A common theme, especially in American churches, is to do more and improve your Christianity through your own strength.
Well, according to John Fawnville, these types of messages have a way of burning you out, and it's not the message of the gospel.
Well, what is solid gospel teaching that will feed us week to week instead of setting us up for failure? We're making our way through Titus chapter 1 in a series called Where in the Church is the Gospel? And here's a message called Is Your Church Centered on Christ? Where in the church is the gospel? Graham Goldsworthy says, he says, the life and ministry of a local church.
Must always remain self-consciously gospel-centered if it is to maintain any kind of effectiveness for the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is simply God's people. In God's place under God's rule and blessing. The need to be self-consciously gospel-centered is exactly what was threatening these young churches in Crete that Titus addresses. And so Paul's driving concern The force behind his letter, he tells you in chapter 1, verse 1.
Look what he says: Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, and here's his concern. For the sake of the faith of God's elect. And their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness, Paul tells us. That the gospel supremacy in the church, the gospel supremacy in his life, the gospel supremacy in his apostolic ministry as an apostle. It's the gospel.
It is to be supreme in that. And the reason for that is because he tells us here. The gospel not only creates the church, but it also brings order to it. The gospel brings a person to saving faith in Christ for the sake of faith of God's elect, and listen. The knowledge of the truth is a technical term in the pastoral letters in the New Testament that means the gospel.
And he says, My ministry in life is for the sake of bringing God's people to faith, and then, once they've been brought to faith, to deepen and move them in the knowledge of that same gospel so that their life will result in godliness. That's his whole driving concern of this letter. In 2 Corinthians 3, verse 8, Paul calls the gospel the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit working through the gospel. Creates faith and strengthens, nurtures, and matures that same faith for the purpose of godliness.
Godliness. And the book of Titus simply means God-centeredness. What is your duty as a believer? It is to love God, is to be centered upon God. That's just what the gospel produces.
God-centeredness, loving God, which results in a godly, ethical life before the world and before the church. And so the letter of Titus tells us. That the leadership of the church, chapter one, That the membership of the church, chapter 2, and that the Christian citizenship of all believers, chapter 3. Must remain centered on this gospel that creates the church and nurtures, strengthens, sustains, and matures the church in godliness, must remain on that self-conscious gospel-centeredness to be properly ordered. Chapter 2: To adorn the gospel, not to live the gospel.
None of us incarnate ourselves, none of us have effected propitiation on the cross. You don't live the gospel. You adorn the gospel. With a godly life. And to have a godly life, this gospel must ever flow deeply in your heart and life.
So, from the outset of this letter, Paul shows us that his ministry. His apostolic ministry, which is a model for Titus to order the churches in Crete. It began with the gospel. It continued with the gospel. And it always ended with the gospel because everything is always about Jesus.
Here's the question that we're looking at. If the gospel provided the framework from within which Paul lived his life and conducted his public ministry as an apostle to the churches, Shouldn't that same gospel be the framework from which we live our daily life and from which we conduct? the order and worship of our church here at Paramount. If at the heart of everything for Paul was the gospel, as he says in 1 Corinthians 15, by which the name of our church comes from, 1 Corinthians 15, 3, the gospel is of first importance. It is paramount.
If it was at the heart and paramount for Paul for everything, Shouldn't the gospel be the heart and soul of everything for us? Yet, what happens too often, many pastors and churches, and this is not to pick on other, to make this observation, and we're guilty of it, and we correct when we find that we're guilty of it, but what happens. Is that so often pastors in churches fail? To see the gospel's many implications and functions in the New Testament. And so that leads us to ask the question: where in the church is the gospel?
By gospel, to remind you, I'm referring to the strict or proper sense of how Paul defines it. For example, in 1 Corinthians 15, verses 3 to 4, I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Old Testament Scripture. That he was buried. The burial of Christ is of first importance in the gospel. Hardly anybody ever talks about it, let alone knows the implications of it for their daily life.
But Paul says here: the burial of Christ is of first importance. That he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Old Testament scriptures.
So, in a strict or proper sense, the gospel. Is the joyful news, the good news, the announcement, the message. of free salvation to sinners through Jesus Christ alone. It is or the gospel in a strict sense. Listen carefully.
is a revelation An exhibition, a demonstration of the covenant of grace to men, which began in Genesis 3:15. Genesis 3:15 is the first mention of the gospel in the Bible. And God's unilateral promise to restore his kingdom, his rule, and blessing among men. Which was forfeited in the garden by Adam and Eve by their rebellion and sin. God's unilateral promise in Genesis 3:15 to restore his kingdom, the kingdom of God, his rule and blessing.
He makes a unilateral promise that he alone will fulfill. By redeeming his people, redeeming all of creation based on that initial promise of Genesis 3:15, and he carries it to fulfillment in the person and work of Christ, his life, death, burial, and resurrection, and ascension for sinners. That's the whole Bible storyline in a nutshell. The gospel and the kingdom of God, God's reign and rule, are closely related. And listen carefully.
In Mark chapter 1, verse 15, Jesus declares. The time is fulfilled. What's fulfilled? All the promises he's made since Genesis 3.15. The time is fulfilled in the kingdom of God, his reign and rule and favor among men, his blessing to man, The kingdom of God is at hand.
Repent and believe in the gospel.
So we might say, in a strict sense, that the gospel is an announcement that God's kingdom. His rule and blessing. Has come to man in the life, death, burial, and resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is now Lord and Messiah, and fulfillment of all of Israel's scriptures. This is the gospel that must reside. At the center and heart of the church.
Must be taught week after week after week, must be known and believed. for eternal salvation.
Now, listen, in light of that, where in the church is that gospel? When you begin to look for churches that have this gospel explicit, self-consciously clear, week in and week out, the curriculum to the children, the curriculum to the adults, everybody's getting that gospel. A certain frustration can accompany the search for a right place to worship. I'd been through the search myself. At one point in our family's life, having been burned out on evangelical moralism, do more, be radical, step up Christianity.
We look for almost seven years. To find one church that would tell you what I just told you in four minutes. Couldn't find it. And so there's a frustration that sets in. There's also a danger that can accompany the search for the right place to worship.
Listen to Gene Veith. He says the church shopping mentality can be dangerous, reducing membership in a particular manifestation of the body of Christ to a matter of consumer preference. In which we expect a community of faith to conform to our desires. The church is not a commodity to be hawked. To the whims and desires of a consumer looking for a product.
It's not the church. It's important to understand that the gospel does not create a utopian community of perfect people. And it does not create a utopian community of perfect leadership. What the gospel creates is a redemptive community of forgiveness, reconciliation, love, and hope to sinners who are struggling and desperately need to hear the absolution words, you're forgiven through Christ.
So what are the criteria that can assist folks in knowing what to look for when evaluating churches in regard to their Christ centeredness and the place of the gospel in their church life? How can you find a church where you will hear Christ? Preached from his word because faith comes from hearing. And hearing by the word of Christ, the word of Christ meaning the gospel. Where will you find a church that signifies and seals to you and the sacraments?
without all the fluffin' distractions. Christ. At the table, Christ in baptism. Incidentally, these criteria that I'm going to give you are intended to give hope to evangelicals who are starving in a post evangelical famine of gospelessness in the church. And so, what are the criteria?
Going back to Dr. Rosenblott's address and incorporating my own thoughts, here's the first. Here's the first question that you should ask. Ask it about our church. Does the church set forth the gospel as the promise of the grace of God?
We looked at this last week, but let me just remind you. Does the church set forth the promise of the gospel? As the grace of God. The gospel is found in the church when it is utterly distinguished from the law, because the law is not the gospel, and the gospel is not the law. The gospel is the promise of God's free grace for the sake of Christ alone.
God's grace is the person of Christ Himself. It is not a substance, it's not a thing, it's not something that's poured into you in various amounts based upon what you do or don't do. God's grace is the person of Christ Himself, who redeems fallen man through His life, death, resurrection, and ascension, and then applies that work to us. Through the indwelling and transforming power of the Holy Spirit. That's Grace.
The gospel promises the forgiveness of sins and eternal life to sinners for the sake of Christ alone. And so, where is the gospel in the church? The gospel is found in the church when the entire and uncorrupted doctrine of the law and gospel are both taught and clearly distinguished. The doctrine of the law and gospel is the chief and most expressive mark of the true church. Second.
Ask yourself this question: Does the church's message center on Christ's work, and in particular, what his death has accomplished? Set the center message coming week in and week out from the church. Where the person and work of Christ are clearly and continually set forth, the gospel is found in the church. Genuine Christianity focuses upon Christ freely dying for sinners. We talk this way because Jesus himself described his vocational calling and mission this way.
He says, The Son of Man came not to be served. But to serve, Jesus is not just Lord, He is servant. Who serves us day and night? How does the ascension benefit you? He ascended so that as a servant, he can continually serve you at the right hand of the Father, interceding for you because he knows you keep sinning, so you need a mediator.
He ascended for you to do this. In John chapter 12, verse 27, Jesus prays to his father.
Now, my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour? No. But for this purpose, I have come to this hour. This is his calling, this is his vocation to die for sinners.
Jesus dying as our Lamb substitute to satisfy the justice of God that hangs against us for our sin and rebellion against Him is at the center and heart of the gospel in the Christian faith and life. And so the central message of the church That the church proclaims, and where this message is proclaimed as central in the church, the gospel is found in the church.
Now, we're going to look at several examples that Dr. Rosenblott, and I'm going to give you two that. That seemed to preach Christ. In his priestly work as a mediator or intercessor for your salvation, but they really don't do it. The first one we looked at last week, so I'll just quickly refresh your memory.
A church that identifies the gospel as God loves you. That's not necessarily preaching the gospel. Amazing as it sounds, God loves you is not the gospel. Until you get to Jesus dying for your sin, Jesus crucified, Jesus spilling blood on your behalf, Jesus exhausting the wrath of God on your behalf. You haven't gotten to the love of God nor the gospel.
How do I know this? Listen carefully to the Apostle John in 1 John 4, verse 10. In this is love. Do you want to talk about love? John says, let's talk about love.
Here's love. In this is love. Not that we have loved God, but that He loved us, therefore, He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. That word propitiation means Jesus died on the cross, fully exhausted every drop of God's wrath and anger against you for your sin. That's love.
That's love. Propitiation through Jesus on the cross reveals the heart of the Father's love for you. No propitiation, no God loves you message. Propitiation, you are flowing in the love of God at that point. Jerry Bridges says this, he says, In taking our sin on the cross, the all-glorious, infinitely wealthy, completely perfect Christ died the most horrific, inglorious, degrading, and humbling death, the death of a wretched criminal.
He gave up infinite perfection for infinite pain and disgrace. That. is incredible love. You have not gotten to the love of God and the gospel until you've come through the cross of Christ. That is incredible love.
Second, we haven't found the gospel in the church where Jesus is set forth as therapist. The subject of a therapeutic gospel is man-centered. The subject of a therapeutic gospel. Is the help that God gives man? He gives them peace, comfort, happiness, satisfaction, health, wealth, prosperity, purpose, your best life now, a wonderful plan for your life, plans to prosper you and give you success.
And on and on and on it goes, you hear in the church. And if these things are being emphasized in a church, then the gospel is not being preached. Jesus is not a therapist. He is a Savior, a mediator, a high priest.
Sociologist Christian Smith has done extensive research revealing that the spirituality of America's teens is best described as what he's come up with. As called moralistic therapeutic deism.
Well let me let me explain to you what that means. He defines it as this: What is moralistic therapeutic deism? Listen carefully. God created the world. God wants people.
Now, he came up with this definition after ex. Extensive interviews of young people across all traditions, Christian traditions, and denominations, compiling all of his sociological research, and this is what he came up with from. The churches of the people that he interviewed. God created the world. God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible.
and most world religions. The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself. God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life except when God is needed to resolve a problem. Good people go to heaven. when they die.
This therapeutic gospel, he says, stretches across all ecclesiastical traditions. It's just not in the mainline Protestant churches that have lost the gospel, as we so to speak. the Bible teaching churches. He says, quote, it's unbelievable the proportion of conservative. Protestant teens.
Who do not seem to grasp elementary concepts of the gospel concerning grace and justification, and it's across all traditions.
So, in brief, a therapeutic gospel teaches people that being religious is about being good. It's not about forgiveness. You know what the underlying theological error of a therapeutic gospel is to the church in America today? You know where it's coming from? The underlying error is coming from an ancient heresy.
Condemned more times over than any other heresy in the history of our church across Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant traditions. Pelagianism. It's coming from Pelagianism, self-salvation, the religion of the natural man. The British monk Pelagius rejected Augustine's view of grace. He rejected the doctrine of original sin.
Which is this: the original sin teaches that the fallen condition in which all men are born, Psalm 51, verse 5: Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and sin, did my mother conceive me. He rejected that. And instead, Pelagius said that Adam was simply a bad example to the human race. He was not the father of our sinful condition. In other words, he's not the federal representative of the sinful condition.
He was just a bad example. He said that all men are sinners because they sin. Augustine said, All men sin because they are sinners, and he was right, and Pelagius was deadly wrong. Because Adam was just simply an example, but not the federal representative. Because all did not die in Adam, but if you become a sinner, it's because you follow his bad example.
Here's what happens to the gospel in a Pelagianist. View. The second Adam Jesus Christ is not your federal representative. He's merely a good example, he said. And salvation comes through following the example that Jesus set for you.
So the gospel According to Pelagius, it is WWJD. The gospel, according to Augustine, in the whole church. It's not that. It's not WWJD, Christ as example. It's Christ as mediator.
Savior. The gospel proclaims that the forgiveness of sins and eternal life are granted to sinners on the basis of grace alone, for the sake of Christ alone. Again, listen to Jerry Bridges, very clear. Nothing we could do. Could cause or compel God to love us enough to send His Son to die for us.
Nothing. Jesus didn't die for you because you are worthy. He died for you because you were ungodly. Romans 5: At the right moment, Christ died for the ungodly. He says, We only contribute one element to the formula of grace.
You're like, uh-oh. Yeah. Sin, our sin. It's what we contribute. We do not and cannot make grace happen, not by what we do.
and not by what we don't do. Third, you haven't found the gospel in the church where Jesus is set forth exclusively or almost all the time. As a model to emulate, which comes out of the therapeutic gospel that we just looked at. WWJD is not to be the driving central motif of your Christian life. and it is not the essence of the Christian faith.
We saw last week what makes Christianity Christianity. It is called the gospel. Every religion has a love your neighbor law. Why? Because every person born in this world has had the law written on their heart by God in creation and they can't escape it.
It's called a conscience. That is the moral law of God written on every single man who is created in the image of God. And try as he may, he cannot escape that law. He knows he is to not kill his neighbor. What he does not know is a supernatural revealed message of good news called the gospel, and only the church has this message.
To announce to sinners. And so, if the week-end and week-out message that you are hearing in churches is moral exhortation after moral exhortation. Christ given to you as an example to follow, you're not hearing the gospel.
Now don't hear me wrong. Christ left you and I as an example so that we might follow in his steps. 1 Peter 2, verse 21. He did. But listen carefully.
Imitation has its place, but it is not under. The rubric of the gospel. The call to follow Christ and to follow his example is an imperative. It is the law, and it is the third use of the law given to direct Christians out of joy because their heart is filled with gratitude because of grace, so that they're obeying God out of a happy heart filled with the gospel. Of course, I want to be like Jesus.
That is the driving desire of my heart. My only problem is, I'm not good at it. And so, listen, the imitation of Christ's paradigm of spirituality. Makes Christ's self-sacrifice, his humility, an analogy for our discipleship, but we have to understand very carefully that there are some things in Scripture that the scriptures do not call us upon to imitate from Christ. Let me give you a couple of examples.
Jesus added humanity to his deity. Can you do that? You don't even have any deity, so you can't even start. Jesus fulfilled the law perfectly in our place. You know, I can't do that.
Jesus redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. Jesus drank the cup of God's wrath and effected propitiation for us. Jesus received authority from his Father to raise himself from the dead, John 10:18. You can't get that. You can't do that.
Jesus ascended in glory to take his throne at the Father's right hand to make intercession for transgressors. You and I can't imitate that. We can't do that. We don't imitate any of these things. Doing what Jesus did is different from bearing the fruit of his righteous life.
You understand that? We don't live the gospel. We don't do what Jesus did. We imitate the fruit of his righteous life. For example, In Philippians 2, Paul says, Have this mind that is in you, that was also in Christ Jesus.
And he says, Imitate Christ. And then. He's obviously in Philippians 2 not calling us to set aside our heavenly glory and power and descend to the earth in human flesh because we are not incarnations of God. The point I'm getting at is that there is a popular way to talk in the evangelical church of incarnational ministry. That's absurd.
There is no incarnational ministry in the church. There is no adding humanity to deity by you and me. To say you have an incarnational ministry is like to say, I've got a propitiational ministry. I've got an expiational ministry. Oh, you remove sin and you placate God's wrath and anger.
Wow. The incarnation is Laser specific. It is as laser-specific, the incarnation, as is propitiation, redemption, expiation, or any other action of the gospel. The incarnation is attributable only to the second person of the Trinity, who has become the God-man now and forevermore, who has ascended to the Father at the right hand, who intercedes for us as our great high priest and advocate. We don't do that.
So when we're talking about imitation of Christ, it's vital to distinguish from what Jesus did from the call to bearing the fruit of his righteous life. But what we have to be careful of is that the call for believers to bear the fruit of Christ's righteous life, that is, urging believers to walk in a manner worthy of the calling by which they've been called, Ephesians 4:1. Demonstrating godliness as we're seeing from the book of Titus. Yeah. Those exhortations, and here's the question you gotta ask yourself.
Are those moral exhortations Grounded in the gospel. You will not read one single imperative from Genesis to Revelation. that is not first grounded in the gospel of grace. All imperatives must be given to the church and clearly seen as implications of the gospel. Otherwise, the alternative, Graham Goldsworthy says, is to preach to people law and to leave the impression that the essence of Christianity is what we do rather than what God in Christ has done for us.
Legalism easily creeps in even when we think we have avoided it.
So. Where the question, where is the gospel in the church? You have not found the gospel in the church when Christ is exclusively or almost weakly set forth to you as the model to imitate. That's not the gospel. If the emphasis is always on the effects of the gospel, you've not found the gospel in the church.
Godliness, yes, is the effect of the gospel. That's all over the letter of Titus. That's what we've been studying for the past, what, year or so? But the fruit of the gospel is vital. We must preach about it in the church.
But it is not the gospel. And so the fruit of the gospel is the work of Christ in us. But the gospel in its strict proper sense is the work of Christ for us, which is wholly outside of us. Listen to the scriptures. Jesus was born under the law and obeyed it perfectly for us.
Paul says in Romans chapter 4 verse 25 Jesus was delivered up over for us for our trespasses And he was raised. For our justification. If the church's teaching always focuses on something that has to do with what goes on inside of you. Your commitment, your love, your stepping up, your abandonment, your radical surrender, whatever you hear. That is not the gospel, and yet, evangelicalism abounds in this stuff.
It is an unending cascade of conferences and teachings in the church and books, go to life way. And see how many books you will find that teach you about the atonement of Christ versus the self-help living section that has an endless array of tip after tip after tip after tip of how you will reach a victorious Christian walk. Evangelicalism is awash in this stuff, and you know what?
So were the medieval handbooks of spiritual direction. But you know what the medieval handbooks of spiritual direction did not have in them during the pre-Reformation days? They did not have in them the gospel. And almost none of these spiritual direction books in medieval Christianity, almost none of them make any reference to the use of the Lord's Supper as a means of grace for you to grow as a Christian. If sermons are not about Christ, life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, they're not gospel sermons.
Dr. Rosenblott says this. He says, When the emphasis of the church's preaching and teaching is Almost always on the effects of the gospel, your imitation, your obedience, your commitment. He says, quote, continual challenges to make vows to copy Jesus not only will lead to disappointment, but a real crash. C.S.
Lewis once remarked that he had no depth, no idea of the depth of his sin until one time he made a vow to be more virtuous. more generous with people whom he had contact. He discovered that the depth of his sin was so great that he was not just surprised, but he was inwardly devastated. There are two results that typically happen. To those who are fed a constant diet of do more Christianity.
Two effects. Yeah. Here's the first effect. But moral exhortation, Jesus' example, radical surrender, abandonment of Christianity, do more Christianity is the continual diet you receive. The first thing that typically happens to people Is that you eventually get burned-out, despairing believers who just say, I'm.
I give up. I want you to listen carefully to Michael Horton. He describes what the process, what happened so well.
So, listen, he says. They have heard the calls to holiness. There's a new men's movement going on now in evangelicalism called Step Up. Come on, man, step up. Get your act together.
Be godly. Be the man God's called you to be. Listen to the celebrity pastors fire you up for a weekend that will change your life forever. Step up. Michael Horton says, They've all heard these calls to holiness.
By surrendering, laying it all on the altar, rededicating their lives, hoping this time it's going to work. They're not told that they are dead to sin's dominion because of the once and for all work of Christ. Rather, they're expected to enter into or attain that higher life. Being harassed regularly into attempting something that they should be told has already been done for them. Instead of living against sin with the recognition that Christ has already won victory, they are certain that they must themselves become victorious Christians.
And after successive, frustrated attempts, they just give up. That was exactly me. Yeah. for 30 years of my Christian walk. And I gave up.
And for three and a half years, walked out of the church and said, if that's the gospel, there's no hope for me, I'm done. The second result. Of a constant diet of moral exhortations. is hypocrisy. Listen carefully.
Many think that they're living holy lives, Horton says, because they do not have the slightest comprehension of biblical holiness. That's why we read the law of God in our church and take his law very seriously and humble ourselves and kneel or sit and confess our sin. Because one day you're going to bow your knee before Christ. You might as well get used to it now. He says that.
These hypocrites have never understood, like Isaiah and his vision, before the Holy Creator, and felt their righteousness crawl into the corner for shelter from the divine glory. They think that because they avoid certain movies, rock music, nightclubs, and non-Christians in general, that they're not at least great sinners. They might be sinners, but they're not great sinners. Not only because they are proud and obnoxious to God and man in their self-righteousness, like the Pharisee. Who thanked God for his piety while the sinner cried out for mercy.
But because they are hypocrites who cannot confess their sinfulness, and he refers to 1 John 1, verse 9. They have never known the terror of God's law. The consciences have never felt The terror of God's law. They don't, he says, their consciences have felt rather like that of the rich young ruler who responded to Jesus' recitation: All these things I've kept from my youth, what do I lack? Because they have never had premarital sex or been drunk, they are certain that they do not require self-examination and a swift flight back to the cross of Christ.
Well, they may not be spiritual giants, but they concede that, but they're good Christian folks. Mediocre. external and superficial in your devotion. They have never been condemned in their righteousness by the law.
So they shall never be justified by Christ's righteousness in the gospel. You know what Dr. Rosenblach concludes about churches that preach this continual diet to people? He says, quote, he says, if sermons are not about that particular cross, that particular blood, that particular death for our sin, they're not gospel sermons.
So if you are in one of these churches, I would, in my office as pastor and theologian, urge you to try a church where you're not the center anymore. Where it is not as if the gospel is about you, because it isn't. If there's no talk of obedience, his obedience, not ours. Dr. Rosenblatt says, if there's no talk of his blood, His blood, not ours.
If there's no talk of cross, his cross, not ours. If there's no talk of death, His death, not ours, if there's no talk of radical sacrifice, His radical sacrifice, not ours. There's no gospel at that church. In fact, you know what? The Reformers would have argued during the Reformation that that kind of church is not even a church.
Because the two undeniable marks of a true church are one where the Word of God is rightly preached. Which chiefly means separating the law from the gospel and preaching the gospel purely. And two, where the sacraments are rightly administered. The gospel is about a transaction between the father and the son that was executed in history for thirty-three years. This culminated in his death, his burial, his resurrection, and then after 40 days, his ascension to the right hand of the Father.
He appeared to Peter and the 12 and to more than 500 witnesses at one time. After 40 days, Jesus finishing teaching his disciples, Luke 24, that the whole Bible, Genesis to Revelation, is all about him. He ascended to the right hand of the Father, where he sat down, having perfectly finished the work of redemption and made purification for sin. Hebrews chapter 1, verse 3. And now, Jesus, as Lord and servant of this whole universe, coronated and crowned as the conquering king and great suzerain who has fulfilled every promise of the Bible since Genesis 3:15, Genesis 12 and 15, the Abrahamic covenant, 2 Samuel chapter 7, the Davidic covenant, Jeremiah chapter 31 and Ezekiel chapter 36, the promise of the new covenant to come through the prophets.
Isaiah 53, the suffering servant coming through this life, death, burial, and resurrection and ascension.
Now, one day, as he reigns as Lord over this whole universe at the right hand of the Father, that conquering king who intercedes from me because of his ascension. Covering all of my sin in the sight of God forever and ever and ever and ever will one day consummate this kingdom and he will come again. And Paul says in Titus chapter 2, verse 13, that everybody who has this gospel buried in their heart are listen. Waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. The hope of the gospel is that Eden will be restored to perfection, never to fall again.
And so we see that the kingdom of God in the Garden of Eden is first established. There, Adam and Eve live with God in willing obedience, with delight and joy in their heart to the word of God and to God's rule, receiving his blessing, loving each other, loving creation, receiving all the blessings of God's reign as king through his rule over their life. And because the Bible says they sinned. The kingdom is destroyed. And the rest of the Bible, from that point onward, tells us that the restoration of a people to be the willing subjects of the perfect rule of God the king is coming.
Because he has made a unilateral promise, and he'll never, ever, never reneg on his promise because his steadfast love endures forever and ever and ever. And at his glorious second appearing, God's people will once again be in God's place under God's rule and blessing, the new heavens and earth. Revelation 21 through 22, where you and I will be swept up into the life of the Trinity so that we are giving and receiving the same love and experiencing that same intimacy that Jesus and the Father experienced by the power of the Holy Spirit. That is the announcement that you must hear and be able to articulate if you want to call yourself a Christian, live the Christian life, and come to church week after week after week and receive it and hear it. And when you hear that, your faith grows and you go, I believe that.
Wow, I'm going to go live the Christian life. That is the difference between here and do more. Do more, do more, and you just say, I can't do more, I'm done. If you do not hear that announcement regularly and explicitly in the church, you've not found the gospel in the church because Paul says that is the message that is the power of God unto salvation. That is the message that creates faith, nurtures faith, strengthens faith, matures faith, changes the church from ungodliness to godliness.
And when you hear that gospel repeatedly, you've found the gospel in the church.
So stay there. And don't leave. It's good news, isn't it? Thanks for listening to the Hymn We Proclaim podcast with John Fawnville. Him we proclaim as a ministry of John Fondill of Fairmount Church in Jacksonville, Florida.
You can check out his church at paramountchurch.com. We look forward to next time.
