Jon Tyson

12 quotes

• A Creative Minority is a Christian community in a web of stubbornly loyal relationships, knotted together in a living network of persons who are committed to practicing the way of Jesus together for the renewal of the world.

• Sometimes we hear about churches having honor cultures, but they rarely seem to be cultures where everyone is honored. The power dynamics work in such a way that the honor flows uphill to the senior leaders. Honor seems to work much as it would in the world. The most visible receive the most glory; the most gifted, the most attention.

• Pride makes us reflect on our own image in our heads all the time. And as Paul reminds us, "There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves."

• Using religion in an attempt to manipulate God merely distracts us from the goal of our faith, which is to enjoy an intimate relationship with him.

• Instead of being a people who have good news to share, news that could transform the world, we have become a people mired in the twenty-four-hour news cycle, fed a constant diet of hopelessness and despair. Our ability to dismiss the work of God in the church has become toxic. We are plagued by a lack of expectation and have begun to believe that this is all there is.

• The scars on my soul come from the church, as does the joy that has come to define me. Leading in the church has been the source of both the trauma and the consolations in my life.

• Discipleship must be stronger than cultural formation. Loyalty must be stronger than compromise. This must be stronger than that. The times called for a beautiful resistance.

• Under the care of the Good Shepherd, our souls will be restored. Under the shepherding of our culture, our souls will be destroyed.

• The early church was strikingly different from the culture around it in this way -the pagan society was stingy with its money and promiscuous with its body. A pagan gave nobody their money and practically gave everybody their body. And the Christians came along and gave practically nobody their body and they gave practically everybody their money.

• The joy and satisfaction that come from being faithful to Christ will always be richer than the mere ease that comes from drifting along the cultural currents.

• Deep in our hearts, we feel sick about the hostility, dishonor, and disdain in our world. A kind of collective fatigue manifests itself in our disgust for our culture. We are exhausted by the devaluing of others but feel powerless to stop. I feel this at times after I am done looking at social media. There is so much condescension and so much anger. I feel both grieved and overwhelmed. I want to lash out, but I don’t exactly know how. We don’t know how to change the channel of contempt. Unity feels like a pipe dream, and healing, out of reach. Our hearts are grieved by the failure of the church as well. The way we devalue people for their theology or lack of it, different practices and traditions, and struggles with sin. Our vision of God has been lowered, his power is scarce, and his love is a rumor that’s been chased away. I believe there is a cure for the cancer of contempt: honor.

• Pride is not thinking too much of myself; pride is thinking of myself far too much. This posture of the heart removes God from the throne, relegating him to a supporting role in our story. This pride sees not just our culture but also our faith as a tool for self-fulfillment.