Christ

Nice!

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 2 Comments

A world of nice people, content in their own niceness, looking no further, turned away from God, would be just as desperately in need of salvation as a miserable world – and might even be more difficult to save. – C.S. Lewis

We live in a world of nice. Nice people, nice houses, nice cars, nice vacations. We tell our children to be nice to other children. We tell our teens to be nice to the relatives. Books on marriage give advice on being nice to one’s spouse. And don’t forget to be nice to your boss.

What does nice mean? For most people it’s pleasant behavior, an agreeable personality, caring and…well…being nice.

Do nice people need to be saved? Most people would say no. They’re nice and nice people go to heaven, don’t they? Isn’t that what the golden rule is about? The Good Samaritan. Now he was nice. How about Jesus who refused to condemn the woman caught in adultery? Wasn’t that nice?

Nice is not a fruit of the Spirit. Nor is it a beatitude from the Sermon on the Mount. God never said, “Be nice as I am nice.” Christ didn’t die on the cross to make people nice.

Nice is cultural. It is meant to help us get along with one another. Nice gives you friends, it even might get you a job, or a girlfriend. But nice will never score any points with God and it will not be your ticket to heaven.

The nice people of the world need to know that they are sinners in need of the saving work of Christ. They need to trade in their niceness for a new life. What they need is holiness and a changed heart. Then and only then will they understand their niceness was filthy rags in the sight of God.

Sin Boldly

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 2 Comments

Martin Luther said,

“God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for He is victorious over sin, death, and the world.”

Christ is for sinners, for people like you and me who have no appetite for God, who prefer ourselves over any other being in the universe, who have a real inclination toward evil, who are rebels, traitors, willful deviants, and who do not want to change. Those are the people Christ goes after.

This predicament is not only in an individual life but it’s universal in scope. Only sinners live on this planet. There are no other kinds of people. No matter what country people live in, or what culture they belong to, their ultimate need is not psychological or emotional, political or economic, or even their alienation from one another. Their true need is to be delivered from God’s judgment and curse. And they are going to be judged on the merits of their own righteousness–or lack thereof–or the righteousness of Another.

This is what makes Christ so relevant to every generation, every culture, and every race.

 

The Gospel Is Scandalous!

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Q. 60. How are you righteous before God?

A. Only by a true faith in Jesus Christ; so that, though my conscience accuse me, that I have grossly transgressed all the commandments of God, and kept none of them, and am still inclined to all evil; notwithstanding, God, without any merit of mine, but only of mere grace, grants and imputes to me, the perfect satisfaction, righteousness and holiness of Christ; even so, as if I never had had, nor committed any sin: yea, as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me; inasmuch as I embrace such benefit with a believing heart.

–From the Heidelberg Catechism

Why Do You Call Yourselves ‘Bad Christians’?

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 4 Comments

We call ourselves ‘bad Christians’ because that’s what we are. By ‘Christians’ we mean people in relationship to Christ and other believers. By ‘bad’ we mean, we do plenty of nasty things and leave a lot of good things undone.

God took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. In other words, the life we have now is not something we produce or sustain; it is given to us for Christ’s sake and maintained by the gift and ongoing work of the Holy Spirit. Any applause we might receive for doing good belongs to God alone. It’s his mercy alone that keeps us. We need him to forgive us every second of every day, while the blood of Jesus keeps on cleaning us from all our filthiness.

Also as ‘bad Christians’ we need the community of other Christians, the preaching of God’s Word, communion, the prayers of God’s people, and the very needful help they can, and often do, give us.

We’ve tried the books, the counseling, and the retreats, but success alluded us. What progress we make as Christians comes as a gift from God. We have no idea how or why God gives it to us except for the fact it gives him pleasure.

The truth lies elsewhere: to live successfully as a Christian we need to recognize that no matter how hard we try to manage our sin, the oil-spill of our pollution continues to spread. That’s because we cannot remove the source. The problem will not be fixed until that day when God exchanges our corruption with the incorruptible. Meanwhile, we live by faith. Daily we seek forgiveness and strength by looking away from ourselves to our Savior. Our faith rests in his completed work and trusts God to make us holy as he sees fit.