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“The
Gospel of Christ isn't about about ‘tolerance.’ It cares about truth.”
These words
caused me to look up from my Bible
Gateway app where I was reading along with selected
scriptures. Matt Short, missions
pastor at One
Community Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, had just uttered
from the pulpit a profound reality that, regrettably, we hear far too
infrequently from this millennial generation (or any generation for
that matter).
After several
weeks of having worshiped with this young church body, I’ve been
repeatedly shocked, and pleasantly so, that, under the headship of
lead pastor Paul Dudley and, clearly, the guidance of the Holy
Spirit, this group of faithful 20 and 30-somethings does not sidestep
truth, in love, as concerns transcendent issues that in today’s
politically correct and postmodern culture (to include much of
Christianity) are considered highly controversial.
Pastor Short
judiciously stacked his words words that blossomed from the very
Vine of Truth Himself upon that elusive sweet spot in the tense
continuum between truth and grace: two central features of Christ’s
nature that are neither mutually exclusive nor at odds with one
another.
“There is
nothing new under the sun,” we are reminded in Ecclesiastes 1:9.
Indeed, by
today’s secular-progressive standards and, more vexing yet, by
the standards of lukewarm Christians and ministries that, under the
intense thaw of postmodern paganism, fall away from the berg like
vast chunks of ice Christ Jesus Himself would, like so many of
his followers today, be slandered as an “intolerant bigot” and
crucified all over again.
To be sure,
under the contemporary misconception of “tolerance,” which
supposes that one must not only tolerate sin of every stripe, but
refuse to call it even that, Christ was (and is) intolerant indeed.
Rather than admonishing the adulterous woman to, “Go now and leave
your life of sin” (see John 8:11), postmodernism, to include the
moral relativist yeast that leavens the body of Christ, demands, at
once, that our never-changing Lord change the unchangeable: “Go now
and continue your life of sin.”
This is not true
grace.
It is cheap
grace.
And it is
apostasy.
While it is true
that none of us is without sin (I’m the first to drop my stone in
the sand for this reason), we are nonetheless commanded to repent of
our sins: “I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will likewise
perish (Luke 13:3).”
The first step
to repentance is recognizing sin for what it is and rejecting
deceptive attempts to sanitize it by calling it something else (i.e.,
“choice,” “sexual orientation,” “she’s not my wife, but
we’re soul mates” and the like). Alas, ’tis true: “Woe to
those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light
and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for
bitter” (Isaiah 5:20).
Indeed, far too
many “seeker friendly” and mainline Christian denominations do
just that. They call evil good. They intentionally omit the central
“repent and go and sin no more” elements of the good news (or
otherwise affirm sin altogether) for fear of driving away would-be
fish in the net those slippery little buggers (aren’t we all?)
who prefer whirling about in a toxic sea of temptation, rather than
surrendering to the ultimate Fisher of Men.
Pastor Short, to
his credit, did no such thing. In fact, he went on to address Paul’s
rebuke of the church in Galatia. Much like today’s “nicer than
Jesus” set, they, too, for different reasons perhaps, adopted a
false gospel that, in their eyes, made them more “relevant” and
palatable to the world around them.
Sound familiar?
Wrote Paul: “I
am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called
you to live in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different
gospel which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are
throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of
Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel
other than the one we preached to you,let them be under God’s
curse!” (Galatians 1:6-8)
Not very
tolerant.
But grace,
tempered with truth, nonetheless.
“As we have
already said,” Paul continued, “so now I say again: If anybody is
preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be
under God’s curse! Am I now trying to win the approval of human
beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still
trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ”
(Galatians 1:9-10).
And so,
according to Paul, those who shrink from the “full counsel of God,”
are not only out of line, they are under “God’s curse.” The
fall he took on the road to Damascus clearly knocked free his ability
to skate the thin ice of political correctness.
Still, like the
Galatians, far too many in today’s church are more concerned with
not offending others, most especially those who are without Christ,
and, rather than being fearless “servants of Christ,” instead
have busied themselves with “trying to please people.”
And, like the
Galatians, they have created a false gospel to that end.
Pleasing the
world is not taking up your cross and suffering for Christ.
Pleasing the world is a cakewalk. “If you belonged to the world, it
would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world,
but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates
you” (John 15:19).
Does the world
hate you?
It should.
We can’t
belong to the world and to Christ.
We must choose.
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