Come Die

Evangelism is one of the key responsibilities of every Christian believer. Our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, has commanded us in Matthew 28:18-20 to make disciples of all nations and to baptize them in the name of the Holy Trinity. Christ did not exempt Himself in this work, and He has set the ultimate standard for us to follow. He spoke to the Jews about the gospel of the Kingdom, revealing to them that He is the Son of God sent to redeem God's elect and that God's wrath shall be upon them if they do not repent. And no, He did not bring some inspirational speech with him that the Jews would love and find attractive nor did he speak about how to be happy, wealthy, healthy, and successful in this life. He had one mission: that is to do the will of the Father who sent Him which is to redeem those who believe in Him even unto death. And He called his followers to come die with him in the service of gospel preaching, that even the gentiles may know the hope that is in Him.

Sadly, not all professing Christians (especially preachers of today) preach the same gospel Christ preached anymore. Why? As Paul Washer concludes, "because they want big churches!"

God Just Wants You To Be Happy?

Here in the Philippines, a majority thinks that all God wants them to be is successful, prosperous, and happy–that it is God's ultimate purpose for them to have these things; that God's mission is to redeem people all over the world to have earthly, temporal "joys". The modern day seeker-sensitive gospel has been diminished to just inspiring talks about God's promises, God's wisdom, God's love, God's plans, God's grace that it has been drastically simplified to a message that the world loves to hear.

One may ask: "So, are you saying that the gospel is meant to be hated by the world?" My quick and short answer would be: "Yes!" And I say: if you think that the gospel's focus is you, you are definitely lost and you need to know the true gospel. The apostles of Christ contended for the faith and preached the gospel to the entire Roman Empire during their time not to get rich, not to be accepted and be liked by the world, not to be popular–but to die for it. So did a lot of faithful Christian martyrs in church history who died standing for the message of the gospel. To quote John Piper on Twitter: "If God's love for His children is to be measured by our health, wealth, and comfort in this life, God hated the apostle Paul."

Homosexuality is Okay?

Another fallacy concerning the gospel (since it's June and it's "Pride Month" as declared by the LGBTQIA+ Community and its advocates) is that Christ affirms the homosexual community. In fact, a lot of Christians came out in support of the movement believing that homosexuality is not sin and is not an abomination to God; that the term 'homosexuality' has not always been in the bible and that it's been added there due to bad translations of what's supposed to be pederasty, or that there are just "bad homosexuality" that the bible disapproves–like as if God was not clear with His words. They would even go as far as saying that if Christ is here today, He would join the pride march that they do and condemn the Christians for their "hatred" towards the homosexuals. The people who believe such things obviously needs to study the whole Bible before making false claims about Christ and God's infallible word.

Well, I would admit that not all Christians have the right attitude when it comes to confronting the world about its sins. Some would approach it in a manner that they appear to be holier than others, and that they are "saved" because they do not do the sins that these people do. However, this is not the message of Christianity. For true Christians would be the first to say that we are not good people–in fact, we believe what the Bible says about us: that we are bad people, we are sinners redeemed by the blood of Christ. So, in terms of sinning and disobedience to and hatred for God and rebellion against the Creator, we (us and the unbelievers) are all the same. We are not holier. We are not better.

The only difference between us and the world is this: we have been forgiven, we have the Holy Spirit that continually works in us to love God and His law, we are given Christ's righteousness, and we've been declared justified before God–making us exempt from His eternal judgment which we actually deserve. We are just people pardoned by God by His grace. Hence, when approaching the topic of homosexuality and other forms of sin, we must be gracious enough to tell them God's design, God's law, God's wrath for sin and the sinner, and God's plan for redemption. Take it from the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 6:

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11

 

Seeker-friendly Evangelism?

It's also believed by most Christians that the best way to do evangelism is to be "friendly", like as if it's our friendship with the world that saves souls. Seeker-friendly Christians have added an 11th commandment, which according to Voddie Baucham states: "Thou shalt be nice". And because we have to be the nice Christians who do not want to appear offensive to anyone we share the gospel to; because we need to be friends first with people we wish to evangelize in order for us to talk about the gospel and address sin, we become hindered in speaking the truth of the gospel and instead, become "approvers" or "partakers" of sin.

The Bible is clear on this. Romans 1:16 tells us that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Let's ask ourselves: do we actually believe this? It is the gospel, the true gospel, that saves us and not the strategies and works of man. God is sovereign over salvation. Hence, He saves all those who He chooses to save (He has that freedom for He alone is the true free being that exists). Now, all that we must do as followers of Christ is to be faithful to our calling to evangelize and bring the word of God to our neighbors–yes, even if they would reject and hate us. We need to firmly believe the Bible with what it says! The sad part about this is: this seeker-sensitive approach that trusts more on humanistic strategies than the method approved by God is the most popular approach in evangelism. Some even think that this is the only kind of evangelism out there.

Context! Context! Context!

I'm sure you understand now what I am trying to say: that there have been a lot of counterfeit gospels out there being preached in the name of "biblical Christianity", even though they are obviously very far from orthodoxy. Especially in these post-modern times, we are faced with variations of the "biblical" gospel. Every Christian could easily defend their position about being "biblical" by saying that they quote from Scriptures, or they read it in the Bible–but that's just silly. For people could easily misquote the Bible if: 1) they do not read it at all, and 2) if they quote out of context.

Remember Philippians 4:13–that verse about having assurance that you can definitely win your basketball game? Or Matthew 7:1–that verse that tells us we should not judge anyone for anything? Or Jeremiah 29:11–that verse about being promised worldly prosperity? Yeah. Those are verses that are indeed taken from the Bible but are badly interpreted out of ignorance of Scripture.

Yes, context is very important. And we must look at the immediate context from which we are quoting and look at the central overarching context of Scripture (all of it) in order for us to interpret and understand the holy words of the Living God properly. Aside from that, we need to study the history behind these passages, too, that we may avoid inserting our own cultures and experiences when reading the Bible. You cannot have a good understanding of who Christ is if you do not know God from the Old Testament. So in order to be "biblical", in order to speak about the "true" gospel, in order to honor God and love Him, we need to know the Bible: the golden source of all truth and wisdom, and the enforcer of our faith.

The Offensive Gospel

Jesus was hated because of His message. Sure, many people followed Him around during His ministry because He was performing miracles in different places, but this wasn't always the case. John 6:15 reveals to us that the people who followed Him around even wanted to make Him king by force because they loved how He was able to feed them (for which Christ rebuked them later in John 6:26). The crowd was never there for the Bread of Life who offers eternal life and reconciliation to God; they were there for the loaves of bread that filled their stomachs. Eventually, they wanted Him dead for claiming to be King and the Son of God–performing miracles, pardoning sins, rebuking the Pharisees and Sadducees for their self-righteousness and hypocrisy, delivering the good news of eternal life to those who believe in Him, fulfilled the law, etcetera.

And as I already have discussed, the apostles faithfully preached all over the Roman Empire and have been subject to persecution and death penalty for preaching about this crucified King whose Kingdom is not of this world, Jesus Christ. Yet, they preached and served their ministry joyfully for they knew that their reward is great in Him. And same goes for the first-century church. If you read the Book of Acts, the church was not exempt and has faced a lot of persecution in the hands of the authorities. It was intense! They suffered in the name of the gospel. Don't believe me? Here's a sample verse in Acts (BTW, please read Stephen's speech in Acts 7 before he was stoned to death):

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.
Acts 8:1-3

So, do we want to be a faithful church? Then why are we so far from being as willed and as dedicated to living and preaching the whole of the gospel as the first-century church did? Is this "offensive message to the kingdom of man" the kind of gospel we hear today being preached in pulpits, radio, books, journals, conferences, and in the streets? Modern-day evangelicalism has been made weak and shallow because we do not trust enough the power of the Word of God. And because of this, evil is becoming the norm in our society. We have a lot of repenting to do, beloved. I, too, despite the blog posts, am guilty of passiveness in actual gospel proclamation to the lost.

Are we afraid that the world would reject us? Are we afraid that our unbelieving friends will hate us? Are we afraid that because of what we believe, we would lose our jobs, our security, our comfort? Can we say the same words the apostle Paul said in Philippians 1:21? Do we affirm Jesus' words in Matthew 10:37-38?

Spurgeon said, "Do you expect to be honored in a world where your Lord was crucified?" The Lord Jesus never said faithful gospel proclamation would be easy. Jesus said in John 15:20, "Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours."

May God awaken our love for the lost and help us to be faithful always in this work He has called each of us to do. God bless you, friends.