The Sunday Gospel

I've gotta get this out... This is a "reprint," so to speak, of my response to a discussion I've been having with friends. We started with the topic of church discipline, and I had to say some very... hard things. So, below the fold is my response to these dear friends:

I  am concerned with hurting you inadvertently. I do NOT want to come across as judgmental and unfeeling. My friend, you know that I love and respect you deeply, even when we do not agree, but I feel the need to walk carefully with you, because I know you've experienced a lot of hypocrisy from "Christians," and I do not want to add to it.

The issue is not the church refusing to allow sinners in, otherwise the church would be empty. The issue is the church refusing to allow self-professing and unrepentant sinners to continue in fellowship. One of my sin-struggles is with, ah, "inappropriate reading material," shall we say. It is a sin, and I DO keep coming back to it. I also struggle with pride, manipulation, lying, wanting my own way, AND speeding. I'm sure there are many more sins I could name, and God could probably fill a book with sin that I'm committing and have not yet repented of - He's just being gracious and not revealing it all to me at once because He's working on me in the areas mentioned above (for now - He'll get to the rest in due time, I'm sure).

The thing is, when I sin, I'm miserable! I can't relax and talk easily to my Father, I can't witness in strength, I can't feel peace in my spirit. There is a disconnect in relationship, and my prayers bounce off of a steel sky. I feel conflicted and sorrowful, I'm restless and, though I may be happy, I'm not joyful. When I repent and ask His forgiveness, however, God deals with my sin as a good and loving Father must deal with a disobedient but beloved child; He gives kind - although sometimes hard - and loving discipline. He guides me back into His will, shows me the right path, and walks beside me and helps me every step of the way. He reassures me of His love, and reminds me of His promise to never let me go. That is an awesome experience, and it baffles me that I could ever even want to stumble and stray out of His presence!

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

Now, a non-Christian has no real sense of sin as an offense against God. "Mistakes," "bad habits," "should and shouldn't," and "Oh, I just don't feel right about this," yes. That's their God-given conscience. But they don't realize that their rebellion against their infinite Creator makes them enemies of God.

Think about it. A beautiful land is ruled by a good King. He's fair, he's generous, he's kind, and he makes good and sensible laws, and every decision he makes is fair and reasonable. Everyone obeys these laws and loves the King, and the land is peaceful, prosperous, and happy. But one day, a sickness invades the land: people begin to decide that they want to make their own rules. They have no authority to do so, and are actually acting in absolute and unmistakable treason.

The King offers them a chance to be restored; again and again he invites them to acknowledge his rightful authority and his good laws. Nevertheless, these rebellious people refuse and reject their rightful king. Everyone makes his own rules, everyone does whatever he sees as right, and the land is laid waste, famine appears, lawlessness abounds, and the people suffer greatly. Some see their error and come to the King to ask forgiveness, and he graciously and joyously receives them back, but most decide that they like doing their own thing and being their own little despots too much to submit to him again.

The repentant people are welcomed into the Palace as beloved sons and daughters. They are disciplined for their disobedience, but with love and kindness, with the intent to teach them how to live within their new family, and how to live joyously and freely under the king's fathership. When they make mistakes, they come to the king, their father, and ask for his help and forgiveness. He gives it to them with gladness, and blesses them with all his wealth, strength, and wisdom so that he may help them however he can.

The rebellious people, however, have proven themselves enemies to the king. They continue to disobey his good laws and they show no desire to change. He cannot welcome them into the Palace, because they hate him and would bring grief and turmoil to the people who wish to live with the king in peace. He cannot forgive them because they don't want to be forgiven - rather, they want to continue in their destructive ways. If he wishes to restore peace, he must destroy the rebellion; if he does not and permits the traitors to ruin the land and harm their fellow citizens, then he cannot in any sense be a good king, can he?

This is a frequently used - though admittedly imperfect - parable of what has happened here on earth. We are in rebellion against our rightful and good King, and unless we repent and obey the laws He has set down, He would not be "good" if He didn't punish us. "Good enough," "nice person," "I really try," and all that will not satisfy Him: if we break one law, we are guilty of it ALL. Perfection is the standard. Period.

God sees that we cannot be perfect. He knows that we deal with sin, the flesh, the world and the devil. He knows that, in justice, He must judge and send us to hell.

But God is also merciful and loving. He does not sit back and say to humanity, "To hell with you! You chose it, you certainly deserve it, so party now because this life is the best it's ever going to be. Hell awaits." No. God decides - and decided even before He created, and even before we sinned - to do something about it. He does not decide to make us work for eternity and more to pay off our sin - He knows that's not possible, because our debt is infinite. Instead, He decides - from before He ever created the world - that He Himself would pay the debt for those who trusted Him (there is a whole host of theological themes here I could pursue, but I'm going to keep this focused on the simple Gospel). He Himself, in the Person of His Son, would leave Heaven, put aside all His riches, clothe Himself in our flesh, and live with us.

And, at the right time, He would permit His plan to come to fruition: His Son - His only Son! - would be sacrificed on our behalf, He would be killed and suffer death to pay for our sin. He Himself had no sin; none of it was His fault. Yet, seeing our plight and hopeless condition, and because of His great love for us, He took responsibility and paid the whole of our debt.

We were His enemies, and hated Him. We refused to acknowledge Him and refused to give Him our love. We refused to obey Him, we denied His existence, and we wallowed in the cesspool of our pride and rebellion. There was nothing in us that was lovable, nothing beautiful, nothing to commend, nothing worthwhile - and yet,

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Now, He has paid for our sins, and also clothed us in His perfection. He has kept the Law perfectly in our place, and so it is no longer an anvil and a curse hanging over us to crush us, but rather the instruction manual to teach us how we can live to please the God who loves us so much. We have been rescued from His eternal wrath, and have been joyously welcomed into His kingdom as chosen and adopted sons and daughters.

The bad news? We are sinners and enemies of God, and we have piled up an infinite debt that we can never pay off. If we continue as we are, we will be imprisoned under unending wrath and never have any hope of relief.

The Good News? The Judge of all the earth is still the God of love and mercy, and He has made a way for our debt to be paid, our sins forgiven, and for us to stand in front of Him in perfect righteousness.

The condition? We have to do it His way. We have to give up our desire to be the rulers of our own lives, to be our own little gods, and to do things our way. Instead, we must abandon ourselves and trust wholly in the Person and Work of Jesus, who took all our sin upon Himself and defeated sin, death and Hell on our behalf.

In Christ alone my hope is found;
He is my light, my strength, my song;
This cornerstone, this solid ground,
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My comforter, my all in all—
Here in the love of Christ I stand.

In light of all this, if someone calls himself a Christian and still refuses to deal with revealed sin by turning away from it and following Christ, if said Christian refuses to even look on his sin as sin - how can he really be a Christian? How can he cheapen the incredible sacrifice God made on his behalf? If he feels no sense of conviction, no need to struggle against the sin, then has God really made him His child, or is he just participating in "feel good-ism"? As Paul says in Romans 6:15-19 -

What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.

This wonderful love and mercy and forgiveness that God has given us through Christ is to lead us into increased holiness, to make us more like Christ, and more willing to repent and forsake sin. We must be very careful not to take it for granted:

Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

And so, church discipline is necessary and needed as well as being commanded. It is to be exercised in humility, gentleness and sorrow; but if a sinner in the church refuses to repent, he must be put out, lest he malign the name of Christ and preach a false gospel in his actions. The church must go through careful steps of evaluation and pleas for confession and repentance, but if it comes to excommunication, the church must exercise that duty with sorrow and deep prayer that the sinner will come to his senses and be restored to fellowship.

At any rate, I'm going to stop this here. There are many theological issues I simplified or simply did not discuss; I'm not Calvin or Luther or Paul (*grinz*) and I doubt my readers would be willing to read even up to here. But that is the Gospel as clear as I can make it; God will do with it as He wills.

Comments

[Man of the West]

1.

Very nicely done, Miss Kat. Most impressive. There was one quote in particular I liked.

[Kat]

2.

Thank you! Oh, thank you so much! I really wrestled with this, and I'm very glad the work showed. Which quote was it that you liked?

[Man of the West]

3.

I quoted you in a post just a minute ago. ...He has paid for our sins, and also clothed us in His perfection. He has kept the Law perfectly in our place, and so it is no longer an anvil and a curse hanging over us to crush us, but rather the instruction manual to teach us how we can live to please the God who loves us so much.

I don't know that I've ever heard it put better.

[Kat]

4.

Thank you, my friend - truly, your encouragement is a HUGE blessing!

And for those who might want a link, MOTW commented on his blog here.

Please check his blog out; he is an excellent writer!

[Angrywhiteman]

5.

Well said KAT

Discipline is absolutely necessary, for the very word is derived from disciple.

The word is full of examples of purging leaven from the church. Deut. 4:3, Josh 7:12&13, 1Cor. 5.

These unrepentant, habitual sinners act as leaven, working their evil throughout the church, but you already know that.

I might add, my experience with most mainstream Christianity today is the churches by and large are teaching very little of the word. Church is for teaching the word, not a social club, it's primary purpose is to teach the word of GOD.

The entire book is tied together for and aft, from beginning to end, it is as John so aptly says;

John 1:1
1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
KJV

It is the ALPHA and the OMEGA, it is GOD's letter to us, it describes what has been, and what to expect.

How can one learn this from a church that teaches one verse and then rambles on with amusing anecdotes of how Aunt Sally saved the neighbors cat from the garbage can? Add to that the division brought about by lack of discipline, and what have you got? How much pleasure do you give GOD?

Rev 4:11

11 Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

KJV

I'm pointing no fingers, this is just my little rant on the subject.

[Raven]

6.

Certainly some heavy stuff to think about. And thank you for putting such effort into this post. Its another piece to a puzzle I am trying to put together. A big one. With itty bitty pieces.

Human beings are perhaps growing faster than then religion can keep up...too many people refuse to call certain habits or lifestyles "sin"- and therefore they choose to ditch their religions. I wonder if it's possible to reconcile this? People who are good; who give away most of their material belongings (as demanded of from God); they live peacefully and give their talents to others free of charge.

I don't know...it's a lot to take in. Bit by bit...

[Mike]

7.

Thanks for sharing this Kat. There's a lot to think about here. I know different traditions deal with the concept of "discipline" in different manners. But what's most concerning to me is the current trend, so to speak, of the church not calling sin what it is. Sin. We sugar coat it with emotional needs and emotional problems when the bottom line, for all mankind, is that we're dirty rotten sinners. And we need a Savior. That's all of us, no matter how good we think we are or how inoffensive we may deem our own sin to be. We can't clean ourselves up, but God can through the redemptive work of Christ. What we in the church have to do is recognize that truth is absolute, and that we are all sinners. We can't wink at sin and say "he's not that bad." A book I was reading recently said we need to hear more sermons that cause us to tremble. I'd give that a big Amen!

[Owlmama]

8.

I came because of a link off google on your old post about Rich Mullins last year. I thought I would see what you were currently writing. I am so glad I did.

Your post grabbed me with opening lines where you said,

"I am concerned with hurting you inadvertently. I do NOT want to come across as judgmental and unfeeling. My friend, you know that I love and respect you deeply, even when we do not agree, but I feel the need to walk carefully with you, because I know you've experienced a lot of hypocrisy from "Christians," and I do not want to add to it."

May we all walk carefully... but walk it none the less. I don't know if you have read C.S. Lewis - The Great Divorce. There can't be hell in heaven...

It is time for the true church to rise up as Mike expressed above. No more winking, excusing, or just ignoring it. I am tired of seeing my brothers and sisters in Christ struggle- and I am tired of being allowed to do it myself. I long for the place where we can walk in openess with one another.

[Owlmama]

9.

What book was that? Curious minds want to know...

[Kat]

10.

Owlmama (great nic!), thank you so much for the very kind compliment; it is greatly appreciated!

I haven't yet read "The Great Divorce," but I'm planning on getting to it. Right now, I'm trying to begin (and finish, eventually!) Calvin's "Institutes," and also re-reading J.I. Packer's "Knowing God" (which completely blew me away - awesome book!)

If you looked around a bit, you'll have noticed that I go all over the place here at CHC, but when I post about Christianity, I do my best to offer my readers something substantial.

I'm glad God led you here, and I hope you stop by again!

[Kat]

11.

Hey, Owlmama - Mike just let me know that its title is "When People Are Big and God Is Small," by Ed Welch...

Here's the Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/When-People-Are-Big-Small/dp/0875526004

And I'm having issues with HTML in comments at the moment, so you'll probably need to copy/paste that URL....

[owlmama]

12.

I will check out that book Mike quoted and see if our local library carries it. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed Lewis' book... I thought it might be too wordy for me but found it wasn't on that particular set of days. I don't know if you have ever noticed but some books are like that. You just have to come back to them.

I have not even dared to read the books you mentioned... but who knows? I will add them to my growing library list of books to potentially ponder.

Currently I am trying to finish up our overview of the Old Testament (the main parts that appeal to a crazy brood of owlets) and my book to tote to baseball practice- Brother Yun's Living Water. He's trampling on all my American toes and I'm loving it.

I just want all that crazy fluff burned out of me- so Christ can fill me with more of Him. But I have to take it in small daily doses, lest I be burned to a feathery crisp.

Yes I'll be back lurking high in the trees. And don't worry about the content of each blog. Owls love to wander through the woods!