Keith Giles hits it out of the ballpark again.
I met Keith last year through a mutual friend, and I have
found him to be a true brother in the Kingdom. Moreover, I absolutely love his
books.
Although for a much shorter period of time than Keith, I
have been involved with New Testament-style open, mutually participatory church
gatherings. At RHM (Renewed Heart Ministries) we call them HeartGroups. One of the biggest challenges I
have encountered is the false idea held by many that they are not qualified
enough, educated enough, or “something” enough to be able to share what Jesus
is doing in their lives with others and significantly contribute to the
Kingdom. Sadly, they feel they either have nothing to contribute, or that what
they have to contribute somehow isn’t good enough. So many people have let
these feelings of inadequacy stop them.
Keith quashes these fears, which is why I am recommending
this small volume to each HeartGroup in our RHM network. It’s the fact that we
ARE so inadequate that guarantees our usefulness to Jesus and His Kingdom. Our
weakness is God’s greatest asset.
Jesus’ Kingdom, with this just as much as with all else,
turns our normal thinking on its head. Keith passionately and effectively
captures this concept. We don’t need better programs, more talented leaders,
and intensely gifted specialists. What we need is more weakness. God’s love is
revealed through normal Joe’s and Nancy’s just like you and me. That’s right,
you read that correctly, what we need is more weakness. It’s the very stuff
God’s strength is perfected in. This is the stuff God confounds the wise and
overcomes the enemy’s strongholds with. And isn’t it just what you’d expect,
this kind of upside down reality from a God who overcame His enemy by allowing
that enemy to put Him to death? It’s the paradox of all paradoxes. And the
Power of Weakness is an excellent volume that pulls back the veil, revealing
that just like Moses, Gideon, David, Peter, Paul, the woman at the well, and
others, what we think will give success to God’s Kingdom is many times
incorrect. And that which we think disqualifies us from being able to
contribute something beautiful to God’s radical Kingdom of other-centered love
is, in many cases, exactly what makes us God’s choice for the job.
If you have ever felt like you weren’t qualified enough,
not good enough, not talented enough to be used by God in a significant way in
the Kingdom, think again. This book is for you.
For those who are also familiar with my work in the book
Finding the Father (on the challenge of believing in a good God in the midst of
so much human suffering), I will say from the beginning you will wrestle with
Keith’s chapter on Paul. Not because Keith is wrong, but simply because he uses
slightly different language than I do. But once you get to Chapter 12 (The
Power of Suffering), it will all “click” as Keith brings it full circle. And if
you’re like me, you too will want to shout it from the rooftops. It must be
remembered that the idea of paying a penalty so that some may go to Heaven is
strangely absent from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. On the other hand, death
and SUFFERING at the hands of one’s enemy as a way of subversively defeating
enemies through self-sacrificial love (John 12.31), delivering those held down
and oppressed, and restoring those very same people to a world where love
reigns here and now, are ideals that are all over the place. This chapter is
the climax of The Power of Weakness with its all-important, paradigm-shifting
element of Christ’s teachings.
Lastly, one of the most cherished elements of Keith’s
books which I find most valuable is that Keith really does forward Jesus’
definition of the Gospel. This is a game changer for any who have seen the
contrast between how Jesus defined the Gospel and how contemporary, westernized
Christianity defines the Gospel.
I’ll share with you one statement from the book in the
hope it moves you to get a copy and read the whole volume for yourself:
“When we look at passages where Jesus sends the disciples
out into the surrounding area to preach the Gospel of the Kingdom, it doesn’t
make sense to conclude that they were sharing with the community a message of
substitutionary death for their sins. It also doesn’t fit with the text to
assume that they offered salvation to those who repeated a carefully worded
prayer of faith so that they could go to heaven when they died. Obviously,
whatever it was that the disciples went out preaching, it wasn’t anything like
this. The Gospel preached by the disciples didn’t have anything to do with the
finer points of the doctrine of the atonement, a subject which they exhibited
zero understanding about. So, what was it that the disciples went out
preaching? We see the answer in Matthew 9:5, Luke 9:6 and Luke 10:9. It was
simply the Gospel of the Kingdom. The disciples were sent out to proclaim ‘The
Kingdom of God is near you’, and then to demonstrate this by casting out demons
and healing the sick. This was the very same message that we see Jesus publicly
proclaiming over and over again in the Gospels” (pp. 9–10).
If you feel that somehow you don’t have what it takes to
help others discover and experience Christ’s kingdom, then The Power of
Weakness is a must read for you as you could not be more wrong. God has chosen
the weak to confound the mighty, the foolish to challenge the wise. Again, what
we need is MORE weakness.
I cannot recommend Keith’s new book, The Power of
Weakness, strongly enough.
Herb Montgomery
Director, author, and speaker of Renewed Heart Ministries (RHM)
