Gospel

No Other Gospel

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After learning I would be beginning a new sermon series this week, a study of the book of Galatians, a friend and colleague who is an Army Chaplain asked me if I had read the relatively new book, No Other Gospel.  Though I had seen it, I admitted I was not really familiar with it.  He suggested it would be a good parallel book to coincide with the series of messages we will be offering at Grace Covenant between now and Easter.

I picked it up, skimmed it this afternoon, and expect to commend it to our congregation – at least to No Otherthose who want to do a little digging of their own over the next few months.  (I’ll read it more thoroughly as well.)

In the video above Justin Taylor interviews the author of the book, Josh Moody, who serves the historic College Church of Wheaton.  Moody explains the basis and the gist of the book.

Evidences of a Backslidden Condition

/ Dennis Griffith / 4 Comments

Through the prophet Jeremiah the Lord dispenses a treasury of wisdom and insight. Perhaps among the most valuable of those insights, at least to my thinking, is found in Jeremiah 17.9:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

The Lord also reminds us, through Jeremiah and scores of other places in his Word, that he is concerned about the heart; more concerned about the heart than even the behavior.  This is because the heart is the key. Whatever owns the heart will dictate the behavior – good or evil.  Yet, according to God, in the passage above, our hearts often deceive us.  We think one thing, unaware of all that is actually going on deep down within.  All looks calm on the surface, but underneath a sinkhole may be developing.  So it is essential that we learn to plumb and decipher our own hearts.  It is at least as important to do this as it is to evaluate our actions (or lack of them).

In his remarkable book, Revival, Richard Owen Roberts suggests to us that the real problem today, in society and in the church, is backslidden Christians.  The Free Dictionary defines backslide as

  • to revert to sin or wrongdoing
  • to lapse into bad habits or vices from a state of virtue, religious faith

Or as another old sage has expressed it:

A backslider is a person who was once emptied of his own ways and filled with the ways of God, but gradually allowed his own ways to step back in until he was all but empty of God and full of himself again.

This condition, whether you accept Roberts’ analysis or not, is quite common. We see it not only in our contemporary culture, but also throughout the pages of the Scripture:

  • Israel all throughout the OT
  • Paul points it out to the Corinthians, Galatians, etc.;
  • John speaks of it to most of the 7 churches in Revelation 2-3;

This should illustrate to us that the problem of backsliding, though not a biblical term, is a biblically recognized human condition – or rather it is a universal condition of humanity effected by the Fall.  There is none of us who is immune to it.  But there is both a remedy and a preventative inoculation that will help minimize susceptibility. The remedy is the gospel. The inoculation is a frequent and regular self assessment, and the applying of the gospel to every hint of infection the assessment reveals.

In Revival, Roberts provides a list of twenty-five possible evidences of a backslidden condition.  While this list is neither authoritative nor exhaustive, it does provide a pretty good index of symptoms to look out for.

Let me encourage you to read through it, jot them down, and honestly evaluate the present state of your personal life and the life of your church:

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REAL Christians Waltz

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French Waltz

Listen to how Bob Flayhart, Senior Pator at Oak Mountain Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, AL, describes a Gospel-centered Christian Life:

A Gospel-centered life is the Christian Waltz. A waltz is a dance made up of three steps. Christians need to consider the Christian three step when it comes to growth.

In the first step, we acknowledge our need as we see our sin in light of the Law. In the second step, we look to Christ to change us. In the third step, we fight against sin and fight to choose righteousness in the strength of the Holy Spirit. Repent! Believe! Fight!…Repent! Believe! Fight!…Repent! Believe! Fight!

An emphasis on the love and grace of God lays the dance floor,or the foundation, for the waltz. Unless Christians are convinced of God’s love for them and His favor over them by virtue of their union with Christ, they will minimize their sin and engage in blame-shifting and excuse- making in order to feel justified before God.

Unfortunately, many in the Church today teach believers a Two-step. The two-step is to simply repent and fight. They acknowledge their sin and proceed with new resolve to try harder to avoid sin. The problem with this approach is it bypasses the cross of Christ and the power of the resurrection.

6 Gospel Aspects

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Seeing Six Aspects

As I teach and preach – and even talk to people – it is not uncommon for someone to ask for clarification of what I mean when I casually and frequently use the term “gospel”.  For some the word has very little meaning. Folks are confused, wondering if it is a style of music, a metaphor for “truth”, or something else.  This is understandable, since the word is used indiscriminately, even if not erroneously.  But others, who are heartfelt follows of Christ, also ask on occasion.  They understand it is the Good News related to Jesus, but what are the essential elements?

Welsh scholar C.H. Dodd helpfully sumarized the gospel in six distinct aspects:

  1. The Age of Fulfillment has dawned, the “latter days” foretold by the prophets.  (Acts 3:18)
  2. This has taken place through the birth, life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  (Acts 2.22-31)
  3. By virtue of the resurrection, Jesus has been exalted at the right hand of God as Messianic head of the new Israel.  (Acts 2.32-36)
  4. The Holy Spirit in the church is the sign of Christ’s present power and glory. (Acts 10.44)
  5. The Messianic Age will reach its consummation in the return of Christ.  (Acts 3.20-21)
  6. An appeal is made for repentance with the offer of forgiveness, the Holy Spirit, and salvation.  (Acts 2.37-41)

Fascinations that Lead Away from the Cross

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Maze of Fascinations

by Michael Horton

Martin Luther opposed the “theology of the cross” to all “theologies of glory.” The latter can be generally placed into three categories: three types of “ladders” we try to climb in order to see “God in the nude,” as Luther put it. These ladders were mysticism, speculation, and merit. I would like to suggest a few contemporary expressions of the theology of glory along these lines.

Fascination with the Miraculous

As in our Lord’s day, few today who seek miracles are interested in that to which signs point. “A wicked generation seeks for signs,” Jesus said, followed by Paul’s reminder that his fellow Jews were so busy looking for miraculous wonders that they stumbled over the Gospel of Christ crucified. Seeking direct experiences with God without the mediation of Scripture, preaching, and sacraments is a theology of glory. Longing for “power encounters,” we trip over the weakness of the cross. This is also true of our triumphalism, long a problem of evangelical revivalism. With its vision of conquering and reigning, the cross-bearing life of Christ which our Savior graciously allows us to share with him is traded in for a crown before the appointed time. Often, we behave like the disciples during our Lord’s ministry. Philip saw Jesus as a means to an end: “Now, just show us the Father and we’ll be satisfied,” he said. “Philip, have you been with me so long and you still don’t get it? He who has seen me has seen the Father!” Those looking for God in demonstrations of power miss the true appearance of God in the humiliation and weakness of the Suffering Servant.

His disciples never did understand him when he said he must suffer and die, and whenever he brought it up, they tried to ignore it. Or, as in Peter’s case, they rebuked him: “Surely this will never happen to you!” As Satan had offered Jesus a crown without a cross, so even Jesus’ own brothers, impressed with his success as a miracle-worker, anxiously offered a tour of the major cities. Similarly, James and John wanted to call down fire on their enemies, and their mother came to Jesus to ask him to allow her sons to sit on his left and right hand in his kingdom. Everyone was planning for glory, but Jesus was planning for the cross. “You do not know what you are asking,” Jesus told their proud mother. “Can they drink the cup that I am about to drink?” “Of course we can!”, they eagerly replied. Triumphalism ignores the cross, and when the hour of trial (sin, failure, loss of popularity, shame, and abuse) comes, we, like the disciples, flee for cover instead of sharing in Christ’s suffering. The triumphalism of theologies of glory can be discerned in much of today’s popular Christian music. Here the realities of life are replaced with platitudes and sentimentalism, a far cry from the emotional and moving words of the psalmist. Contrast much of contemporary Christian music with the depth of the classic hymns of the Moravians, Lutheran and Reformed hymn writers, Charles Wesley, and the old African-American “spirituals.”

Fascination with the Moralistic

Sadly, evangelicals and liberals often read the Bible in a similar way these days. While the former may be more conservative in their interpretations, both tend to read (and preach) the Bible moralistically: that is, either as positive tips for better living or as scolding for not being what one should be. Thus, the key biblical characters become heroes to imitate rather than figures in a redemptive-historical plot centering around Jesus Christ. Jesus told the Pharisees that in spite of their ostensive devotion to the Scriptures, they did not really understand what they were reading, since he (Jesus) is the point of all of Scripture. Similarly, after his resurrection, he rebuked his disciples for not understanding how his death and resurrection were foretold. So “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:27).

If an obsession with “power encounters” stumbles over the weakness of the cross, the preoccupation with moralism finds the preaching of the cross “foolishness.” How can the wicked be declared righteous while they are still sinful? If I could know right now that nothing I did counted for my salvation, why would I even try to be holy? It’s unfair for God to elect people without basing his choice on anything in or foreseen in those who are chosen. Or, as we have seen already from Feuerbach’s pen: “The Christian theory of justification by faith is rooted in a cowardly renun-ciation of moral effort,” and belief in the hereafter nothing more than “an escape mechanism.” Our fallen sensibilities rebel against the utterly gracious character of God’s way of saving. When sin and grace are replaced with therapeutic, ethical, political, and pragmatic concerns, it is a sure sign that we too have stumbled over the Rock of offense.

The Puritan Thomas Goodwin warns us of our ten-dency even as Christians to attempt to turn faith into a work. Seeing the condition of his ship of faith and obedience, one sets out to rebuild another ship, “so he undoes himself in what he endeavors, and goes to hell by striving to go to heaven.”

Fascination with the Mysterious

As liberal theologian Paul Tillich pointed out (and exhibited), mysticism and rationalism are of one piece. Like Plato, the mystic-rationalist does not care much for this world and wishes to escape the world of “appear-ances” by abstract contemplation of “the Divine.” Christianity is deeply committed to this world (creation, provi-dence, redemption through historical events, restoration of the whole creation at the end of the age, including the resurrection of our bodies), and announces that God cannot be known directly by our reason, but must reveal himself by condescending to our capacity. The mystic-philosopher who attempts to penetrate God’s hidden council, either by specu-lation or claims to secret knowledge of God’s will beyond what is revealed in Scripture, is a theologian of glory. The theologian of the cross is content to know God as he has graciously manifested himself in the Living and written/preached Word.

The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals exists to call the church, amidst our dying culture, to repent of its worldliness, to recover and confess the truth of God’s Word as did the Reformers, and to see that truth embodied in doctrine, worship, and life.

This article appeared in the  July/August 1997, Modern Reformation/ACE

Gospel Warning Signs

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Lighthouse Crown

Noted 19th Century Anglican Bishop J.C. Ryle offers a handful of warnings about counterfeiting the gospel:

1. Substitute anything for Christ, and the Gospel is totally spoiled!

2. Add anything to Christ, and the Gospel ceases to be a pure Gospel!

3. Put anything between a person and Christ, and that person will neglect Christ for that very thing!

4. Spoil the proportions of Christ’s Gospel, and you spoil its effectiveness!

5. Evangelical religion must be the Gospel, the whole Gospel and nothing but the Gospel!

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel – not that there is another one…  But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.  As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.”

~ Paul, the Apostle, from Galatians 1

Inebriated by the Gospel

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Smoky Mountain Moonshine

Great grace laced imagery from Robert Capon:

The Reformation was a time when men went blind, staggering drunk because they had discovered, in the dusty basement of late medievilism, a whole cellarful of fifteen-hundred-year-old, two-hundred-proof grace – of bottle after bottle of pure distillate of Scripture, one sip of which would convince anyone that God saves us single-handedly. The word of the gospel – after all those centuries of trying to lift yourself into heaven by worrying about the perfection of your bootstraps – suddenly turned out to be a flat announcement that the saved were home before they started… Grace has to be drunk straight: no water, no ice, and certainly no ginger ale; neither goodness, nor badness, nor the flowers that bloom in the spring of super-spirituality could be allowed to enter into the case.

Appropriating Grace

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Circle of Life (Celtic)

Here is an important reminder and challenge from Richard Lovelace, from his monumental Dynamics of Spiritual Life:

Only a fraction of the present body of professing Christians are solidly appropriating the justifying work of Christ in their lives… Many… have a theoretical commitment to this doctrine, but in their day-to-day existence they rely on their sanctification for their justification… drawing their assurance of acceptance with God from their sincerity, their past experience of conversion, their recent religious performance or the relative infrequency of their conscious, willful disobedience. Few know enough to start each day with a thoroughgoing stand upon Luther’s platform: you are accepted, looking outward in faith and claiming the wholly alien righteousness of Christ as the only ground for acceptance… Christians who are no longer sure that God loves and accepts them in Jesus, apart from their present spiritual achievements, are subconsciously radically insecure persons… Their insecurity shows itself in pride, a fierce, defensive assertion of their own righteousness, and defensive criticism of others. They come naturally to hate other cultural styles and other races in order to bolster their own security and discharge their suppressed anger.

This paragraph, surprisingly, caused somewhat of a stir when I posted it on my Facebook page yesterday.  Most appreciated it. Some who expressed appreciation, I wondered if they really understood what Lovelacve was saying.  I hope so.

So, how do we respond if we find ourselves among the majority who are not functionally appropriating the justifying work of Christ?

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Uneasy ‘Calvinist’

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Branded

I feel no little uneasiness when labeled a Calvinist.  It is not that the description is unfitting.  Nor is it because I have any disaffection for Calvin. Quite the contrary.  My reservation is that there is much baggage that accompanies that label – baggage assigned by those who reject the tenants of the Faith associated with this particular theological system; and baggage freely toted by some who proudly – and sometimes obnoxiously – wear the label.  So, while happy to be identified as belonging in the Calvinist camp, I tend to agree with theologian Douglas Wilson who says that whoever coined the phrase “Calvinist” is a “marketing chucklehead”.  Wilson says he prefers to simply be called “Christian”.  Me too.

I am gladdened, though, that I do not need to carry my ill-ease alone; nor do I need to craft a defense or explanation of my (clearly Calvinistic) convictions.  It has already been marvelously expressed, by no less a stalwart of the Faith than Charles Haddon Spurgeon.  In his autobiography, The Early Years, Spurgeon wrote:

I have my own private opinion that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and Him crucified, unless we preach what is nowadays called Calvinism. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel . . . unless we preach the sovereignty of God in His dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel unless we base it upon the special and particular redemption of His elect and chosen people which Christ wrought out upon the Cross; nor can I comprehend a gospel which lets saints fall away after they are called.’

Well said.

Losing Our Gospel Grip

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Losing Grip

Evidence abounds all around that the current Spiritual climate of the typical Evangelical church is rightly described by sociologist Christian Smith as “more akin to Moralistic-Therapeutic-Deism than anything resembling historic Christianity.”   I paraphrased Smith there, but it reflects the essence of Smith’s assessment.  (If you want a refresher on what Moralistic-Therapeutic-Deism is click here & here.)

J.I. Packer, in his sagacious Introduction to John Owen‘s Death of Death in the Death of Christ, offers one of the best and most comprehensive explanations I have recently read about how we got this way.  In short, Packer suggests, we have embraced a counterfeit gospel.

Read what Packer wrote, and think about how his critique compares with what you hear from the pulpit in your church:

There is no doubt that evangelicalism today is in a state of perplexity and unsettlement. In such matters as the practice of evangelism, the teaching of holiness, the building up of local church life, the pastor’s dealing with souls and the exercise of discipline, there is evidence of widespread dissatisfaction with things as they are and or equally widespread uncertainty as to the road ahead. This is a complex phenomenon, to which many factors have contributed; but, if we go to the root of the matter, we shall find that these perplexities are all ultimately due to our having lost our grip on the biblical gospel. Without realizing it, we have during the past century bartered that gospel for a substitute product which, though it looks similar enough in points of detail, is as a whole a decidedly different thing. Hence our troubles; for the substitute product does not answer the ends for which the authentic gospel has in past days proved itself so mighty. Why?

We would suggest that the reason lies in its own character and content. It fails to make men God-centered in their thoughts and God-fearing in their hearts because this is not primarily what it is trying to do. One way of stating the difference between it and the old gospel is to say that it is too exclusively concerned to be ‘helpful’ to man – to bring peace, comfort, happiness, satisfaction – and too little concerned to glorify God. The old gospel was ‘helpful’, too – more so, indeed, than is the new – but (so to speak) incidentally, for its first concern was always to give glory to God. It was always and essentially a proclamation of divine sovereignty in mercy and judgment, a summons to bow down and worship the mighty Lord on whom man depends for all good, both in nature and in grace. Its center of reference was unambiguously God. But in the new gospel the center of reference is man. This is just to say that the old gospel was religious in a way that the new gospel is not. Whereas the chief aim of the old was to teach people to worship God, the concern of the new seems limited to making them feel better. The subject of the old gospel was God and his ways with men; the subject of the new is man and the help God gives him. There is a world of difference. The whole perspective and emphasis of gospel preaching has changed.

From this change of interest has sprung a change of content, for the new gospel has in effect reformulated the biblical message in the supposed interests of ‘helpfulness’. Accordingly, the themes of man’s natural inability to believe, of God’s free election being the ultimate cause of salvation, and of Christ dying specifically for his sheep are not preached. These doctrines, it would be said, are not ‘helpful’; they would drive sinners to despair, by suggesting to them that it is not in their own power to be saved through Christ. (The possibility that such despair might be salutary is not considered: it is taken for granted that it cannot be, because it is so shattering to our self-esteem.) However this may be, the result of these omissions is that part of the biblical gospel is now preached as if it were the whole of that gospel; and a half-truth masquerading as the whole truth becomes a complete untruth.

NOTE: One thing amazing to me is that Packer wrote this in 1958!  …Two years before Christian Smith was even born.  Our plight has been long time coming.  Recovering a thoroughly Biblical gospel is the only recipe for our recovery.

2 Mistakes Christians Make

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Redemption Acccomplished But Not Applied

People tend to make two mistakes when they think about the redeemed life. The first is to underestimate the sin that remains in us; it’s still there and it can still hurt us. The second is to underestimate the strength of God’s grace; God is determined to make us new. As a result, all Christians need to say two things. We admit that we are redeemed sinners. But we also say boldly and joyously that we are redeemed sinners.

~ from Cornelius Plantings, in Beyond Doubt

Sailboat Spirituality

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

Do you sometimes have difficulty understanding or remembering who does what in our Spiritual maturation? We get that it is God who must make us alive to believe (regeneration), and that he gives us the gift of faith to believe, which leads to salvation (justification).  But then what?  Surely there is something we must do.  What about spiritual disciplines? But then, how does grace work? What does the Holy Spirit do?

I love the imagery Jared Wilson offers in his excellent book Gospel-Wakefulness:

As long as we are thinking of achieving the fruit of the Spirit by our own efforts to be more fruitful and joyful, we may be working in their direction, but we’re getting there by the sweat of our brow.  We’ve embraced rowboat spirituality.   But think of the obedient work of the Christian life like a sailboat.  There are lots of things to do on a sailboat. Sailors don’t just sit there – at least, not for too long.  There are lots of working parts on a sailboat and lots of things to pay attention to. But none of those things make the boat go.  The boat doesn’t go unless the wind catches the sail.

What we are picturing here is the work of the Spiritual Disciplines in conformity with the law of God found in Scriptures, not as the means of propulsion, but as the means of setting the conditions for Spiritual fertility. In obedience, we till the soil of our hearts so that they are more receptive for the planting and growth of the Word in our lives.  We obey both in response to the Spirit’s awakening us and in order to raise the sail for the Spirit’s movement.

“If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” ~ Galatians 5.25

Fighting the Sin in Our Hearts

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In Colossians 3, the Apostle Paul commands us:

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you:sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (v. 5)

His list should not be seen as exhaustive, but rather suggestive.  There are many other things that could be included in this list – things which are mentioned in many other passages throughout the Old and New Testaments.

But while Paul’s list here may not be complete, his message is clear:  “Put your sin to death!”

For those who cling to the notion that once we are secured in the grace of Jesus that we have little or no need to give serious and ongoing thought to our sin and the lingering effects it has upon us – that all we need to do is look at the positives of the promises of the gospel – Paul’s words provide a much needed corrective.

Certainly, the promises of the gospel give us a tremendous status. But there is still much to be done; much we need to be doing.  The gospel gives us the confidence that no matter what we may find when we look deep into the recesses of our own hearts, we will never be forsaken.  Whatever we may find in the dark and dank depths of our souls, it is no surprise to God.  He already knows. And he is the one who is encouraging us to take a look for ourselves. God, our Father, does this with the reassuring promise that no matter what we find he will not love us any less.

Still, easier said than done.

I appreciate the work Jonathan Dodson has done to  develop the concept of Fight Clubs to help us put our sin to death.   Dodson bases Fight Clubs on three essential principles:

1. Know Your Sin

Look for the sinful patterns in your life and trace them to the “identity of the moment” that you are looking to for worth and/or meaning (good person, faithful parent, creative artist, successful entrepreneur, etc.).   For instance, your sin could be sulking and your false identity could be victim…

2. Fight Your Sin

Once you know your sin/identity issue, you can begin to fight it.

There are two primary ways God calls us to fight our sin.

First, confess your sin to God and ask for his forgiveness for your God-belittling desires and decisions. (1 John 1.9)  Follow your confession to God with confession to community so you can experience healing and encouragement of the church.  (James 5.16)

Second, encourage one another to take sin seriously, to “put sin to death”. (Romans 8.13 & Colossians 3.5) Don’t let identity-twisting sin just roll off your back. Get tenacious about glorifying and enjoying God!

In short, you could summarize it this way:

  • Confess your sin (to God and one another)
  • Get serious about fighting for true joy

3. Trust Your Savior

Trusting our Savior for gospel identity instead of an identity-of-the-moment is the most difficult and important part of being a disciple.

Robert Murray McCheyene said:

“For every look at sin, look ten times at Christ.”

How does Christ offer you a better identity than the false identity?

Dodson writes:

If my sin was sulking and my identity was victim, 2 Peter 1.3 reminds me that my identity is godly, a partaker of the divine nature. I was sulking in ungodliness because I thought I deserved better circumstances. I felt weak. Peter reminds us that we have “divine power granted to us for life and godliness.”

This scripture reminded me of my identity — godly — but it does not stop there.

It also offers us a Savior to trust, a counter-promise of divine power necessary to live a godly life, not a sulking life. What a relief! Our identity is godly, and our promise is divine power!

So, again, in short:

  • Find your Gospel counter-Identity
  • Trust your Biblical Promise