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Mark Driscoll is one of the 50 most influential pastors in America, and the founder of Mars Hill Church in Seattle (www.marshillchurch.org), the Paradox Theater, and the Acts 29 Network which has planted scores of churches. Mark is the author of The Radical Reformission: Reaching Out Without Selling Out. He speaks extensively around the country, has lectured at a number of seminaries, and has had wide media exposure ranging from NPR’s All Things Considered to the 700 Club, and from Leadership Journal to Mother Jones magazine. He’s a staff religion writer for the Seattle Times. Along with his wife and children, Mark lives in Seattle.

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Reformission

ZONDERVAN

Contents

PREFACE..............................................................................................................................................................9ACKNOWLEDGMENTS......................................................................................................................................................13INTRODUCTION: My Personal Reformission and the Emerging Reformission Movement........................................................................................151. EAT, DRINK, AND BE A MERRY MISSIONARY: Imitating the Reformission of Jesus Reformission Interview with David Bruce: Hollywood Jesus...............................292. AND NOW, THE NEWS: Shaping a Reformission Gospel Reformission Interview with Ichabod Caine: Christians and Country Music..........................................473. SHOTGUN WEDDINGS TO JESUS: Reformission Evangelism Reformission Interview with Stef Hjertager: From Dancer to Deacon.............................................674. ELVIS IN EDEN: A Reformission understanding of Culture Reformission Interview with Crash: What Would Jesus Tattoo?...............................................935. GOING TO SEMINARY AT THE GROCERY STORE: Connecting with Culture in Reformission Reformission Interview with Tim Ottley: Rocking for the Lamb.....................1176. THE SIN OF LIGHT BEER: How Syncretism and Sectarianism Undermine Reformission Reformission Interview with Mike Hale: Protestant Pubs.............................1377. POSTMODERN PANDEMONIUM: Defeating the New Demons Reformission Interview with Jenny Schneider: Glued to the Tube..................................................155CONCLUSION: From Demons to Dreams: Building a Kingdom Culture........................................................................................................177POSTSCRIPT...........................................................................................................................................................185APPENDIX: Peering through Portals into Tomorrow......................................................................................................................187NOTES................................................................................................................................................................195

Chapter One

Imitating the Reformission of Jesus

Jesus. The first word of this book must be Jesus, because everything, reformission included, begins and ends with him. But the longer someone is a Christian, the greater their propensity to diminish the Jesus of the Bible until he becomes a predictable little God who ceases to surprise them. Therefore, it is imperative that all Christians continually search the Scriptures in order to see Jesus clearly. And as we read of Jesus' involvement in culture, we see a free and radical God whose life is so shocking that it is self-evident that the story is true, because no one in their right mind could make it up. Therefore, to prepare you for reformission, I first want to remind you of the beautifully scandalous life and grace of Jesus Christ.

REMEMBERING: WHAT GOD'S STORY REVEALS

The story begins with God making all things, then creating a man named Adam. Though Adam is technically perfect, it is still not good for him to be alone. The Bible never tells us why, exactly. Perhaps he would have forgotten to pick up the trash around the Garden of Eden, and the place eventually would have looked like an eternal fraternity without a hint of an annual spring cleaning.

Whatever the case, God creates a perfect woman who is beautiful, sinless, and naked — the same kind of woman every guy ever since has been searching for. Adam meets her and, recognizing that his life has just taken a turn for the better, he sings her a song, after which their marriage is consummated. The Bible could end right there, after only two chapters, with the man and woman naked, eating fruit, and trying to fill the earth all by their happy, horny, holy selves.

But ever since the dreadful day of the Thud in Eden, we have all been walking around scratching our thick skulls, trying to figure out how to get back to that glorious time. Why? Because our happy, naked first parents sinned against God and brought a curse upon themselves and all of creation. They sinned because they believed the lies of a talking serpent who had been an angel until he got kicked out of heaven for his pride.

After they are exiled from Eden, our first parents have two boys, and before long, one boy kills the other. From there, carnage and death ensue, and people grow so wicked that God floods the earth, killing nearly everyone. But he starts over with another decent guy named Noah, who nevertheless ends up having a bad day, gets drunk, and passes out naked in his tent like some redneck on vacation.

As time rolls along, God also works through a cowardly old man named Abraham, who is happy to whore out his loving and beautiful antique of a wife to avoid conflict. God also chooses to work through a guy named Jacob, even though he's a trickster and a con man. Later, God raises up a stuttering murderer named Moses to lead his people. Years later, a king named David comes onto the leadership stage, but he becomes an adulterer, a murderer, and an odd type pointing ahead to the promised Christ. David's son Solomon redefines addiction, with more wine, women, and money than any guy could possibly know what to do with, though he gave it a good Hefneresque run. This brief list doesn't even include the prophets, like Ezekiel, whom God tells to cook a meal over his own feces; Hosea, who marries a prostitute; Jeremiah, who cries like a newly crowned beauty queen all the time; or any of the freaks on cable television right now talking about Jee-zus along with their wives, who by God's grace alone are not naked like their mother Eve.

And to top it all off, God comes to earth. He has a mom whom everyone thinks is a slut, a dad whom they think has the brilliance of a five-watt bulb for believing the "virgin birth" line, and brothers who likely pummel him frequently, because even God would have to get at least one wedgie from his brothers if he were to be fully human. The God-Man goes through puberty and likely goes through that weird vocal transition in which, in the course of one syllable, a young man can seamlessly go from sounding like Barry White to sounding like Cindy Brady. God comes hiding in human flesh and, according to Isaiah the prophet, he's a regular-looking guy. In sum, nobody knows exactly who this guy is.

Doesn't the story sound like the plot of a trashy, daytime television talk show? The God-Man is born to a teenage virgin in an animal stall, grows up with a blue-collar dad in a dumpy rural town, and has a weird cousin named John, who lives in the woods and survives on a steady diet of bugs, sugar, and repentance.

Somehow John becomes the leader of a religious movement with a small posse of guys you'd have to think probably looked like clones of the kid on the porch in the movie Deliverance. Then Jesus takes a few of John's posse as his own. At this point in the story, God is thirty years of age and a classic underachiever with no wife, kids, stable career, or even much of a home.

But apparently God is fun to hang with, because he and his posse get invited to a lot of parties, including a wedding, which is basically a week-long wine and...