Graduating from the Gospel?

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Graduating from the Gospel?

Kingdom Perspective

December 28, 2023 • Don Willeman

Transcript:

Hello, this is Pastor Don of Christ Redeemer Church. Welcome to The Kingdom Perspective.

Over the past hundred years or so, Christians in the West have tended to view the Christian life as steps in a process. Like a manufacturing process, Christians are “developed” step-by-step.

Now, there are some aspects of this paradigm that can be helpful, as it recognizes the fact that living the Christian life is indeed a process. It is a “walk” that involves living our lives day-by-day before the face of God. However, it fails in at least one critical point. It usually places believing the gospel as merely the first step in that process.

So, for example, it goes something like this…
The first step is to believe the gospel.
The second step is to understand the basics of the Christian life.
The third step is to follow Jesus as a disciple.
The fourth step is to… etc., etc.

Now, here’s the problem. This way of thinking puts believing Jesus as merely the first step. However, that’s not how the Bible speaks of it. Believing the gospel is an ongoing aspect of living the Christian life.

Believing in Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection informs and transforms every moment of my life. The gospel is not just the first step, but the interpretive grid and power for every step.

As Zambian pastor Conrad Mbewe puts it:
“Christians never graduate from the gospel.” ~Conrad Mbewe, pastor in Lusaka, Zambia

The moment we get beyond the gospel is the moment we get beyond Jesus. And a Christianity without Christ’s saving and sanctifying work is no Christianity at all.

Something to think about from The Kingdom Perspective.

“And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.”

~ 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 (ESV)

Jesus’s Radical Love

December 26, 2023 • Don Willeman

Transcript: Hello, this is Pastor Don Willeman of Christ Redeemer Church. Welcome to The Kingdom Perspective. The gospel is good news for sinners. This is both its attraction and its irritation. If I think of myself as a pretty good guy who only needs a little self-improvement here or there, then I am going to be offended at the notion that the Son of God had to die on a bloody cross to take away my sin. I can accept the notion of Jesus as my self-help guru. However, I cannot stomach the notion that my sin is so bad it caused the suffering and death of God Himself. I am going to chafe at the idea that, as Jesus put it, I “must be born again” and I must “deny [my] self and take up the cross daily”. Why does a person who is basically good need to take such drastic measures? However, if, on the other hand, Jesus is the savior of the helpless sinners (Romans 5:6)—if sin is so pervasive and overpowering that “without Him [I] can do nothing” (John 15)—then the suffering and death of the Son of God on the cross for me is going to be the best and sweetest news I’ve ever heard. Listen to the beautiful words of author, poet and hip-hop artist Jackie Hill Perry: “Jesus had the guilty in mind when He hung high and stretched out wide.... He, bare-bodied and face set on joy, became as a slaughtered lamb underneath the wrath of God... Didn't He know that wrath was mine? It even had my name on it. But He knew... Without asking my permission, a good God had come to my rescue.” Something to think about from The Kingdom Perspective. “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.” ~ Romans 5:6-11 (NASB) References: Gay Girl, Good God: The Story of Who I Was and Who God Has Always Been by Jackie Hill Perry (B&H Books: 2018). Thank you for listening to and supporting The Kingdom Perspective! The Kingdom Perspective is a ministry of Christ Redeemer Church of Hanover, NH. To hear more episodes you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts. To donate or to find out more about the ministry and resources offered by Christ Redeemer Church visit http://www.christredeemerchurch.org.

Jesus, Savior of Sinners

December 14, 2023 • Don Willeman

Transcript: Hello, this is Pastor Don Willeman of Christ Redeemer Church. Welcome to The Kingdom Perspective. The only way you can come to Jesus is as a sinner. As a matter of fact, if you come to Jesus as anything other than the Savior of your sins, you will not find the true Jesus. Rather, you will find at best a grotesque caricature of Him. Jesus is not the mascot for your favorite political or social cause. He is not your guru, your personal life coach, giving you advice on how to have a happier, more fulfilled middle-class life. He is not your divine barista, serving up personal happiness at the McJesus Café. No, Jesus is the creator God come to save you, giving up His life for your sin on a bloody Roman cross. Jesus is the exalted one who has dominion over all things. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the Creator and Redeemer of all things. All things were made by him, through Him and for him (Colossians 1:15-20; Revelation 21:1-4). He is the eternal judge of heaven and earth, who Himself was judged for His people. He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29). Certainly, any caricature we make of Jesus will speak to something of His nature—after all this is how caricatures work. Nonetheless, Jesus is not defined by our culture-bound distortions. Jesus did not come to take your side. He came to take over. Jesus did not come to help you with “your life.” He came to give you His life. He did not come to conquer your problems or your enemies. He came to conquer you with His love. Something to think about from The Kingdom Perspective. Thank you for listening to and supporting The Kingdom Perspective! The Kingdom Perspective is a ministry of Christ Redeemer Church of Hanover, NH. To hear more episodes you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts. To donate click here or to find out more about the ministry and resources offered by Christ Redeemer Church visit http://www.christredeemerchurch.org.

The Fear of Shame

December 12, 2023 • Don Willeman

Transcript: Hello, this is Pastor Don Willeman of Christ Redeemer Church. Welcome to The Kingdom Perspective. Fear is very powerful and controlling. Bad fear, that is fear not rooted in the fear of God, will constrain you and keep you from growing as a person. It will stunt your spiritual, emotional and relational development. Now, one of the most powerful controlling emotions is that of shame, and it is very much related to fear. When we are tempted towards shame, we are being driven by a particular kind of fear—a fear of relational connection, or maybe better said, disconnection. Shame says, “I am fearful of being vulnerable, because I don’t want to be seen as inadequate. I don’t want to be uncovered in the nakedness of my soul. I’m fearful of being rejected and despised.” We all experience this sense of shame at times. The Bible suggests that this fear is deeply rooted in our human psyche, precisely because it is deeply rooted in the history of the human race. When our first parents Adam and Eve sinned, their initial experience was that of fear and shame. Listen to Genesis 3. Adam says to God: “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself” (Genesis 3:10). Now, here’s the good news. Adam would have never had this conversation with God, were it not for God pursuing Adam in his shame. Adam had swallowed the lie of sin and shame. But God’s pursued Adam, still. And in this we see the foreshadowing of the gospel of Jesus. In the gospel, God’s comes after us. In our shame we do not seek God; but in His grace He seeks us. Jesus put it this way, “The Son of Man has come to seek and save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). Something to think about from The Kingdom Perspective. Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” ~ Genesis 3:1-13 (ESV)