Tag: Gospel

Proper Christian Growth

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Leadership, Pastoral, Quotes2 Comments

It is all too easy for us to think that once we know the basics of the gospel we must then move beyond them for true spiritual growth. Yet it is not extra-biblical revelations and methods that mature us, nor is it the search for esoteric meanings and codes in Scripture. Instead, it is the continual attempt to plumb the depths of the gospel message and its application to all of life, which is, in fact, the story of the Bible.

Question for Reflection

  1. How do you pursue Christian growth

Resources

Table Talk Magazine, Proper Christian Growth, January 6 2011.

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Do We Attract Like Jesus?

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Practical, Quotes3 Comments

Jesus’ teaching consistently attracted the irreligious while offending the Bible-believing, religious people of his day.

The Church Today

However, in the main, our churches today do not have this effect. The kind of outsiders Jesus attracted are not attracted to the contemporary churches, even our most avant-garde ones. We tend to draw conservative, buttoned down, moralistic people. The licentious and liberated or the broken and marginal avoid church.

What Does This Mean?

That can only mean one thing. If the preaching of our ministers and the practice of our parishioners do not have the same effect on people that Jesus had, then we must not be declaring the same message that Jesus did.

Question for Reflection

  1. Have you known this to be true in your own life – our message differing from Jesus’ in either word or deed?

Resources

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Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God: Recovering the heart of the Christian faith, 15-16 via A Meal with Jesus by Tim Chester, 84.

Missional Contextualization for Gospel Transformation

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Discipleship, Evangelism, Practical, Quotes1 Comment

Paul’s determination to adapt himself to the different cultures and contexts in which he would work established a basic mission strategy reflective of an important understanding of the relationship between the gospel and culture that has been essential to effective mission work throughout history.

What Could Have Been the Strategy

The Christian church could have simply decided that the gospel was a Jewish message sent throughout the world and that a proper response to the gospel should result in adopting the same cultural incarnation in all places. In that way Christians would all look and act the same, all have the same culture, wherever (or whenever) they lived.

What is the Strategy

Paul understands that the gospel does not belong to any particular culture.

As the gospel takes root among different peoples and cultures, its essence will remain the same but its “look and feel” may be somewhat different.

Why Contextualization is Important

Paul’s ability to adapt his life and culture according to the context in which he worked would have been strategic not only for the initial communication of the gospel but also for the ability of his converts to understand what it would look like for them to become members of Christ’s body. Gentile converts would not have to adopt Jewish culture to be members of Christ’s community, and Jewish converts to Christ would not need to become Gentiles or reject their Jewish heritage and lifestyle as part of their recognition of Christ’s lordship.

Question for Reflection

  1. Do you expect the lost to adapt to your culture? If so, why could that be an unnecessary hindrance to salvation?

Resources

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Text from Ciampa and Rosner, 1 Corinthians (PNTC), 425-26. Headings are my own.

A Continual Reformation

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Devotionals, QuotesLeave a comment

Fundamentally, Reformed theology is theology founded on and fashioned by God’s Word.

For it is God’s Word that forms our theology, and it is we who are reformed by that theology as we constantly return to God’s Word every day and in every generation.

At its core, this is what the sixteenth-century Reformation was all about, and it’s what being Reformed is all about – confessing and practicing what God’s Word teaches.

The Reformation isn’t over, nor will it ever be over, because reformation – God’s word and God’s Spirit reforming His church – will never end.

God’s Word is always powerful and God’s Spirit is always working to renew our minds, transform our hearts, and change our lives. Therefore, the people of God, the church, will be always “being reformed” according to the unchanging Word of God, not according to our ever-changing culture.

Question for Reflection

  1. Is God’s Word or the culture changing you?

Resources

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TableTalk Magazine, January 2015, The True Reformers, Burk Parsons

Who are We in Christ? – Part 3

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Devotionals, Evangelism4 Comments

Jesus on the Cross

Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians while in Ephesus after he heard of some issues plaguing the church. The issues Paul deals with in 1 Corinthians are the same issues we deal with today, which is why this is such a good book for the modern day church to study.

However, before Paul dives into the issues, he reminds the Corinthians, and subsequently us, of who we are in Christ.

In 1 Corinthians 1:2 Paul writes:

“To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.” (1 Cor. 1:2)

Based on 1 Corinthians 1:2, the second thing we learn is that:

(3) Those who are in Christ are Saints

In the middle of verse 2, Paul says that we are:

“called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (1 Cor. 1:2c)

Paul doesn’t beat around the bush. He flat out says that we are all called to be Saints.

What does it mean to be saint?

The Catholic Church doesn’t have the market cornered on saints. A Saint is someone who is set apart to live for God. Since all Christians are set apart to live for God, all Christians are saints.

Saints because sin no longer holds us back

We are all saints — we all can live for God — because sin no longer holds us back.

When I was in college, I had a passion for rock climbing. We had a nice climbing wall in our Rec Center at the University of Georgia, and we lived within a few hours drive of the best climbing in the Southeast. Needless to say I climbed all the time.

I remember one day I was climbing on a route in Tennessee at Foster Falls. A route that was a too advanced for me, but one I attempted anyways. While working the route, I hurt my shoulder. Not real bad, but I hurt it. Instead of resting my shoulder for a week or so, I decided to climb the next day. When I did, the small shoulder injury I had turned into a major shoulder injury. One that kept me from climbing for a long time.

Just as my shoulder injury once held me back from climbing, our sin once held us back from living for God. No matter how hard we tried, before we turned our lives over to Jesus, we couldn’t live a life that pleased God. It was impossible because our sin held us back.

Set free to live for God

When we became Christians, however, Jesus sets us free from sin, so that now we are able to live for God. That is exactly what God expects from us. He expects us to live for Him, to desire to and strive to become more and more like Christ each and everyday. Which is possible because we are saints who have been freed from the grip of sin.

Questions for Reflection

  1. Do you think of yourself as a saint?
  2. Do you believe you can live a holy life?

Resources

Post adapted from my sermon Who Are We In Christ?

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The Reformer’s Cry

On By Dr. Casey LewisIn Devotionals, QuotesLeave a comment

Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda, secundum verbum Dei – The church reformed and always being reformed according to God’s Word.

Question for Reflection

  1. Do you realize God’s Word and Spirit are always reforming His church by renewing, transforming, and changing us?

Resources

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