Why This booklet? There’s more to the Christian life than you may know. What typically passes for Christian spirituality and church life are sad substitutes for God’s true desire for His people. From the beginning, God has been calling His people to an all-consuming intimacy with Himself; but we are ever distracted and preoccupied with other things, because we have never seen Him as He truly is. He’s bigger and better than we've ever dreamed; and He will not easily fit into our preconceived notions about Him.

There have always been those whose experience of God pushed them to discontentment with Christendom’s chronic lack of depth and authenticity. Many have set out on that harrowing journey towards the deeper aspects of our relationship with God. And many have also embarked on the quest for an experience of "church" that more accurately resonates with the powerful, dynamic experience of the first-century Christians. But few ever see the necessity of both, and still fewer express their inseparability. God’s ultimate desire is to be known well, and this can only be done with other believers.

But a realization of each of these things forces us to reevaluate our current experience in a critical light. If simply knowing Him well is our priority (see John 17:3), then most of the activities and traditions of our churches are superfluous and even distracting when compared to this essential thing. As Martha of Bethany, we "are worried and bothered about many things, while only one thing is needed" (Luke 10:42). Martha learned by her sister’s example that the "one thing that is needed" is sitting at the feet of Jesus, listening to Him tell us about Himself. He is all we need, and we need a larger view of who He is and what He has accomplished in His death and resurrection.

Furthermore, we need to see that Christ is so big that we cannot see much of Him as long as we are separated from our fellow believers, who have become our "brothers and sisters" in a very real sense. Our church traditions and our culture have effectively splintered our lives into millions of disjointed pieces, so that the intimate community life of the first-century believers appears strange to our modern eyes. Or worse still, we never see at all that the deep and glorious truths of the New Testament were written to intimate communities of believers, rather than to isolated individuals chasing an elusive "deeper Christian life" in a "lone ranger" fashion.

Both a Me and a We

Many men and women have delved into the deeper things of Christ and proclaimed to us that Christ and His cross are bigger than we have ever imagined (see 1 Cor. 2:2). But, more often than not, these have resigned themselves to presenting their pursuit of God in an individualistic fashion. Emphasizing personal growth in grace, they neglect the "wineskin" of church life and focus exclusively on the wine of the indwelling of Christ. Consequently, we aspire to be satisfied (or silently dissatisfied) either in our traditional churches or as individuals disconnected from the Body of Christ in any ostensible form. Both of these choices fail to apply the deeper realities of Christ to the corporate experience of the Body of Christ. The love and joy that are felt within cannot find outward expression in a typical gathering of the fellowship of believers, because centuries of church tradition have dictated that only a select handful of specially trained leaders can contribute and give direction in a gathering of the church. Of all the members of the Body of Christ present, only one percent or less are allowed to function in an active way. This is a strained and stifling arrangement which precludes any fuller realization of God’s purpose among His people. Our church traditions have become an old wineskin into which God will never pour the New Wine of His manifested presence, because He cannot be contained in such a rigid and lopsided structure.

Sensing this obstruction, many have joined the ranks of the flourishing "House Church Movement" or more recently the "Emerging Church" in search for a more informal and intimate experience of "Body Life". Various groups and organizations are presently forming around a myriad of agendas and identities in an attempt to meet the needs of those who can no longer stomach the boredom and aimlessness of traditional church life. But these many groups demonstrate a typically external focus rather than an internal one. Most of their energies are expended on getting the outward form of New Testament church life right ("open" meetings without official clergy, based in the home, having fluid structure, etc.) while the deeper things of Christ (like oneness with Him, identification with Him in His death and resurrection, and a daily experience of His suffering in our own lives) are rarely ever mentioned, and obviously not understood. In the case of the "emergent" fellowships, too often the focus is on mimicking the prevalent cultural trends of the day rather than those deeper things of the spirit.  It is all too rare to find those who hold together both sides of these things (internal and external), while in truth these are two interrelated aspects of one very big Christ. He is the Christian Life, from Alpha to Omega, and He is fully expressed only in the corporate gathering of the church. Once you have come to see that "all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Christ Himself" (Col. 2:2-3), you must then come to see that "the fullness of Him who fills all in all" is in the church (Eph. 1:22-23), not in you, the individual.

This booklet attempts an explanation of both the individual and the corporate experience of being "in Christ". This phrase is so full of meaning that it can hardly be overstated. To be "in Him" means that He is now your world. You have Him at the center of your very being, and you also have Him in your Christian brothers and sisters. If you are fortunate enough (or cursed, depending on whatever day it is) to live in some form of community with these people, then you truly can touch what being "in Christ" means. You have Him within and without. He can be for you both "All" and "in All" (Col. 3:11)

Christ is the Everything of our faith. Paul once stated that he spent 18 months in Corinth with nothing to talk about "except Christ and Him crucified" (1 Cor. 2:2.). This should boggle the mind of any modern evangelical, who spends his days chasing whatever chimera his tradition holds most dear. But what can it mean to know nothing except Christ and Him crucified? Whatever the answer, you can be sure that the person and work of Christ has been vastly underestimated. To alter a J.B. Phillips phrase, Your Christ is too small. We need a much bigger Christ and a much bigger cross, and we need to see that they encompass not only you as an individual, but you along with the brothers and sisters with whom you meet. May He make known to us the mystery which has been hidden from so many for so long: Christ in Y’all, the hope of glory (Col.1:27).

Why "Christ in Y’all"? If you are not from the southern United States, you may not know that "y’all" is the only pronoun in the English language that is both plural and in the second person. When you say "you," it is hard to determine whether one person is meant, or many. But most of the places in the New Testament addressing "you" use the plural pronoun, including many of those favorite passages proclaiming the "deeper Christian life". Therefore it becomes necessary to borrow that old southern colloquialism, "y’all". May our English teachers forgive us.

By the way, you will find little written here that has not appeared somewhere else. The writers section of this site gives an account of those who have influenced my thought and my life with God. Most of what I have to say results from the internalization of things spoken or written by other folks, and they explained these things better than I ever could. But I have posted my own explanation of these things because I feel they need to be said in as many places and by as many people as possible.