Get Your Pretense On!

Preface • 15

This idea of pretending your way into who you really are – “hardening” muscles and “sharpening” wits – is a fundamental disposition of the Christian life. This text seeks to make this plain. We who believe in Christ have been grafted into a Story so big that the entire universe and all of time will not contain it. We are now, by faith, recipients of the Kingdom’s authority and rule, baptized by the Spirit as members into the body of Christ, the pillar and ground of the truth, so says the apostle Paul. We have been granted an entirely new identity with a new nature, set free from the futility of empty religion and legalism, all in order that we might represent Christ in this world as his ambassadors and agents. Now, through the Spirit’s leading, we are commissioned to represent his interests in our own unique, special web of relationships, given the privilege to pray, and proclaim the Good News of Christ to our family members, friends, and associates. In these last few sentences is the entire plan of this little book, which I hope can encourage you to “get your pretense on,” as we say in the neighborhood where I currently live and minister. Everything is at stake in our ability to claim as our own those gifts, privileges, status, inheritances, and blessings God says he has provided us in Christ. No one will be able to enjoy the rich depths of Christ’s salvation blessings if they refuse to go against their feelings, circumstances, and “odds” to cling simply to the truth as it is in Christ. That is the key to Christian identity and to fruitfulness in Christian ministry. This is a theological work, not a tactical manual. I may be a dinosaur because I believe the Bible doctrine is the key to an adventurous, wonderful, and meaningful life. You cannot live well if you do not see well. The focus of this book is how you see yourself and the world . Its basic conviction is that, once you come to understand who God is, what he is doing in the world,