THE GOSPEL AND PATRIOTISM

The Gospel and Patriotism

Dr. John P. Davis

Note: I am indebted to Steve Wilkins’ article on “Biblical Patriotism” for some of the major points and the basic thrust of this blogpost.

Recently in the United States, the last Monday in May was marked by the remembrance of those who have given their lives as members of the Armed Forces of the United States of America. In just one week on July 4 we will celebrate Independence Day. National occasions such as this raise the question of ‘what does it mean for a Christian to be patriotic?’ Were you to draw a continuum of Christian opinions on this subject you would have a myriad of views including pacifists, ‘just war’ proponents, some who will not swear loyalty to any earthly government, others who are actively involved in the political process, etc. Read more »

Destroying the Works of the Devil

The following is a short gospel message that was preached to the poor and homeless at a special worship outreach and feeding on April 16th:

This evening, I want to share a few words about a people who were severely afflicted and oppressed; and a few words about the God who heard their cry and delivered them out from under the hands of those who were causing their suffering.

Before the time of Moses, the ancient Egyptians enslaved the people of Israel and “made their lives bitter with hard service,” treating them “ruthlessly,” (Ex. 1:14) the leaders even going so far as ordering that all male Hebrew children be killed immediately after birth (Ex. 1:15-22). Read more »

Mercy Ministry and Evangelism: The Necessary Interdependence of Grace and Deeds of Justice

[Above is a modified reproduction of Ferdinand Hodler's (1853-1918) "The Good Samaritan."]

The following is adapted from an upcoming presentation to Christian students on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania:

We live in a day of radical skepticism toward the Christian faith. People question biblical Christianity for numerous reasons and with numerous motives.

I do not intend here to exhaustively address all of the assorted reasons and motives as to why people, fairly or unfairly, reject Christianity.

My purpose is to attempt to lay out a possible remedy that should strip one particular group of skeptics of their rhetorical and emotional weaponry in their battle against the church.

You’ve probably heard it said by those who reject Christianity that their rejection is due to the presence of all the judgmental hypocrites in the institutional church who profess Jesus as their Lord and Savior.

By such skeptics it is claimed that of the many Christians who proclaim Jesus Christ, there appears to be very few whose lives appear to be genuinely impacted by Him.

And so it is that Christians are labeled as “hypocritical,” and “insensitive,” and “judgmental.”

It is not so much that many outsiders have rejected the gospel message as they have rejected the messengers, namely: us.

Researchers at the Barna Group recently concluded a multi-year study that asked outsiders to describe “present-day Christianity.”[1]

85% of outsiders described Christianity as “hypocritical – saying one thing, doing another.” Eighty-five percent!

87% of outsiders described Christianity as “judgmental.”

70% of outsiders described Christianity as “insensitive to others.”

72% described Christianity as “out of touch with reality.” Read more »

The Gospel and Mercy Ministry

At Grace Church, our desire is that everything we do and say and think would be informed and driven by the gospel of Jesus Christ. And “everything” necessarily includes our ministries of mercy.

In other words, we don’t want mercy ministry to become an end in and of itself. We are very concerned that it never becomes detached from Jesus and His saving gospel.

Missionary Lesslie Newbigin speaks on the danger of reductionism in the life and thought of the church: Read more »

Steve Davis on “The Gospel and Multi-Ethnicity”

On “Therapeutic Spirituality”

Frequently, I dialogue with nice, moral people who genuinely believe that they are “good” and that Jesus came to help them discover their ultimate potential in life. They believe that he can help them by unleashing some kind of untapped, or dormant, power inside of them.

I’ve asked people who believe this sort of thing to explain to me what they believe Jesus meant when he said, “You must be born again” (John 3:7). Usually, I get an explanation that sounds something like this: “Well, Jesus can help us discover how much love and greatness we have inside of ourselves so that we can live better lives.”

In this type of religious system, Jesus the omnipotent God-man is reduced little more than a self-help guru. Sort of like Tony Robbins with a halo.

Those who are deceived (or have deceived themselves) into thinking such strange and unbiblical things are usually people who have some type of (very) limited knowledge of the teachings of Scripture, attend church on occasion (either presently or in their past), and know some facts about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. I confess that, in the months leading up to the day I was saved, I believed something very similar to what I described above (although, for the life of me, I don’t believe I could have offered such a creative explanation as to what being “born again” meant).

Following are some excerpts from a fabulous book I am currently reading and re-reading. In it, the author adeptly addresses the type of culturally-popular / ungodly / vapid / powerless / counterfeit “spirituality” I just described above.

Excerpts from Michael Horton, The Gospel-Driven Life (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2009), 78-80:

“Spirituality” is as successful as materialism in feeding our narcissism. Keeping us preoccupied with our inner self and its experiences, morality, and activity, the “search for the sacred” is as godless as atheism. There are plenty of resources on the market to feed our culture’s anxiety over self-improvement. But they are all different ways of dressing up the old Adam. Furthermore, their moralistic prescriptions never actually reduce stress but pile more expectations upon us to try to make ourselves acceptable to God.

We are not sick, but spiritually dead. We are not good people with room for improvement, but the ungodly. We are not children who need a little direction, but lost. The gospel comes not to help us get our act together, fixing us up for a night on the town, making us more respectable to ourselves or others. Rather, it comes to kill us and make us alive as completely new creatures. Not a new and improved self, but a self buried and raised with Christ, is the gospel’s message of genuine transformation.

Moralistic, therapeutic spirituality is part of that narcissistic complex about which Paul warned Timothy that makes us “lovers of self…, having an appearance of godliness, but denying its power” (2 Tim. 3:2, 5). And the power that it denies is the announcement of free justification in Christ, apart from works. The power of God does not lie in programs, strategies, self-help formulas, seven steps to a better life, or political reform. Like someone trapped in a burning building, we cannot rescue ourselves. There is no hope inside of us! There are no inner resources or possibilities – no Archimedean point at which we might pry ourselves open to God and begin to climb the stairway to heaven. Our whole nature is in bondage to sin, so we cannot even repair our condition by an act of the will. Our only hope lies outside of us, from the God who rescues us in his Son! Paul said that he was “not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16)….

This gospel – the Good News of God’s justification of sinners in Christ – …is the ocean that we swim in, the air that we breathe, the identity that defines us….

The gospel is not a general belief in heaven and hell or hope for a better life beyond; it is not even confidence in a resurrection at the end of the age. It is the announcement that Jesus Christ himself is our life, for he is our peace with God. He does not merely show us the way; he is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6).

Pastor John Davis on the Gospel

The Gospel and Being Missional

Missional Grace

The World Needs Grace

Colossians 4:2-6
² ¶ Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. ³ At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison– ⁴ that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. ⁵ ¶ Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. ⁶ Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

We seek to be missional in our approach to those who are outside of grace.

Paul, in how he handles his imprisonment and in his words to the church at Colossae, sets forth a picture of what it means to be missional (Intentionally committed to engage those who do not know or misunderstand Jesus.).

What drives his life is captured in the words – “that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison.”

There is something that has captured his imagination (the mystery of Christ – the gospel in all its wonder of his incarnation, death, resurrection, exaltation, and consummation). But not only has it captured his imagination, it has become a deep conviction worth suffering for. And, despite the suffering, the message is so important that he asks not for freedom or justice, but for open doors for the Word that speaks of this ‘mystery of Christ.’

It is this experience of the gospel that is at the heart of being missional. ‘Missional’ begins when the wonder of what Jesus has accomplished becomes the ‘pearl of great price’ in your imagination.

When the most intriguing thought you have is that of Jesus Christ, when your mind constantly returns to that one great delight of a Merciful Savior, when your conviction deepens that He alone has power to save, when you are sure that the advance of the gospel is worthy of your suffering, you are on your way to becoming missional.

Paul began this great epistle with a gospel-driven missional focus. Listen to the beginning words:

Colossians 1:3-8
³ ¶ We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, ⁴ since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, ⁵ because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, ⁶ which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing–as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, ⁷ just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf ⁸ and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

What a wonderful portrait of the life giving gospel as it bears fruit and grows – both qualitatively in the lives of believers and quantitatively in the number of those who believe.

What does it look like, when the gospel impacts our lives in a missional way?

That Missional commitment will be reflected in at least three ways.

Outward focused prayer

Watchfully – praying with eyes wide open. Too often we are willingly blind and deaf men and women seeking to avoid the cry of the city around us. Being watchful will make us aware of the tragedies of people’s lives apart from grace. That tragedy may be the empty soul of success or the empty soul of being alone.

Thankfully – Outward focused prayer is compelled by gratitude for the gift of God’s grace. Gospel thankfulness will enable us to be watchful without becoming envious of or angry at those who live apart from God’s grace.

Evangelistically – He prays for an open door for the word, that I may speak as I ought (a necessity). Our prayer should be that God would further the advance of the gospel through us, despite the adverse circumstances we may be in (ca. Paul in prison),

Outward focused living

(toward outsiders)

Outside of what? Of Grace – they may be inside the church, they may insiders in much of what we call important in life – but they are outside of grace.

Wisely – i.e living life by God’s design as He has ordered it, beginning with the dear of the Lord (Prov 1:9). This means
living with the following tensions:

• We are in the world not of the world, i.e. we engage the culture without being absorbed by the culture (John 17).
• We are a new community but not an isolated one – we live within the culture but always ‘cross’-cultural in that our identity is ‘we are in Christ’ – Gal 2:20
• We are citizens of heaven (Phil 3:20) and ambassadors on earth (2 Cor 5).

We live wisely toward outsiders because we want them to become true insiders.

Sacrificially – ‘making the most of every opportunity’

Older translations, such as the KJV, bring to mind the metaphor of redemption being used. Redemption reminds us of the cost of having something.

Also, the Greek word used here for time views time, not simply as chronological succession of moments, but time as specific moments within that succession, hence the ESV translation “opportunity.”

Certain opportunities come along in life for both personal and corporate ministry that must be responded to in that moment. And, often that costs us something.

“Opportunity is like a fleet horse that pauses for one moment at one’s side. If you do not mount it in that moment, you will forever, here the clatter of hoof-beats, down the corridor of time.”

We do not want to sit back and mourn over the lost opportunities to make a difference for Christ. We can’t go back. We simply ask forgiveness and learn something about our own self-centeredness and reluctance to sacrifice for His kingdom.

Today there are opportunities at this moment, at this very hour, both here in Philly and across the world.

As a church, our special opportunity is to reach the nations of the world throughout the city with all of its density, diversity, and depravity.

Outward focused speaking

With grace

“conversation always full of grace” – This is speech that manifests God’s fullness in or lives. Too often Christians are known as being judgmental and condemning. Grace-filled speech comes out of a life that knows it own sin and its own experience of grace. Why be grace-filled? Because God has been full of grace toward you.

“seasoned with salt” – the idea of salt in this context is not preservation, but bringing out the good quality of something – to make it tasty. We have the responsibility of seeking God’s grace to enable our speech to become palatable.

First listening

An answer is a response to a question? Perhaps this is where we fail in communicating the gospel. We do not listen to the questions that the world is asking and therefore do not answer accordingly. Let me say that the answer to all of the world’s questions is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our responsibility is to show them how Jesus Christ relates to their questions.

Peter put it this way:

1 Pet. 3:15 But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect,

Conclusion

“Grasping the external propulsion of God’s grace is crucial to our understanding of mission. It means that mission is not a duty (something we ‘should do’) but a natural overflow of the gospel’s work inside us. If you aren’t motivated to love, serve, and speak the gospel to people, the answer isn’t to ‘just do it.’ The answer is to examine your heart, repent of sin, and discern where your unbelief is short-circuiting the natural outward movement of the gospel. As the gospel renews your heart, it will also renew your desire to move out in faith into the relationships and opportunities God places in your path.

To put it simply, the grace of God is always going somewhere—moving forward, extending his kingdom, propelling his people toward love and service to others. As we learn to live in light of the gospel, mission should be the natural overflow. God’s grace brings renewal internally (in us) so that it might bring renewal externally (through us).”

Bob Thune and Will Walker, The Gospel-Centered Life (World Harvest Mission, 2009), 46.

Description of the Missional Church (from http://www.friendofmissional.org/)

• The missional church is a collection of missional believers acting in concert together in fulfillment of the missio dei.
• The missional church is one where people are exploring and rediscovering what it means to be Jesus’ sent people as their identity and vocation.
• The missional church is faith communities willing and ready to be Christ’s people in their own situation and place.
• The missional church knows that they must be a cross-cultural missionary (contextual) people and adopt a missionary stance in relation to their community.
• The missional church will be engaged with the culture (in the world) without being absorbed by the culture (not of the world). They will become intentionally indigenous.
• The missional church understands that God is already present in the culture where it finds itself. Therefore, the missional church doesn’t view its purpose as bringing God into the culture or taking individuals out of the culture to a sacred space.
• The missional church is about more than just being contextual, it is also about the nature of the church and how it relates to God.
• The missional church is about being — being conformed to the image of God.
• The missional church will seek to plant all types of missional communities.
• The missional church is evangelistic and faithfully proclaims the gospel through word and deed. Words alone are not sufficient; how the gospel is embodied in our community and service is as important as what we say.
• The missional church understands the power of the gospel and does not lose confidence in it.
• The missional church recognizes that it does not hold a place of honor in its host community and that its missional imperative compels it to move out from itself into that host community as salt and light.²
• The missional church will align all their activities around the missio dei — the mission of God.
• The missional church seeks to put the good of their neighbor over their own.
• The missional church will give integrity, morality, good character and conduct, compassion, love and a resurrection life filled with hope preeminence to give credence to their reasoned verbal witness.
• The missional church practices hospitality by welcoming the stranger into the midst of the community.
• The missional church will always be in a dynamic tension or paradox between missional individuals and community. We cannot sustain being missional on our own, but if we are not being missional individually we cannot sustain being mission-shaped corporately.³
• The missional church will see themselves as representatives of Jesus and will do nothing to dishonor his name.
• The missional church will be totally reliant on God in all it does. It will move beyond superficial faith to a life of supernatural living.
• The missional church will be desperately dependent on prayer.
• The missional church gathered will be for the purpose of worship, encouragement, supplemental teaching, training, and to seek God’s presence and to be realigned with God’s missionary purpose.
• The missional church is orthodox in its view of the gospel and scripture, but culturally relevant in its methods and practice so that it can engage the world view of the hearers.
• The missional church will feed deeply on the scriptures throughout the week.
• The missional church will be a community where all members are involved in learning “the way of Jesus.” Spiritual development is an expectation.
• The missional church will help people discover and develop their spiritual gifts and will rely on gifted people for ministry instead of talented people.
• The missional church is a healing community where people carry each other’s burdens and help restore gently.
• The missional church will require that its leaders be missiologists.

Christmas – A Celebration for Notable Sinners

Christmas – A Celebration for Notable Sinners

Dr. John P. Davis

In preaching on Matthew’s record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ in Matthew 1:1-17, I was wonderfully reminded of the grace of God in giving us a Savior who is not deterred by our great sinfulness. One point of my message that day was on how the genealogy of Christ contains the names of notable sinners. They are notable because they stand out in the genealogy, though everyone (except Jesus) in that genealogical record is a sinner.

It was unusual in ancient genealogies to include the names of women. Their inclusion in Matthew is not necessary to establish any legal point so they must be included for a theological purpose.

Tamar, Rahab, and Bathsheba share something in common. They have notoriety in Scripture partly because of their moral failures. In our self-righteousness and pride we would exclude names of those with whom we do not want to be identified. Jesus doesn’t.

Tamar was the daughter-in-law of Judah. Her husband died and left her childless so it was the next son’s responsibility to take her as wife and continue the family name through her. He refused to do so and Judah did not demand it. Tamar sought justice but in an unrighteous way. She posed as a harlot and seduced her father-in-law and bore twins through her father-in-law. So her father-in-law is a philanderer and she is a prostitute. This is the ancestry of Jesus Christ. I know this story sounds like a Hollywood soap opera, but it is real life where sinners, even those who know better, do sordid and horrible things. Matthew doesn’t hide it. Jesus identifies with them. Jesus came as a friend of sinners, to call them to repentance, and to give his life for them.

Rahab even when spoken of in the NT is called Rahab, the harlot. Though she came to faith in the true and living God she doesn’t seemed to have outlived her prior reputation. She married one of the descendants of Judah through whom the Messiah would come. Salmon must have seen in this harlot a transformation of God’s grace that brought him to marry her or perhaps he was sordidly attracted by her reputation. She becomes the great, great grandmother of King David. She is a marvelous picture of God’s redeeming and transforming grace.

Bathsheba is noted in Scripture for being not only the mother of Solomon but the woman involved in bringing King David to the lowest point in his kingdom. Though she was seduced by David, she surrendered to his seduction, and became pregnant. David had her husband killed, then married Bathsheba and bore a child whom God did not allow to live. Nevertheless, God in his grace gave another son, Solomon, the heir to the kingdom.

Jesus’ genealogy includes notable sinners because he comes for sinners. He identifies with sinners in his incarnation and in his death. Whatever your sin may be, you are not so bad that Jesus would not identify with you. He came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.

This is our Savior. And let me say, that until you have seen yourself as a notable sinner, you will not know the power of the grace of Jesus Christ. He came for sinners.

When you trace the genealogy of Jesus that follows Him, i.e. those who are his descendants by faith, you find the names of notable sinners. One of those names is John P. Davis – a sinner saved by grace. This is the blessing of Christmas.

How we Understand the Relationship of our Gospel-Centered Focus to our TRIM Values and our 4G Commitments

Figure 1 THE GOSPEL – THE INNER CORE

Figure 2 THE GOSPEL EMPOWERS BOTH TRIM AND 4G

Figure 3 THE GOSPEL – THE CORE OF OUR TRIM VALUES

Figure 4 OUR TRIM VALUES ARE REFLECTED IN EACH OF OUR 4G COMMITMENTS