One of my least favorite Christian phrases is "I want to live a BALANCED Christian life." I hate it because it is not usually a statement that indicates a desire to be theologically sound - it's a statement that really means, "I want to live comfortably." It really means, "I want to live without risk or inconvenience."

I was reading a book by John Perkins recently in which he asked whether we have conformed our Christianity to our lifestyle, or conformed our lifestyle to biblical Christianity. We cannot fully answer the call of Jesus Christ without changing our lifestyles from self-centered to God-and-neighbor-centered. The change that the Gospel calls us to is not just about giving up immoral practices - it is call to embrace a radical love that is willing to take any number and types of risks to see reconciliation and justice and wholeness for others. It is a change that means incrementally dying to ourselves and our self-interests. The degree to which we are willing to do so is the degree to which the love of God can flow through us to a broken world.

Jesus told us that "he who seeks to save his life will lose it." Is that what we have been doing? Have we been unconsciously or consciously been spending our energies on making our lives safe? Perhaps there is no better time than now to pull out our calendars and checkbooks and take stock of where our lives are centered. If we find that it indicates something other than a lifestyle of radical, Christ-centered love, let's start taking some intentional steps toward change.