Time to Resurrect the Full Gospel
Without the resurrection of Christ, there is no gospel. Without a gospel, there is no need for a resurrection; no Easter. Without the gospel, there is no hope for humanity, for the justice and peace we all long for. Of God it is said, “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4).
Hmm. What to write about. This opportunity does not arise very often, so the topics pile up like trucks on the turnpike on a snowy day. There is only time and room for one topic. Not only that; this piece lands in the midst of the most drastic cultural upheaval in the country’s history, and the unbending celebration of the most drastic upheaval in sacred history: the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, the unique Son of God. So, which did I choose?
I chose neither. The cultural issues are important but temporary. The resurrection is unfathomably important but is part of a larger story and is eternal. It is a vital part of the gospel, without which it has no meaning.
The apostle Paul, by the Holy Spirit, describes the gospel as “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3b–4). The word “gospel” means “good message.” What is this good message, and why should we care?
As a prelude to the answer, we need to go deeper. There are many presentations, beliefs, and emphases that skim the surface of the gospel. In a biblical nutshell, Christ, the Messiah, will restore creation to its pristine Edenic condition. There are some common but misguided ideas about the purpose of the gospel that miss the point.
The gospel will change your life! True, but not the main point. “My life is good; my family’s great, I have a good job, I’m a nice person. I don’t need the gospel.”
Related Posts:
You Might also like
-
Does Biology Need “Queer Theory”?
The fact that more honest scientists find it necessary to call out prestigious institutions for embracing unscientific gender nonsense says a lot about the assault on reality happening right now. Biology doesn’t need “queer theory.” It needs instead a worldview that grounds the givens of reality, givens that were put in place by God, instead of an ideology that sees everything as a social construct.
A recent video from the PBS Eons YouTube channel, a show which covers topics related to paleontology and evolution, wrestled with how it is possible to distinguish between male and female dinosaurs when all that is left are bones. In it, the host objectively defined the concept of biological sex as applied to these extinct creatures: “In this script, we’ll be using ‘male’ and ‘female’ as shorthand for ‘sperm-producing’ and ‘egg-producing’ individuals.” She then added that “one shortcut for assigning sex to an individual is by their reproductive organs. Sperm producers have testes while egg producers have ovaries.”
This definition is essentially correct, although no one “assigns” anything. A given individual, whether human or dinosaur, just is male or female. We identify sex; we don’t “assign” it. Sex is objective and binary and has to do with the two distinct roles in reproduction.
Unfortunately, not every source of science education is this clear. For example, evolutionary biologist Colin Wright recently called out Yale University for a lecture that redefined sex according to queer theory. According to slides from this Ivy League course, “Sex is not an inherent, binary fact about a gene, a genome, a zygote or an embryo” but instead a “cluster of iterative, coevolved, differentiated reproductive homologies.” Additionally, the materials for the course (a required course for all Yale pre-med students) claimed that “sex is not determined.” It is “a fact about history, not individuals,” “a performance of the self,” and that “biology needs queer theory.”
Read More
Related Posts: -
Christian Suffering––Blessings, Not Curse!
Written by Saji P. Thomas |
Wednesday, December 8, 2021
There was never a greater crisis of faith for the disciples as when their Lord was crucified on the cross; but God has never been more at work in that very moment of weakness and suffering of his very Son!Recently a close relative hosted a believing family who visited Bangalore to treat their five-year-old daughter for a few weeks. The little one had been suffering from bone cancer, enduring an indescribable amount of pain. Doctors advised bone marrow transplant. All the tests for compatibility cleared the father as the donor. The surgeries on both the father and his darling daughter were carried out on the next day satisfactorily. But within a few days, the child got infected, and she did not recover. Watching the little one’s funeral was one of the most heartbreaking experiences in recent times.
During the course of the treatment of their child, they also found out that the mother is at the fourth stage of bone cancer herself. The intensity of their trial is all the more because they are a very young family in the Lord.
I took time to reflect on how we Christians grapple with the reality of suffering, especially those that come to us due to no apparent fault of ours. Why would God allow the curse of suffering to come upon His own children, especially because Christ has paid for the curse of sin? The subject is awfully perplexing and yet what the Scripture has to offer is both assuring and rewarding.
Let me share with you five of the many New Testament truths that I came across about why the suffering of Christians is not a curse, but a blessing!
Suffering is a Test of Our Faith
Almost every paragraph of 1 Peter has something to say about Christian suffering. In addition to the general sufferings of the world, the ridicule and scorn, and being ill-treated, the apostle Peter anticipated the state-sponsored persecution that was imminent on these believers. The set of instructions given to the believers to submit to various non-Chrisitan authorities (2:13-3:6) underscores this situation.
He begins the letter by warning the church not to be surprised by various sufferings (1:6-7). Strong encouragement is given to us to be prepared in the light of the coming “fiery trials.” Peter gives the first theological reason for our sufferings. “The tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire” (1 Pet 1:7a). It is a test of our faith, a faith that endures in spite of the trials, faith that will “result in praise and glory and honour” (v.7b).
Suffering Signifies Our Union with Christ
Peter reminds his readers not to be surprised at the fiery trials (4:12ff.). Instead, he says we are to rejoice in them. The second reason why we suffer as Christians and can rejoice in our suffering is that it signifies our union with Christ: “to the degree that you share (fellowship, koinonia) the sufferings of Christ” (v.13a NASB). “Their sufferings are not a sign of God’s absence but his purifying presence.”1 This too will result in our joy and exultation at the coming of Christ … so that also at the revelation of His glory you may rejoice with exultation (v.13b).
Read More -
A Single Woman’s Response to Greg Johnson
Christians ever identified themselves by inner desires? Don’t we all experience a multitude of desires we deal with besides sexual ones? As a single female Christian, it never occurred to me to identify myself related to any sexual desires. I am not alone. Among Christians, there are life-long single men and women, widowed men and women, divorced men and women, who have obeyed God’s commandments while remaining celibate during periods of their lives. Furthermore, they never identified themselves by any desires they experienced during those same periods of their lives.
Dear Dr. Johnson:
I read your USA Today article, “I’m a gay, celibate pastor of a conservative church.” Here’s a trick for de-scalation.” My first thought was why would a Christian–—and a pastor at that–—take an issue controversially engaged and involving believers of a specific church and denomination out to the world–—a world that generally mocks Christianity and Christians? A second thought came immediately–— that this is not “de-escalation,” is it? If anything, it’s a bold escalation bringing an unbelieving world into the church’s business.
Perhaps it’s time someone other than a married man or woman address you due to our mutually-deprived lives in accordance with God’s righteous laws–—deprived but not unfulfilled or unfruitful. To begin with, you state you’ve been investigated by church authorities . . . because of your sexual orientation.” As this issue is long-standing and quite public, you appear to miss the focus, that is, your promotion of “gay Christian identity” more so than your inner conflict. You appear to insist on identifying yourself by desires. Since when in Christianity’s history have Christians ever identified themselves by inner desires? Don’t we all experience a multitude of desires we deal with besides sexual ones? As a single female Christian at 80 years of age, it never occurred to me to identify myself related to any sexual desires. I am not alone. Among Christians, there are life-long single men and women, widowed men and women, divorced men and women, who have obeyed God’s commandments while remaining celibate during periods of their lives. Furthermore, they never identified themselves by any desires they experienced during those same periods of their lives.
Specifically, why would any believer choose to self-identify oneself with a biblically-communicated deviant desire? Both Plato and Aquinas taught: “It is sexual vice, among all vices, that has the greatest tendency to destroy rationality. Sexual desire can seriously cloud the intellect even in the best of circumstances, but when its objects are contra naturam, indulgence makes the very idea of an objective, natural order of things hateful.”
Further on in the article, you confess: “I’ve found myself at times curled up in a ball on my office floor weeping.” You do not define or describe exactly on what basis you wept. Was it because you struggle with your desires? Was it because you feel persecuted? Was it perhaps a combination of both? What it reveals is that you weren’t “gay.” You were, in fact, “miserable.” I haven’t curled up in a ball, but I know what it is to weep before the Lord. They were times of recognizing sinfulness in diverse areas of my life and God’s many, many mercies and acts of grace in my life for which I knew I didn’t deserve. We all need to humbly weep over any sinful desires, e.g., lust for power, lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life, and more.
Now permit me to specifically address your insistence on identifying yourself as “gay.” The word “gay” is essentially a euphemism, isn’t it? It’s “a mild or pleasant word used instead of one that is unpleasant or offensive,” according to the dictionary. In other words, it’s a cover-up word. It’s used instead of “deviancy,” “homosexual,” “lesbian,” or even “sodomite.” It softens something that is biblically very offensive to God. I can’t remember anyone being willing to call himself/herself a “deviant Christian,” a “homosexual Christian,” a “lesbian Christian,” or “a sodomite Christian.” Would you be more honest to use any one of the genuine words for what you are claiming? If you chose the actual word for the sin and sinful temptation you struggle with, would you choose to so identify yourself then as such a believer first, and secondly as a minister of the Gospel? Those terms sound terrible, don’t they? Well, truth reveals the awfulness of sin and temptation.
I’m sorry if someone or others have hurt you unkindly and unnecessarily. Many of us have been hurt by fellow believers. At the same time, we have to do some soul-searching in order to ensure we did not do or say anything that deserved honest, loving, rebuke. As a pastor, you must be aware that there are many diverse sexually immoral desires even believers struggle against. So far, none of those are employed to identify one’s Christian faith. Do you really want that door opened? If alleged “gay” Christians insist on being so identified, wouldn’t the rest of us feel the need to identify ourselves otherwise? Do Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican priests need to outwardly identify their sexuality? Wouldn’t that become a quagmire for the church?
For millennia, there have been single or bachelor pastors/priests. It did not provoke unwarranted curiosity. Hopefully, the majority practiced celibacy, not as a sacrifice but as an act of obedience and love for God’s holy law. The same is true for non-clerical men and women who devoted themselves to God’s holy and righteous moral standards.
Back to bringing the world into this ecclesiastical issue: Wasn’t it unwise to do so? Would the Holy Spirit lead you to put fellow believers and your fellow elders into a position to be further mocked and scorned by the world? Was love the driving force or a desire for affirmation and sympathy by the many unbelieving “gays” and others who will take your article and run with it to hurt Christians who humbly seek to follow God’s commands?
A shepherd’s vocation is to protect the sheep—not to expose them to danger or derision. It’s not too late for you to rethink and relinquish identifying your faith by an immoral and sinful desire.
I’m just a single Christian woman who has lived a long life accepting all the limitations and proscriptions our most compassionate God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—communicated to the unmarried knowing they represent His love. But I’ve never felt any need to identify my faith by any desires, especially any morally sinful desires.
Sincerely in Christ,Helen Louise Herndon
Helen Louise Herndon is a member of Central Presbyterian Church (EPC) in St. Louis, Missouri. She is freelance writer and served as a missionary to the Arab/Muslim world in France and North Africa.