I seem to be writing less these days; inconsistent might be more truthful. With the grands now rightfully capturing any flex time, not to mention the bizarre political climate that has seized the institutional church, it’s hard to write with a positive bent!
Yet, when daily compelled by ever present thoughts around a particular theme, I will eventually be driven to process, the purpose of my blog.
The words spoken to me at age nine, “One day you will preach the Gospel” are forever etched in the recesses of my mind. How does one escape calling?
Regardless of that sovereign voice, my life has never taken on the vocation most would assume. Now at age 67, when most are considering retirement, I continue to wrestle with communicating the Gospel, howbeit in non-traditional venues. Maybe my childhood orientation toward “preaching the Gospel” behind a pulpit was part of the challenge?
Maybe “this is the Day the Lord has made” and so I must get on with it.
What is the Gospel? Ss well, if platforms for its preachment have been erected on almost every corner, yet have produced the national leadership deficit we now face, it should cause us pause! Think about it, if “the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom”…?
The answer perhaps is a Gospel based not on fear but grace alone. Fear brings torment, the tool behind the many terrorists who believe themselves agents of God!
As we sit on the cusp of a choice between anarchy and socialism, the Gospel message is quite simple and when demonstrated in love, equally compelling. “Righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost” was the writer’s summation in the Book of Romans. Contextually, a definition of the Kingdom of God, yet the Gospel, at its best is exactly that: the declaration of another Kingdom come among us! One that so stretches our faith that we often err in communicating this beautiful reality.
True righteousness cannot be learned but rather is “imputed”, an alien righteousness offered from the only true standard bearer, our Creator!
Peace is the gift bought on our behalf by the One who reconciled sin, not mine alone, but the sins of the whole world. Simply put, God became flesh and bore the brokenness that we perceive within ourselves, now our sins are no longer entertained by the Creator! Sin was put to death, nailed to the cross as at it were!
Joy, that flood of awareness and freedom from our dreaded lost-ness, now back-fills the void, without one pence of cost to us! We who have been made whole are now free to “become”, rather than being tasked to “do”, as our faith based institutions more often require!
Perhaps the frustration of our politics is certain evidence that the message we have preached has fallen short of the glory of God?
This day, I have preached the gospel!