“When we make our central message anything other than the gospel of grace, we end up being known as a people of hate—judgmental, hypocritical, and defined by what we are against.”

A thought by Darren Whitehead and Jon Tyson (2011-07-19) from their book, Rumors of God: Experience the Kind of Faith You´ve Only Heard About (Kindle Locations 1160-1161). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

Somewhere along the line we got off track. They say it takes only two generations to get away from the core values of any organization and that for sure has been true of us.

So why in the world would we take the greatest announcement that was ever given and make it the complete opposite? I mean Jesus came into the world to save it not to condemn it. That is what He said and that is what He did.

Now we live today in a world where we believe that people should get what they deserve. This is one of the main reasons for a lot of people’s anger. Somewhere in their life they didn’t get what they deserved in a positive way and it makes them angry. Or someone did something wrong and they don’t get punished as they deserved to be punished and that makes them angry.

But here is the problem. Jesus didn’t come into this world to give us what we deserve but to give us what we don’t deserve, grace and that doesn’t seem right to us. We must earn whatever we get but we find that grace is giving us unmerited favor. We don’t deserve it. It is a gift from God through His Son, Jesus.

Also we want to have a hand in all of this so we came up with a bunch of religions. You see religion is man’s poor attempt to get to God and we put all of these doing things or not doing things to earn the right or deserve to be favored by God. Man perverts what God wanted. He came to us through His Son so that we could be saved from our self, saved from getting what we deserved. That is the gospel of grace.

So I do believe it is right that too many times we are known as people of hate—judgmental, hypocritical, and defined by what we are against. Somehow, we’ve got to get back to who Jesus was and what His message was.

Now there will be a day when God will give us if we haven't accepted His grace what we deserve, He will judge us all but this is not that day. This is the day of salvation that comes through our asking Him to forgive us of our sin and to accept us into His family even though we don’t deserve it. That is the message that Jesus came to give and it is our message too.

What about you?

Comments

“There’s a big difference between building a castle and building a kingdom.”

A thought by Bob Goff from his book, Everybody, Always: Becoming Love in a World Full of Setbacks and Difficult People ( p. 41). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) Have you ever built a sand castle or maybe a Lego castle? Have you? Bob says, “We actually build castles all the time, out of our jobs and our families and the things we’ve purchased. Sometimes we even make them out of each other. Some of these castles are impressive too. Lots of people come to admire what we’ve built over the course of our lives and tell us what great castles we have. But Jesus told His friends we weren’t supposed to spend our lives building castles. He said He wanted us to build a kingdom, and there’s a big difference between building a castle and building a kingdom.” Bob goes on, “You see, castles have moats to keep creepy people out, but kingdoms have bridges to let everyone in. Castles have dungeons for people who ha...

“When you understand that life is a test, you realize that nothing is insignificant in your life.”

A thought by Rick Warren, (2012-10-23) from his book, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? (Purpose Driven Life, The) (p. 57). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. To realize that from God’s perspective life is a test goes a long way in determining how you handle your life. It is important to see that in testing your character is both developed and revealed. Rick goes on to say that “even the smallest incident has significance for your character development. Every day is an important day, and every second is a growth opportunity to deepen your character, to demonstrate love, or to depend on God.” So there is a God purpose behind each situation in your life. Even the bad ones are there to strengthen you and develop you. You see those bad situations are really good ones because they are there for your good. I start each day with a reminder that God is good. Not every situation that is going to come in my day is good but because G...

“What areas of my personality, background, and physical appearance am I struggling to accept?”

A thought by Rick Warren, (2012-10-23) from his book, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? (Purpose Driven Life, The) (p. 35). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. Rick posed this question at the end of his chapter, You Are Not an Accident. In this chapter he deals with the fact that God created you the way you are with a purpose. In other words you are not an accident. I am also reading the Apostle John’s view of Jesus and what He said and did while He was here on earth. In the beginning of Chapter 9 there is a story about a blind man. And the disciples who were with Him asked Him a good question, “Who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind? ” Have you ever asked the same thing about something in you that you don’t like? Like that characteristic is a curse or something. Society has set a standard that is not a standard of God. Remember, He created you and you are not an accident. Je...

Just Continue That Thought...

Search This Blog