Fools who shout “SHEPHERD!” too many times in vain make common cause with wolves who harm the sheep.
~~~ The Gospel of Life vs. The “gospel” of death ~~~
As Jewish psychologist Rollo May pointed out, death is our age’s pornography, that which decent people refuse to talk about.
Therefore a ‘gospel’ morbidly obsessed with one’s own death comes across as creepy, manipulative, coarse, vulgar, and something not to be taken seriously. It’s a MUSLIM kind of piety. Goodies on hold, reserved for me after I die, if I meet the criteria.
Speaking of censorship, let me mention the two things you’ll never find in the traditional tracts at the back of the church:
* The Kingdom of God, and
* The King.
The “Jesus” of the tracts is a salvation appliance. Insert coin A, utter incantation B, pull handle C, and VOILA! Out pops ONE (1) item of Personal Eternal Fire Insurance! (This may have something to do with dispensationalism, and its ‘gospel’ that goes nowhere and does nothing in this age.)
MY Gospel, and the Bible’s, celebrates LIFE breaking into a dying world, a river of LIFE flowing from the throne of God that heals all that it touches, a Lord of LIFE Who rose from the dead and LIVES with us today, making us more ALIVE that we’d ever dreamed. ALIVE with joy, hope, purpose, and mission. We have so many opportunities in THIS life to experience, work with, and rejoice in our God. More than can be crammed into just this life, but more than enough to fill every second of every day with transcendent meaning.
Eph. 2:10 energizes my “day job” as a teacher. Every student has a sense of purpose, of mission, of vocation, of having been “designed” to DO something. Christian, Hindu, Muslim. Gay or straight. It’s hard-wired into us. And matters more to us than life itself. At Gallipoli, and Dien Bien Phu, soldiers were motivated to incredible heroism by a blunt command to “go and die,” knowing that their deaths would bring victory a little bit closer.
We have a message that will grab the attention of those around us — God is at work. In Jesus Christ, He has broken into this fallen world, and launched the process of setting it aright. Life is NOT a closed system, a Skinnger Box, a zero-sum game, winding down to nothing.
YOU, too, can have a piece of that action. YOU, too, can be in on what God is up to. As He is creative, and Creator, the ultimate Maker, so too will serving Him inspire you to make, to do, and to create. And the world will be better because you heard, and heeded, the call to get with His program.
Do you see the difference here? One “gospel” worries about death, and seeks to use Jesus to escape it. The Bible’s gospel focuses on LIFE, and the duty we have to let our God use US for His glory, and the blessings of our children and neighbors.