Outlaw Preachers’ Past, Present, and Future
As I write this, I am almost in tears. Had I been able to envision what the Outlaw Preachers would become, I don’t think I would have ever felt worthy enough to be a part of the community, let alone be so apparently instrumental in its inception. The truth of the matter is that I am a two-time Bible college dropout who has never had a “congregation” of more than a couple dozen. We have met at bars and restaurants and struggled to grow — even continue meeting — at times. I am a nobody if ever there was one.
The beautiful thing about the Outlaw Preachers is that it is not about me. It is not even about you. It is about the unconditional love and grace of God through his son Jesus Christ.
There is a wonderful African concept of Ubuntu that Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the first black South African Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, South Africa, and fierce opponent of apartheid, describes thusly:
“A person with Ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed.”
To me, the Outlaw Preachers embody much of that sentiment. I am who I am because of who we all are.
If you will allow me to speculate on the appeal of the community, I will use the same words I use to describe what we attempt every day with Metamorphosis:
“If we offer — consistently and constantly — the grace we ourselves have already received, if we do not hoard this treasure among treasures, we won’t have enough room to hold all the people who just desperately want to be loved. Unconditionally. … Grace is simultaneously our most powerful weapon and most peaceful path to restoration, and in the end, grace is all we have.”
Fortunately, grace is all that is needed. I have found it. Or, rather, it has found me.
Thank you.
All of you.
Regarding the future for Outlaw Preachers, I will echo the sentiment of Martin Luther when he wrote of the third article of the Lord’s Prayer, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven:
“The good and gracious will of God is done indeed without our prayer; but we pray in this petition that it may be done among us also.”
