For all the bigness of the gospel, for all the grand proclamations that Jesus is drawing all things to himself, his way of sharing that news is surprisingly small. Jesus is at work in the local. The Church that is committed to the Jesus message and the Jesus method will be deeply committed to local. As my (Pastor Sam) grandmother once told me, “A pastor should smell like his congregation.”

The gospel stories of Easter aren’t merely recounting “what happened.” They show us the first moments of a new world breaking into the old. On the road to Emmaus, two disciples can't recognize the risen Christ because they were looking for victory in the ways of the old world. When the open the Scriptures and break the bread, they recognize Christ, who has brought new life that has defeated death. And that changes them forever. So it is with us.

Before Jesus sends the apostles to the world or gives them work to do, he gives them an experience of Himself. Because before anything changes out there, something has to change in me. God renews the world, beginning in the hearts of people. Peter describes it in 1 Peter—a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That is not a metaphor for self-improvement. It is a way of saying that the very life of God has been breathed into us.