Jesus , livre ebook

© 2012 by Wayne Cordeiro
Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
www.bethanyhouse.com
Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan
www.bakerpublishinggroup.com
Ebook edition created 2012
Ebook corrections 10.07.2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means for example, electronic, photocopy, recording without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-7082-5
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible®, copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.lockman.or g
Scripture quotations identified ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. ESV Text Edition: 2007
Scripture quotations identified THE MESSAGE are from The Message by Eugene H. Peterson, copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations identified NCV are from the New Century Version®. Copyright © 1987, 1988, 1991 by Word Publishing, a division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations identified NIV are from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
Scripture quotations identified NKJV are from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations identified NLT are from the Holy Bible , New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
The Internet addresses, email addresses, and phone numbers in this book are accurate at the time of publication. They are provided as a resource. Baker Publishing Group does not endorse them or vouch for their content or permanence.
Cover design by Lookout Design, Inc.
Author is represented by WordServe Literary Group.
“I’ve written a lot of books and read even more, but once in a while I catch myself reading a great book from someone who has lived a great life, and I stop here and there, look out wistfully through an open window, and say, ‘I wish I’d written that!’ Wayne Cordeiro puts me in that kind of envious mood. But even if I had written Jesus: Pure and Simple, it would not have been done nearly as well. Because a book like Jesus: Pure and Simple can only come from the heart of a man who knows his subject very well. This is a book that might have been titled Jesus Close Up. After any single paragraph you will know it was written by a man who lives his devotion to the Savior, and out of the depths of his Christ-neediness makes the poor in spirit wealthy.”
Calvin Miller, speaker and author of Letters to Heaven (and more than 70 other books)
“What I love about this book is that the content and title match what every follower of Christ should long for. In a world where everything soon gets over complicated, we all need these reminders to keep the main thing, the main thing purity and simplicity of walking with Jesus every day.”
Doug Fields, speaker and author of Fresh Start
“To a generation that can’t find the real story amidst all the tradition, churchyness, poor street cred, or newspaper headlines, Jesus: Pure and Simple is a breath of fresh air and should be the first place you start or start over.”
Hugh Halter, pastor and author of Sacrilege and The Tangible Kingdom
“If you’re sick, you need a doctor who knows how to study what’s wrong with you and offer a savvy diagnosis your life might depend on it. And in Jesus: Pure and Simple , Wayne Cordeiro is spot-on in his diagnosis of a Christian culture that is sick of itself. His prescription? More of Jesus, and less of everything else. I couldn’t agree more.”
Rick Lawrence, longtime executive editor of Group Magazine and author of Sifted and Shrewd
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Endorsements
Introduction
1. Pure & Simple
2. Just Shy of Jesus
3. Avoiding the Subculture
4. Who Is This Jesus?
5. Tales of Hidden Service
6. One Thing
7. Eyes on the Harvest
8. Internal Corrections
9. The Power of Contentment
10. Living Life . . . Along the Way
11. The Way Home
12. Jesus Never Changes
Notes
Special Thanks
About the Author
Books by Wayne Cordeiro
Back Ad
Back Cover
Introduction
When you cannot remember the 22 characteristics of a good wife, the 7 steps to authority, or the 9 ways of love . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When a speaker insists (again) that you need to stop your bad habits, increase your devotion, reduce your worry, augment your faith, or banish your fears . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When you’re overwhelmed by testimonies of others praying all night, fasting forty days, raising the dead, and leading thousands to the Lord on their airplane rides home . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When you’ve sat through your one hundred fifty millionth sermon about giving more, suffering more, doing more, or being more . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When you attend another hyped-up conference that promises to be the one that will reduce all your problems, and you buy all the books and CDs and try them out, but nothing is reduced except your savings account . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When someone points a finger in your face and says, “Thus saith the Lord,” but their advice contradicts someone else who ^shouted a different “Thus saith the Lord,” and it sounds different from yet another “Thus saith the Lord” . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
When your mailbox is flooded with a multitude of letters, newsletters, and giving requests from a multitude of organizations with three-initial names . . .
It’s time to get back to Jesus.
It is time to hear His voice and simplify. It’s time we get back to Jesus, pure and simple. [1]
That’s what this book is all about.
CHAPTER 1 Pure & Simple
But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.
2 Corinthians 11:3
Nothing is as refreshing as a cold glass of fresh orange juice, pure and simple. For that matter, anything that is pure and simple is refreshing in today’s artificial world of sleek packaging and million-dollar marketing. Currently there’s a grassroots movement afoot for getting back to locally made and organically grown products. It could be a knee-jerk reaction to genetically modified vegetables using growth hormones and finished off with a touch of artificial green coloring, but I like it nevertheless.
A few weeks ago I read the label on a carton of apple juice, only to find that it was made with “10 percent real apple juice” (from concentrate, of course). I’ll bet if I meandered down enough supermarket aisles, I’d one day find the small print on a carton of eggs to read “Eggs produced by synthetic chickens from Farmville. Assembled in China.”
It’s time to get back to the pure and simple.
One of my favorite passages in the Bible is 2 Corinthians 11:3. I memorized it early on, and it has become a safe haven for me when life spins out of control, which seems to happen more frequently as of late.
But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.
2 Corinthians 11:3
Here’s something refreshing: a pure and simple devotion to Christ. Sounds wonderfully inviting, doesn’t it?
And the good news is that it’s not about doing more or doing less. Because God created you in His image, the more you become like Jesus, the more you become the person you were created to be. It is in Him that you actually find fulfillment, not in religious activities (as good as they may be) or in serene settings that give you a needed respite from your harried workplace. He is not the rest from our labors. He is the rest in our labors.
“A promise remains of entering His rest” (Hebrews 4:1). It’s the rest of a child close to his mother. It’s the rest that comes when we are near the one we love. It’s the rest we find when we are walking through unfamiliar surroundings with a guide who knows the way.
The closer you get to Jesus, the more at home you will feel in this journey. God designed it that way.
You have probably seen great influential Christian leaders in person or on television or listened to them on radio. You may have read their books and attended their conferences. In Jesus’ day, Pharisees filled that bill. Gamaliel was one of the more popular ones. But even knowledgeable God-followers like Gamaliel missed the point. Read what Jesus said to a gathered group of them: “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life” (John 5:39–40 NKJV ).
But missing the point may not mean that Jesus is distant. It’s usually that our eyes are too full to see Him. Our attention is arrested by what commands our lives . . . this week’s desires, today’s fears, relationships we want, things we need, or problems we despise.
It’s not destruction that causes our greatest concern.
It’s distraction .
The Great Counterfeit
If you want to know what is valuable to God, check out what