The Gospel is Irrelevant

I started thinking along these lines this evening when I saw a blog post sharing a similar title. The author went a different direction than I did, but I still wanted to give him credit for getting me thinking along these lines. 

The Gospel is the "good news" that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners by becoming sin for us (2 Cor. 5:21).  We have all sinned and have fallen short of God's glory - everyone one of us (Rom. 3:23). Because of this, we are separated from a holy God and there is no way that we can get to Him. The penalty for sin is actually death (Rom. 6:23). God loved us so much that He sent His Son, Jesus, to die in our place so that God's righteous judgment against sin would be carried out, but also so that Jesus could take our place. He was punished for our sin and we were given His righteousness so that we could go free and be reconciled to God. All of this happens by faith in Jesus. We confess our sins to God, believe in Christ as our Savior, turn from our sins, and accept God's forgiveness. We then live for God and not ourselves. The gospel is the good news of what Jesus has done for us. We just respond in faith and repentance.

Through the gospel, Jesus also conquered death, Hell, the powers of evil, and began the work of reconciling the world to Himself. We are saved from judgment and hell through the gospel, but we also live by the power of faith in the gospel - the finished work of Christ - every day of our lives.

But, for some, the gospel is irrelevant.  It is irrelevant if

• You trust in your own strength and ability to live a good life and be acceptable to God on that basis.
• You believe that there are things in this world that will satisfy you more than God will. All acts of sin are ultimately a declaration that that act of sin is more satisfying than God is. Do we really think that our sin can satisfy us more than God? Unfortunately, yes. That is why we choose it. And, this is called idolatry, by the way.
• You think that Jesus is not enough - you need something besides Christ.
• You want to live to please yourself instead of God and others.
• You believe that there are steps that you can take that will ensure personal fulfillment or satisfaction apart from dependence on Christ alone.
• You are full of pride, spiritual or otherwise.
• You are full of unbelief that God does what He says He will do.
• You think that there are other options for salvation and satisfaction in this life and the life to come.
• You care too much about what others think of you. You live to gain praise from this world.
• Your identity is in superficial things - what you wear, how you look, your wealth, status, friends, or experiences.
• You think that you can manage God and keep Him on a leash to do your bidding, so to speak. You will have no use for the gospel.
• You think that there are things that you must do to earn God's favor.

There are probably a lot more people that I could mention who have no use for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They are fit only for this world and not for God. But, this is why Christians need to fully embrace Christ and live differently from the world and hold out the word of life to those who are perishing so that they might hear and believe. I am not saying that we must engage in monastic withdrawal here. I am talking about living according to another truth - a higher truth. We cannot live as the world does and expect God to bless it or expect to draw people to Christ that way. What does light have in common with darkness? We must put aside the values of this world (power, greed, status, lust, grasping, pride, etc.) and crucify our own sinful nature so that we can manifest Christ. We must live "upside-down" from what the world tells us. Only then will the gospel truly be lived out through us as we incarnate Christ through proclamation and our lives.

1 Corinthians 1:18 says, "For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."  Amen.  God was most glorified when Jesus hung on the cross, suffering and taking the punishment for our sins. He made a way for us to be restored to God. THAT is the glory of God - the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53.  The world does not understand this.  It tells a different story from the gospel. When we think about things the way the world does, the gospel becomes irrelevant to us, even as believers, and we begin to grasp for other things. We lose the power of the Holy Spirit. All of that grasping is futile, though, because God will not share His glory with another.

I am convinced that Christ is all that matters. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2:2, "For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified." Every truth about God flows from the truth about the crucifixion of Christ. The Holy Spirit takes from what belongs to Jesus and makes it known to us (John 16:14).  He is before all things and in Him, all things hold together (Col. 1:17).  If we look anywhere but Jesus for our strength and satisfaction, then the gospel becomes irrelevant to us and we miss out on the power of God (Romans 1:16).

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus and turn away from trust in everything else.

These truths were shared with me over and over again for the past 4 years by a dear friend of mine who unexpectedly passed away today.  He saw something of the Lord that was amazing and shared it with me. He will truly be missed.  I am grateful.

Comments

[Antje from Holland]

Dear Mr. Cross, I am sorry that your friend passed away. You`ve been blessed to have a friend like that. Thanks for passing on what he has tought you.

I keep struggling with the thought of Jesus being all I need. And I admit there are far to many points on the above list I can just tick off. Still.
In times of trouble though I often see much clearer that nothing and no-one else is of more value than Jesus. On other days I (and maybe most people) need a lot of the Holy Spirit to know, as you put it: THAT is the glory of God - the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53.

Thanks for this post and the one that followed. And the other ones :-).

[Alan Cross]

Antje, please call me Alan.

Trouble does have a way of clarifying things for us, doesn't it? Maybe that is why we are to "consider pure joy whenever we face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Perseverence must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything" James 1:2-4.

Troubles, trials, and suffering burns out of us our love for this world so that we can see that all that remains is Jesus Christ. If we see Him, then what else is there?

Thanks again for reading and commenting. I always appreciate the feedback.

[Mich]

Isn't this part of the problem--your definition of the Gospel fails to mention that Christ is LORD. Also, you appear to privilege the Crucifixion at the expense of the Resurrected Lord. Again, I think this Gospel leads to overemphasis on Personal Salvation and marginalizes the People of God and the Kingdom of Heaven.

Your posts are provocative--keep writing.
:-)

[Alan Cross]

Mich,

I understand what you are saying and I apologize for any unintentional deletion of the Lordship of Christ. I have written a great deal about that in the past and am actually doing a study now about the actual nature of "faith" and "believing" in Scripture. It is far more than mere belief, but it implies entrusting ourself to Christ and submitting to His lordship, I believe.

I am adamantly opposed to a truncated gospel that is only vertical. However, I also see no need to back away from penal substitution as the core of the gospel message. When I talk about the Cross, I am referring to the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ in the same way that Paul said that He preached nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified (1 Cor. 2:2). He had all of the work of Christ in view.

Don't worry. I've been reading my N.T. Wright and give him a hearty amen. I just don't think that it is an "either-or" situation. The salvation work of Christ encompasses all of the biblical atonement models, not just one.

At the same time, I also want to delineate between the gospel that saves and the implications of the gospel. For example, I am saved through repentance and faith in Christ. I am not saved by loving my brother. Loving my brother, however, is an implication of the gospel and it cannot be left out if Christ is Lord. Unfortunately, we push the implications of the gospel (obedience, works) out of the view of the believer and they think that these things are optional. The are not. They are the implications of the gospel and cannot be ignored if one is really saved.

So, I agree with you on what you have said. I just think that it is a "both/and" situation.