“You’re not some radical though, right?”

My face felt hot as my classmate awaited an answer. He stared with a puzzled look on his face – like the one you give an hors d’oeuvre when deciding whether to try it or throw it in the trash. If I answered incorrectly, it would be me he’d throw in the trash.

“Nah man. Not one of those.”

He nodded and went back to his work sheet. My throat felt dry as I looked back down at mine. In one sense I was relieved. This kid and all the others around us in class still held their view of me. They didn’t think I was weird or crazy or any of the other things I feared. They thought of me as just another kid. Someone relatable and generally likeable. Yet in another sense, I felt shame. I had just begun to learn my true identity, and I couldn’t help but feel like I took the easy way out of a potentially eternally significant conversation. Like I’d taken a side against who I truly was and who I knew.

The conversation which bore this exchange is not an uncommon one among high school students. While slogging through our math homework, a few students near me began to talk about music. Eventually I was asked what music I enjoyed. I threw out a few names, but my classmates had never heard of them. Intrigued, they asked what genre these artists performed. When I answered, I got a response to which I’ve grown accustomed over the years.

“Christian Rap?”

It was as if it was a logical fallacy. How could anything Christian be in rap? And how could any rapper be a Christian? The kids were alert, so the questions kept flowing. Most were about me and my Christian decisions – not necessarily what I believed. All until my friend asked me the question that still sticks with me. “You’re not some radical though, right?”

When the word “radical” is used in any sort of religious context – it’s almost always with a negative connotation. I’m not sure exactly how he defined a radical Christian, but I’m confident there were images of people with signs saying “You’re going to hell” in his head as he asked the question.

While it’s true that there are “radicals” out there that care more about orthodoxy than they do God, I believe that God takes all those who believe in His son Jesus and makes them true radicals. How?

Conforming them to the image of His son or making them look like Jesus.

Jesus was as radical as they come.

While speaking unequivocally against sin, Jesus pursued sinners as a shepherd searching for his lost sheep. He asked God the Father to have mercy on those who tortured Him and laughed at Him while he cried out in agony. He laid down His life for the guilty though He Himself was innocent.

This is the most shining act revealing His glory. Jesus dying on the cross for us is the ultimate proof for being able to say that God loves us. The action of Him rising from the dead show that He is who He said He is. Without this, there’s no hope.

When one believes in this message, scripture tells us that they are made a new creation. Their slave papers to sin and the broken human condition are shredded and thrown into the fire. Amazingly, this person goes from “death to life”; “from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light.”

It’s not that they become incapable of sin at this moment – for they will still have the same sinful desires they had prior to conversion. Yet, it becomes a battle in which the believer in Jesus becomes more like Christ every day with a decreased pattern of sin in their life.

As they become radical by God’s work, they don’t develop into some superior spiritual superstar. They grow into a meek, selfless and dependent child looking for their Father to carry them. They agree with what their Father says. What He says goes, no matter what the majority may say. They call themselves blessed when they humbly suffer on behalf of their Father and just like their Father did, they love their enemies.

If I had another crack at answering my friend’s question, I would tell him that I am indeed a radical. Not because of some self-righteousness, but because God has claimed me as His own, adopted me into His family and provided me my most pressing need – forgiveness through Jesus. Again, not because of any deed I have done, or any restraint from sinful behavior I’ve maintained, but simply because He has bought me with a price and is in the process of making me more like Jesus for the glory of His name.

May the lives of those who are in Jesus be made more radical every passing moment and the lives of those who have not yet surrendered themselves to Jesus be gripped by His depths of grace and mercy.

 

References:

Romans 8:29 – Conformed to the likeness of His Son

John 10:1-18, Matthew 18:12-14 – A shepherd looking for his lost sheep

Luke 23:34-37 – “Father, forgive them…”

1 John 3:16 – How we know God loves us

1 Corinthians 15:3-8 – The resurrection is proof of Jesus’ deity

2 Corinthians 5:17 – “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation…”

Romans 6:6 – No longer a slave to sin

John 5:24 – Passing from death to life

Colossians 1:13 – From the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light

Philippians 1:6 – He who began a good work in you will finish it

Isaiah 66: 1- 2 – Those who the Lord delights in

Matthew 5:11 – “Blessed are you when you suffer because of me…”

Matthew 5:44 – “Love your enemies…”

1 Corinthians 6:20 – God bought me with a price

Ephesians 1:5 – Adopted as a child of God

Acts 16:30-31 – Jesus: our greatest need