Video Transcript: Lesson 16 Gospel-Driven

Well, here we are, again, ready to dig into more about church revitalization. Again, wherever you are in the world, I want to just welcome you and invite you into this really important and meaningful discussion on bringing health and vitality back into the church, obviously assisted through the work in the ministry of the Holy Spirit. And so we're going to jump right in, we're going to pray and get started. On our next three sessions here. As we talked about, starting to take those first steps, we've done a ton of groundwork. And now we're ready to jump in and get some things going. But before we do that, let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you so much for this day, the day that I'm teaching this, sitting here, and the day upon which all these students of CLI are watching and listening to this. Lord, we bless your name, we give you thanks and praise for the gift of salvation through your Son Jesus Christ. And for the work of ministry that you've invited us into. Lord, we confess that we are ill equipped for it on our own, and yet you call us anyway, and you prepare us to do great things in your name. So Lord, we claim that promise today and ask that You would bless us as we seek to bless your name, amen. Okay, well, as I said just a moment ago, we're going to really start transitioning our conversation in this class from a lot of background and understanding, revitalization and, you know, things like history and assessments and all that kind of stuff. And we're going to, we're nearing the halfway point. And as we do that, we're going to start taking things more out of kind of the large system, way of thinking about things to some kind of more concrete, practical application. So these next three lectures are really going to be kind of like the bridge and kind of going from one to the other. So as we do that, there might be a few things that we repeat. And that is on purpose. There's a few things I think we need to kind of touch on again, just to make sure we have the right direction heading forward. But then also, obviously, we're going to be introducing some some new material. So let's jump right in. And as we talked about getting started with church revitalization and revitalizing with any kind of ministry, we really want to make sure that our, our starting point is, is making sure that we are gospel driven. That that is, that is the the most important thing about who we are the most defining characteristic and quality of what we're doing is that we are gospel driven. So let's read what scripture has to say about the importance of the gospel. This is from Paul's letter, this first letter to the church in Corinth, chapter 15:3-4. And if you've got it up on the screen there, you can read along with me. For what I received, I passed on to you as first important that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures that He was buried that he was raised on the third day, according to the Scriptures, notice what Paul says, as he kind of sums up the gospel. He passed on to the gospel message to them about Christ's death and resurrection. As first importance, you know, this was this is like the first first things and when we talk about church revitalization. We're always going to be moving back towards the gospel. We never get beyond the gospel. I remember early in my ministry, I would think that like, Okay, once people understand the gospel, and they're saved, then we'll go on to the like, the deeper things and the more advanced things. And I realized what a great mistake that was. The truth is we never get beyond the gospel, we only sink deeper and deeper into our understanding of it, of its application into our lives. And so, it's really important for us to to keep the gospel as first important. And I think one of the reasons that churches or whatever is struggling or in decline is because we begin to make other things of first importance we begin to define ourselves by something else, that something becomes more primary to our identity than the Gospel itself. Now, in the day in which I'm teaching this, and in the United States, there are some social issues that are swirling around and churches have made themselves. So aligned with various social causes, that, that seems to have taken over the number one place, whether it has to do with sexuality, or immigration, and how to deal with all these things. And, um, those are just some kind of current things going on right now in our country, and churches are taking such bold stands on this. And another one might be the environment and you know, caring for God's creation, but those becomes so promoted. And that's what they're known for. And that's what their their message is all about, that the gospel is no longer of first importance. It can also be the denomination we belong to, there might be some denominational or theological specifics that we hold to, whether it's like, let's say, speaking in tongues, then that becomes like, the defining thing. And that, you know, you have to believe this about this, or you have to do this. Otherwise, you're not really a Christian, or, you know, faith, faithful follower of Jesus. So, these specific things become the first importance. Now, they might be important theologically, but they're not of first importance. Another thing that people might become really concerned about the building, or the facility there, and that is like, becomes a first importance. And we spend so much time talking about taking care of the building, and who can use it, and who can't, who has keys and who does and what things we need to do. That the building itself becomes of first importance. And so you can see how all these things, once it takes center stage, and then the story of Christ's incarnation, his death, resurrection, ascension and return. When that becomes second place. Obviously, the church is going to find itself in a very, very difficult situation. So we're really kind of going back to the very, very beginning, the very roots of what it means to be not just a follower of Christ, but by ministry of Christ, in the kingdom of God, what I received, I passed on to you as first importance, okay. The story of the gospel. So, you might be thinking, I mean, is it really necessary that we have to hammer home on this? I mean, we're a church. After all, we know Jesus died on the cross for our sins and we get that. Well, I would say, in terms of the people that you lead, and this is not a commentary on your preaching, or your teaching or anything, or your leadership of your church, nothing like that. I don't know you personally. So you cannot take this personally. But I would say, when talking about understanding the the first importance of the gospel, assume nothing, assume nothing. In one of my roles that I have in my denomination, I test theology students. Right before they're getting ordained, and I am the last examiner that they have to get it's called their senior theology exam. And one of the questions that I make sure I asked every single student is to define the gospel in a clear, concise definition. And you would be surprised as probably in a way that I was, how few people can really articulate it or not. This isn't just you know, the casual churchgoer. These are people who are one step away from becoming pastors and missionaries are leaders in in churches that they kind of struggle with will what actually is the gospel? And they'll say, Well, what's the good news about Jesus? Well, what does that mean in its totality? And there's a struggle there. And the you know, they can talk about Hebrew and Greek and all these other kinds of things, and they know a lot of church history, but when it's of the first importance, what is the gospel? It's not always as clear as as it needs to be. And so my guess is is if we have students who go to very qualified and A seminaries with able professors and teachers, if they're struggling to really grasp this, many of the people in our pews or in our chairs, or in our groups, or in our meetings, don't have a great idea of what the gospel is, as well, rather than a very surface understanding that Jesus died for me, well, as we're going to talk about in a moment, the gospel is more than that. And it's a beautiful, wonderful thing. So what we're going to do in this session is I'm going to teach you how I understand Scripture reveals the gospel, what is the good news of Jesus, because I'm not going to ask you to return your church to first importance if it needs to do that, if if I don't share that with you, as well. And as I'll tell you later, this is something that I've done on multiple occasions and layers in my own church. So here is the gospel of start with a definition of the gospel. It's the good news that by His Grace, God has is in will save me from my sin, through Jesus Christ. And I borrowed this definition from my good friend and mentor and fellow pastor, Harry Reeder. And I've shared before he was a faculty advisor, and very influential in my journey through revitalization. And Harry really hammered home to me the importance of returning to the Gospel, being a gospel driven church, and then taking the step and helping me define an understanding in a concise way, what is the gospel, so we're going to take this definition apart bit by bit, it's the good news that by His Grace, God has, is, will save me from my sin through Jesus Christ. And so to kind of make this maybe a little easier to follow, I've got a chart up on the screen, and we're gonna look at that. Okay. So if you look at the very top line, from left to right, it's kind of the white lettering with the black background, we're going to look at four things, we're going to get the time reference of when God's grace was enacted, we're going to see what God has saved us from, we're going to see, or we're going to what's the kind of a fancy or theological term we use, and then kind of a word picture that will help us understand it. So again, we're talking about God's grace, and how it's saved us from our sin. So let's look at the screen right now. So time, we're going to talk about past grace. This is something that God did in the past, that impacts me, but by His grace, and he did it without any. You know, requiring me to achieve any kind of merit or status before him it is just God moving and coming to me. And we obviously will think of Jesus dying on the cross. That is something that God has done in the past, it was by His grace, that he became a fully God, fully man goes to the cross to die for an eternity of sin. And so when Jesus does this, when he dies on the cross, what he is saving us from, he's saving me, he's saving you, he's saving all who believe he's saving us from the penalty of sin, so that when we would come to the end of our life, and we would meet our maker, and we have to stand in front of him, that the sin that we have, would no longer be charged to us and so that when Christ died on the cross, He takes all of our sin, and He receives the punishment and the wrath of God for that he, he stands in our place. And in the same way, Jesus then takes all of his righteousness. And he kind of deposits that into like our account, our spiritual bank account. So he takes all our debts. He assumes that Himself on the cross and He takes all his righteousness, and he puts that upon us. And if you want to see just a really great, short, concise theological kind of scripture of the gospel, Romans 3:21-24, it really kind of outlines this was just a lot of really, you know, hard hitting theology. Now the term that we use for this is that is justification and and some people said justification is just as if I have never sinned. So I'm justified, made right before God. God no longer sees me as a sinner because my sin has all been taken away and removed. It's been it's been totally dealt with by Christ on the cross my been my sins have been washed away, I've been forgiven. And it's just as if I never sinned. And obviously, our word picture here is we want to think what it what is past grace, again with about the cross. That's, that's the justifying work of Jesus Christ on our behalf, saving us from the penalty of sin. Now, here's the thing. What I just talked about, probably everybody listening is saying, Yeah, no kidding. But here's the thing. That's usually where we stop. And sometimes we're not even, we don't even get it. We know that Jesus paid for our sin, but we don't even necessarily always talk about his righteousness being conferred upon us. So we might not, we might have gotten most of that, but sometimes not all of it. But if you'll notice, there's still two blank slides, two blank rows on the screen here. So we're just getting started into the gospel message, we're only 1/3 of the way through. So let's keep going. What is the gospel? Remember, it is the good news that by His grace God has, is, and will save me from my sin through Jesus Christ. So let's talk about now you might guess the next category is present Grace. So the grace that the Lord has, for me isn't just something he did 2000 years ago, it's, it's a grace that is still at work in my life today. What he does is, he saves me from the power of sin. And He does this by the work of the Holy Spirit in my life. So when I become a follower, a believer of Jesus Christ, in an instant, I am justified, I am made right with the Lord. But, and then, at that moment, the Holy Spirit comes in and starts to live in me and speak to me and give me prompting, and work through my conscience and all these sorts of things. So what what, what the Lord does is he's working to save us from the power of sin that has controlled us. Remember, in Philippians 1 it says that, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. Think about that. mean, that is the work of the Lord, it's he, the Lord Christ, who began a good work in you salvation, He will bring it to completion. So the Lord is working in our lives today, to save us from the power of sin and the flesh that just can wreak havoc in our lives. And that had that had control and dominion in our lives before we came to Christ. So he's saving me from that. Now, the other thing though, we want to think about though, is, in this process, which is called sanctification, which is from the Latin sanctus which means to make holy, so we're justified before the Lord, now we're being made holy, we're being made into the image of Jesus. That's not a passive experience. We have to cooperate with the Lord, just as Paul says, He who began a good work in you, He will carry it on to completion. In the same letter, Paul also tells us to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. So it's something that we're also actively engaging in that we have to yield to the work of the Holy Spirit, we need to submit to it. We need to understand the word of God and then build our lives around us. Now, again, the Lord helps us in that he gives us strength, he gives us teaching, he brings people around us. But there is a part of us that is very much involved in this. And so maybe a good word picture for us. A good image would be like airplane wings. There's not too many people who would like to fly around on an airplane with one wing, right? I mean, it would go down, it would be a mess. We'd all be killed. You want a plane that has two wings. And that's really a good picture of sanctification is that we have the Lord doing his work in our life and us yielding, cooperating submitting, working with God in that but, And how great it is to know that it's not just that Jesus did something for me 2000 years ago, Jesus is at work through his spirit in my life today, making me more and more like him. Okay. And so we had a past grace, we've got a present grace. And then you can probably guess where this is going to go? A future, Grace, future grace that the story of the gospel is not yet complete. What does Scripture teach us that in the end, Christ returns now there's a whole bunch of ways that people understand the the timing and the events of Christ's return. We're not going to get into the weeds on that right now. But what I will say is, what we do agree on is that Christ will return. And when there, when he does return, there will be the bodily resurrection of all those who have died. That's something we just we agree on. As Paul talked to the Thessalonians, the Thessalonians about this, this is just Christ is going to return and there'll be a bodily resurrection. And when that happens, we will be ascended into heaven. And we will be with with Christ, we will be with, you know, the saints and the angels and all gathered, we'll be in a perfect place. And what we're going to be saved from then is the presence of sin. Because when Christ comes in return, at some point, however, you understand that there is going to be judgment for all sin, sin will be destroyed, the world will be burned over the world, all Creation itself will go through some kind of a resurrection. There'll be a new earth and heaven descends upon it and eternal, glorious state that we live in. And we're saying there'll be no more sin. And that's the wonderful text in Revelation that you know, no more sin, no more crying and no more pain, no more deaths. It's this idyllic kind of garden of Eden restored existence that we will have. Now, the term we use for that is glorification, because we'll be glorified, we will be made, like Christ, I don't mean we're gonna be made into Gods, but we will be perfectly then conformed into His image. And so the word picture there we might think of like the golden Streets of Heaven. You know, we just think of like the perfection that awaits us. And just like the unspeakable, unimaginable glory, that is there. Now, we think about, you know, that that's just, that's all grace, where sanctification was like us working with God, how much are we going to have to be responsible for, for being raised up into eternal life? Zero. I mean, that's, that's, that's full grace, right? Just like Jesus coming to die on the cross for sinful people. That was complete grace. The Lord coming back and raising us up that other and complete grace. Okay. So that's really the the full gospel story that Christ has saved me, he is saving me right now. And he will save me from sin in all its forms. He has done that, by His grace, by His goodness, out of His love for us. And it gives me assurance of my salvation. It gives me confidence and how to live today. It gives me hope, for tomorrow and where I'm going. So this is, and I know that this is not an original thing. The penalty power presence of sin. I've seen that in different publications and in different forms. You know, this, this chart isn't anything that original, but I do think it really communicates the a more holistic, like, more complete understanding of the gospel. So now, let's talk about why having a really good understanding of the gospel matters when it comes to revitalization. Okay, one, getting back to our original point. This puts the focus back where it needs to be. This is who we are, okay. This is our story. This is our identity. This is the one thing, the Gospel story. This is the one thing that will always make us unique from the rest of the world as a people group. This is our calling card. This is if so, this so obviously it puts the focus right back out. And there's a lot of good things churches can be involved in. But this is the one amazing, great unequaled incomparable thing that defines who we are, okay? Because there's other groups that care about social issues. There's other groups that care about the environment. There's other groups that care about whatever. This is the one thing that separates us and makes us stand apart from the rest of the world. Okay. Why is the gospel so important? And why does it matter revitalization? Well, it increases our love and devotion to Jesus, hopefully, the more that we embrace the gospel, it's going to drive us deeper into a relationship of love and affection and devotion as we consider what Christ has done for us and how it applies and all of its implications. And like I said, we just, we sink deeper and deeper and deeper into our understanding of Jesus. And so our focus then becomes more on him more on giving him praise, and glory, the Christ is the center, and he has all my heart and he has all my life. Okay. And then this is going to touch back on what we talked about in our last few sessions, that a really a really strong sense of the gospel creates a culture of repentance. Because there's a sense of this is about Jesus, it's not about our image, it's not about trying to give, like, be perfect, it's, it's just it creates a place where people can ask for forgiveness is where we know that we're forgiven, where the Lord is at work in our life, that we keep coming back to him to be freed from the power of sin and to have his leading in our life. So the gospel reminds us that there's no condemnation in Christ, all these things are at work. And, and I would dare say that you cannot have a culture of repentance, without first or kind of, alongside it a really clear understanding of the gospel. Otherwise, confession turns into like, just like misery. It just weighs you down. The gospel is the thing that frees you from the guilt, and empowers you to live the way that the Lord wants you to. So again, as we think in the, in the past about past lectures about, you know, repentance, and if you don't repent, you're not going to move forward. And I would even say, if you don't understand the gospel, you're not going to repent, therefore, you're not going to move forward. So obviously, just really, really critical for us, as churches as ministries, to be able to have the gospel of first importance. Okay, so let's talk about how can you make your your context really one that is gospel driven? Okay, I'll just share a few ideas. And I'm sure you'll have some on your own. But how do we apply this one is certainly through preaching. The pulpit is such a powerful weapon of the kingdom of God. The Greek word there is Kerygma proclamation of the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ, by His grace God has is and will save me from my sin through Jesus Christ. So making sure that every message has a gospel component to it. Now, you might say, well, they all do I mean, we preach our messages from the Bible. Well, I remember when I was first getting going in ministry, and I was preaching and was doing fairly well. And I had a lot of people encouraging me and one gentleman who I really respected and he'd been a former pastor, he challenged me after a message. And I think I was talking about Joseph, and it was like, what a great guy Joseph was, and how we can learn so much from him as a man of integrity and character. And it was really kind of Joseph, we should be like, Joseph. And after the message, my friend had said to me, you know, that was, that was great. I really appreciate it. But he said, Where was the kerygma? Where was the declaration in this message about who is Jesus Christ? And at first, I kind of thought, well, I don't even know what you're talking about. We were just talking about the Bible, you know, and Joseph, what a great guy. And then I started to realize he was right The message I preached probably could have been preached in a synagogue, without a whole lot of editing it because it wasn't pointing towards Jesus, it didn't, at some point say this is this is about the work of Christ. And so that message was very Josephcentric, not Christocentric, it didn't have Christ at the middle. So I would just say, just think about your preaching, making sure and again, not every message necessarily is this, you know, Jesus died on the cross. And if you believe in Him, you have eternal life. You know, the gospel was a lot more broad than that. It takes us to much a lot more different places. But be thinking about, does my message ultimately point people back to the Gospels as it unfolded? You know, how does the gospel apply here? You know, in this text, okay. So that's a really, really big one. I would also say, and it's something we've done is often begin our worship services with a gospel declaration, in different liturgical backgrounds. Some churches start with a call to worship, whether it's formal or informal, there's usually something that we say that brings people together, as we're starting. And many times we have just pulled different scriptures, whether it's something out of the Gospels, or Paul's writings, or even Old Testament prophecy that points us to, you know, this is, is this is the gospel. So we might begin something with like, you know, welcome everybody, we are gathered here in the name of Jesus, because Scripture tells us there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And we declare, you know, we are here today to worship because of what he has done, and how that frees us today, and leads us into the future, you know, of hope and glory. So something just even simple like that, that we always begin. And then we intentionally as we're putting our worship services together, there's always like, how many times can we like, pop the gospel in, like, you know, obviously, if you're doing if you're from a background where you do confession, and assurance, I mean, the assurance is the gospel declaration, right? Again, making sure it's in the message, as you're praying, just always finding places to to where you can kind of restate the gospel in short, succinct ways, again, obviously using scripture, okay. So we, we make gospel statements and declarations throughout our worship service. You can teach a class and say, we're going to, I'm going to teach a three week or six session class, or I'm going to do whatever. And we're going to just talk about the gospel. And we're going to really get back down to the basics and really explore this one thing I do, we have a class for people who are began to become members of our church, and everybody who wants to join our church has to go through this class. And one of the sections we do is the chart we showed, I showed you earlier, the past grace, you know, present grace, future grace, every person in our church, goes through that we've had former pastors join our church. And they go through that, I assume nothing. And I want to know that everybody who's coming into our church family, they all know the gospel, I do the same thing with the younger people in our church, who are making profession of faith. And that's usually like end of middle school, early high school. And I meet with them for an extended period of time, over a couple of months. And what do you think is the thing that I hammer on the most with them? Yeah, it's the gospel, I want them to know, this is what I believe this is who I am. This is what Jesus has done. This is what he's doing. You know, all those sorts of things. So just really intentional times of teaching. You know, you can preach on it. You can have classes, you can have your small groups, do something with it, whatever kind of discipling ministry you have, even if it's just you and one other person, like, Let's go out for coffee, or let's go out for breakfast every couple of weeks, and you can just disciple people any way you want. But to bring them on board with that. And then finally, I know I've asked you to do a ton of things with assessments and history and all that kind of stuff. And I know that that's a lot. I've got one more thing, but it's really not. It's not nearly as in depth, but I think this is something I did and it was very helpful was very revealing to me, and that's why I passed that on to you. But I was challenged by Harry Reeder I have to list all the different ministries in our church. And so I like, Okay, we have worship, we have small groups, we have children's ministry, we have a youth ministry. We have a local missions ministry, we have a global international missions ministry, and you get the idea. So I went through everything. And the thing was, was how does each of those ministries reflect the gospel? Or how are they incorporated? Because how are the children being taught the gospel? For our local missions, when we do a good deed is How is that connected in one way or another to the Gospel? And so I had a rank of one to 10. And I'm like, Well, I guess this is a three, because we don't really do a whole lot, we kind of do one thing, well, okay, here's a nine, because we really focus on it here. And it was just really interesting to see that there were a number of kind of holes in, in our ministry, where we were not being gospel driven. It was kind of become something else. Even as, even as we, as a whole church were trying to be gospel driven. There were certain areas where we didn't. So I would just invite you to kind of do kind of a quick down and dirty, share, you know, list all the things, rate them, talk to the people who lead those ministries, ask them, how are they intentionally sharing the gospel? How is that factored into their their overall execution of what they're doing? And, you know, and again, share that back with them, teach them, you know, start with your leaders, this is the gospel, this is why we do this. Okay, how can they work the gospel in? All right, you get the idea. That doesn't have to be like a big project. But it's one of those, you can probably do that in a relatively short amount of time, and yet have it be very insightful and very revealing. All right. So, again, we're starting now to move into some practical kind of things. We're kind of building that bridge from kind of the understanding and theory and philosophy to practical applications. And so hopefully, you're beginning to see a little bit of that. Well, let me pray for you. And we're going to wrap this up, and then we're going to jump right into our next lecture. Father, again, thank you for this day, this time, we thank you for the glorious message of Jesus Christ and His salvation. And, Lord, perhaps, if there's nothing else we get out of this whole class. It is a recommitment of our lives to the gospel. Lord, thank You that we have this glorious message to share with the whole world. Lord may you continue to shape and form us as we share the gospel in your name. We love you and we thank you. And thank you word again for your patience with us. As we return back to what is the first importance we pray this in Your name, amen. Well, thanks again for watching and looking forward to our next one, where we're gonna go into the Old Testament and find out a little bit more about church revitalization.