ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church
Overview
ReJesus asks the following questions:
- What ongoing role does Jesus the Messiah play in shaping the ethos and self-understanding of the movement that originated in him?
- How is the Christian religion informed and shaped by the Jesus that we meet in the Gospels?
- How do we assess the continuity required between the life and example of Jesus and the subsequent religion called Christianity?
- In how many ways do we domesticate the radical revolutionary in order to sustain our religion and religiosity?
- How can a rediscovery of Jesus renew our discipleship, the Christian community, and the ongoing mission of the church?
These questions take us to the core of what the church is all about. Rather than reformation, the authors call their task re-founding the church because it raises the issue of the church’s true founder or foundation. This theme is of particular importance at the dawn of the twenty-first century as many attempt to address Christianity’s endemic and long trended decline in the West. The authors feel that a spiritual, theological, missional, and existential crisis looms in the West.
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- Highlights the Jesus of the Gospels as a model to follow for an effective Christian life
- Discusses missional living both theologically and practically
- Tears away false characterizations of Jesus to reveal a radical revolutionary
- How Jesus Changes Everything
- ReJesus and Personal ReNewal
- ReJesus for the Church and the Organization
- I’ve Got a Picture of Jesus
- The Shema Schema (One God, One Love)
- Three . . . Two . . . One . . . Engage
- The Church That Jesus Built
Top Highlights
“Through the eyes of Jesus, we will see God differently, no longer as a distant father figure, but through the paradigm of the missio Dei to find the sent and sending God. Second, we will see the church differently, no longer as a religious institution but as a community of Jesus followers devoted to participating in his mission. We call this the participatio Christi. And third, through Jesus’ eyes we will see the world afresh, not simply as fallen or depraved but as bearing the mark of the imago Dei—the image of God.” (Page 24)
“We have elsewhere asserted that it is Christology (the exploration of the person, teachings, and impact of Jesus Christ) that determines missiology (our purpose and function in the world), which in turn determines our ecclesiology (the forms and functions of the church).” (Pages 5–6)
“In other words, as stated earlier, Christology must determine missiology (our purpose and function in this world), which in turn must determine ecclesiology (the cultural forms and expressions of the church).” (Pages 42–43)
“We believe that Christology is the key to the renewal of the church in every age and in every possible situation it might find itself. The church must always return to Jesus in order to renew itself. When, for whatever reason, the church gets stuck or loses its way in the world, it needs to recover its primal identity in its founder.” (Page 42)
“We think that to be the sent people of God implies that we will have our neighborhood’s best interests at heart. We think Christians should see themselves as sent by Jesus into the villages of which they’re part, to add value, to bring wisdom, to foster a better village. In short, to participate with the work of Christ all around us.” (Page 32)
Frost and Hirsch challenge us to reinstate Jesus as the central focus of our spiritual lives—both as individual disciples and as communities of his people. The Jesus they present is not the domesticated Jesus that we learned about in Sunday school, but the ‘loving, wildly passionate, dangerous, radically merciful and always surprising’ Jesus portrayed in the Gospels. An encounter with this Jesus transforms us from the inside out and radically changes our approach to mission.
—Felicity Dale, cofounder, Christians in the Caring Professions
Frost and Hirsch have done it again! In their characteristic way (heart-pounding in a spiritual sense) they invite us to a journey with God. Don’t miss this trip!
—Reggie McNeal, missional leadership specialist, Leadership Network
For anyone in the missional conversation in even the slightest way, this book addresses what is by far the most important thing about it theologically and practically.
—Dan Kimball, pastor, author, and Emerging Church movement leader
Frost and Hirsch tear away false characterizations about Jesus and reveal a wild and radical revolutionary . . . anything but boring. This book is a huge leap in the right direction.
—Neil Cole, founder and executive director, Church Multiplication Associates
ReJesus will rock your world—and cause you to reJesus your life, reJesus your church, and reJesus your Bible. Expect ‘reJesus’ to become a mantra and a mobilization in the revitalization of Christianity in the twenty-first century.
—Leonard Sweet, E. Stanley Jones Professor of Evangelism, Drew University
ReJesus invites us to pare back layers of tradition, recognize distortion and misrepresentation, read the Gospels afresh, and learn to imitate and follow the wild and radical Jesus. An engaging and challenging example of applied Christology.
—Stuart Murray, chair, Anabaptist Network
Michael Frost is the founding director of the Tinsley Institute, a mission study center at Morling College in Sydney, Australia. He is the author of more than a dozen books including Exiles and The Road to Missional. He lives in Sydney.
Alan Hirsch is founding director of Forge Mission Training Network and cofounder of Shapevine.com, an international forum for engaging with world-transforming ideas. Currently he leads an innovative learning program called Future Travelers which helps mega churches become missional movements. He is the author of numerous books, including The Forgotten Ways, and coauthor of Untamed and Right Here, Right Now. Hirsch lives in the Los Angeles area.