In my post yesterday, I listed three key areas in which I believe the church of Jesus Christ is failing in its mission. Today, I’d like to comment on the foundational failure—the watering down of the message of salvation.

While this certainly doesn’t apply to all individual churches and Christian leaders, there are far too many who, in their desire to bring people to the faith, make it so palatable that the faith of the apostles is hardly recognizable. The New Testament, both in the precise words of Jesus and in the letters sent by His apostles, clearly reveals that salvation comes only after first coming to terms with one’s sinfulness. It’s no good to simply invite people to an altar to “try Jesus” or, more commonly, to “accept Jesus.” The reverse is closer to the truth: will He accept us? And the answer is: only if we meet the conditions He has set forth for restoring the broken relationship.

The message of sinfulness sounds so negative; people want the positive instead. Talking about sin will only drive them away, we rationalize. Yet without first understanding our lostness, we will never get to the positive part of the message. We must begin with a deep realization that our sins have separated us from God and that something is required on our side of the ledger. Jesus did die to forgive those sins, but His sacrifice is of no value to anyone without a genuine repentance. Until we seek to change our ways and live for Him, we cannot cross over to the life He offers. Any message of salvation that doesn’t emphasize sin and repentance is a stillborn message, and the “converts” from that message are often not converts at all; they just want assurance that God is on their side and they can go to the heaven He describes.

The terms “easy believeism” and “cheap grace” are sometimes used to explain this approach. Usually, this cheap grace, which treats the atonement and the sufferings Jesus endured for our sake in a shallow manner, carries over into one’s life. We’re told not to worry too much about one’s sins from now on since Jesus’ death covers them all; just ask Him to forgive and everything’s fine. There is little expectation of holiness; that’s far beyond our reach, so one’s life will probably continue as before, not much different in quality. The nice thing, though, is you get to go to heaven regardless. It’s epitomized in the bumper sticker that proclaims, “Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven.” The unintended consequence of that bumper sticker is to convey the idea that there’s no real difference between Christians and other people, except the Christians can sin and be forgiven while others cannot expect that benefit.

This type of cheap grace creates a multitude of people who think they’re okay with God, but who are still wallowing in their sins. They pass themselves off as Christians, but the world looks at them and wonders—if that’s what being a Christian is, what’s the big deal?

The apostle Paul has a passage in his second letter to the Corinthians that lays out the distinction between true and false repentance, and therefore true and false salvation. Here’s what he says:

I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death.

Note that there are two kinds of sorrow: one that leads to life and one that leads to death. A lot of people feel “sorry” for what they have done, but they never get to the point of genuine repentance. Take Judas, for example. After he realized his betrayal of Jesus led to the Cross, he had remorse for his action. Yet what was his response? He went out and hanged himself. Peter, on the other hand, who also betrayed Jesus, when he faced up to his betrayal, had a change of heart and found true repentance. Afterward, he became the chief spokesman with the original apostles.

Jesus also lays out the problem in what is normally called the parable of the sower. I prefer to call it the parable of the soil because the focus is where the seed [Word of God] lands. When God’s message falls on the hardened path, it bounces off. Jesus likens this to those whose hearts are so hardened there is no place for the seed to be planted. Then there is the rocky soil, which corresponds to those who eagerly receive it, but it doesn’t really take root in their hearts. There are a lot of people who get excited about wanting to be happy in God and receive His “goodies,” but they are fly-by-night “Christians.” Actually, they never were Christians at all.

Some of the seed falls among the thorns, which, as Jesus explains, means it does start to take root, but it gets choked out by all the worries and temptations that an earthly life offers. There is no fruit. These are not real Christians either.

Finally, there is the deep, rich soil—those with honest and good hearts who grasp the depth of the message—where fruit grows in abundance. Only in this soil do we find the genuine Christians.

If the church is not making as much of an impact on our society as it should be, I suggest we begin by examining the message of salvation we are teaching. A phony salvation message leads to phony Christians who will never change anything in the society because they have never experienced the change personally.

What I have written today will not be accepted by some, but I had to say it anyway. Our only hope is to get the salvation message straight before anything else.

All sin is rebellion against God’s righteous and reasonable commands. All sin is foolish. I became a rebel and a fool at a time in my life when I had many blessings from the Lord. As I noted in my last two posts, He had given me the headmastership of a Christian school and had shown me a Biblical way of educating. Yet I decided to be a fool just when He was giving my life its real meaning.

Too many personal testimonies of God’s grace dwell on the sins. I know it’s important to make it clear how thoroughly the Lord can deliver a person from sin, but I’m concerned that the sin not get all the attention. I’m not going to detail my particular sins; suffice it to say I became ungrateful and resentful toward God. It was stupid on my part, and I freely admit that now. When I think back on that period of my life, it still hurts. If not for God’s mercy and grace . . .

It was while I was in rebellion that I left the Christian school and forged ahead with my master’s and doctorate. I didn’t know if this was God’s will, but that was beside the point; I was running my own life without Him. I had left the Lord behind. Fortunately, He hadn’t given up on me.

I had high hopes that advanced degrees would give my life meaning. I blitzed through my master’s program in one year, thesis and all, at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. Then I was accepted into the doctoral program at American University in Washington, DC. In two years, I had finished all my coursework, had taken my comprehensive exams, and had my dissertation proposal approved. I was on the fast track. American even proved the conduit for getting an internship in the history office of the United States Supreme Court. By all outward appearances, I was succeeding in carrying out my plan. Inwardly, though, I was suffering.

Those three years of higher education gave me a lot of information, but I came to realize that my professors didn’t exactly have the answers for life. I couldn’t honestly say any of them were role models. They had knowledge, but lacked real understanding and wisdom. You see, all that I had learned in the Principle Approach refused to disappear. God was using that infusion of Biblical principles to call me back to Him.

I was tired physically, mentally, and emotionally. Spiritual dryness, of my own making, created a new hunger and thirst for reality. Somewhere along the way on this return to sanity a passage of Scripture practically leaped out at me. It stared at me from the book of Ecclesiastes, and it said:

The words of wise men are like goads, and masters of these collections are like well-driven nails; they are given by one Shepherd. But beyond this, my son, be warned: the writing of many books is endless, and excessive devotion to books is wearying to the body.

The conclusion, when all has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil.

Those words stunned me. This was exactly what I had been attempting to do—devote myself to books and study, seeking meaning in them. The passage reminded me forcefully that the bottom line in life is to reverence and obey God.

Slowly, I made the trek back, hoping the Lord would forgive my wandering; but I wasn’t sure. In late 1988, I received some assurance that He wasn’t done with me yet. Regent University called and asked if I could teach as an adjunct. I joyfully accepted because this seemed to be a pathway back to where God had wanted me originally. Yet He wasn’t done with His assurances.

Regent was about a three-hour drive from our home in northern Virginia; I drove down there once a week to teach for two days. I would fill the time listening to Christian music. On one of those drives, in early January 1989, the song “It Is Well with My Soul” played on my tape. I was paying close attention to the words of the second verse:

My sin, oh the joy of this glorious thought,

My sin, not in part, but the whole,

Is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more.

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul.

Immediately, as those words ended, a voice—not audible in the sense that anyone sitting next to me would have heard it—a voice within me, distinctly spoke to my mind and said, “That’s for you!” The voice was strong, yet gracious and comforting. I knew I had not manufactured it; God had done something very wonderful in that moment. He had taken time out of His management of the entire universe to speak to a repentant wretch who hadn’t yet had the deep assurance that he had been forgiven for his waywardness. In what I will always refer to as “The Moment,” I knew I was forgiven. I had trouble keeping the car in my lane on I-95 for a few seconds as I experienced a weeping that combined joy and deep regret over the past.

I know there are some readers who won’t believe this account, or who will conclude I am deluded. I can’t help that. All I know is that it happened. It was as real as anything I’ve ever experienced, and I now knew something for sure:

God had given me a second chance. He had confirmed the teaching ministry He had given years earlier. I now had to carry it out His way and do it for Him.

More on Monday.

Nothing fancy today . . . or long. I just want to make a few statements to help provide some understanding for why I am so dedicated to speaking out about righteousness in government and culture. I don’t do so from some position of presumed authority or because I think I’m the fount of all wisdom. In fact, it’s precisely due to the failures in my own life over my 61+ years that I feel called to write and teach.

When I was 25, I knew everything. I wouldn’t have said so at the time—who would be that foolishly bold?—but as I look back now, I see that I thought I had captured most of the truth about God and life. That confidence was shaken, though, when I went through a time of estrangement from the Lord. I walked away from the faith and tried hard to find another way. God’s grace, however, prevailed as He allowed me to follow a path that led to a dead end.

At the end of that path, I had nowhere to turn but back to Him, and for that I’m eternally grateful. He gave me a second chance. He showed me the devastation of sin in one’s life, the cleansing nature of repentance and faith in His atonement, and hope for a new start—a new path. I’ve traveled this new path with Him now for about 25 years. It has not all been easy. I’ve had to live with some consequences from that period when I wandered, and the path has contained some rather large potholes, some of which I navigated successfully, others into which I fell. Yet even in times of near-despair, He has shown me His faithfulness.

I am more attuned to some things now. Sin is uglier than ever to me. A culture awash in sin makes me grieve. The politics of hypocrisy and self-centeredness brings pain to my heart, even as I know it does to God’s heart. Falsehood, whether in theology or political philosophy, brings the response of wanting to correct all such falsehood with declarations of truth. As a teacher, which is God’s calling on my life, I have a natural tendency to discern error and counter it with Biblical principles.

Yet I am also more attuned to God’s mercy. He showed mercy to me when I deserved judgment. Even as I point out error and talk of God’s potential judgments, I must leave room for His mercy, particularly toward those in the culture and government who are deceived and are deceiving others. God’s judgment may fall, but I will continue to pray that it be forestalled and that spiritual renewal may increase.

We are to judge. That is Biblical. We are to evaluate men’s hearts and actions. We need to do so, though, only when we have first taken the beam out of our own eye.

A couple of sentences from a small devotional book that I’m reading stand out to me today. The first deals with sin:

It is no secret that when a man sins he ever so rarely does anything unique or original or new or different. Sin is monotonously the same, generation after generation.

My sins were not unique. God’s forgiveness is not unique. But it was uniquely applied to my life. It gave me a new life.

The devotional also noted this:

There is a perpetual power of renewal in the Christian religion. It is forever producing prophets and saints who keep calling it back to the heart of its message.

I have been the recipient of a renewal. God continually calls me back to the heart of His message. My goal is to spread that message in any way I can. This is why I write.

A week ago, I wrote a post I called “The Moral Majority?” In it, I outlined two misperceptions I believe are hampering efforts to turn around the culture. The first misperception is that too many of us think we still live in a majority Judeo-Christian society. We think we’ll just eventually come to our senses and everything will be alright. The second misperception is that we can live a Christian life without holiness. We blend too easily into our culture and don’t want to embrace God’s righteous standards. I’d like to follow up on those thoughts.

One of the key reasons, in my view, that we don’t live righteously is the message that the church too often proclaims—a message that doesn’t really require a change of heart and action on our part. We are told continually that God’s love is unconditional, and that He will accept us just as we are. There certainly is truth in those statements, but the implications we attach to them undercut what I would consider real salvation.

Yes, God’s love is unconditional. He loves us in spite of what we have done and what we are. But that’s not the same as saying salvation is unconditional. There are very specific conditions before we can enter into a relationship with the One who unconditionally loves us. First, we need to grasp the nature of sin, the utter selfishness behind it, and how it destroys all that God intends for His creation. Only when we come to grips with the evil that not only infests the world, but permeates us as well, can we take the next step, which is a deep and genuine repentance over the sin that we have allowed to control our lives.

Far too many evangelists, pastors, and para-church organizations skip these steps. They are eager to make converts, so eager at times that they just want people to come forward to the altar without first leading them into an understanding of their sin and the need for repentance. Without these two vital components, though, there can be no salvation. Why? Because the basic problem that separates man from God has not been addressed.

We tell these potential converts that all they have to do is accept what Jesus did for them, and then we assure them they are saved. Those whose hearts were prepared for the message are genuine converts, but I believe the majority have simply given an intellectual assent to the need for a savior and want to have what has sometimes been called “fire insurance.” I mean, who wants to go to hell?

The problem is then compounded when we declare that they can never expect to live up to God’s standards since His demands are too onerous for any of us to achieve. We solemnly assert they will probably keep on sinning as they have done before, but not to worry because they’re going to heaven anyway. We lower the expectations to where they’re already met.

This theology has its manifestation in a bumper sticker I used to see on cars that stated categorically, “Christians aren’t perfect; they’re just forgiven.” It’s almost like saying, “Hey, I’m just as bad as you, but I get to go to heaven.” What a great salvation—I can continue to sin as much as I used to, but I don’t have to bear the consequences.

No, that’s not salvation. And the reason we are a weak church, and the reason we are fuzzy over moral issues like homosexuality, can be traced to the prevalence of this diluted theology.

I am prepared to be called judgmental because of these comments. That’s fine. God has called us to be righteous judges, as long as we cleanse ourselves of hypocrisy and we offer our judgments along with the message of reconciliation. The glorious thing is that God says we can be set free from the power of sin in our lives, but we must begin with a proper recognition of the pernicious nature of that sin and earnestly desire a changed heart. That’s when the atonement of Jesus can flood our hearts with His love, all our past sins can be forgiven, and we can walk in newness of life. The only reason I’m “judgmental” is because I want people to experience victory in their daily lives.

On this Good Friday, I want to draw attention to another aspect of the atonement of Christ. Our traditional theological explanation is to say that Jesus died on the cross so we might escape the penalty for our sins. Most of the time we seem to treat it as a type of commercial transaction. Sure, we are grateful we don’t have to bear the consequences, but all too often we see what Jesus did as some kind of transfer: God the Father got mad at Him instead of us. Whew, that was close.

I don’t accept the idea that God was angry at Jesus, that He couldn’t stand Him at that moment because of all that ugly sin attached to Him. Well, the Father did abandon Him, right? It must have been, as the majority of preachers say, that He was pouring out judgment upon Him because He became the personification of sin. The scripture used to back that up is the one that says Jesus became sin. Yet a closer examination of the Greek shows a better translation is He became a sin offering—not the same thing.

Why did the Father turn away? Two reasons, I believe. First, Jesus had to suffer this alone. Just as any sinner separated from God will feel supreme emptiness at the Last Judgment, so Jesus had to fully grasp that experience. We’re told in the book of Hebrews He had to be made like us in all things so He could be the perfect sacrifice. He had to undergo every temptation as a man to be able to take our place. Yet until that moment on the cross when the Father turned away, He never had experienced alienation from Him. Throughout all eternity past, they were One. Now, for this one agonizing moment, He fully experienced the feeling of separation.

Second, and this is where some may say I’m speculating too much, think about the effect on the Father as well. This was new to Him also. He had never been separated from the Son. If Jesus was suffering, wasn’t the Father also? Yes, Jesus carried out the physical suffering, but both grieved in their hearts.

You see, God the Father and God the Son are not some faraway entities. They live with us, feel with us, work with us at all times. The crucifixion was an intensely personal act.

The other half of this is that we so cavalierly tell others to accept what Jesus has done for them and they can live forever. It’s much deeper than that. We need to come to grips with the personal nature of the crucifixion. We need to “see” the agony Jesus voluntarily submitted to for our sake. In our spirits, we need to view the cross as more than a commercial transaction where we dodge a bullet or have a debt paid. We need to gaze upon Jesus on that cross, realize the degree of His suffering, both physical and spiritual, and be so humbled by His love for us that we would never again want to do anything that would bring even more grief to Him.

In other words, we need a stronger sense of the absolute evil of every sin—the bottomless selfishness of every sinful thought or action—in order to bring us to a place of genuine repentance. The cross should break us down, humble us to the point where our commitment to Him is to live a life that honors Him at all times.

Salvation is not one prayer, and too often we push people into praying a prayer of salvation that may be phony. That prayer will only be real when we first acknowledge our complete spiritual poverty without Him and seek His forgiveness. When we come to that point, when we know in our spirit that we are nothing without Him, only then can we begin to walk in newness of life.

On this Good Friday, we should contemplate not some payment of a debt, but rather the kind of love that would lead the God of all creation to empty Himself of all Godhood, and to humble Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. If we understand the depth of that love, we will be changed. And that’s what it’s all about anyway.

No, this is not a self-portrait

I spent many years earning a doctorate in history. When I began that quest, I had turned my back on the Christian faith. I wondered if the world of academia could provide the answers. One master’s degree, a multitude of courses, and three comprehensive exams later—all prior to the doctoral dissertation—finally convinced me that the educated elite were just as clueless as the rest of the world.

“Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age?” These questions come from the pen of the apostle Paul. He answers himself:

Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.

He then makes a statement that I’m sure sets the intellectual elite’s teeth on edge: “The foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

Am I saying that higher education is worthless? It can be. It all depends on the context of the learning. Anything divorced from God’s truth is not going to be beneficial in the long run. Knowledge for knowledge’s sake is pointless. Man’s wisdom is often little more than arrogance and stupidity—people thinking they are intelligent, yet not realizing they are intellectual pygmies in light of God’s truth.

Some people seek advanced degrees to feel better about themselves. They want to be respected; they want to be important. Yet,

God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God.

Boasting is one of man’s primary activities. This is particularly true of those who hold political power. They make promises seemingly without end: “Here is what we will do for you”; “We will end this problem once and for all”; “If you want answers, elect us!” Most of them, however, trust in their own minds and are disconnected from the Ultimate Mind.

The apostle Paul continues,

We speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

What was true of Paul’s age remains true today. There is a wisdom that comes from God that provides all we need to know for having relationship with Him and with all others. If followed, it solves the world’s problems. Sinful man, though, refuses to submit his mind and his will to the One who has the answers.

“Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, he must become foolish, so that he may become wise.”

This calls for humility; humility only appears after genuine repentance; repentance only occurs when a person is grieved over his sinful heart. How often does this happen? According to Jesus, not often enough:

Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

May we all come that place.