Ragamuffin

It's Sunday evening, and I'm still listening to the new Andrew Peterson album. I like his songwriting. I never really listened to him before a few years ago, but for some reason his music takes me back to the way I felt when I was growing up listening to Rich Mullins.

Speaking of Rich Mullins, he wrote a testimony in Brennan Manning's The Ragamuffin Gospel:

"I owe Brennan Manning thirty dollars for lecture tapes I bought from him on an I.O.U. I'm not writing this foreword because of that debt. I simply mention it because indebtedness is a condition indicative of ragamuffins - a condition we all share, until we lose ourselves in the liberating, healing, invigorating truth to which these pages bear testimony.

My introduction to Brennan Manning's work came on a drive south from Manhattan, Kansas, through the edge of the Flinthills. It is a beautiful drive, best accompanied by the music of Aaron Copeland...or by pure silence. When a friend put a tape of one of Manning's lectures in my truck's tape player, I objected. But my friend said, 'Just give it ten minutes.'

Five minutes later, I steered the truck onto the shoulder of the road. My eyes were so full of teas, I could not see to drive.

I have attended church regularly since I was less than a week old. I've listened to sermons about virtue, sermons against vice. I have heard about money, time management, tithing, abstinence, and generosity. I've listened to thousands of sermons...but I could count on one hand the number that were a simple proclamation of the gospel of Christ.

That proclamation is the message I heard that day. And it did what the gospel can't help but do: it broke the power of mere "moralistic religiosity" in my life, and revived a deeper acceptance that had long ago withered in me.

In our society, we tend to swear unyielding allegiance to a rigid position, confusing that action with finding an authentic connection to a life-giving Spirit. We miss the gospel of Christ: the good news that, although the holy and all-powerful God knows we are dust, He still stoops to breathe into us the breath of life - to bring to our wounds the balm of acceptance and love. No other author has articulated this message more simply or beautifully than Brennan Manning.

I owe Brennan Manning thirty dollars, and I expect to get it to him soon. But I owe him an even bigger debt for the freedom he helped me find through this book...and the greatest debt of all to the God whose grace extends to - and especially for - the ragamuffins of this world."

Wherever you're at, whatever season of life or frame of mind you find yourself in today, go read The Ragamuffin Gospel. Go buy it right now at Barnes and Noble or order it online from Amazon. Get it from your church library or a friend's house. Whatever you need to do, get this book...it will change your life. I already typed out Rich Mullins' words, so I feel like I don't need to do the trademark Levar Burton, "But don't take my word for it..."

Chances are, I'm going to be mentioning it in future blog posts, but that's not why you should read it. You should read it because it "is a dangerous book. It will shake you to your core and shuffle every idea you've neatly arranged in your brain."

Go read it.