Discipleship Begins at Home

Deuteronomy 6:5-7, 20-25 ⁵ You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.  ⁶ And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.  ⁷ You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise…

²⁰ “When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the LORD our God has commanded you?’  ²¹ then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand.  ²² And the LORD showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes.  ²³ And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers.  ²⁴ And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day.  ²⁵ And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us.’

Ephesians 6:4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Recently, through teaching and example, some in our church have come to embrace spiritual mentoring as described in Titus 2—that the older men should train the younger men in life and godliness and the older women should do the same with the younger women.  We have a group of about twelve people who signed up to be mentors and/or mentees (I must confess I didn’t even realize “mentee” was a word until I read Dr. Chuck Lawless’ recently release Mentor—How Along-the-Way Discipleship Will Change Your Life, a book which I will happily plug for LifeWay; oh, and until I saw it in the dictionary I thought he made up the word! J ).

The title of this post is one thing in my initial training materials I didn’t include, but would certainly add if I had it to do again.  If we’re going to talk about discipleship, absolutely we must have older men and women training younger men and women who are not in their “homes.”  Discipleship is about growing the spiritual family and building a community of faith.

Yet, Christian homes are also the seedbed for discipleship.

If I mention the word “Deuteronomy” some people respond, “Oh, that’s one of those boring Old Testament books that really doesn’t have much to do with my life.”  Wong!  Deuteronomy is one of those 39 exciting Old Testament books that are very relevant to our lives as Christians.  In Ephesians 6:4 Paul tells fathers to bring up their children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.  And in my personal opinion, Deuteronomy (especially chapter 6) provides us one of the best explanations of what this looks like.

The Greatest Commandment, Jesus tells us, begins with Deuteronomy 6:5—love God with the whole of our beings, and then immediately after that, “These words I command you will be on your heart and you will teach them diligently/faithfully to your children.”  In part, we show our love to God by teaching his word to our progeny.

And notice what Moses says—talk about God’s words and commands when you sit in your house, walk by the way, lie down, and rise.  In case you missed it, that pretty much covers every avenue of life in the time that you spend as a family.  Moses later says, when your kids ask you, “What does all this stuff we do mean” (which in our context would include church, Bible study, prayer, fellowship, giving, etc.) you tell them “God saved us and commanded us to obey”—it’s the Gospel story…

But what does home discipleship require?

First, intentionality.  You must be intentional.  If you’re going to get your kids, especially most teenagers, to open up about questions and situations concerning life and faith you’re going to have to go to them.  Teenagers especially don’t tend to be all that open about talking to you unless you go at them with a crowbar (metaphorically speaking, that is!).  And, most children are more apt to play games, play with toys, text with friends, or stare blankly at a wall than to open their Bibles on their own.  To disciple your children you have to put the effort forward.

Second, sacrifice of time.  We have a plague in America.  It’s called sports and school activities, and for some of us church activities.  We are so busy doing doing doing, even what seems like helpful and useful things that we miss the “good part.”  Read Luke 10:38-42… we’re a bunch of Marthas when we should be Marys instead.  (Or for you dudes who don’t want to be compared to a Martha or Mary, call them Marty and Mark…)

If your children want to play sports or do scouts or be a part of the glee club or whatever—great.  But if all you ever do is run your scouts between basketball practice and choir rehearsal then you need to rethink your priorities.  Maybe it means your children don’t get to do everything they want to do—so be it.  Maybe it means you don’t get to live out your dreams of being a High School sports star through your children—great, that’s kind of deluded anyway.  Maybe it means your little boy doesn’t grow up to be the next Michael Jordan—well, what’s more important: the eternal state of his soul or having a line of Nike shoes named after him?

Time is a necessity, but time can also be a killer when we misuse it.  As Paul wrote in Ephesians 5:15-16, “Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time because the days are evil.”

Are you making the most of your time?

And we can fall into the church trap as well.  Yes, we must gather together regularly for worship, fellowship, and encouragement.  Yes, we must find out which part of the body we are (which gifts we have) and put those gifts to use in serving others.  But if your days are spent running from church activity to activity and serving on committee after committee and not actually living out the word, especially in front of your children, then you are doing too much and need to step back.

Life is but a vapor, time is precious, don’t waste it, but instead make sacrificial efforts to spend time with your spouse and children.

Third, prayer.  Pray for your spouse, pray for your kids…and, pray with them!  When the Bible tells us to pray without ceasing, we know that we can never pray enough.  And most of us don’t pray anywhere near the amount that we could.  When the Twelve were with Jesus, they reached a point (Luke 11:1) where they asked, “Lord, teach us to pray.”  What better way to teach your children how to pray than to pray with them?  And let’s move beyond the “Good food, good meat, good God, let’s eat” prayers of the dinner table, if we even still have dinner at a table.  Say a prayer with them before you send them off to school.  Say a prayer with them after they return and you ask them about their day.  Say a prayer with them before bed…before you go to worship as a part of church…before you go on a trip…before they go out with their friends, etc.

If you have a job that keeps you on the road or out of the house, my recommendation is to call or text your kids to let them know you’re praying for them and to ask them if they have any prayer needs.

These prayers don’t have to be hour long contemplative moments where everyone has their heads bowed and eyes closed.  They can be quick prayers of thanksgiving, prayers for safety and wisdom, or prayers of confession as needed.  And really, isn’t that a practical part of pray without ceasing?

Fourth, Bible devotion.  Spend time each day as a family where you sit down and read the Bible together.  Rotate each day who reads, and then spend a few moments talking about what it means.  These don’t have to all be deep exegetical studies about the use of the word “holy” in Leviticus either.

Use it as a devotional time.  Read a passage or a chapter, and ask some questions of it, like:  What does this say about God?  His nature?  His character?  What does this say to us?

In finding out ways to apply it, I like an acrostic I learned from someone in the Navigators ministry a decade or so ago… Is there a/an:

Sin I need to confess?
Promise I can keep?
Attitude I need to change?
Command I need to obey?
Error I need to avoid?

SPACE out with your kids.

Finally, worship.  Yes, Bible study and prayers are a part of worship, but what are some other things you can do?   You can sing hymns and praise songs.  You or your children can share poems about God they have written.  You can talk about giving to the Lottie Moon Christmas offering and what it goes for, then use this time to set aside money from the family to give at church worship on Sunday.  You can recite catechisms, or read a good Christian book together, or plan a service project, or…there’s a lot of possibilities.  But worship together as a family as well.

Discipleship begins at home—disciple your children and grandchildren in the hopes of leaving a lasting legacy of godliness.

What If We All Thought This Way?

On Wednesday nights, like a lot of “traditional” Southern Baptist Churches, we have a prayer meeting followed by a time of Bible study—basically like what we do on Sunday nights but without the music.  We have spent the past 13 months quickly working through the entire Bible, doing a broad overview of all 66 books, one each week or sometimes one for a two week span.  This past Wednesday we studied Philippians.

The cool thing about short books is that in this study we actually get into more detail than we do with the longer ones like, say, Jeremiah.  But I digress…

Philippians is a book that fascinates me on several levels.  In my seven years of pastoring, I’ve not yet had to opportunity (or, “felt led”) to preach through it, though I have bookended it by preaching Ephesians and Colossians.  One of these years I hope to get to it (maybe after I preach Hebrews, Ecclesiastes, and Luke).

Personally, Philippians is one of the most convicting books in the Bible.  Especially for a very introspective guy like me, I read certain lines, think of my life, and am left with a stunned, “Oh…wow…uh…”  I mean…

For me, to live is Christ to die is gain.

Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ.

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.  Let each one of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Do all things without grumbling or questioning.

But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.  Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.  For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ.

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say rejoice.

Do not be anxious about anything.

I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound.  In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.

How do I fall short?  Let me count the ways!

And in 4:8 we find, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”

Think about these things.

Let that echo in your mind for a while.

I may have mentioned it before, but in seminary I worked in the library for three years and saw thousands of books pass through my hands.  In the masses didn’t have time to see too much detail, but occasionally one would show up with a fascinating title or subtitle, or I’d have an opportunity to peek at a back cover and check one out for a read.  One was a book on so-called Baptist distinctives.  Of course, it mentioned the usual suspects: believer’s baptism, regenerate church membership, priesthood of the believer, and such, but it argued that not one of these was the true, central, Baptist distinctive.  That honor belongs to division.  We must always have something to fight about and to divide over.

Looking at most of the past and present activities of our denomination and churches I’ve been involved in, I must say it sounded like a pretty good thesis.  But it’s not limited to Baptists.  I can ask my Methodist, Christian Church, Assembly of God, and Presbyterian friends and get the same stories.

And then, it’s not even just a Christian phenomenon.  Politics anyone?  Social class?  School cliques?  Race?

Division isn’t a Baptist distinctive…it’s a fallen human distinctive.  Our minds are so clouded with pride and other sins we think about a hundred things before we get to anything pure, lovely, honorable, and excellent.

Of course the Bible as a whole is contra our human nature past Genesis 3.

So for the Christian, if we are going to live in this world but not of this world, if we are going to let our manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, we must intentionally battle ourselves to set our minds on greater and better things.

Like any habit, it might be hard at first, but it will grow better with time, especially as a Spirit-empowered habit.  But think of the difference it would make if we became known for thoughts and attitudes described as true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, and praiseworthy…

How would it change our churches?  How would it change our families?  How would it change our schools?  Our jobs?  Our neighbors?  Our witness?

It’s past due time we stop thinking like the world!

Pursuing Holiness

Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.—Hebrews 12:14

Holiness.  Sanctification.  Being saints.  It’s all the same idea.  If I were to put a simple definition to holiness it would be: acting like Jesus in all we do.  God is the one who is “holy, holy, holy” (Isaiah 6:3) and we are to be imitators of God walking “in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us” (Ephesians 5:1-2).  And holiness is a pretty big deal—after all, consider what the author of Hebrews tells us: without holiness no one will see the Lord.

So how do we pursue holiness?  How do we become holy?

In one sense there is nothing we can do.  Holiness comes from the Lord, much like our righteousness and our justification.  In fact, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:30, “[God] is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.”  Jesus is our sanctification.  He is our holiness.  As much as God sees us justified and righteous in Christ, so he sees us holy and perfect in Christ.

Way back in Leviticus God tells the people multiple times to be holy because he is holy, but then in 21:8, aside from being the God who is holy he also is the one “who sanctif[ies] you.”  It’s kind of like in Philippians 2 when Paul says to work out our salvation in fear and trembling because God is at work in us.

We are able to pursue holiness because our holy God has already made us holy in Christ.  Yet the practical outworking of holiness is still something we must strive for.  The commands in the Bible to be holy or live in sanctification are several (Romans 6:19, 1 Thessalonians 4:3ff, 2 Timothy 2:21, 1 Peter 1:15-16 to name a few).

God has made us holy, he is making us holy, and we must pursue holiness.

The pursuit of holiness is a defining aspect of being a Christian.  Though Peter does not use the word “holy” in 2 Peter 1:3-11, the ideas of holiness are clearly there—life in the knowledge and glory of God, being partakers of the divine nature, escaping corruption, supplementing faith with virtue, virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control.  We are called and elected by God, but we are to be diligent to make such calling and election sure, to grow in holiness.  So, Peter says: faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brother affection, and love, “if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

We might run the race of such pursuit at different speeds, but if we claim to be Christians and have no pursuit of holiness nor a desire to pursue holiness, then we need to seriously reconsider our claim.

First Corinthians provides a good study in the pursuit of holiness, I think.  It is easy to pick at the Corinthians, for the way that Paul describes things and what he must tell them to do, they seem to be perhaps the second most messed up church he wrote and ministered to (well second in light of the fact that the many churches of Galatia were all turning after a false gospel and Paul lambasted them, not even providing his usual “I thank God for you” in the opening of his letter—so we’ll call them, whatever their numbers might be, all tied for first).

But as Paul writes to the Corinthian church he writes “to those sanctified in Christ, called to be saints” (1:2).

As messed up as these people were—being hyper divisive, being called by Paul spiritual infants, allowing horrendous sexual immorality to go unchecked, some questioning the resurrection, abusing the Lord’s Supper, mis-using spiritual gifts, etc.—Paul still called them saints and said they were sanctified.

The tone of the letter seems to be, “This is who you are…now live like it!”

And if we were to use the letter as a template, the pursuit of holiness would include such things as wisdom in Christ, unity, serving others, sexual purity, church discipline, humble use of Christian liberty, concern for others, fleeing idolatry, celebrating the Lord’s Supper together, worship, love, and sound doctrine.

Thus, the pursuit of holiness is something we do as individuals but it is also something we do together as a church, encouraging one another and spurring each other on to greater godliness.

In this, there are some aspects of holiness that will look different for different people in different situations.  I think Paul even gets to this point in his talks on Christian liberty.  There are certainly plenty of things that strictly define holiness—unity, concern for others, sexual purity, etc.

But with other things such as the type of music we listen to, the movies we see, the beverages we drink, the clothes we wear, the Bible translations we use, etc. there is more leeway and freedoms.  For example, holiness dictates we dress modestly (1 Timothy 2:9), but it does not dictate whether we dress casual or in our finest to worship the Lord.  For some, their conscious will say that to properly come before the King of kings you must offer your best even in terms of dress, and so it will be sin to them not to wear a suit and tie or a dress.  Yet for others, they will look at how Jesus dressed as a common man, and how his followers were mainly common men and women.  Plus they may say that belonging to Jesus means we belong to a family and family is less formal.  Therefore their pursuit of holiness will allow for more casual dress in worship.  In this issue, both are right, so long as they act in faith, do not pass judgment on each other, and do not seek to cause the other to stumble (Romans 14:1-23).

If we are in Jesus we are saints, so let us live as saints.  Let us pursue holiness in all things and encourage one another in such pursuits!

God is Big Enough (but do we live as it is so?)

On Sunday Mornings, we are presently doing a 21-week jaunt through Acts.  This past Sunday I preached on Acts 9:32-11:30.  My focus was for us to wrap our minds around the “bigness” of God.  Three of my four points were: God is big enough to deliver us from our infirmities, to rescue us from death, and to save people from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

My other point out of this two and a half chapter passage came from one tiny little verse that you can easily skip over if you’re reading fast—9:35, “And all the residents of Lydda and Sharon saw him, and they turned to the Lord.”

God is big enough to save entire towns!

My church is in a town of ~1700 people in a county of roughly 18000, about 40 miles due south of Kansas City.  In the surrounding area, they don’t grow the towns big but there are plenty of little communities scattered across the terrain.  Most people you encounter “belong” (in the loosest sense of the word) to some church, so they claim.  Yet on any given Sunday the seven churches here have at most 700 people sitting in the pews.

There are plenty of people in need of Christ.

One of the questions I had for the congregation: if God could save the entire population of Lydda and Sharon, then why doesn’t he do the same thing with Adrian?  Of course to be biblically faithful, I talked about how just because God does something one way in the past it doesn’t mean he’s going to do things the exact same way in the future, but the overall point here is to begin to think outside the little boxes we like to put God in.  Even if God doesn’t move here in the same way—he is still perfectly capable of saving all the residents of our little town.

And then I brought up a second question: what has changed?  What is different today than it was almost 2000 years ago?  Of course culture is always fluid—one generation never looks the same as the previous or the following (at least here in America).  But at their core humans are still the same.

So have unbelievers changed?  No.  They’re still the same as they have been since Adam and Eve first partook of the fruit.  Unbelievers reject God.  They reject Jesus (unless it is some false idol of Jesus they have created in their own mind).  It doesn’t matter if you’re inviting them to events at church or to a meal and a Bible study in your home—unbelievers are by nature disinclined to hear and receive the Gospel.  Our methods won’t change that, only the Spirit of God preparing their hearts and opening their ears and minds will change that.

Well then, what about the Spirit?  Has the Holy Spirit changed?  Again no.  Our God is the great unchanging God—the one who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  He is the God who progressively revealed himself.  He is the God who relates to us on a personal level.  But he is the same unchanging God.  The Spirit is the same today as he was in Acts.  We have the same access to the same power and the same potential to see sweeping and true revival.

So what does that leave?  What has changed?  What about us?

The Bible tells us not to grieve or quench the Spirit—so we can affect not the Spirit’s power but how he operates within us.  The Bible tells us to be filled with the Spirit “addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ” (Ephesians 5:18-21).

Now there’s a question for us to ask: do we live filled with the Spirit?  We might address one another with song each time we gather and sing hymns and praise courses and read Psalms, but… do we do it making melody to Jesus with all our heart?  Are we people who are thankful always and for everything?  Are we people who actively put our wills and pride aside to submit to one another?  So first of all do we truly live filled with the Spirit?

Secondly what about our devotion to word and prayer?  Has that changed?  A few chapters earlier in Acts, it says the disciples devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching (the Word) and prayer among other things—and they did this day by day both at the temple and in homes.

Is that us?

Do we seek God in his Word?  Do we cry out to God in prayer?  Do we daily pray “your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is heaven”?  Are we as God’s people devoted to the word and prayer each and every day?

In John 17 Jesus prays on behalf of his disciples.  He ask the Father to “sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.”  We must be in the Word because it is what brings us to sanctification—to holiness.  It is what helps us become more like Jesus.  But as Jesus continues, flowing from our sanctification in the truth, he prays for us to be one as he and the Father are one, and why?  “So that the world may believe that you have sent me.”

Prayer shapes us.  The Word shapes us.  If we are not going to be people who are daily devoted to the Word and prayer, then we have zero reason to expect that the Spirit might move in our community like he did in Lydda and Sharon.

Yet if we are people (and all the church people—not just the pastors or the deacons or the Sunday School teachers—all of us) of the Word and prayer; people who live filled with the Spirit, then just maybe we will see the same thing happen in Adrian (or substitute with the name of your town) as we read about in Lydda and Sharon.

Unbelievers haven’t changed.  The Holy Spirit hasn’t changed.  God is big enough.

But will we change and truly embrace the bigness of God?

A Meditation on Life, Death, and Being a Nameless “Other”

And I will die alone, and be left there
Well I guess I’ll just go home
Or God knows where
Because death is just so full, and man so small
I’m scared of what’s behind, and what’s before

But there will come a time you’ll see
With no more tears
And love will not break your heart
But dismiss your fears
Get over your hill and see, what you find there
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair

–from Mumford and Sons, “After the Storm”

Now, I wouldn’t count Mumford and Sons as a beacon of good theology (perhaps as an existentialist one), but these haunting yet hopeful lyrics are part of a beautiful sounding song that captures how much of the world views death: it’s there and it’s scary so hope for the best.

James reminds us, even from the Christian vantage point, that we have no idea what tomorrow brings—after all what is life?  We are just a mist—a vapor­—we’re here for a little time and then we’re gone.  That moment of vanishing is sometimes quick and sometimes painfully slow.  It can happen in an instant without us even sensing it is coming.

Yet if we are indeed followers of Jesus, while we might not know what tomorrow brings (literally speaking) we are assured of what tomorrow brings (speaking of the end of this life).  With grace in our hearts and no more tears, we just go home (2 Corinthians 5:8).

I have been thinking about death more recently, and I have no idea why.  I’m only 31, this is still supposed to be the prime of life—of course tell that to the hair that has gone missing (traitors), the ears that cannot hear as well as they once did (what?), and the aches and pains that crop up and stubbornly refuse to go away (groan).  If I’m “average” then there’s still another good 50 years of this.  Death should still be a generation away—plenty of time for this body to continue to fall apart!

But thinking about death also makes me reflect on life.  Like most people, I have dreams of being someone—of being special, of leaving a legacy that is remembered for centuries.  That must be a part of our celebrity culture, though, I mean if I were to think realistically and rationally I’d know that legacies are overrated—very few people leave one.  With all the billions of people who have ever lived, how many get remembered?  Five years after they’re gone, how many people still get talked about?

Even in our own families: how many of us can recall the names of our great-grandparents without digging up the old genealogical tree we keep in the basement?

In the Bible where we actually have the rare legacies of some of the oldest names around, there are also those faithful ones who lived and died (sometimes rather painfully) and all we know is they are the “others.”

That’s most of us—that’s the vast majority of us in the eyes of history.  Death is so full, it has swallowed so many, yet we’re so small—we’re just “others.”  Depressed yet?—you shouldn’t be.  At least not because of this, if you are a follower of Christ.

See: life and death and our place in history isn’t about leaving a legacy, it isn’t about the power we had, the blogs we wrote, the degrees we earned, or the prestige of having our names preserved in a 6^th grader’s chewed up old history book.  It is about being content with being an “other” because we have sought to devote every moment not to seeking our own glory but the glory of Christ.

In Philippians, Paul wrote, “to die is gain.”  Why?  Because we get to be with Jesus.  So when we Christians face the death of a fellow Christian we “do not grieve as others do who have no hope” but remember the coming of the Lord and the resurrection and “therefore encourage one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4).  The death of a fellow Christian is an opportunity of encouragement for us who remain behind, and the inevitable approach of our own death is a sign displaying the coming of perfect joy.

But before Paul said “to die is gain” he wrote, “to live is Christ.”

Solomon tested all that the world had to offer and determined it is all vain—good or bad.  After all, everyone meets the same end and whatever gain we had is left behind for others to do whatever they want.  Solomon advised his son in the face of this reality to get married, eat bread, drink wine, be merry, wear clean clothes, and so enjoy life (Ecclesiastes 9)…oh, and this: “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (12:13).

That’s life: whatever we do, great or small; whatever we gain or lose; whoever we have around us…fear God and follow him.  Honor Jesus.

For in the end, when you go over that hill to see what lies behind, it’s the only thing that matters.  Have you lived your life for the glory of God in Jesus?

True Freedom

Here at the start of July many of us will barbeque, spend time with family and friends, and watch an explosion of color in the sky from fireworks.  We do this on July 4—Independence Day—to celebrate the freedoms we have in this country.

Of course, our freedoms are great.  In the history of the world, ours has been one of the freest countries for Christians to worship God.

But as patriotic as we can be as Americans we must remember that “American” at best is a secondary and mere temporary mark of our identity.  We have a much greater citizenship in an infinitely superior country.  Hebrews 11:13-16 reminds us that people of faith acknowledge the fact they are “strangers and exiles on the earth” and instead “as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.  Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.”

And Paul wrote, “But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Philippians 3:20).

As citizens of heaven, we belong first and foremost to a global and eternal kingdom (Revelation 7:9-12, 11:15) and are patriotic and loyal to the one true king, Jesus.  After all, in his kingdom we find a freedom worth more than all the freedoms we might have on earth: freedom from sin.

When Jesus spoke with a group of Jews in John 8 he told them if they keep and follow his word, they will know the truth and the truth will set them free.  Looking more towards their physical and national linage and identity as Israel (children of Abraham) they scoffed at Jesus’ words of freedom.

Then Jesus explained that everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.  It doesn’t matter if we live in the freest country in the world or under the most restrictive of governments, we are all born into this world as sinners and therefore slaves to sin and under the brutal dictatorship of sin and death.  Yet through the cross, Jesus destroyed the power of and our bondage to sin.  If we follow him we have an infinite freedom.  We go from being slaves to sons who forever remain a part of God’s house.

And if the Son, Jesus, has set you free then you are free indeed.

Again, it doesn’t matter if we live in the freest or most restrictive of countries—true and eternal freedom is found in Jesus alone and no human law can remove such freedom.  And belonging to Jesus we have a freedom that is much much greater than what any government can guarantee.

So we may take a day to grill hotdogs and shoot fireworks to celebrate our national freedoms, but let us take every day to celebrate and proclaim the eternal and true freedom we have in Jesus alone!

Reclaiming Gospel Community

In my last post A Church-less Gospel? I lamented “gospel” presentations that have little-to-no emphasis on church, the gospel community.  Part of the problem we face is our cultural focus on individualism that mars a greater sense of community.  We do not build biblical community because we do not truly understand and practice the ideas of community living.

The culture in which the Bible was written was a much different culture than ours.  Then, others more strongly identified you with your community and your family.  And it makes sense—transportation at the time was much slower and more difficult, it was harder to break out of the confines of your social class—if you were a man you most likely followed in your father’s footsteps and started learning the trade at an early age, and several generations of one family would live near each other if not with each other.  In the Bible many churches are described as city-churches, likely because there was only one church per city or town.

Today our culture is much more mobile and fluid.  It is no strange thing to live in one town, work in another, and go to church in a third.  I once lived in a town of 100 people—we had 2 churches in town and several more nearby, there were options in even such a small community.  It is not unusual to find a person who lives in a completely different state than their parents and siblings, let alone cousins and grandparents.  We work long hours and when we come home, we retreat behind our walls and picket fences so much so that many might only know the names of their neighbors—if that—let alone anything about them.  Church is no different.  We may be familiar with a small number of people in a Sunday School or small group but by and large the corporate gathering of our so-called bodies are filled with strangers, though we might recognize their faces.

It’s funny but it’s sad…I’m a pastor and, granted on Sundays I’m dressed a little nicer and always wear my contacts, there are times I’m out in town in shorts, a hat, and wearing glasses and I will pass one of my fellow church members on the street.  I’ll say “hi” and they’ll stop, look surprised, and say, “Oh, sorry, I didn’t recognize you!”  Okay—but how many other 6’5 guys do you know walking around this town?  But it’s sad—I can stand up, preach, shake hands, etc. and not be recognized and part of it is we don’t look long enough at a person we’re passing on the street to even know if we know them!  (And I admit, I often do the same in reverse…)

For us, community will be more difficult to build and by necessity take more intentionality.  So what steps can we take to recapture biblical community in our churches?

First, we must reemphasize the central focus of the Lord’s Supper in our worship.  We Southern Baptists tend to have a bad habit when it comes to the Lord’s Supper.  Aside from our own dogmatic liturgy involving deacons and the folding of white sheets, we seem to treat the Lord’s Supper as a side note.  Many of our churches only practice it once a quarter and then we tack it on to the service.  We might give a quick speech about reverence and properly partaking, but then we hand out thimbles of juice and tiny bits of pre-broken bread that halfway seems designed to speed up the process.  After all, we have to do this but we also still have to beat the Methodists to dinner.  Okay, I’m somewhat exaggerating here, but with the way many of us typically partake, it’s a miracle that God hasn’t struck some of us dead like he did the Corinthians.

The Bible paints the Lord’s Supper as both a centerpiece of Gospel proclamation (Luke 22:14-20), and of Christian fellowship (1 Corinthians 10:14-17).  In the early church the Supper was referred to as the “breaking of bread” because that was a part of the ceremony as they told the gospel story with the elements, it often accompanied a larger meal (Acts 2:46), and seems to have been practiced at least once a week—on the first day of the week (Acts 20:7).  So important was the fellowship of the Supper, Paul chastised the Corinthians and told them to discern the body and wait for each other when gathering to partake of it (1 Corinthians 11:27-34).

Perhaps it will help us build the fellowship of community if we bring the Supper back into the communal spirit—emphasizing the participation in the body, partaking more often, ditching the bread bits and juice shots for a loaf we actually break and a cup we actually divide, and possibly even including it as part of a larger fellowship meal.

Second, we must make time on days other than Sundays (and for some: Wednesdays) to meet with our fellow church members.  Time is valuable and we’re all busy.  We know the drill.  We’re all like Martha (Luke 10:38-42).  We’re running around doing this, that, and the other thing, and when we see our sister Mary sitting around with the other disciples and listening to Jesus, well it just makes us so frustrated!  “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?  Tell her then to help me!”  Or maybe if that was today, “Why don’t you people get out of my way so I can get that couch clean!”  Or even, “Look, I’d like to spend time with you but I got to take little Simeon to soccer practice and Sarah to ballet!”

And the Lord will answer, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary.  Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”

Oh.  So in other words, Jesus, you’re saying that many of the things we busy ourselves with and wear ourselves out doing are not as important as we think they are.  Exactly.

Little Johnny getting that traveling team trophy and a scholarship to Oklahoma (the best university in the world—I’m biased) and potentially becoming one of the 0.0001% (not an actual figure, but I’d wager it’s close) who make millions each year playing professional ball—all of that is not anywhere near as important as the fellowship of the body of Christ.  Working those extra hours at the office so we can impress our bosses, move up the ladder, and buy a nicer car is not anywhere near as important as spending time with Jesus.

Mary had it right: the feet of Jesus.  The church is called the body of Christ—it is how Jesus still works, moves, and speaks in the world.  Spending time with our fellow church members, especially as we spend time in the fellowship of the Word and prayer is spending time with Jesus.  Joining together to serve others for the sake of the Gospel is spending time with Jesus and spending time acting as his body.

That’s not to say that we can’t ever work any overtime, our kids can’t play any sports, and we can’t have an evening all to ourselves but we must be in control of those things with moderation.  Maybe we sacrifice a few hours of work and our kids only play fall sports instead of spring and summer sports in order that we can intentionally plan a night or two each week to get together with other church members.  More than that, we mix it up and even spend time with people we don’t know as well or whose personalities are out of our comfort zone.

Finally (not really, but this is getting long, so finally for here), we find various ways to connect with other people in our church and show them we care.  As part of what I do as a pastor, I divide the family units of my congregation across a 28-day calendar to pray for them, and then every other month I send a card letting them know I prayed for them and include a prayer request slip they can return to me.  I do it because I love my flock and want to lift them up in prayer.  But there’s no rule that says I am the only one who can do this.  Any church member/family can take the most recent pictorial directory (do we still have those?) or membership list and pray through it.  Then once a quarter or whatever send a card in the mail saying, “Hey, I’m so-and-so from church, just wanted to let you know that as your brother/sister in Christ I love you and am praying for you.”  Yes it will cost a little money for cards and stamps, but it’s worth it!

It doesn’t even have to be a card—you can make a phone call, send a text message, or write an email of encouragement just trying to lift others up in their day.  Growing up, there was an older man in my church who would call every church member (young or old) on their birthday and wish them a happy birthday—and in 31 years of life he was the only person I have ever known to do that.  Why can’t more?

Check with the local policies first, but you can take your family to the nursing home and go visit the members there.  If they’re able to eat them, you can even take goodie baskets along.  Even the crazy talking ladies with dementia smile (and sometimes cry) when someone stops and says “hi” and asks how they’re doing.  And isn’t that pure and undefiled religion—to visit orphans and widows in their affliction (James 1:27)?

Invite a widow or a family with young children over to dinner once a month.  Offer babysitting services to a single parent.  Take your teenage boys and go rake the leaves and clean the gutters at Old Man Wilson’s house.  Do it all in the name of Jesus.

And here’s the trick: be the one to step out and do something.  Serve.  Don’t sit back and wait for others to serve you or for your deacons to start something.  Intentionally connect with other church members as a part of what you do.

A Church-less Gospel?

Trevin Wax wrote a recent piece about the proper place of church in the story of the Gospel.  This certainly touches on a broader issue that we see a lot of places from George Barna all the way down to the person we see in worship once in a blue moon: the sad issue of defining the Gospel and Gospel living without the inclusion of the local church.

I recently looked through a study some of my church members completed in the past about Gospel-centered living.  One man told me, “I really like that study.”  After looking through it I replied, “I don’t.”  That’s not to say there wasn’t good substance in it.  It lamented our tendency to shrink the cross and think our works somehow earn favor/righteousness before God.  And it did well with defining repentance as an aspect of true faith, and seeking to show how we should live in repentance.  As I perused the study, however, I could only find one mention of church and that was a passing reference to an event in the early church.

It was a nine-week study about how to live out the Gospel without hardly a reference to the Gospel community.  Ironically, it shrunk the cross in a different way.  This is a church-less Gospel, and therefore, if I may be so bold: a false gospel.

When we minimize, indeed, even eliminate the local church from Christian living and following Jesus we have missed the Gospel.

Part of this stems, in my opinion, from our over-focus on a “personal relationship with Jesus.”  And while undoubtedly the Christian life is very much about a relationship with Jesus (John 17:3), we must remember what the church is in regards to Jesus: his body, the temple of his Holy Spirit, his bride, his flock, and his household.

Several times over, the Bible calls Jesus the head of the church which is his body—and we are the members.  A church-less gospel is like the thumb trying to be in a relationship with the head while maintaining no connection to the hand, the wrist, the arm, the shoulder, the torso, etc.  A severed thumb really has no relationship to the body at all, let alone the head.

The Gospel is more about Jesus saving a people (Titus 2:14) than a particular individual.  Yes, God saves his people by saving individuals but then he takes them and makes them part of something bigger than themselves—part of a flock, a body…a church.

The Gospel produces the church.  And no individual Christian can live a Gospel-centered life apart from belonging to and involvement as a member in a local church.  After all, let’s consider what the Bible says about the church in just one of Paul’s letters, Ephesians:

The church, as his body, is the fullness of Jesus who fills all in all (1:15-23).  These are no mere words—God has immeasurable power, in which we are included, as we see in the resurrection of Jesus.  When God raised Jesus he seated him far above all other powers and dominions and put all things under his feet, so that Jesus is over all.  But to the church, he gave Jesus specially as the head therefore making the church his body—and this body is the very fullness of the One who fills everything.  The church, universal, of course is the full and complete body; but each local church faithful to Jesus is its own particular reflection of the complete body.  Without church we do not see or experience the fullness of Christ.

The church is God’s household and holy temple, built together as a dwelling place for God by the Spirit (2:11-22).  When Solomon built and dedicated the temple of God, he stated that God truly does not live in a house built by human hands.  The church is not a house built by human hands, instead Jesus said, “I will build my church.”  He builds the church and each member serves as an individual brick.  It is true that an individual believer is also himself a temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6), but how much more, then, a church consisting of a plurality of members and bricks?  How much more complete is the whole than the part?  Without church we do not experience the full indwelling of God’s Holy Spirit.

The church manifests the manifold wisdom of God to heavenly rulers and authorities (3:7-13).  The fullness of God’s plan to bring salvation through the crucifixion and exaltation of Jesus was a mystery in ages past, hidden even from the sight of heavenly powers.  Now that he has revealed Christ, the truth behind such mystery is proclaimed in the preaching of the Gospel as made known through the church.  The existence and life of the church declares God’s wisdom in a way that nothing else does.  Without church we do not fully declare the great wisdom of God.

The church is the body of Christ through which comes unity and maturity (4:1-16).  After reminding his readers of the unity they have in Christ, Paul tells the church at Ephesus God gave them particular leaders to equip them for the work of ministry.  This ministry is the building up and maturation of the body of Christ.  In our physical bodies, the parts are meant to mature together.  If an arm grows but the body does not, or if the body grows but an arm does not then there is something wrong.  And certainly any part cut off from the body can no longer grow, in fact it dies.  A Christian’s individual maturity in Jesus is intrinsically linked to the maturity of the body/church to which they belong.  No Christian will reach full and proper maturity without their life engaged in a church and no church will reach full and proper maturity without the work of its many and diverse parts.

The church is the bride of Christ, whom he loved enough to die for (5:22-33).  Here Paul talks about Jesus’ great love for the church—he gave himself up for her and cleanses and cares for her.  Does/did Jesus do the same for individuals?  Yes.  But as 5:29-30 shows, the way he cares for individuals is through the nourishing care of the body of which we are members.  Not only this, but the Bible nowhere references an individual Christian as the wife/bride of Christ.  Yes, Jesus loves his individual followers and greatly so, but he has greater love for the collective body he calls his bride.  Think of your own body—if your hand was trapped and you faced the choice of cutting it off or losing your life, you (most likely) would cut it off.  Certainly you love your hand but you love the life of your body as a whole more.  So Jesus loves his whole bride more than any individual member of his bride.  Without the church we do not experience the fullness of the love of Christ seen in his sacrifice, cleansing, and nourishment.

The Gospel Story part 3: Redemption and Transformation

Redemption

Redemption is the part of the story where God works over and against our sin to bring us and his creation out of the corruption of death, restoring us to life.  God first hints at redemption in Genesis 3 when he tells Eve and Satan that a son shall be born of woman whom the serpent will strike on the heel, but the son will strike the serpent’s head.  This is the Bible’s first prophecy about Jesus and his crucifixion—an act where Satan thought he was destroying Jesus, yet instead God accomplished the destruction of Satan and established our great hope.

Then in Genesis 12 God begins the process of redemption by giving certain promises to Abraham.  He tells Abraham to leave his family and home to dwell in a land he will give to him.  Though Abraham was old, God promised him a son from whom a mighty people would come.  The people, as numerous as the stars, would forever possess the land and God would bless them and make them a blessing to the world.

Physically, this people came a few generations later as the nation of Israel was born from Abraham’s twelve great-grandsons.  But many Israelites chose to walk in the way of Adam instead of trusting God like Abraham.  They rejected God and chose sin.  For a time this people lived in slavery to Egypt, yet God brought them out of such slavery through mighty works performed by his servant Moses.  As they left Egypt and marched to the Promised Land, God established the Law.  If the people followed the law, then God told them they would indeed possess the land forever and be blessed by him.  Yet due to their sin and stubborn hearts, they could not and would not keep the law.

Later still, the people rejected God again by becoming jealous of the nations surrounding them and desiring a human king to rule.  God gave them the desire of their hearts in this matter through King Saul, who also acted foolishly and had the kingdom stripped from him.  The kingdom then passed to a shepherd named David, a man described as being “after God’s own heart”—or the chosen king of God.

David desired to build a house—a temple—for God’s Spirit to dwell among the people.  God denied his request, and told David he would build a house for him and establish his son upon the throne forever, and this son would build a temple for God’s spirit.

So here we have the promises of two sons—one who would spawn a nation and another who would be king forever.  The New Testament tells us both these promised sons are Jesus (Galatians 3 and Luke 1).  The people who come from him and the temple he builds are neither a physical nation nor a brick-and-mortar temple.  Instead they are his people—the church (the body of believers throughout all time but who also gather in particular places at particular points in history).

The prophets of the Old Testament also spoke of this Son-King, Jesus, coming as Savior.  Isaiah 53&54 tells how he bears the sins of his people so they have life and righteousness.  This is the redemption we see through Jesus’ life and his death on the cross.

Jesus was born of God to Mary and adopted by her husband Joseph.  As he grew and lived, he did so without fault or sin.  Jesus fulfilled all the points of the law and kept them perfectly, something no other person could do.  Around the age of 30, he began to preach and minister to people, explaining salvation and freedom from sin.  In John 8, he tells how everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin and a child of Satan.  Yet freedom and life come through him and his word, and if he sets a person free they are free indeed.

God gave this freedom to us through the cross.  In a great exchange, God the Father took all of our sins and placed them on Jesus so Jesus stood in our place through death.  There he poured out his judgment and anger upon sin, in order to satisfy his goodness, holiness, and justice.  And at the same time he took the righteousness of Jesus—that perfect obedience in life and perfect love for the Father—and gave it to us.  This is an act God preformed by his own free will, not based on anything we did.  It is not something we are even capable of earning.  The Bible calls this act grace—the freely bestowed favor of God where we receive what we absolutely do not deserve.

In grace, we simply respond by following Jesus.  Following implies two things: the first is faith.  We trust in Jesus, believing that he is worth following and has something to offer.  More specifically, we trust that our salvation and our return to a good and right relationship with God came through his obedient life, sacrifice on the cross, resurrection from the grave, and ascension into heaven.  These last two granting us more than basic salvation, but hope upon hope that death is forever defeated.  Though we may still die physically, we are alive spiritually with abundant life (John 10) and one day God will raise our bodies from the grave and glorify us with Jesus for eternity (1 Corinthians 15).

The second implication of “follow” is repentance.  We repent when we recognize our sin places us on a path of death and judgment, away from God’s goodness and love; and then we strive to avoid sin and live a life that honors Jesus in all we do.

In Romans 6, Paul says through salvation God unites us with Jesus in his death, burial, resurrection, and life (all symbolized by the act of baptism in our Christian life).  If we are united to Jesus, we belong to him; and by belonging to Jesus, we belong to his body (1 Corinthians 12) and his household (1 Timothy 3:15), which is his church.  Following Jesus through faith and repentance makes us part of his people.  We are no longer on our own but we are a part of something bigger than ourselves.  We were as lost sheep but Jesus makes us part of a flock (Luke 15 and John 10).  Belonging to Jesus, then, is all about belonging to a particular people who are followers of Jesus as part of a church.  We will never fully come to know Jesus and mature in Jesus unless we are faithfully a part of a local church that honors him.

Not only this, but if we are united to Jesus we are alive in Jesus; and if we are alive in Jesus, then we are dead to sin.  And if we are dead to sin then how can we continue to live in it?  So instead of walking in the sins of our old life identified with Adam and Satan, we walk in the newness of life in Jesus.

We call this newness of life “transformation,” and it is the fourth aspect of the Gospel…

 Transformation

In 2 Corinthians 5, the Bible says we are a new creation.  Spiritually speaking, we are born again (John 3) or regenerated (Titus 3).  We are new creatures given a new heart and a new spirit—God’s Holy Spirit—so we desire to honor Jesus and follow him in all we do.  In the future this transformation will expand to include our bodies (1 Corinthians 15) and all of creation—the heavens and the earth (Revelation 21-22).  In eternity on the new earth, we will reign with Jesus.

In the beginning before the fall, God created us in his image to declare his glory to creation.  In our salvation, he re-creates us in the image of Christ so one day we will fully declare his glory to a new creation.

Yet this transformation is not merely a future hope.  There are also many present implications.  Paul says we are to walk in the newness of life (Romans 6).  God works in our lives each day through the presence of his Holy Spirit and the fellowship of church to continually transform us into Jesus’ image.  This is a process we call sanctification (becoming more holy as God is holy, or becoming more like Jesus).

In our present transformation we also bring God’s transforming grace to the world around us, especially as we live and work together as church.  First, we share the Gospel message with others, for how will they hear and be saved if no one speaks the Gospel to them (Romans 10)?  We seek the transformation of their hearts so they follow Jesus.  We show them their need for Jesus and as a church we show them a place to belong as followers of Jesus.

Second, we do good works for people in the name of Jesus (Matthew 25).  We try to make the world a better place by bringing peace, giving water to the thirsty, food to the hungry, and clothing to the naked.  We visit those who are sick and in prison.  And we care for the widows and the orphans.  In all of this we also seek to speak kindly to others and build them up no matter how big or small their needs might be.

Third, we seek to carry out a restored sense of our rule over creation by caring for and using the earth around us for reasons that honor Jesus.  Thus, we recycle, we minimize our pollution, and use the natural resources we gather to serve others and accentuate beauty.  With this, we use our gifts and talents to create beauty through art, movies, music, stories, architecture, gardening, our jobs, etc.

Fourth, we strive to raise our families to know, honor, and follow Jesus.  As our children, grandchildren, parents, siblings, and others in the world turn to Jesus we teach and mentor them in his ways so their lives might reflect his glory and grace.

In Matthew 6, Jesus told us to pray to the Father, “Your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  Our desire should be to see the kingdom of God touch and transform the world around us through our words and actions as a church.  So, we do all we can to evangelize (tell them the good news), bring justice, and create beauty.

Ultimately only God and God alone will fully transform and perfect his people and his creation, yet we still strive for it in our lives as we seek to bring light into the darkness, corruption, and decay of the world around us.

The Gospel Story part 2: Creation and Fall

Creation
We have already seen that God created all things for, through, and by Jesus.  Genesis 1&2 tells the story of creation piece-by-piece, first describing the whole of the seven days of God’s work and then specifically exploring the details of the day he created us—mankind.  The opening words of this story are, “In the beginning, God.”

Creation begins with God.  Since everything is about Jesus and Jesus is God the Son, then creation is all about God.  Psalm 19 and Romans 1 tell us that creation displays the glory and the attributes of God.  From the creation account itself we see that God is infinite, powerful, wise, good, personal, relational, a lover of beauty, creative, and majestic.  As we gaze upon the creation surrounding us today we continue to see these attributes displayed.

In the beginning when God created, he took time to shape and form the earth.  He spoke stars and planets, land and oceans, and plants and animals into existence with the simple power of his word.  (Not by coincidence later in the Gospel of John we find another “in the beginning” but this time speaking about Jesus, named “the Word”—as God created through and for Jesus!)  And then God personally took the dust of the ground to shape and form a man named Adam, and he took from the flesh of Adam’s side to shape and form a companion and helper for Adam named Eve.

God said of Adam and Eve (and of all of mankind), “Let us make them in our image.”  Then after creating them, God spoke this charge to them (and also to all of mankind), “Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

God formed the heavens and the earth to declare his glory to us, and God formed us to image and declare his glory to creation.  We were created to rule and care for our world under God and in perfect relationship with him and with each other!

On each day of creation, God declared his work “good.”  When he finished creating and looked upon all the works of his hands, he declared it “very good.”

But this is only the beginning of the story…

 Fall
Genesis 3 introduces us to a crafty serpent, later identified as Satan (Revelation 12).  Satan is also a creature of God.  The Bible does not tell us much about his origin, but by the time he appears on the scene in the human story he is an adversary (the meaning of the name “Satan”), a murderer, and a liar (John 8:44).

When God created Adam, he gave him free reign over all parts of creation and the ability to eat from and take joy in any fruit-bearing tree, with the exception of one: the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  God’s positive commands to humanity were to rule over, care for, and enjoy creation; God’s one negative command was to avoid this tree.  And if they disobeyed they would bring the judgment of death.

Satan, liar and adversary he is, used this knowledge to twist the truth.  He spoke to Eve, tempting her to rebel against God (rebellion is the act we call “sin” or “iniquity”), by convincing her God was withholding good from them.  Satan convinced her that the tree God said to avoid was good for them and would help them become like God.  Giving in to the temptation, Eve ate of the fruit, gave to Adam, and he did the same.

At that moment, they moved from identifying perfectly with the image of God to identifying with Satan who hates, refuses, and rebels against God.  They experienced immediate spiritual death—a separation from a good and right relationship with God.  They felt shame upon themselves, and when God came to walk with them, they hid in the bushes.

When confronted, they immediately started to pass the blame: Adam blamed Eve and God for giving him Eve; and Eve blamed Satan.  Not only were they ashamed and in rebellion, they refused responsibility for their actions.  As a consequence of their disobedience, God did bring the curse of death upon them.  He cursed the ground and caused it to make man’s work hard.  And he cursed their bodies, bringing them under decay, disease, pain, and ultimately death.

This is the judgment of a good, righteous, and holy God against people who chose to be his enemies and reject his word and his love.

At that moment mankind fell into sin and brought the curse of corruption, decay, and death upon the entire world.  God gave Adam and Eve lordship over the earth, so as they fell the earth fell also.  And ever since, we are all born into this world with the sin nature of fallen Adam, we grow to reject God every chance we get, and instead of choosing what is good and right we choose to pursue our own corrupt will and pleasures.  Our bodies and spirits cry out in the midst of this corruption, and the Bible says creation cries out and groans with us (Romans 8)—thus the ferocity and destruction we see mixed among the beauty of nature.

We all stand guilty, we all identify with Satan, and we all deserve physical death and also eternal death—the “second death”—described in Revelation 20 as a lake of fire.  God designed eternal death for Satan and his minions (demons and fallen angels).  Yet it is also the just and deserved death people face for the evil and corruption they commit and pursue in their sin.

If this were where the story ends we would face nothing but bad news and a hopeless future.  But the word “Gospel” means good news, and that is what we begin to see next…

Next up: Redemption