Hidden In Plain Sight by Mark Buchanan

I finished reading Mark Buchanan's book, Hidden in Plain Sight on our Winter Retreat last week. What a great book. He has a pastor's heart with journalist's writing style. His writing is similar to Philip Yancey in that it is investigative, authentic and transparent. Buchanan spends time taking apart a portion of Peter's 2nd letter in the New Testament. Two quotes particularly struck me as insightful.

"Dogmatics is useful thread for stitching together our patchwork ideas about God. But it's terrible suture for a broken heart" (91). I don't know that I really believed that as a college student and later as a seminary student or even early in ministry during those years. Looking back I would have said with out the theological dogma we can't have healing in our lives. After journeying through different scenarios with people and in my personal life I would whole-heartedly echo this sentiment. We cannot as Christians throw dogma out the window, but we can't go around using it as a salve to heal the brokenness of our lives and the world around us. Really the dogmatics, the particulars of theology must be in place although we can't ever fully grasp the depth and breadth of the mind of God, so that we can offer to others the healing, the hope, the full life promised in Jesus Christ and his life, death, and resurrection. Theology divorced from compassion is useless! Compassion divorced from theology often leads us to heresy! Our goal should be to have a theological framework in place so that it informs our opportunities for ministry in our daily lives so that ultimate healing can begin. The modern day image that pops into my mind is the band-aids with Neosporin already on the bandage so that healing and treatment is readily available.
"I think Peter discovered that the love of Christ frees us to love, not only the least of these and most of these and worst of these, but also and just as much the most-taken-for-granted of these. Who are often our own children. Our own spouse.
In Christ, love comes full circle. It not only reaches heaven's glories, stoops to Sheol's blackness, extends to the outermost ends of the earth. It also turns the heart toward home, so that the wife of your youth becomes the queen of your days and the love of your life. And only then do our prayers get heard" (195).

I am approaching 11 years of marriage and 15 years of being together with my beautiful wife...I can honestly say that I love her more now than I did then. The love of Christ compels us is how the Apostle Paul put it. The love of Christ, the love of the savior for me and for her is what compels our love to grow to mature to never be satisfied with how we use to look at each other or treat each other, but always be looking for ways to know each other deeper, more intimately in light of the truth of the gospel. For me that means that Christ is always willing to forgive and love us deeply, then shouldn't I for my wife and children. Shouldn't my heart's cry be to lay down my life for them in the same way that Christ did for his bride, the church? I do not get it right half the time, but even then, grace is present in our relationship because of the foundation! My campus minister in college use to always tells us that the greatest potential for ministry is staring us in the face in our homes (spouse, children, parents, etc.). It's always a good reminder to me that no matter how much I love my students, parents, and volunteers...my greatest opportunity for ministry comes when I walk in the doors of my home!