It’s really no wonder that a great big chunk of the world thinks that the message of Christianity is the same message as Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, that is: Be excellent to one another! (That survey takin’ fool, Barna, says around 54% think, 'be good' is what gets you in good with the Heavenly gatekeeper). When I heard the message of the gospel in church, it was always intermixed with the message of not doing bad.

So, What's the Gospel?

Horton has said that you can’t live the gospel, because it’s an announcement. I can’t live out the message that Jody loves Nathan, or the news that Al Miller passed away, or that there’s been a spill on aisle 3. But those messages are important to Nathan, Al’s wife, and the guy in charge of the mop. In a similar way, the message of the gospel is news that announces a change--the news that Jesus died for his enemies (us) and we can be set free of our bondage to sin, our guilt, and be reunited in relationship with our Creator by his kindness alone. 

It’s the news that Christ has come, not a list of right and wrong.

A Nasty Mixed Drink

We get those two mixed up a lot. The law of God reveals God’s character and who he desires we Christians to be (and causes us to be by his Holy Spirit). That law is good and right, but it’s not the Good News. The two of those together is a nasty mixed drink that waters down both. Yet that’s what we’re out there giving the world. God loves you, so, get right, or get left, we say. The not-so-subtle implication is that yeah, Jesus died and all, but you gotta put a little skin in the game before you get that gift. 

And that's a lie.  A big one.

The message isn’t the law. The message is Jesus for sinners.

The message isn’t do better and God will like you, it’s God’s righteousness for the unrighteous.

 Of First Importance

In 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, Pauls says this: “Now brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, and in which you stand firm. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,”

Christ's death, resurrection, and ascension for the ungodly is the message with which we have been entrusted.

When we let that message go—when we imply that the message is anything other than Christ dying for our sins; the message of peace between God and man—we’ve accomplished nothing but confusing non-Christians and corrupting the gospel. Any old religion can tell you to be more moral. Anyone with half a decent heart can point out all your flaws. But only the gospel can tell us that, in spite of our deep sin, God offers us peace through Christ.
9:04:00 PM
R. Scott Clark wrote that social media is a covenant of works. He said we have to watch our step, not showing our true faces, but “what we must seem to others lest the wrath of the ‘righteous’ fall upon us.” 

I’ve actually thought a lot about this idea over the last year or so.

While we all have to watch what we say among the people of this easily upset time in which we find ourselves, no one is as easily scandalized as the religious. While I’ll admit to some rather seriously religious moments—in the cultural sense of that word, not all that wonderful James: helping orphans and widows stuff—I’m generally fairly unreligious. In other words, I don’t take myself very seriously, nor do I take most of the cultural ideas we falsely associate with Christianity to heart very often. 

I do, however, try to be respectful of other people’s preferences. But some people just want to lay their rules on your back like heavy burdens no matter what--in short: they want to control you.

That ticks me off, but, man, it’s surprising how much power those people have. 


A Convenient Example


For example, when you write for a living, you get so weary of dealing with the pointless reprimands that you start self-editing. And, like I said, I’m all about laying my rights aside for the weaker brother (well, I’m in love with myself, so it’s not always easy), but sometimes it’s a fine line between self-editing out of love for someone’s conscience and just being bullied into doing and saying things in certain ways.

Jerk Faces

They say things that are just plain mean, clearly unbiblical, and toss out superficial judgments like candy at a parade. I can’t do anything about those people. (I said that more for me, than for you. …I have to remind myself.) But if you care about showing love and humbly marrying it with truth, you’re going to be sensitive to how what you say is taken. Which makes you more likely to back off from the truth in the name of love.

 That may be acceptable when dealing with your smaller freedoms. But it's downright dangerous when you start talking about the gospel.

Lying About the Truth

When the message is that it took the death of God’s own Son to cover our sins, there’s not many places your pride can go to run from that truth. It reveals two things at once—our deep, deadly sin and God’s deep, abiding love for us. When we add a single thing to that message we’re building a theology of works.

If I say that my good works, my sanctification, has anything to do with God’s being morally satisfied with me, I'm negating the message. I'm saying my political activism, my time in the soup kitchen, the church nursery, or all the money I've given to good causes is as effective as the death of God's own Son. Even if they just give us that last 1% we need to cross over the line; even if we say it's with God's help--it's still partially us, and we can take pride in that. If I say that anything I do at all adds or detracts from God’s free gift, I’m making it about me. 

 And people love a message about themselves. And it's a dangerous thing to mess with people's loves. They can get mean. Real fast.

 So, the temptation to back off from the true message is huge. Especially when people are making you feel guilty for not being hard enough on sin, or not talking enough about how bad sex or booze or gay people or cigarettes or blue states or red states or whatever, are.

One side will tempt you to focus more on the law, and how our works, especially side-issues that do more to make us feel self-righteous than help anyone, are so vitally important. (and they are, just not in the way they're saying.) The other side will push you to talk about people’s felt needs, and giving them a therapeutic answer to assuage their guilt rather the gospel.

 If you sell the lie, you might also sell more books, get more friends, and get a lot of kindly notes and pats on the back, but it isn’t the Message--you're also selling your soul. There’s only one message—one name under heaven by which men may be saved—Jesus, and him crucified for the ungodly. And that kind of love is offensive.

-Chad West
12:31:00 PM
Have you noticed that, for some people, God’s personality is mysteriously similar to theirs? Sometimes, if we’re dead set on getting our way, the way we see God’s will is going to magically line up with our will. He wants you to have that big house that overextends your budget because God wants the best for you and, darn it, you deserve it. God does think you’re being persecuted because people disagree with you, and it’s not at all because you have zero tact and a big mouth. You see, that kind of thing is not Christianity, that’s just us having an imaginary friend to justify our lousy behavior.

10:21:00 PM
We Christians seem to think the world's problem is a behavioral one. And if the problem is bad behavior, then the solution must be good behavior. And, while we're sinners too, we know the truth. So, we think we should all get together—there’s a heck of a lot of us, after all—and we can totally make a difference in this dark world. 

9:53:00 PM
Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

I struggled for years with the loud and persistent message of God against sinners. The idea was that if you were a smoker, a drinker, a skimming-off-the-top candlestick maker, God despised you and your evil ways and you might as well stay away. His salvation, they implied, was for the good; for those who had it all together. He only gave his gift to the worthy. You didn’t have to be perfect, of course, but you had to be trying.

That’s a lie.

2:46:00 PM
We Christians have an unhealthy relationship with suffering. If suffering itself weren't awful enough, because of our screwed up ideas about it, our pride is often stabbed in the process. We either can't imagine that any ill would come to we generally good and gentle folks, or that God would allow us, specifically, to suffer in a world obviously chock full of suffering. We, whether we would be able to admit or not, see suffering as the result of moral failure; as punishment.

 And that's just not true. 

12:12:00 PM
They’ll tell you that you should forgive and move on.

They’ll say that you were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or that you somehow caused it, or that you’re lying.

Don’t listen to them.

It’s okay if your pastor, your father, your uncle, or your gym teacher goes to jail for his crimes—and they are crimes. Against you, against God. You’re not being unforgiving, unchristian, unreasonable or not thinking about the problems it will cause. You are being wise. You are being strong. Taking a criminal off the streets to protect others from his touch.

Maybe that’s all you need, is for someone to tell you it’s okay. Sometimes we’ve heard the lie so much that it’s hard to hear the truth. But, it’s okay. And you will be too. 
12:18:00 PM
All my life, I wanted to do something special. My heart ached with hunger for some reason to beat. I dreamed of success that led to peace. It’s probably why I went into ministry. Besides the religious expectation that anyone showing a serious interest in Christianity must be destined to be a pastor, I wanted meaning. The problem was that once I had a meaningful calling, I started asking myself if it was meaningful enough.

I wondered if I were being spiritual enough. (I wasn’t.) If I were studying enough. (I wasn’t.) If I were witnessing enough. (I wasn’t.) If I was doing everything the congregation expected of me. (I definitely wasn’t.) So then, even smack-dab in the center of my personal world’s most important vocation, I wasn’t satisfied. I was letting myself, my congregation, and—most importantly—God, down.

2:53:00 PM
If you haven't heard Rosenbladt, this is a great talk to get you started. One of our biggest problems in the Church is not understanding the roles God's perfect Law and the Gospel play in our lives. When we try to make the Christian life about us, and how well we follow the Law, we're just asking for a life of fear, shame & doubt from which the gospel is our only hope. As Rosenbladt said,
The Law needs to be heard by my old Adam. Because he hasn't believed in Jesus, doesn't believe in Jesus, never will believe in Jesus. All it understands is power and fear. So, as a Christian, I need to hear the Law, because the old Adam won't listen ... But, suppose I'm right on the edge of the abyss, and saying, 'I must not be a believer at all.'  If you don't give me the gospel, then don't even bother to come to me.
Listen Here:

Law & Gospel in the Christian Life

2:32:00 PM
We get so mad about the way the world portrays us Christians. We get upset when they don’t understand the bible like we do. We get angry when we don’t always get our way, because our way is the right way, darn it! Don’t they see that?

We’re entitled and self-righteous when we do that, you know? And we miss the whole point of the Christian faith.

5:44:00 PM
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