Berridge and Romans 7...

“Run, John, run,” the law commands
But gives me neither feet nor hands.
Yet better news the gospel brings;
It bids me fly and gives me wings.

- After John Berridge (1716-1793)

Also:

A complaint was lodged against him, and the bishop sent for him and reproved him for preaching "at all hours and on all days." "My lord," said he, modestly, "I preach only at two seasons." "Which are they, Mr. Berridge?" "In season and out of season, my lord." [taken from biog here]

Truth Claims are banned???

Halfway through the KCLMS CU's week of events, and we're facing upto having been told by college authorities to change the name of our lunchtime talks on all publicity, so that they no longer make truth claims.

It strikes us all as a little odd that a truth claim can be so threatening that a univeristy society made up of around forty students in a college full of thousands is required to turn objective statements to fence-sitting questions.

It was nearly two years ago now, but this letter from Richard Cunningham, Director of UCCF, to the Guardian newspaper, is well worth a read on the importance of freedom of speech meaning exactly that, whether your chosen belief is a subjective haphazard approach to the world or whether you have an actual opinion. All the more stunning given we're dealing with the context of the university.

So, what's the gospel?

It's been about three months since I last whacked some thoughts up on the blogosphere. So, what's brought me back from the cold? I wanted to take a look at some thoughts on Brian McLaren's soon-to-be-released book Everything Must Change.

Every few weeks I get some circular emails from a couple of Christian bookshops and it seems stuff by McLaren, Rob Bell and others that are often put under the 'emerging church' label, is ever-present. If these are the books and DVDs that an increasing number of people in the UK church are buying (and that makes sense if that's what the likes of Wesley Owen are heavily plugging), then we need to be pretty clear as to what's at the heart of them.

So, Tim Challies gives us an insight here as to how McLaren sees his gospel, his good news. And if we want to be gospel-guarders, as Paul desperately desperately urges us to be, then it would be good to give it a read.

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

2 Tim. 4.1-5

“You’re supposed to be helping him, ‘getting him off the streets’…”

Here's a refreshingly unacademic post worth a read from the blog of Frog and Amy Orr-Ewing; it's a piece written by Rachel Hughes, a youthworker in Peckham, and speaks of the realities involved in reaching unchurched young people with the gospel - always an exciting thing! It's a conversation between Rachel and two young people at one of the youth clubs she runs, and it rings true with what is fairly normal outside middle-class Britain I guess. I'm always indebted to having the camera zoom-out and being reminded that there is more to Christian ministry than student work.

Faithful workman...

John Stott announced his retirement this last week, at the age of 86. Imagine spending a lifetime devoted to pointing to someone else. A life well spent.

“If He is not who he said He was, and if He did not do what He said He had come to do, the whole superstructure of Christianity crumbles in ruin to the ground.”

Stott, Basic Christianity

Probem solving...

"The greater the problem, the greater the gospel.
The smaller the problem, the smaller the gospel.

"We need to be very clear on the problem, and its magnitude, to understand and be thrilled by the gospel that solves it... many heresies stem from having the gospel without a problem. To have a Jesus who is the ultimate answer, but to not understand the problem, means we come up a problem resembling whatever we think the world's greatest problem is."

Michael You

Servants, Builders, and Fools...

Church hosted a 9:38 lunch on Sunday with Pete Gaskell, who works for Gloddaeth Holidays. Pete looked at how Paul describes his ministry in 1 Corinthians.

Christian workers are servants (3.5-9)
Paul couldn't be clearer to the Corinthians: it doesn't matter who does the ministry, whether Paul or Apollos, for they are both servants (5). It's so easy to fix our eyes on the minister, the famed teacher, the top cat in the big evangelical ministry. But actually they're all servants. Servants. That is how we are to think of ourselves (cf. 4.1). Crops are for one thing: growth, so we're to put our eyes on the only one who gives growth, and to remember our place in gospel ministry.

Christian workers are builders (3.10-15)
We're called to build on Jesus Christ in gospel ministry - he is the only foundation (11). And Paul says we're to build well, for how we build will be shown to be what it is on the last day (12-13). What is the quality of our work, what's the state of our efforts, what's the reality to the gospel ministy we're doing? Am I doing a ministry of gold, am I cutting corners, am I struggling hard to understand the Bible; being vigorous as I submit my life to it? Shoddy work will one day be shown to be what it is, and the warning is real: 'if anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire' (15), whilst if anyone who has work built on the foundation that survives testing by fire 'he will recieve a reward'.

Christian workers are fools (4.8-13)
These are striking words - words that cut deep as we examine our own lives and attitudes to ourselves. Paul says that he is like the man sentenced to death at the end of the amphitheatre procession... gospel ministy requires you to be a fool, 'a spectacle to the world...' (9). Becoming the 'scum of the earth, the refuse of all things' (13). Hated, despised, mocked, not taken seriously. It has to be part of my thinking - I'm a fool. There is no room for pride, for puffed-up reputation. I remember in SA, a friend told me that in some communities the sign of being a pastor was driving a Mercedes. That's not gospel-ministry according to Paul: 'we are fools for Christ's sake...'.


I must have this view of myself... God's word is so sharp and active... change your thinking now!
Paul may have been going place to place, as apostle to the Gentiles, but like him I too am called to be a servant, a good workman, a fool, here and now.
A servant of Christ, a builder on Christ, a fool for Christ. Am I that?
To extract every ounce of pride and to remember I am serving the Lord Jesus. To see my actions in light of the last day, doing a ministry of gold on the foundation of Christ. To consider myself as a fool, ready to be seen as nothing in the eyes of the world. To not be concerned with how I'm being compared with others, but instead to fix my eyes on Him who grows His crop. Change me!

Be a God-pleaser...

Paul: didn't decieve, didn't use his title as 'apostle' to powertrip, didn't use flattering speech to win people over, didn't get phased by suffering, didn't try and please men.

Paul: spoke with boldness the gospel message that he'd been entrusted with, wanting to please only God.

Announcing the Kingdom!

It was really cool to spend nearly two hours today looking at the gospel, the Bible, and evangelistic preaching, and to find that all three are totally inter-linked (as one might imagine if one thought about it!).

The Good News of God, the gospel, is that the time has come - the kingdom is near - because the King is here to rule, and salvation is possible in his kingdom through forgiveness of sins. It seems the gospel, the good news about the King, cannot be taught unless the rule of Jesus is taught.

And, as we announce the King, we look for repentance and faith: people are to change their minds about who's in charge for they recognise Jesus is King, and trust his promise to forgive them, thus abandoning any idea of self-righteousness.

So in evangelistic preaching, we aim to present Jesus as Lord and also as Saviour. Of course both have to be told, for if he is Lord without Saviour then we have on our hands a religion of works, and if we omit his Lordship then we have a state of being where we can do whatever we like (anti-nomianism?) - though of course if there is no Lord, then really we needn't be saved anyway.

Similarly we can't substitute repentance or faith - if there is no faith then there is no real trusting God for mercy, so actually repentance will not have been understood. Likewise, an understanding of forgiveness will include being ushered graciously into the kingdom, of which of course there is a King and kingdom life.

Paul firmly believes in the gospel, not a gospel, and that is the apostolic gospel. Is it a big issue? Well, in Galatians 1.6,7 Paul says he wishes that those who twist the gospel of Christ be accursed. Yet when we unleash the true gospel, it is the power of God to save - in it the righteousness of God is revealed, the true character of God.

Words from Miletus...

Having Acts 20, Paul's final words to the guys in Ephesus, opened up to us this afternoon was thoroughly defining in thinking about gospel ministry.

Paul's work amongst the Ephesians was serving the Lord and this meant humility, tears and trials. What mattered, however, was whether he testified to the gospel of the grace of God. It is more blessed to give than to recieve. That's a big shout. It's other-person centred, it's laying myself down, it's not my need first. I cannot do that on my own!

Serving the Lord is serving his people - testifying of repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ - for the church of God has been obtained with his blood. That is their price, that is how much they're worth. Nothing could be more exciting, and nothing could make you feel so helpless.

Post-modernism post-pudding...

Good food, good friends, and good discussion were on the menu at 10 George Street tonight. Much chat about the gospel, how we present, do we present it the whole gospel in a fair balance. Here's a brilliant quote from Marcus H that I found as I was pondering it all - kinda spun our discussion the other way round for me...

“The real shock is not that God punishes, but that he provides any way out at all. The unfairness is not that he doesn’t rescue everyone, regardless of their deeds, but that he rescues anyone, in spite of our rebellion… Postmodernism has turned the offense of the gospel upside down. It says that Christians are offensive in proclaiming only one way of salvation. The reality of the situation is that we should be offended that there is any way of salvation. We should be offended by the cross, offended by our sin and guilt, and then immensely grateful, from the depths of our souls, for such a great and magnificent Saviour” (Marcus Honeysett, Meltdown p191)

Also, some words from the big J himself...

“…whoever does not believe stands condemned already
because he has not believe in the name of God’s one and
only Son…. whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but
whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath
remains on him” (John 3v18, 36).

"The world has many religions; it has but one gospel." (George Owen)

After our bible-study on Daniel 4 (see yesterday's post), and after looking at Nebuchadnezzar's (and Daniel's) response to Daniel's interpretation of his dream, I have been thinking about what we present and live by as the gospel, and whether or not it is the gospel...
Firstly, I think we need to examine our own attitudes...

"If you believe what you like in the gospel, and reject what you don't like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself."
St. Augustine

"The gospel begins and ends with what God is, not what we want or think we need." Tom Houston

"A gospel that elevates man and dethrones God is not the gospel."
Will Metzger

That's very hard. I shudder to think of the reaction of my friends. I wince when someone mentions judgement/sin/hell. I shy away from its relevance outside of my Christian bubble. I would rather speak of today's news than of the glorious riches of Christ to the gasman.

Yet for myself, and my neighbour, the gospel is what matters.

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.
Colossians 2.6-7

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."
Romans 1.16-17

The gospel is...

Here's what happens when you google the gospel:

The gospel is...

- about God!
- easy to distort...
- the good news that God decided not to abandon...
- is the singularly most important communication of God to man.
- carried from the altar...
- that God has provided a way of salvation...
- available for purchase at bookstores Tuesday, March 28th.
- the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for Jew, then for Gentile.
- greater than just the redemption of fallen human nature.
- the message of hope for absolutely everybody.
- the good news of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ...

The Jolly Blogger has some further thought on it.