But Jesus was Silent

You don't have to look far to understand our world as one that demands fast-paced, loudly-articulated personality.

Lights are bright. Public speakers are hilarious. Our worth is often gauged by how readily we've kept pace with the last twenty-four hours of news, fashion, and social networking.

And I see the ways I've accepted it as my own paradigm. I see the ways we, the Body of Christ, have accepted it.

As a Church, we note the rate of rapid change in our world and are afraid that the Gospel will become a relic of the past if we do not dress it in the same bright lights and social conventions.

We evangelise according to the signs of the times. We infiltrate social media. We keep our wardrobes on trend. We equip our apologists with effective rhetoric and a handful of side-splitting puns.

But Jesus was silent.
Matthew 26:63

His progress through various courtrooms on His way to Calvary is the story of the original peaceful protestor. He didn't retaliate with violence. He didn't rest on creative rhetoric or persuasive, charismatic speeches.

He simply unleashed a raw call to accountability - a quiet reminder of Truth.

One of the guards slapped Jesus in the face... Jesus replied, "If there is some offence in what I said, point it out; but if not, why do you strike me?"
John 18:19-23

Jesus knew the power of His message, the value of an invitation left to its natural effects. He didn't present. He didn't augment. He just set the Truth free.

For a long time, I've wrestled with feeling ill at ease in certain aspects of mission life.

I find small talk painful. I have no interest in keeping my wardrobe up to scratch by the current fashions (quite frankly, can someone just give me a habit already?). As a speaker, I usually agonise over ways to come across less serious, funnier, more light-hearted and accessible, when in truth all I want is to delve straight and deep into the heart of the Father.

I usually end up feeling a little insincere. I present a fashionable gospel that responds to the slap of society not will a quiet recall to truth, but with a well-orchestrated and elaborate image projection.

When did we become more concerned with how we are seen than with who we are in Christ?

Reading the book Quiet, by Susan Cain, I was struck by the observation that somewhere around the turn of the twentieth century, the Western world experienced a tipping point culturally: where once character was emphasised and cultivated, the focus now shifted to the cultivation of personality. 

Earlier advice manuals were filled with words like 'integrity' and 'morals' - from the 1920s onwards, the emphasis shifted to 'fascinating', 'attractive', 'energetic'.

And somewhere along the line - fuelled, of course, by the earnest desire to reach as many souls as possible with the Gospel of Joy - we arrived at Contagious Christianity.

It's not a bad thing. Our faces should be radiant with the knowledge of God's mercy. The world needs preachers - charismatic, gifted speakers who can communicate the Gospel in a way that draws souls into the Truth. The world is blessed when Christianity leads to expressive praise, to talented apologists, to relentless warriors who stand up for the Church in the fray.

But Jesus, that day, was silent.

I couldn't understand it. I couldn't understand why He would willingly waste an opportunity to speak the Truth to precious souls who needed to hear it.

Bringing it to prayer, the Lord's answer to me was this:

I am who I am. 

Jesus couldn't be untrue to his own self. And His was a humility that did not preserve its own life, even to death on a cross. 

The face our God presented to us was not one of larger-than-life personality, fast-paced rhetoric, and relentless persuasion using all the latest techniques. 

It was the face of a humble man - silent, condemned, and nailed to a Cross.

As Jesus' hands and feet today, we're called to contemplate and imitate His priority for character over personality. 

Too often more time is spent on advertising than on pursuing deep virtue. Too often a Church that is committed to evangelisation can also become a Church in which a soul's practical ministerial function outweighs that soul's communion with Christ.

We're called to unleash the Truth - but not to resort to the world's manipulation strategies if that Truth leads us to Calvary. 

Sometimes, we're called to be silent - even to the point of death on a cross.

AMDG