I asked, “Do we believe in a gospel that allows us to believe the worst about ourselves?” Do we believe in a gospel that allows us to confidently face the past and the future? That is the gospel offered through Jesus Christ. That is the promise of God through his Son, the power and right to become children of God.
What I thought I needed to add this morning is this: We need to believe in a gospel that allows us to believe the worst about ourselves and that God is going to do something good beyond our imagination with the “mess.”
John 1.6-13 (New Living Translation)
6 God sent a man, John the Baptist,7 to tell about the light so that everyone might believe because of his testimony. 8 John himself was not the light; he was simply a witness to tell about the light. 9 The one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.
10 He came into the very world he created, but the world didnt recognize him. 11 He came to his own people, and even they rejected him. 12 But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. 13 They are rebornnot with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God.
So I ask, “The gospel you believe in, is it the one that God offers through his Holy Book the Bible?”
Does your gospel properly deal with the bogeyman? Can you let your feet dangle over the edge of your bed? Do you have “no worries” if someone opens the closet looking for embarrassing skeletons from your past? When Satan accuses you and dredges up your past and present struggles, do you have God’s answer firmly embedded in your heart? Forgiven, forever, righteousness and beautiful in the eyes of God, not because of what I have accomplished or who I am but because of what Jesus Son of God has accomplished on my behalf and on account of who he is.
Because of Jesus I stand forever in the good grace of God.
Jesus paid it all, fellow traveler, and the good God promises to do with his Son’s sacrifice is beyond our dreams.
Ephesians 3.14-21
14-19My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spiritnot a brute strength but a glorious inner strengththat Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.
20-21God can do anything, you knowfar more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.
Glory to God in the church!
Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!
So stand, Friend, stand firm in the grace of God!
