Two Gospels
Some time ago, a Barna survey reported on how non-Christian adults perceived members of different groups from military officers to conservative Christians. The survey participants were asked to rate their impressions of these groups as favorable, in-between, or unfavorable. Of the faith-based groups, pastors fared the best—forty-four percent said they had a favorable impression of them while 32% had a favorable view of born-again Christians, and only 22% viewed Evangelicals in a positive light. In fact, the only group that rated lower in the favorable impression category than Evangelicals were prostitutes. The Barna report concluded that the negative image unbelievers hold about conservative Christian groups is one reason why our churches are not growing.
These same churches talk a lot about the Gospel and the need to spread the Gospel to the world. We use that word to mean theological ideas, the truth about Christ, all ushering from a sacred text. We have the pages of the Bible, but what of the text of our living? We create a dichotomy between the two at our own peril. I've heard Keith ask, "What is the gospel of your life?" We need to wonder what people read when they encounter us. Paul was very clear on how both speak: "Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity....Keep a firm grasp on both your character and your teaching....Both you and those who hear you will experience salvation" (I Timothy 4: 12, 15-16, MSG). The NIV renders verse 16 this way: "Watch your life and doctrine closely." As we find our footing in a post-modern culture, we must attend to both gospels: our lives and our doctrine. Too many Christians are like travel agents handing out glossy brochures to places they never visit.
Some years ago I sat at a sidewalk cafe with Barry, a pastor from San Francisco, during a break at a spiritual formation conference in Denver. I was interviewing him for a phantom book project. I sipped iced tea and described to him my ideas for the book and reported the results of the Barna survey. When I mentioned that evangelicals scored just above prostitutes as a favorable group, his initial laughter lapsed into sober reflection. Barry can get this Buddha-like look, and you know something profound is on the way.
Finally, he leaned across the table and said, “One reason we’re right next to the prostitutes is that we’re in the same business. We don’t offer love, we offer services. We look good but we don’t know how to love and, unfortunately, society will settle for that to get what they think they need.”
Barry's words practically turned me to stone—they were so simple, so heart-rendingly true, and while the Barna report saddens me, I don't despair. God is so much bigger than our wounded apathy and willful self-rule. And it compels me to press harder into Jesus, to desire to become a more loving and authentic person, to live a gospel worth reading.
These same churches talk a lot about the Gospel and the need to spread the Gospel to the world. We use that word to mean theological ideas, the truth about Christ, all ushering from a sacred text. We have the pages of the Bible, but what of the text of our living? We create a dichotomy between the two at our own peril. I've heard Keith ask, "What is the gospel of your life?" We need to wonder what people read when they encounter us. Paul was very clear on how both speak: "Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity....Keep a firm grasp on both your character and your teaching....Both you and those who hear you will experience salvation" (I Timothy 4: 12, 15-16, MSG). The NIV renders verse 16 this way: "Watch your life and doctrine closely." As we find our footing in a post-modern culture, we must attend to both gospels: our lives and our doctrine. Too many Christians are like travel agents handing out glossy brochures to places they never visit.
Some years ago I sat at a sidewalk cafe with Barry, a pastor from San Francisco, during a break at a spiritual formation conference in Denver. I was interviewing him for a phantom book project. I sipped iced tea and described to him my ideas for the book and reported the results of the Barna survey. When I mentioned that evangelicals scored just above prostitutes as a favorable group, his initial laughter lapsed into sober reflection. Barry can get this Buddha-like look, and you know something profound is on the way.
Finally, he leaned across the table and said, “One reason we’re right next to the prostitutes is that we’re in the same business. We don’t offer love, we offer services. We look good but we don’t know how to love and, unfortunately, society will settle for that to get what they think they need.”
Barry's words practically turned me to stone—they were so simple, so heart-rendingly true, and while the Barna report saddens me, I don't despair. God is so much bigger than our wounded apathy and willful self-rule. And it compels me to press harder into Jesus, to desire to become a more loving and authentic person, to live a gospel worth reading.
posted by Judith Hougen at
2:53 PM
4 Comments:
Can your gospel save? Or is there 1 gospel that saves? Yes, we christians are a messed up bunch, for it is only by the grace of God that we have been redeemed. That is the only Gospel that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.
Thanks for your comment and the opportunity to clarify. I speak of two gospels only in the sense of two kinds of proclamations or messages (I was using a little poetic license and gospel does mean good-newsing, indicating proclamation). I was hoping the lower case g would help indicate that I wasn't talking about the truth of the Word of God (I used both to distinguish). Only the Gospel of Jesus saves. Still, the plan of God from Abraham on was to save the world through a people. God works in spite of our shortcomings, but I still grieve how often the "proclmation" of our actual living does not truly align with the message of the Gospel of Jesus (and I include myself in this). I desire for others to meet Christ because of how I live, not in spite of how I live (knowing I will never do it perfectly).
What made the gospel come alive for me was not how she lived but how she was transformed day by day . . . right before my eyes. Every day she revealed more and more the face of Christ . . . that was very attractive . . . and I came to believe if He came for her . . . He would come for me. Deo Gratias!
I just read this post and was reminded of Eugene Peterson's words in "Leap Over a Wall": For myself -- and I think I stand at the historical and biblical center on these matters --I refuse to either apologize for the church as it is or attempt to improve its image. Apologize for David's crew--the distressed, the debtors, and the malcontents at the cave of Adullam? Improve the image of Jesus eating with crooks and whores? St. Paul is more realistic: 'Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don't see many of "the brightest and the best" among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn't it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these "nobodies" to expose the hollow pretensions of the "somebodies"? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That's why we have the saying, "If you're going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God. 1 Cor 1:26-31'"
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home