Incarnation Life
Sadikin Djumin

How do we live our Christian lives in this world? What do those lives look like? These questions sound very general that it is commonly assumed that Christians know the answers. Christians are to worship and glorify God in all aspects of life is, indeed, a very general answer. The real question, however, is how well we do in reality in bringing God His glory through our existence and activities in this world. How can our lives make significant differences for God’s Kingdom in this world? What are the challenges to do so?

We as Christians always believe that our existence in this world is for a mission. We are not in this world just waiting for the Lord’s second coming, if we live long enough, or for our time to depart from this world. Without understanding God’s mission for Christians and how it requires of us, our lives indeed will be very boring, without much meaning and purpose. Moreover, our Christians lives will not be any different from the people of the world because we are not immune from the lure of the world systems, such as materialism and consumerism, fame and popularity, and pleasures (1 John 2:16). The temptations always look “good” in our eyes just like the fruits of the tree of knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. It is not surprising that Jesus teaches that salt that lost its saltiness is pretty much not only useless but also will be trampled by others (Matthew 5:13) because it does not function as it should.

Therefore, it is very essential to comprehend the Christian mission and what it demands our lives to be. From John 17:14-19, we can be sure that Jesus sends us to the world as the Father sent Him to carry on the mission of God. Our mission involves proclaiming the Gospel and advancing the presence of God’s Kingdom in this world. We are called to make disciples for Christ (Matthew 28:19, 20) and to present them mature in Christ (Colossians 1:28). We are called to be salt and light in the midst of corruption and darkness in the world so that our good deeds will make people to glorify the Father in heaven (Matthew 5:13-16). We are called to be God’s ambassadors for the ministry of reconciliation that brings people to God (2 Corinthians 5:18-20). We are called to develop good cultures and civilizations, to take care of the earth and it resources, through our creativity and productive work (Genesis 1:28; 2:15). We are called to be God’s soldiers taking up all armors of God to fight the devil’s attacks and schemes (Ephesians 6:10-18). We can continue to list the callings of God as we continue walking through the Bible.

From the callings mentioned above, one thing is certain. Each and every one of them requires complete sacrifice and commitment. It demands other-centered life that is to be poured out like Paul’s for God (Philippians 2:17). Proclaiming the Gospel and being God’s ambassadors with the message of reconciliation assumes the risks of misunderstanding, mockery, rejection, physical persecution and even death. Being salt and light require complete sacrifice as their physical entities have to disintegrate and burn up in order to produce the function and result. Developing good cultures and civilizations with the conscious mindset of taking care of the earth and its resources always requires hard work because the prominent secular cultures are all about greedy exploitation and the drive for the maximum profit. Lastly, God’s soldiers are expected to face hostilities, surprised attacks, unexpected sabotages from the enemies and even death.

These risks seem very distant and strange in today’s modern world, even to most Christians. They are considered foolish and crazy because our human nature is to avoid pain and sufferings at all costs. In addition, we live in the world full of the values and cultures of materialism and egoism. They put a constant, pressuring demand on our lives to keep pursuing the so-called “American Dream.” Our lifestyle has to constantly move upward on the ladder of success and power. We can observe these values and cultures of materialism and egoism being reinforced in ourselves daily via media advertising and marketing efforts in TV or magazines.

In addition, the values of materialism and egoism are so engrained in our lives that they are reflected in our daily choices and decisions. They even affect our ministry mindset. Most of the times, consciously or unconsciously, we make a decision based on monetary worth, such as how much less we can spend or how much more we can gain from the decision. We have a yearly plan with goals to reach, such as a yearly milestone for our career development in order to gain certain higher job position, status and power. Usually, these goals are motivated by the desire for a bigger salary. However, interestingly, we usually do not have a yearly plan for our spiritual development, especially goals that will bring us closer to those God’s callings. Even if we do have the yearly goals for our spiritual development, they are seldom planned as rigorous as our yearly goals for career development. If this is true, we should wonder how well we do with Jesus’ command for us to store up treasures in heaven (Matthew 6:20).

However, the risks and expectation of sufferings for God and His mission were accepted by the earlier Christians with joy and correct expectation. Many Christians have still been experiencing sufferings as part of a normal Christian life in the countries that are hostile to Christianity. Readiness to suffer for Christ is also reflected on Paul’s statement in Philippians 1:21, which is “to live is Christ and die is gain”. He even regards suffering for Jesus Christ is a privilege (Philippians 1:29). In his book “Meditations on the Cross”, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote from the Tegel Prison to his friend Eberhard Bethge that his suffering in the Nazi prison was not to be dramatized because it was nothing compared to what Jesus suffered on the cross.

Therefore, we need to learn, reflect and imitate the life of Jesus Christ. Philippians 2:5-8 can be a good starting point for our learning. Jesus gave up all His godly attributes, status, power, richness and privileges and became a regular human being like us in order to save us from the power of sin and death. He completed God’s mission to the point of death with complete sacrifice and commitment. He chose the life of incarnation instead of upward mobility, the life of sacrifice instead of the life of pride and elite. He came down from heaven to meet our situation, to free us from the clench of sin and death and to provide us the only way of salvation to the Father.

The same attitude and life should be applied in our lives if we are to be faithful to God’s mission and callings. The incarnation life requires us to leave the ambition to pursue, keep and maintain status, power, wealth and privileges of the world. It will give us freedom to bring the message and presence of the Gospel to the people whom we do not regularly and intentionally meet, especially those who are in need and oppressed. It is a ministry of compassion, which we leave our comfort zones and go down to meet people so that we understand their situations and their real needs. It is a ministry of love that we see people from the eyes of the loving God. Without the incarnation life, it will be difficult for us to be relevant to the people and their needs. It is the irrelevancy that marginalizes Christians and the Church in the world today. Without the incarnation life, it is extremely difficult to understand the real grim and complicated situations that are faced daily by the poor and oppressed people. Without excursion to the real conditions, it is almost impossible to comprehend living a life trapped in injustice, oppressions and fears.

What does this mean to us? It is the hope of the author that this short article will trigger our thinking and action to adopt the incarnation life as our ministry mindset and model. The road to materialism, egoism and popularity is very enticing and powerful, but it is not the road that our Lord Jesus Christ chose (Luke 4). He chose the road of the cross. His incarnation life should inspire us on how we should live our lives in this world. It is true from Jesus’ teaching that we cannot serve two masters. Interestingly, Jesus only states two gods: God and Mammon (money) in Matthew 6:24. The question is who our true God is. Of course, we all may be struggling on the issue. It is okay because it is better that we are honest to ourselves and God as we struggle on. Let us pray that God will strengthen our faith as we start to adopt the incarnation life for our lives and ministries.

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