JESUS SAID, "GO!"

Jesus said, “Go!”

The church usually just says, “Come!”

Let me explain.

Time and again, Jesus instructed the infant church about sharing the Gospel with the lost world.* While the details of His instruction varied a little bit from situation to situation, it is clear that Jesus expected His people to go into the world around them, and penetrate the culture with the Gospel. We are instructed not only to invite people outside the family (Matthew 22:9), but to eagerly search for them (Luke 15:4), and even to compel them (Luke 14:23) to come be with us!

In contrast to Jesus’ clear expectation, the church typically simply hopes that people will come to us, if we provide good programs and try to meet their needs. Several studies indicate that only a small percentage of active church members ever invite anyone to church. Dr. Thom Rainer’s book, Surprising Insights from the Unchurched, states that only one in five active churchgoers invites anyone to church in the course of a year. Even more sadly, only one in fifty church members has ever invited an unchurched person to church! One in fifty. Ever. No wonder the American church is not growing! Ironically, other studies show that most unchurched people would attend church, if they were invited by a friend they knew and trusted.

Do you invite your unchurched friends to church? Do you invite anybody? Ever?

But, let us note that Jesus clearly expects His followers to do far more than simply extend to the lost a personal invitation to come join us in worship and study. He commands Christians to actually share the Gospel with the lost.

Doing that will require three foundational changes in the way we look at the world we live in. First, we must see the people around us the way Jesus saw the people around Him: lost souls in peril of hell, and in need of a Savior. Second, we must see ourselves as Jesus saw us: agents of the Gospel, sent by Him to tell the truth about Who He is. Third, we must see Jesus as He truly is: the Lord of our lives, Who both expects us to obey Him and empowers us to do so.

Two pertinent questions arise from these considerations. First, how can we expect God to draw the unchurched to our churches, while we consistently operate in longstanding and blatant disregard to His clear commands to go to the lost, invite them, and tell them the Gospel? Second, how might God move among us and through us if we actually became more obedient in these crucial areas of ministry?

I, for one, have become increasingly burdened that the church in America – and the churches in Sterling, Colorado, including the one I pastor – must soon discover more effective ways to go, invite and tell. I’m not sure what that looks like, but I’m praying God will make it clear. Would you join me in asking Him to do so? If Jesus said, “Go!” we’ve got to find ways to do what He said.

*If you are interested in checking out some of the passages in which Jesus issued these instructions, here is a sample:
Matthew 10:5-16
Matthew 18:12-14
Matthew 22:8-9
Matthew 28:18-20
Luke 10:1-11
Luke 14:16-23
Luke 15:4-7
John 15:14-16
John 20:21
Acts 1:7-8

What Is the Gospel?

The Apostle Paul wrote that he was “not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God to save everyone who believes it” (Romans 1:16). That, indeed, is good news, very good news. But then, what IS the Gospel?

At the risk of over-simplifying, I propose that you can state the basic framework of the biblical Gospel in three simple sentences of three words each. Here it is.

God is holy. People are sinful. Christ is sufficient.

The first statement is “God is holy.” It’s only appropriate that the Gospel should start with God. After all, everything started with God: “For from Him and through Him and back to Him are all things,” as Romans 11:36 says.

But why start with His holiness? Because in Scripture, every time God discloses Himself to humanity, the first aspect of His self-revelation is His utter holiness. Over and over, God shows Himself as the Holy one. No wonder that Scripture says “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 111:10 and Proverbs 9:10). And on those rare occasions when God gives us a glimpse into heaven, we hear the angels sing, “Holy! Holy! Holy is the Lord” (Isaiah 6:3 and Revelation 4:8).

So, we start – indeed, we MUST start – with the holiness of God. “God is holy.”

And whenever we remember the truth about God’s absolute holiness, the next thing to cross our consciences is always our sinfulness. So the next part of the Gospel is, “People are sinful.”

Since “God is holy,” and “People are sinful,” that means we are in eternal danger: sinful people can’t be admitted into God’s holy heaven. If God were to let people into heaven with their sin, heaven wouldn’t be holy any more, with the result that it wouldn’t be heavenly either.

So, who can solve this problem? That’s where the person and work of Jesus Christ come in: “Christ is sufficient.”

What Jesus Christ did for you is sufficient to take away your sin and establish you in a right relationship with God, Who is holy. By living a perfect life, Jesus satisfied the righteous requirements of the law. By dying as His Father’s appointed substitute for you, He took upon Himself God’s holy wrath against your sin. Thus, He is sufficient to save you from the due punishment of your sin and grant you admission to heaven forever.

Some innovative forms of the Gospel water it down a lot. Instead of “God is holy,” we get “God is pretty nice.” Rather than “People are sinful” we hear some nonsense like, “People are just incomplete, or sick, or misinformed, or even underappreciated.” In place of “Christ is sufficient,” we are being told, “Jesus is here to help you make the most of your potential.” Sadly, though that incomplete Gospel may make folks feel a little better for a while, it is utterly powerless to save anyone.

Only the biblical Gospel can do that.

God is holy; and people are sinful; but – praise be to Him! – Christ is sufficient! Hallelujah!

GUARD THE GOSPEL

Thirty-four years ago, in his commentary on Paul’s second letter to Timothy, Dr. John Stott made the following observation about the Anglo-American church: “All around us we see Christians relaxing their grasp on the Gospel, fumbling it, and in danger of letting it drop from their hands altogether.” What Dr. Stott warned about a generation ago, we see coming to pass among us today.

We Americans are steeped in pragmatism. Questions like, “What works?” “What can I do?” and, “How can I solve this?” drive our very understanding of reality. We tend to be doers, fixers and solvers. Add to this the natural bent of us sinners to please ourselves first and foremost, and you have the multi-billion dollar self-help industry.

The church, in its recent effort to be “relevant,” has accommodated its message to the trend of the age. I find that extremely odd. Was the Word of God ever in danger of becoming irrelevant, and we weren’t aware of it? Yet, many among us have concocted a kind of self-help “gospel” by which we can have our problems solved, our hurts healed, and our dysfunctions made more functional. The church is fast becoming a servant to seekers of self-help.

And the Gospel is in danger of being lost.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that the Gospel is in any way contrary to happiness, fulfillment, or wholeness. But what I am saying is that the Gospel is so much more than all that. By focusing more upon its occasional temporal benefits than upon its eternal substance, we have nearly lost the Gospel.

So, what then IS the Gospel? Here’s a hint: the four biblical accounts of the life and ministry of Jesus are themselves called “Gospels.” That tells us that the Gospel, more than anything else, is about Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the Son of God. It’s specific, factual, real and objective.

In addition, these factual accounts in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John concentrate mainly upon the death and resurrection of Jesus. Almost half of the verses in these four books deal with Christ’s suffering, crucifixion, burial and victory over death.

In keeping with this focus, the apostle Paul summarizes the Gospel message this way: “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the Gospel I preached to you . . . that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:1, 3-4).

There you have it: Jesus Christ died for our sins, was buried and rose again, just as the Old Testament predicted He would. The Gospel is Jesus doing for us what we could not do for ourselves, even with help.

Indeed, what the Gospel says is the opposite of self-help. The Gospel tells us that we can’t help ourselves, not at all, not even a little bit, because we are spiritually dead. Dead people can’t help themselves. Dead people need someone to take their deadness upon Himself, and give them His death-conquering life.

And that is exactly what Jesus did.

Do you believe it? You should. It’s the Gospel truth. It’s your only hope.

What Jesus Did NOT Come to Do

The title isn’t the best grammar; but it gets to the point. What I want us to do is consider the question, “Why did Jesus come to earth?” Or to put it another way, “What did Jesus come to do?”

A lot of people have some really bone-headed notions about Jesus’ mission. One of the ways of clarifying what He came to do is to debunk the faulty understandings of His mission. So let’s look at some of the things Jesus did NOT come to do.

First – and in our “meet-my-needs” culture, this point may seem a bit blunt – Jesus did not come to make unhappy people happy. Instead, He came to make unholy people holy.

Jesus came to take away your sin and put His Holy Spirit in you, so that you could walk in obedience to the will of God. Walking in obedience to God may be very costly and difficult; but, in eternity if not in time, it brings great reward. In fact, happiness can sometimes be the by-product of obedience to God. More importantly, however, holiness means being in an intimate relationship with God, and that is far better than happiness, because it lasts forever.

Second, Jesus did not come to make irreverent people religious. He came to make God’s creations into God’s children.

The point of His mission was not to transform the so-called “religious aspect” of people’s lives. Indeed, as you read the Gospels, it’s clear that Jesus didn’t care that much about religion at all. Far from making people religious, He came to put people into a right relationship with God.

Here’s how that works.

By trusting in Jesus’ finished work, you can be born again and thus become a child of God. Prior to trusting in Jesus, you are just a creation of God; made in His image, to be sure, but lifeless in terms of eternity. By trusting in Jesus, you receive God’s eternal life within you, thus making you God’s eternal child.

This brings us to the last thing Jesus did not come to do.

Jesus did not come to make bad people good. He came to make dead people alive. The primary focus of Jesus’ mission on earth was not morality, but rather eternity.

Scripture makes it clear that all human beings are dead in their sins. When Jesus came, He took our sins upon Himself, and suffered the punishment and death God requires of sinners. He then rose again from the grave, “because it was not possible for Him to be held by it” (Acts 2:24), so that He could impart His death-breaking life to you. It doesn’t do you any good to strive for moral goodness if you’re spiritually dead. Jesus can make you morally good; but first, He has to make you spiritually alive.

In summary, Jesus’ mission was to make unholy people holy; to make God’s creations into God’s children; and to make dead people alive.

Is He fulfilling His mission in you?

Distinguishing Marks of a Cult

Several people in my church have asked me lately about cults. Some of the questions have been about specific and well-known cults, while other questions have been more general.

In addition, I recently had a conversation with another pastor here in Sterling who has had similar questions asked of him. As a result of that conversation, he and I, each of whom writes for one of our two local newspapers, decided to each write a newspaper article about the topic, “What are some distinguishing marks of a cult?”

First, in considering the question, it’s important to be clear about what we mean by the word “cult.” Orthodox Christianity stands upon the exclusive assertion of Jesus Himself: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6). Indeed, in terms of all that is needed for salvation, “the truth is in Jesus” (Ephesians 4:21).

In contradistinction to these claims, by definition a cult is any religious system that asserts its so-called “truth” comes from somewhere other than, or in addition to, Holy Scripture; or from someone other than, or in addition to, Jesus Christ. Well-organized cults typically have their own book or set of books, usually written by the founder. Even though some cults read the Bible or admire it as an inspired book, a key element of a cult is that it has another “scripture” that contains its identifying doctrines.

Another common mark of a cult is the nature of its leadership. Cult leaders allow no questioning of their teaching, claiming absolute adherence at every point of doctrine. They must be viewed by their followers as infallible interpreters of truth. Indeed, they typically do not allow their followers to receive any form of teaching, or even fellowship, from any source outside the cult itself.

By virtue of the unquestioning loyalty cult leaders require, they make uncanny demands upon their followers. They may command them to sell property, change jobs, relocate, or sever relationships with friends and families. In some cases, they may even direct their married followers to divorce or even exchange their spouses. Mind you, these are not voluntary moves the followers make, but requirements imposed by the leaders as a condition of remaining in the group.

Perhaps the two clearest marks of cults are their doctrine of salvation and their teachings about the person of Jesus Christ. Holy Scripture indicates that Jesus claimed to be the eternal Son of God and the only way to salvation. His actions so clearly supported His claims that He could boldly state, “The works I do in My Father’s name bear witness of Me” (John10:25; see also verses 37-38). Orthodox Christianity has always asserted that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, revealed in Holy Scripture alone, for God’s glory alone.

By contrast, even though cults may use biblical vocabulary, talk about Jesus, and even admire Him and His teachings, they always assert that the way of salvation requires something else or something more. The salvation message that cults preach always involves obedience to a human leader, or to a set of duties and obligations. For cults, Jesus is never enough.

It is vital for you, Christian, that you know the truth. There is plenty of deception going around in our world. Don’t be taken in. Know the truth. Know Christ. Know His Word. The best way to avoid the influence of cults is to know the Word and walk in It.