Rick McKinley

Summary: Explores what it means to live as a Christian in a polarized and secularized society, drawing on the idea of exile in scripture and proposing practices that sustain faithfulness in exile.

Rick McKinley, like many Christians, wrestles with what Christian faithfulness looks like for the church he pastors in Portland, Oregon, amid a secular and highly polarized American society. We can look for who to blame, resort to denial and despair, or recover an idea of understanding our situation upon which Jews and Christians have drawn through the centuries--the idea of exile.

McKinley traces the idea of exile through scripture, from the first exiles from the garden, down through Abraham and Sarah, Israel in Egypt, the Jews in Babylon, and the church scattered through the Roman empire. McKinley lays out the alternatives of how exiles live:

"[T]he way in which the people of God navigated their faithfulness to God in exile was not to burn Babylon or to baptize Babylon but to find distinct ways to bless and resist Babylon."

He argues that our calling as exiles is both to bless and resist our "Babylons." We need to recognize both windows of redemption, places where we can engage the culture around issues of shared concern such as the arts or the environment, and windows of opposition, such as our consumer culture. To be people who know where to bless and resist, we need two critical skills--the discipline of repentance and the practice of discernment. In repentance, we acknowledge our indifference to God and to our society and are converted by God to people who begin caring about the things God cares about. Discernment helps us know what faithfulness looks like in particular situations such as becoming a reconciling presence in a polarized society.

McKinley contends faithfulness is empowered and lived out through five critical practices:

1. Hearing and obeying--the centering practice that holds the others together.
2. Hospitality: overcoming fear to welcome the stranger
3. Generosity: repenting consumerism to recognize money and time are gifts and not possessions.
4. Sabbath: turning from busyness to embrace rest and relationships
5. Vocation: moving from the drudgery of jobs to the holy joy of living out a calling.

McKinley's vision is for the church as a healing presence in a divided society. He writes:

"The move I am suggesting is what Miroslav Volf called a move from exclusion to embrace. What if we began to envision a nation in which we didn't simply tolerate our differences but engaged one another around those deeply held convictions? What if we moved beyond polite disagreement to demanding safety for those with whom we disagree and defending the rights of those who hold convictions other than our own? What if we truly believed that each of us bears the image of God and has something to offer the other? What new types of civility might emerge among us? This new kind of relating could create new possibilities of understanding, out of which relationships could be born and change could become tangible."

Oh, that it were so! Beyond this healing vision, what I like about McKinley's book is that it both reflects insights of the likes of Volf and Newbigin (I also wonder if he has read Charles Taylor, James K. A. Smith, and other who have wrestled with secularity), and distills the best of these into a readable and practicable book for the rest of us. Others have written about Christians as exiles, and about formative practices, but I have not often seen all this thinking summarized so succinctly and translated into the real-life practice of a church.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.… (altro)

If God is good, live fully, love boldly and fear nothing because all is grace.

Rick McKinley's The Answer to Our Cry explores what real freedom is. If you grew up in Sunday School or have imbibed your share of Christian publishing, you know 'the answer to our cry' is probably Jesus (♪♫Jesus is the answer for the world today♪). Well that is part right. McKinley leads us through a mediation on how 'freedom comes only when we are attracted to the communion between the Father, Son and Spirit (15). You see, God, as Trinity, is the one being free from any need or obligation:

The Triune God is entirely free in himself as Father, Son and Spirit; They are happily united and fulfilled by their own communion within their own being. . . .They created everything seen and unseen so that we can share what they have. That's just how good God is. (27)

The human experience of freedom is always within bounds. Freedom without boundaries, would lead us to death (like when a man jumps off a building or cheats on his wife). McKinley argues that for freedom to be sustained it needs a form, and that form is relationship. Thankfully God has made a way for us, in Jesus, to share in the life and relationship of the Triune God. This allows for the fullest expression of sustainable human freedom.

So the answer to our cry (for freedom) is the Triune God, but our example of what real human freedom looks like is Jesus (yay! Sunday School answer still works!). Like Jesus, McKinley says Jesus:

Lived Fully--because he came from the Father, the Giver of Life
Loved Boldly--exemplified especially by his life poured out on the cross for our freedom
Feared Nothing--because no power on earth could shake him (28)
And So McKinley exhorts us also to live fully, love boldly and fear nothing. This book explores the nature of what the Christian life is, and can be. McKinley draws on trinitarian theology (recommending Michael Reeve's Delighting the Trinity)(157). This book is the gospel reexplained and examined in trinitarian terms. It is theological--exploring the themes of God's love and justice but it is also pastorally sensitive.

I am an occasional listener to the Imago Dei podcast (the church McKinley pastors) and have read a coupe of McKinley's previous books (This Beautiful Mess and The Advent Conspiracy). I like McKinley's conversational communication style and appreciate how substantive he is (a rarity for famous pastors). I would say that this book is deeper than his early volumes, but not necessarily a compelling read. McKinley lays his thesis out early and spends the rest of his chapters expanding the theme. All and all great stuff, but repetitive in places. I give it four stars.

Notice of material connection: I received this book free from the publisher for this honest review.… (altro)