Tuesday, August 25, 2009

The Gospel for Busy People

Kevin DeYoung's post here is worth reading carefully. If you--like me--sometimes walk around with a foggy feeling of guilt that you're not doing more for the Kingdom, then what Kevin says here will likely be a fresh breeze of gospel air.

It is loaded with risk, of course, to say what Kevin is saying, because some will interpret it as a license to coast. But it shouldn't prevent us from offering this nuanced message, for some in the church truly need to hear it.

Here's the conclusion:
No doubt some Christians need to be shaken out of their lethargy. I try to do that every Sunday morning and evening. But there are also a whole bunch of Christians who need to be set free from their performance-minded, law-keeping, world-changing, participate-with-God-in-recreating-the-cosmos shackles. I promise you, some of the best people in your churches are getting tired. They don’t need another rah-rah pep talk. They don’t need to hear more statistics and more stories Sunday after Sunday about how bad everything is in the world. They need to hear about Christ’s death and resurrection. They need to hear how we are justified by faith apart from works of the law. They need to hear the old, old story once more. Because the secret of the gospel is that we actually do more when we hear less about all we need to do for God and hear more about all that God has already done for us.