A New Freedom - SAMPLE

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CONTENTS Preface

PART 1—THE THEORY

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Chapter 1 · I want to be free

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Chapter 2 · Getting the right equipment

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Chapter 3 · A kite for all conditions

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PART 2—THE PRACTICE SESSIONS

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Chapter 4 · A new freedom to be a student

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Chapter 5 · A new freedom to use money

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Chapter 6 · A new freedom to confront suffering

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Chapter 7 · A new freedom to combat violence

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Chapter 8 · A new freedom to love sex

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Chapter 9 · A new freedom to be yourself

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Epilogue: Graduation day

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Appendix: How to faithfully approach a Bible text

229

Thanks!

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PREFACE ABOUT ME I’m Mike. I live for Jesus, my King and Saviour—he died in my place to reconcile me with God, even though I had rejected him. I love seeking to honour him with my whole life. I’m married to Tania and we have four little boys. We’re all redheads from Australia who have been living in Valencia, Spain, for the past nine years. Through the Church Missionary Society (CMS), I’ve been working with Grupos Bíblicos Estudiantiles (GBE, ‘Student Bible Groups’) to help Spanish youth meet Jesus. This has involved developing resources like this book. I now live in Sydney, Australia, helping youth here to meet Jesus too.

WHAT IS THIS BOOK? Think of this book as a training manual in how to approach life, a beginner’s guide to Christian ethics. The first three chapters outline a framework for approaching any ethical topic in a comprehensive and faithful way. They also explain why Jesus and his word help us live freer than any other approach. The last six chapters give practical examples of how to use this framework, thinking through specific topics. But they can’t provide all the answers, and many topics aren’t covered. Going through the theory and then the early practice topics will give you the basis for living well and approaching the later chapters. You’ll need to at least skim through the theory chapters or WATCH THE VIDEO SUMMARY before getting started on any topic chapter.

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WHY THIS BOOK? I’ve written this book for teenagers with two aims in mind: 1. to show that the Bible is God’s good word for his world 2. to offer practice in discovering and living out God’s goodness.

I grew up in Sydney, Australia. My mum taught me about Jesus from before I can remember and took me to church, where I got to know Jesus better. Then at high school and university, doubts started surfacing. A number of people, confident in the Bible’s goodness and clarity, challenged me to investigate the Bible for myself.

I became convinced that Jesus was not only real and my Saviour, but the Lord of the universe.

However, I often found myself disagreeing with family and friends on different issues. At times I thought they had good arguments and reasoning, particularly regarding things like love and sex, and all I could come back with was ‘The Bible says no!’ I was fighting hard to maintain my trust not only that the Bible was God’s word, but that it was good for me and our world.

I started studying for Christian ministry at Moore Theological College in Sydney, Australia. The subjects on Christian ethics confirmed that not only did the Bible prove to be true and good, but it also gave me the best resource for discovering how to live well in our world. It presented goodness for every aspect of life, not just simple ‘No’ or ‘Yes’ answers. In Christian groups, I’d been given good examples of how the Bible did this, but I hadn’t identified what was actually being done. This was the first time I’d been made aware of a comprehensive framework for approaching life, using knowledge of God (sometimes called ‘theology’ or ‘doctrine’) alongside Bible texts. I was delighted when Dr Andrew Cameron, my ethics lecturer, published a summary of his material in a book, Joined-Up Life.1 Instead of doubting the Bible’s approach to life, I wanted to help others see its goodness. I especially wanted to help teenagers who were going through the same period of questioning and identity-discovery that I had gone through.

In Spain I met a lot of teenagers from different churches. They were generally welltaught with a good knowledge of who God was, but hadn’t grown to trust the truth

1.

Dr Andrew Cameron and Dr Andrew Ford were my lecturers, and I am indebted to their teaching for most of the ideas I’ve included in this book. See Cameron, A 2011, Joined-up Life: A Christian Account of How Ethics Works, Inter-Varsity Press, Nottingham.

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of the Bible themselves. When it came to living it out, they would say, ‘My church says I can do this but not that’. But they found it hard to defend the Bible’s goodness when others questioned their decisions. Our friends working with teenagers in Australia were seeing the same thing. Christian kids wouldn’t necessarily believe what was said about God and trust that his way was good. Their friends were no longer believing that the Bible and Christians were good. Instead, they saw both as representing slavery and oppression.

I became convinced that Christians would greatly benefit from both reading God’s word for themselves and engaging with a framework for Christian ethics. I wanted to present Andrew Cameron’s Joined-Up Life framework in an accessible way that would accompany youth as they began to read the Bible for themselves. If I could go back in time, it’s what I would want to give to my teenage self to help me both trust that the Bible is God’s good word for his world, and learn about and practise how to discover and live out that goodness.

I’m praying that it does just that for you.

WHY THE BIBLE? The best way to discover that the Bible is God’s good word for his world is to read it. You might be thinking, But Mike, you can’t say that I should trust the Bible because the Bible tells me to—that’s a circular argument! You’re right. But there’s a good reason that it’s circular—the Bible claims to be God’s word. Here’s one example:

2 TIMOTHY 3:16a

This is part of a letter in the New Testament written by Paul, a first century Christian who wrote much of the New Testament and was instrumental in the early church.

When he says ‘Scripture’ he’s referring to the collected writings of the Old Testament which we now find in the Bible. Other parts of the New Testament then refer to Paul’s letters as ‘Scripture’ (2 Peter 3:16), and so on until we see all 66 books as ‘Scripture’. This means that that the whole Bible is ‘inspired by God’—literally ‘breathed out’ by God. Each word is not just a person’s word but God’s word. Think about that for a moment. The most common way to get to know a person is by talking with them. If God has spoken, then he has revealed himself. This has FOUR BIG IMPLICATIONS FOR US and for how this book approaches how we use the Bible.

THE BIG 4 …

NINJA STYLE

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1 · WHO YOU ARE MATTERS The Bible claims that it is God’s spoken word. God used words—a method of communication that we can understand and use daily. If this claim is true, then it means that God wanted to reveal himself to us, and chose to do that in a way that we could understand. This means that we matter so much that God decided to reveal himself to us!

2 · WE GET TO KNOW GOD THROUGH HIS WORD The Bible also claims that God is powerful and always speaks the truth. This means that his words don’t change, and will be effective in revealing who he is. The Bible will be consistent with itself, holding God’s authority. So, if the whole Bible is God’s word, we can trust that as we read it, we will get to know God. 3 · WE READ THE BIBLE TOGETHER The Bible is God’s word to us all, and so we read it in community. I can’t just tell you what it all means myself, as if I had authority over the Bible. I’m going to tell you what I’ve understood from it, but you have every right to disagree with me as long as you use the Bible to do it. We’ve got to work hard together at reading it well.

We need to look at everything in its context, and see how each part fits within the bigger story (see the Appendix for a Bible-reading method). Together, we sit under the Bible’s authority, seeking to be humble and faithful in our reading.

The Bible also claims that God helps us to read his word. The Holy Spirit helps us both individually and as a community to read it faithfully, recognise its truth and live well. We can ask him for help.

4 · GOD’S WORD INTERPRETS US As God reveals himself to us, he also reveals who we are. He interprets us. In revealing his purpose for life and the world, he shows up our own plans and dreams that don’t line up with what he wants for us. As he tells us what he loves, he uncovers what we do that he doesn’t like. So we’ve got to ask ourselves, Am I ready to change?

However, I still haven’t answered that first question regarding the circular argument: how do you prove that it’s God’s word? The problem is that you can’t. The Bible claims to be the highest authority. Only God has the authority to prove to you that it is his word. Even a miracle happening before your eyes couldn’t prove it, because you’d first have to prove that the miracle came from God. How could you do that unless God proved it to you? So only God has the authority to tell you that his word is his word. It does my head in!

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Believing the Bible is God’s word is not like a mathematical formula where you just put in all the numbers to come up with the right answer. It’s more like science. To ‘prove’ it, we put it to the test. In order to do that, we’ve got to read it, and read it well (see the Appendix, p. 229). That’s why I’m convinced that the best way to help you trust that the Bible is God’s good word for his world is to read it with you.

WHICH BIBLE? There are lots of different versions. Most of these are different translations. English didn’t exist 2000 years ago! Most of the Old Testament was written in Hebrew and the New Testament was written in Greek. So for us to read the Bible together, we need a translation. I’ve chosen to use the same one throughout this book—the Christian Standard Bible (CSB). I think the translators have done a pretty good job of being faithful to the original texts and making it understandable in modern English.

There are loads of other great translations too. If your Bible is a different translation, no worries. Keep it open as you read this book, and compare them. The differences can even help us to pay attention and work hard together at reading it faithfully.

WILL YOU READ WITH ME? I’ve said all this (about me, about why I’ve written this book, and about why I’ve used the Bible) because I really want you to read the Bible with me. Maybe you’re not a Christian, or maybe you’ve got serious doubts about God and are about to give up on him. I don’t want to manipulate you or make you into something you’re not. I want you to investigate the Bible and interrogate what I say about it. I want you to fight with all the ideas that you don’t think make sense. I know it’s going to feel a little one-sided because it’s a book rather than a conversation (though if we meet one day, I’d love to hear your thoughts!). I’m confident that if you read the Bible well, you will be convinced that it is God’s good word for his world.

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Maybe you are a Christian, and you’re thinking, I already believe the Bible is God’s word and that it’s good. Why should I read this book? I believe that this book will help you to grow even more in your trust in God’s good word for his world. It will also give you some great tools and practice in how to better discover and live out that goodness.

If, like me, you tend towards thinking you already know everything you need to know, it will be particularly helpful for you as long as you don’t approach it looking for quick fixes and more ways to win arguments. Instead of finishing with all the answers, I hope that you’ll get to the end and realise that things are far more complex than you once thought. But instead of causing you to give up, I hope you’ll feel excited about humbly and faithfully pursuing what God says is good for the rest of your life.

SOME TOOLS TO HELP YOU QR CODES The QR codes throughout this book direct you to videos that have something to do with the content near the codes. I appear in a number of them, so you’ll get to know me a bit more ‘in person’, too. If they are distracting and you would prefer to just read the book, feel free to ignore them. They complement the material, but are not essential. If a code doesn’t work or if your phone doesn’t read them, you can use THE ONLINE LIST OF LINKS to access them. Please feel free to use these videos in groups or at your church.

THE APPENDIX, THE FIVE SENSES AND THE BIG BIBLE TABLE At the end of this book, you will find three tools designed to help you to read the Bible. The ‘Five Senses of Faithful Bible Reading’ (p. 240) is a step-by-step guide that you can use to read the Bible. The ‘Big Bible Table’ (p. 241) is a reference sheet. The Appendix (p. 229) explains these two tools in more detail and how to use them. It also complements the ‘kite’ framework that I present in this book, demonstrating the method that I have used to interpret the biblical texts that I use within the book. You could use these tools in your personal reading of the Bible, or in a group in your school, college, university or church. You can download printable copies of them from ANEWFREEDOM.NET. IDEAS FOR GROUP DISCUSSION To make the most of this book, the best thing would be to talk about the content with your friends or in a group from your church.

Please don’t spend the whole time saying ‘Mike said this, so …’. I want you to pretend you’ve just listened to me read the chapter out loud, and then open

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your Bibles and interrogate what I’ve said. This is how you will grow in your trust of the Bible as God’s good word to his world. After reading a chapter, you could look up the text of the Bible that I used to talk about Jesus, read it among yourselves (and maybe also look at its context) using the ‘Five Senses of Faithful Bible Reading’, and then consider these three questions: 1. What stands out to you about Jesus from this text?

2. What do you think about what Mike said in the chapter?

3. How are you going to live out your new freedom this week?

I’ve also provided more Bible references at the end of each ‘Practice session’ chapter (Chapters 4–9) that you could look up but which I haven’t talked about. Then, after thinking together about what the Bible says, use your group time to talk about what you will practically change in your life in light of what you have considered together. You can download detailed guides and more resources from ANEWFREEDOM.NET.

WHY DON’T I MENTION CORONAVIRUS? We were just about to publish A New Freedom when COVID-19 hit the world. In March 2020 everything was locked down in Spain, and Australia was not far behind. This put the brakes on all publication plans for both Spanish and English versions of this book. On the one hand, I was very thankful to God for the extra time that we had to revise the text and work on more resources to accompany it. On the other, due to the effects of the pandemic, I was concerned about the new challenges that Australian and Spanish youth would face, especially regarding sickness and death. After reviewing the whole book, we decided not to change anything (except for adding this paragraph), because we believe that what you have here is enough to help you confront the existence of evil and suffering (Chapter 6, p. 112). In fact, it’s made me even more confident that it will help you take on any other topic that may come up in the future.

SO … WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? Great job reading the Preface. Now it’s time to get into the book. I’ve prayed that you and all who will read it will grow in your trust that the Bible is God’s good word for his world, and that you’ll both learn and practise how to discover and live out that goodness. So with his help, let’s go for it!