The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical

This book immediately became my favorite. It is packed with so many tidbits of wisdom & it will really challenge you to ask yourself if you’re living in a way that pleases Jesus!

Not a theological treatise or a how-to book, Claiborne's text is a challenge to the faithful, especially those who have become frustrated with the sometimes stale and/or hypocritical church of today. You may disagree with what he has to say (in fact, I think nearly everyone can find something to disagree with here), but you cannot deny the need for this challenge to bring the Christian faith back to its roots and examine what that means for us. It would be difficult (and inadvisable) to categorize Shane Claiborne's book on a liberal - conservative spectrum. Claiborne's radicalism comes from asking different questions about Christianity, or at least asking old questions in a different way. What does it look like to live as Jesus taught, as the early church strove to live? Where would we take a stand? What systems would we challenge? How might we achieve that today? Where I think Claiborne falls short, and other authors perhaps need to pick up the conversation, is in the field of the church as a body as opposed to the individual believer. I feel he ends on a relatively weak note, imploring readers not to 'leave the church behind to follow Jesus,' but not yet delving into the questions of how we might follow Jesus, dragging the church-- willingly or unwillingly-- along.

Shane has captured the complacency found in western Christianity. Personally I prefer deep books on theology, but this author has given us "street-wise" theology that needs to be read by every teen, collegiate, and adult. Shane has taken the essence of the message of Jesus and given a practical and pastoral theology. That does not mean it has become domesticated, not in the least. Shane Claiborne sees the phrase "Kingdom of God" and exchanged the world "Revolution" for the word "Kingdom." Does that make a difference? Not in what Jesus meant, but it greatly changes how people view the practicaly day to day workings of Jesus' life, ministry, teachings, and words. He freely shows how even the words of Jesus existed in the flesh through the works of Ghandi and Mother Teresa. Whether it is sleeping with the lepers or giving away everything he has to feed an empty stomach, Irresistible Revolution grabs the westernized, domesticated, once-a-week Christian and shakes them to the core with ideas and thoughts that rarely enter most church doors on a given Sunday. Does that mean I agree with it all? No. But reading a good book, like Shane's, is like eating fish...there is a lot of meat and a few bones to spit out. But in the end, I think every reader will be greatly satisfied with the meal after feasting on this book.

In his book, The Irresistable Revolution: Life as an Ordinary Radical, Shane Claiborne speaks of his journey into love. He tells the stories of his life, a path that has led an upwardly mobile Christian young man into one of the worst neighborhoods I have ever been in. Although this book is full of radical theology (stuff that gets you to really fall in love with loving God's poor), it is communicated by stories. These tales are always delightful, often funny, and very confrontive to the ways of a middle-class suburbanite. Yet I don't feel guilty about my life by the time I am done with the book: I feel invited into serving God's poor and working to bring about a more just world, bit by bit. Shane shares with gentleness and care. Shane is very careful to embrace the Christian church while at the same time challenge it to be more persistent with God's call to involve our lives with the poor and work for justice. It is not a riducule of evangelicalism, as he is clear that he is an evangelical; it is merely a relook at what evangelicalism can and should be about: living in the way that Jesus would have us to live. And with all that said, Shane presents the downsides of solidarity with the poor while also sharing about the wonderful lifestyle of joy that can come about through creating what he calls the Kingdom of God. Life as an ordinary radical might lower your economic social status and it might put you on the FBI list of ones to watch, but it also allows you the opportunity to depend on your neighbors, play with children, and live without a lot of the worries that a materialistic culture brings. The book reads easy enough for a middle schooler to get, and deep enough for a PhD to be moved. It is excellent material for group study. Pick up ten copies and have your Sunday School class dig in, and then go try some of the lifestyle stuff for yourself. It'll be awesome!!!

As someone who lives in an intentional Christian community that emphasizes the inner, contemplative life of the church, it has been difficult for me to articulate and put flesh on my longings for this life of Christ within me to spill out onto the streets. Shane Claiborne succeeds in telling his community's--the Simple Way's--story...admirably. For him, there is no dichotomy between the rich mystical experience of God's fellowship and the urgent need for ordinary radicals to live out God's justice and shalom. Page after page, the two go hand in hand. The story of Shane and his friends will convict you--through Scripture, church history, struggle, and experience--in the best of all possible ways: not by piling on guilt but by assuring you that another world is indeed possible, one where the glory of the Lord covers the earth as the waters cover the sea.

This book is a quick read that will leave you thinking (and praying) long after you're done with it. Shane's writting is witty and self-depricating, and yet he takes himself seriously as a disciple of Christ. He is not interested in finger-pointing or placing blame for what he sees as a chasm between what the Church is and what Christ called her to be, neither is he interested in glossing over each of our complicity in "the system". His book is a paper version of his tireless invitation to anyone who asks about his community, The Simple Way, "Come and see!" I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in following Christ--it would make a great introduction to radical Christian living. I can't wait to share it with friends and family and see what they think about the challenge of the Gospel as Shane lays it out.