’t how we build a better church platform, but whether we’ve made the platform necessary in the first place.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@Sean_McDowell Honestly, none of them appeal to me. One word. Different colors.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@FlockChurchApp Amen. I agree with this wholeheartedly. It has been my experience as well. The rest tends to be manufactured.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

John, I am not misunderstanding anything, and I think you have not slowed down to see your own shifting language.

In your first post, you said loving our enemies is not the center of the Christian faith. Jesus and the Kingdom are. That’s the scripture. WW is wrong that confession is. That’s the way in. I would say loving your enemies is central—not because it replaces the Great Commandment, but because it is one of the clearest expressions of what it means to live as Jesus did. We are commanded in Scripture to follow Jesus and live as he lived (1 John 2:6; 1 Peter 2:21). It’s not just confess and wait for judgement.

You continually set up a false dichotomy. To love someone does not mean there is no justice, or that I am going to let someone harm my wife or children. However, we cannot ignore that Jesus himself said to turn the other cheek and go the extra mile (Matthew 5:39–41). Paul tells us to overcome evil with good (Romans 12:21). Loving our enemies doesn’t eliminate justice or discernment. It changes the way we respond to those who oppose us. This Posture does and must influence my paradigm. I must live as Jesus did.

Your first post also says that if loving our enemies makes them stop being our enemies, then Jesus, John the Baptist, and the rest of the disciples would have lived happily ever after. But no one is saying loving our enemies means they will become our friends or that opposition will disappear. No one denies enemies exist. It doesn’t erase Jesus’ command, nor does it erase the biblical belief that loving our enemies can have an effect on them. Paul says that by responding to an enemy with good, we “heap burning coals on his head” (Romans 12:20).

You ended with, “We must love them and fight them.” I still don’t see the biblical justification for that statement. What does “fight” mean? If you mean resist evil, protect the vulnerable, or pursue justice, then absolutely. But if you mean adopting the posture of a fighter toward the people Jesus commands us to love, I don’t see that modeled by Jesus. If we love our enemies and are willing to take up our cross and lay down our lives (Matthew 16:24; John 15:13), then the way we “fight” cannot simply look like the world’s way of fighting.

The cross is how Jesus fought. The cross must be central. Jesus has already claimed victory through laying down his life (Colossians 2:15; John 16:33).

I don’t know William or the interviewer, and I’m not interested in judging their motives. But the interviewer asks a question that creates a false choice. Jesus is the center, and the kingdom of God is the center—not even confession by itself. The question is whether we actually live like Jesus.

William says loving your enemies isn’t a public policy. Fine. But the command to love our enemies runs throughout Scripture and is rooted in Jesus’ teaching (Matthew 5:43–48; Luke 6:27–36). That doesn’t mean we don’t have immigration laws, governments, justice systems, or legitimate concerns about safety. It does mean we have to ask how we treat the people affected by those things. We don’t get to set Jesus’ command aside because the people involved are our enemies.

I’m not touching the Marxist argument because that is removed from the conversation for me. My approach is Bible first, ideology second. I don’t want to wedge Scripture into the world’s paradigm. I want to start with Jesus.

You said, “God’s enemies are our enemies.” Where do you get that idea? If God loved me while I was still his enemy (Romans 5:8–10), then the question isn’t whether someone can oppose me. Of course they can. The question is whether their opposition gives me permission to stop loving them. Jesus says it doesn’t (Matthew 5:44).

I’m far from unconcerned with justice, immigration, or safety. I’m more concerned with learning to live like Jesus.

William may be right that there is a cultural tactic at work. But For me, it’s Bible then ideology. I start with Jesus.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@reformedhg I appreciate Bonhoeffer!

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@Phillies Happy Birthday, Dan!

We appreciate you.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I like to think I am or will make the shift. I’ve long appreciated the way Brad puts some things. This is an important reminder.

Give as freely as you have received.

[Brad Brisco @bradleybrisco]

First half: Ego asks, What can I build?
Transition: Soul asks, Who am I beneath what I've built?
Second half: Elder asks, What can I give away?

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@dankimball I believe Bob is still with us.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I don’t always agree with Ryle.

But this is 🔥

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@DrFrankTurek With the help of the Holy Spirit, yes.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@drewdyck It’s against my religion.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

@JohnRushemeza @WilliamWolfe By the way, I’m responding to your commentary more than WW.

I would state that while Jesus is the Gospel, and we enter relationship through repenting and confession, the truth is Jesus made our ability to love God and others, deeply central to the faith. We cannot ignore it.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I can protect my wife and children. I can resist violence. I can oppose injustice. I can confront evil. But I don’t have to hate the person I’m resisting. Jesus himself was opposed, betrayed, falsely accused, and killed, yet he still prayed for his enemies and commanded his followers to do the same.

That’s not a liberal tactic. It’s the way of Jesus. The question isn’t whether we will encounter enemies; it’s whether we will become enemies in the way they are enemies to us.

The way WW takes is the way of fitting Jesus into nationalistic thinking. It is not Jesus.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I’m convinced the danger of Evangelicalism today isn’t that we misunderstand Jesus.

It’s that we refuse to understand him and then spend our mental energy finding ways to explain why we don’t have to do what he said.

[Jeff McLain @jeffmclain]

I think the distinction is between having people who oppose us and making people our enemies. Scripture absolutely recognizes that Christians will have opponents and persecutors. That’s a given. We practice forgiving and not holding on to such a class. Jesus never tells us to make those people our enemies in return. Actually quite the opposite. He tells us to love our enemies, pray for those who persecute us, and overcome evil with good. If you do that, people may be your enemy in their mind but in yours they cannot be.

In fact, Romans 5 says that while we were God’s enemies, God reconciled us through Christ. That is the model Jesus gives us. We die for those we love. We are called to pick up our cross in the same way. Someone can consider me their enemy without me considering them mine. I can resist evil, oppose injustice, and protect people from harm without withdrawing love from the person doing the opposing. The one thing I can’t do is worldly apply the lines you are to people status. There is only those I’m called to love as brothers or as enemies.

If loving our enemies means anything, it means we don’t get to create a category of people whom we are now permitted to stop loving. Or to view in a less than way. That’s why I think the Great Commandment remains central: we don’t defeat the command to love by identifying someone as our enemy.