Which Way Is Up?

Here are some pictures of a house built in Germany that is upside down. No the pictures aren’t upside down, the house is.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080905/lf_nm_life/germany_house_dc_1

Built in Trassenheide, it’s a tourist attraction. It’s supposed to make you think about the way we view things.

Makes me think of the way we use things. Everything in the house is upside down; the artwork, the kitchen table, and even the bathroom. The whole thing is completely useless. If you are gonna live in this house, you’ll have to relearn how to do just about everything.

“Upside down” is the phrase some translations (from KJV to the Amplified) use to describe what the early church had done to the world. “These men who have turned the world upside down…” Upside down is not a good thing. Other translations render “These men who have caused trouble all over the world.” When you turn something upside down, it does more than just give you an alternate view. It makes the old form and function useless.

If God’s people could really turn stuff upside down today, it would “cause trouble” for the status quo. It would upset the current institutions. Our current methodologies and paradigms for politics, education, welfare, and security would be useless. The way we related to fellow Americans and citizens of the world would change. Commerce would be different. Entertainment values would look very different. Our worldview would be the complete opposite. It would all be “upside down.”

Grace will do that for you.

When you abandon revenge, fear, hatred, and gossip and let grace reorient the way you look at life, it turns everything on its head – upside down.

And the great inconvenience to us all is that we have to relearn how to do everything.

But to be known as the people who turned the world on its head, it would be worth it.