The subtitle of this great new book by David Platt is taking back your faith from the American Dream. This is by far one of the most challenging and rewarding books I have read in a long time.
When you become a follower of Christ you accept both the privileges and responsibilities of that relationship. Discipleship demands radical obedience to be on the mission of impacting the world with the gospel.
The mission is to be carried out as you are going about your life everyday at home, work, neighborhood, community and ultimately to the ends of earth. This means that we all need to see ourselves as missionaries and our task is to tell our story to as many people as possible.
The most challenging part of the book is how we as American Christians have bought into the lie of the world and committed the sin of materialism. He is not saying in my opinion sell everything you have and give it all to the poor.
He is saying that we have been blessed beyond measure compared with the rest of the world and every Christian should be living a lifestyle that reflects biblical priorities. We may not need to sell it all but we sure don’t need to buy it all either and we must be generous in helping others who are literally dying every day from preventable causes.
According to David, “today more than a billion people in the world live and die in desperate poverty.” This reality forces us to move beyond mere knowledge and even debate to sustainable action that seeks to do something to help.
How many starfish are you willing to throw back into the sea?