Dear Friends:

The Lord has stirred the story of Eutychus in my heart. This is the first of a two part series on the lessons of that story.

On the Saturday night, when we gathered for the breaking of the bread, Paul, who was to leave next day, addressed the congregation and went on speaking until midnight. Now there were many lamps in the upstairs room where we were assembled, and a young man named Eutychus, who was sitting on the window-ledge, grew more and more drowsy as Paul went on talking, until, completely overcome by sleep, he fell from the third story to the ground, and was picked up dead. Paul went down, threw himself upon him, and clasped him in his arms. “Do not distress yourselves,” he said to them; “he is alive.” He then went upstairs, broke bread and ate, and after much conversation, which lasted until dawn, he departed. And they took the boy home, greatly relieved that he was alive (Acts 20:7-12, REB).

This story is best known as a cautionary tale about long-winded preaching and a description of one of the miraculous signs and wonders that accompanied the power of the Holy Spirit in the early Christian church.  I think it speaks a much deeper message to the contemporary church.  See what you think?

A young man sits on the window ledge of the church, halfway in and halfway out. What brings him to that position?

Apparently that’s where he has followed his family and friends, but there isn’t much attraction in the message. He can’t relate to it and he is bored. The preaching lulls him into sleep. He falls out of the church and he dies.

A concerned embrace revives him. Fellowship, a meal, and conversation renew him. He returns home with new life.

I know a lot of young men and women like Eutychus. In fact, I’ve been Eutychus–born into a Christian family; brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; attending church and church school; listening to thousands of sermons, homilies and devotional talks.

There is a common, but false premise in the circles I grew up in that just showing up and listening is going to bestow citizenship in the kingdom of heaven, along with a godly spouse, good-looking kids, perfect job and a white picket fence around the yard here on earth. When that doesn’t prove true, accusations fly about who and what has gone wrong?

I have worked with Christian schools, colleges and universities for 30 years and never cease to be bemused at the projected blame of parents, teachers and denominational leaders when young people walk out the door at graduation and leave the church. Judgments issue in blasts of self-righteous invective.

— It’s the parents’ fault. There is a failure of devotion in the home and a lack of support for the school!

— The church has failed to keep up with the times. The message lacks a vital nexus of relevance to the challenges and enticements of contemporary society!

— The schools betrayed us. Faithlessness and cynicism in the classroom destroy the belief of our youth!

— You don’t want these young people to think for themselves. All we’ve done here is raise legitimate questions and given them some exposure to what the world is really like. It’s
up to them to find the answers for themselves!

Every one of those statements can have factual merit, but they also carry a Christ-denying arrogance that salvation depends on human performance. The best that parents, teachers and pastors can do is to plant the seed. Only God can give the growth (1 Cor 3:7). It makes sacred sense then to focus on the crucified Christ (Jn 12:32; 1 Cor 2:2; Gal 6:14) in our own devotions and in where we point the youth, but pride keeps us fighting rather than focusing.

We are prone to sing with tears,

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,

Look full on His wonderful face,

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,

In the light of His glory and grace.

Stunningly and disgustingly, we too often close our hymnbooks and go right back to our senseless arguments of comparative fault. Meanwhile more and more young people fall off the ledge and go missing.

You see, each one of us has a free choice to go with Christ or to pursue our own path. Whenever we invite someone to join us in commitment to Christ, they look at us as an example of what he or she will become if they accept the invitation. If what is observed is an angry, stubborn, hair-splitting debater, it is quite likely the invitation will receive a pass. If it doesn’t, it most likely means that the proselyte shares a pathology with the proselytizer. Then the question is whether the conversion is to the life of Christ or to a human point of view?

I have many friends who have just given up on the faith and doctrines learned in their childhood. Many of these reprobates actually believe that the teaching is correct, but they lose hope in the face of its harsh application and demands for perfect performance. They are confused and disheartened. They quit and drop out in despair. For the most part, they don’t move on to any other faith community. They just suppress the spiritual aspect of their life unwilling to live their faith as their rule of life.

There are some of my acquaintance who believe they have it spiritually made because they are doing the “right” things with the “right” people and avoiding all the “wrong” things with the “wrong” people. My basic question for them is this: If you are so sure of your righteousness, why is it that, whenever two or three of you of like mind are gathered together, you are angry and miserable toward everyone else?

There is a larger “safety-in numbers” crowd comprised of individuals who aren’t as sure about where they stand on the spectrum of absolute right and wrong, but who find their comfort in showing up at the same time and doing the same thing as their peers without giving much thought to the deeper implications of what God may want for them or from them. (Compare with Gal 6:12-13).

Some of us (I learn about more all the time), are hungry for more than we’ve been getting. We are criticized for dissatisfaction with the status quo by those who profit by control of the religious franchise. We are disdained as “too serious” and “too religious” by “the safety-in-numbers” crowd. We don’t want to fight over what it means to follow Christ, because it really doesn’t matter to us what someone else thinks about that. Scripture is our compass and prayer is our desired means of communication.

There is an increasing pressure in my heart from the Holy Spirit. A one day-a-week, set-piece Christianity expressed in glib platitudes doesn’t cut it. I see people hanging on for dear life to the window ledges of the church and falling when their strength gives out because they aren’t offered anything compelling enough to bring them into the center and no one extends a hand of rescue when they are teetering on the edge.

My heart burns with desire to say to them, “Wait, wait, don’t give up on Jesus who has never given up on you. Whatever you have heard, he is bigger, better and more demanding than that and his burning passion is for you. I am pleading with you, don’t settle for anything or anyone else. Let’s talk.”

It takes time and the building of relationships to bring someone back from that window ledge. This takes patience and substance that are rarely devoted to the challenge.

Parents bring their wayward children to hear me speak. Spouses drag their husbands into my sermons hoping that this Christian lawyer will say something that will turn everything around. They do it with preachers and evangelists too. Folks, it’s just not realistic to hang the hope of salvation and the godly life on a person or an institution, let alone a sermon. This breeds the cult of personality, “lone ranger” religion, or the heresy of corporate salvation.

One of the real disappointments that I know as a Christian is that our culture is so accepting of the status quo and devotes so little thinking to the implications of the great gift of our salvation reflected in the way that we live and relate to each other. Why do we settle for so little?

Our friends in the 12-step recovery movement tell us that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. So we keep seeking our spiritual well-being in finding just the right pastor to preach just the right words. We keep plowing the same spiritual ground with the same implements forgetting the agrarian truth that over-farming causes sterility.

When Jesus said “I came that they might have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10) he was speaking in the plural. He was not talking about one man or woman or one-day-a week religion. He condemned “hired-hand” religion as leaving the flock open to scattering under attack. He proclaimed the benefits of life in community. “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd” (John 10:16). Only engagement in community will fulfill the life that Jesus gives us.

Jesus picked 12 persons as disciples to change the whole world. The best educational theory says that knowledge transmits best in a ratio of somewhere between 1 to 1 and 1 to 30. So by what madness does modern Christianity celebrate a 1 to 3,000 ratio as a success through the “preaching” model?

Once a week most of us go to church in anonymity and then we return to our private lives for the next six and one-half days. We are exhorted to do more but we think, “Who has the time?” Besides, “I gotta be me,” don’t I?

But what is that person going through who sits next to us on the pew or kneels in front of us or passes by us in the foyer? What is breaking their heart of giving them new hope and delight?

How will we ever know and how can we ever help when we are content to sit lined up in rows looking at the backs of those sitting in front of us? Do we not know and fear that many modern day Eutychuses are not coming in off the ledge, are falling asleep and dropping out the window to their spiritual death because the old ways of “show up, sit down and shut up” are not engaging them?

If Jesus came to gave us life and we accept it, than we need to live. We can’t sleepwalk through the kingdom. We need to be alert and responsive to what’s around us. In support of this point, I love the way Eugene Peterson paraphrases Paul’s admonition in Romans 12:1-2:

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life­your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life­and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

I don’t know about you but I used to be full of ideas and expectations about the church was supposed to work. Lately, my desire is for the mature life of Christ to be formed in me. That’s where I’ve learned that life in the community of believers begins for me.

Next time we’ll discuss more about building the community and healing Eutychus.

“O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him.” (Ps. 34:8)

Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

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Please note that the content and viewpoints of Mr. Hansen are his own and are not necessarily those of the C.S. Lewis Foundation. We have not edited his writing in any substantial way and have permission from him to post his content.

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Kent Hansen is a Christian attorney, author and speaker. He practices corporate law and is the managing attorney of the firm of Clayson, Mann, Yaeger & Hansen in Corona, California. Kent also serves as the general counsel of Loma Linda University and Medical Center in Loma Linda, California.

Finding God’s grace revealed in the ordinary experiences of life, spiritual renewal in Christ and prayer are Kent’s passions. He has written two books, Grace at 30,000 Feet and Other Unexpected Places published by Review & Herald in 2002 and Cleansing Fire, Healing Streams: Experiencing God’s Love Through Prayer, published by Pacific Press in spring 2007. Many of his stories and essays about God’s encompassing love have been published in magazines and journals. Kent is often found on the hiking trails of the southern California mountains, following major league baseball, playing the piano or writing his weekly email devotional, “A Word of Grace for Your Monday” that is read by men and women from Alaska to Zimbabwe.

Kent and his beloved Patricia are enjoying their 31st year of marriage. They are the proud parents of Andrew, a college student.