You ever wonder how you would launch a worldwide movement? Find the people, credential them, equip them, give them an Amex, give them a foundation, a position, a working budget, something that proves they belong and they know what they’re doing? That is how we would build something that changes an industry, and guess what, it’s the exact opposite of what Jesus did.
He sent the twelve disciples out in pairs and told them to take nothing with them: no bread, no bag, no money, no bartering tools, no change of clothing (Mark 6:7-9). He then sent 72 more out the same exact way and added a line that should make all of us stop and think: “No purse, no bag, no sandals, and greet no one on the road” (Luke 10:4). He wasn’t equipping them; He was stripping them down.
These were not “rabbis” or “pastors”. Acts calls them agrammatoi kai idiōtai. These are not seminary graduates; they’re not ministry professionals. They are men with no academic credentials behind them (Acts 4:13). The world of religious knowledge ran on accumulation. You gathered learning, built standing, collected students, operated from a fixed place, and the more you had, the better and more equipped you were considered.
Yeshua (Jesus) gave His men authority through confidence instead of seminary credentials, then sent them off bare. Nothing else. Everything the system said made you a powerful preacher, He told them to leave at home.
And the craziest thing of all: if a town would not receive them, He told them to shake the dust off their feet and keep on walking (Mark 6:11). He didn’t give them a campaign to win. He didn’t give them entertainment. He didn’t tell them to sing. There was no church to plant. There was nothing to stay and defend after they made their point.
Now take a hard look at what we’ve built. There are buildings we cannot sell, degrees in seminary, budgets we’re not allowed to question, and institutions that will defend them to the last member. We make permanence the point; Yeshua made mobility the target. This is not a small difference. It is the exact opposite of the command, and that’s what we call church.
And this is what should really make you sad and, honestly, deeply unsettle you. It’s not that it’s ill-intentioned; it’s simply human nature, and it has a name. I learned about this in a book I recently read called The Intelligence Trap, and reading it hit me like a brick: this is romantic logic. Choosing an attachment first, and then convincing your mind afterward to defend it.
We have this inherent craving for security, for position, and for something to belong to, and given enough time, we will do whatever we can to build it to fit our needs. That’s the instinct that feels like faithfulness. However, it’s the exact opposite of what Jesus asked, and it’s the exact opposite of how He taught truth.
Go back and read that again. We shouldn’t stay to defend what we’ve made comfortable, not because the message cannot be defended, but because a truth that needs a defense team has already been considered ill, and it has become protected property.
Romantic logic exists in all of us, to keep an attachment safe from reality itself. Yeshua sent His men out with nothing so that nothing would stand between the truth and reality’s own verdict on it. Received or rejected on the spot, there was no comfort filed either way.
I go deeper into that mechanism, the heart hiring the mind to defend what it has already decided to keep, in The Heart Hires the Mind. If this unsettled you, that piece will show you exactly how the machine runs, and how much of what we call Western Christianity is built by it.
Selah.
What have you accumulated in His name that He told you to travel without? If He sent your favorite ministry out two by two with nothing tomorrow, would it survive the trip?
Shalom v’shalvah, your brother in the Way,
Sergio
I haven’t heard these statatements since my post Professor of Theology at Duke Divinity many years ago propagated. He argued against investments in Jesus name in properties, rather than the poor, needy, and of course those in need of the gospel.
I have thought about your sentiments alot. Especially in struggling churches because of finances. I argued with some pastors, minsters, that covid may have been God's way of trying to move us beyound our Jerusalems into the real world of need like it was in the early chapters of Acts. Of course, we made a U turn back to the familiar with the other as a add ons. I see no exit door out of this. Since we believe unity, and power is in numbers and associations. And prove it with our statistics. I remember reading somewhere that the Church was a entity, rather than the concept of going, a place where you go for worship, gathering, ministry. Again I see no exit door out of this after a thousand years into this belief system. And for some, it works for the expectation of it.
May the Lord bless you Sergio Desoto, for your courage to speak in an unknown "heterais glossais".
The Truth is a breath of fresh air and an eye opener. I appreciate the depth you bring to the table!!!