Rich Villodas seems poised and ready to earn yet another Best Seller on his resume. Villodas, who is the author of The Deeply Formed Life along with Good and Beautiful and Kind, is no stranger to being able to move his primarily young audience through the path of what it takes to be a Disciple of Jesus. Villodas is pastor of New Life Fellowship in Queens, New York, where he ministers to a mostly young and diverse membership. Although this is Villodas’s third book, when asked about his trajectory into the world of writing, which began in 2020, he seems okay with letting his audience know that God has placed in him four books along the journey.
In his third and new book, The Narrow Path, Villodas wants to take his readers down the path of what it takes for Jesus to satisfy their souls.
Crosswalk Headlines: This is your third book. Can we revisit what God has done in your life as an author?
Rich Villodas: The first book was The Deeply Formed Life because I wanted to offer a vision of formation for my church community based on the five values that make up our Church. The second one was Good and Beautiful and Kind, and it was oriented around the fractures of our world that didn’t just show up in 2020, of course. They’ve been going on for a long time, and so I wanted to offer a theological vision of where the fractures emerge from and what it means to work towards wholeness in our individual lives and in our lives together. The Sermon on the Mount, The Narrow Path, is really a treatment of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. I had this burgeoning sense of wanting to write about the Sermon on the Mount.
CWH: What is the reason behind writing the Sermon of the Mount?
RV: Number one, I just think the personal impact it’s had on my life over the last 25 years. When I became a follower of Jesus, I often tell a story about my grandfather discipling me for eight months, four to five days a week, two to three hours each time. My grandfather discipled me the last year of his life. The Sermon on the Mount has such a profound impact on my life because of my experience with my grandfather.
CWH: What placement in your personal life do you give to the Sermon of the Mount?
RV: For the last 25 years, the Sermon on the Mount has been one of the areas of teaching I’ve returned to routinely in my life with God. Some people have their thing for Proverbs and the Psalm and Romans eight, or whatever it might be. For me, it was like I wanted to keep coming back to Jesus’s teachings. I think you could argue this is the most significant set of teachings in the entire Bible.
CW: What was your writing experience like in writing The Narrow Path?
RV: If you wanted to take a collection of teachings and say you are stranded on an island, and you can choose one set of teachings from Scripture, what’s the most important? What are you bringing with you? I’m bringing Jesus’ words on the Sermon on the Mount; that’s not to throw shade at anybody else. All Scripture from God is breathed and inspired by the Spirit. The Sermon on the Mount is the manifesto of the Kingdom of God. It is the Constitution of life in Christ. I wrote on it because I believe it’s the most important set of teachings, which is ironic because one would argue relative to its importance that it might be the most important portion of the Church; lots of folks run to Romans and Ephesians and Paul’s apostles before they run to Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.
CW: Why do you think that is the case?
RV: I think lots of people live in that place of doctrine, particular traditions, even in my Pentecostal tradition that I became a Christian out of, so much emphasis is placed on the stories of the Old Testament for the particular spiritual truths that we can make, and not focusing on the words of Jesus. And so, it might be one of the most underread portions relative to its importance.
CW: What do you want people who may have never read your books to know about your writing style?
RV: It’s interesting because, first, from a teaching and writing perspective, my number one goal is to be understood. I mean, that might sound like a little bit obvious, but it’s what I want people to get from my teaching and writing.
CW: Can you please tell our readers about the Church that you pastor?
RV: In my context, 50% of Queens is foreign-born. We have several first-generation immigrants in our Church who speak English as their second language. We also have a lot of people who are discovering Christianity for the first time. We have people who have maybe deconstructed at some point in their journey, and they’re back at Church trying to give it another go. The top of my mind when I’m writing or preaching is number one — I want to be understood.
CW: What did this book do in you that you want it to do in the reader?
RV: I want them to read the words of Jesus consistently from the beginning to end in terms of Matthew chapters five through seven, along with it to be a constant reminder of their need for the grace of God. The Sermon’s goal is to reach a point where you realize you need God’s grace. I don’t believe that the Sermon on the Mount was given simply to show that we need the grace of God, and then we have to trust him, too. I think the Sermon on Mount is given so that we recognize there are some gaps in our lives. I just don’t need the grace of God in some kind of forgiveness and grace thing. I need the grace of God to actually live this out.
Photo Credit: ©Facebook/Rich Villodas
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