39 “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; 40 and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life. (Jhn 5:39-40 NASB) The Urgency of Theology On social media feeds and comment sections and such, I have […]
I think that if we had never suffered, we would see Him there on the throne, a Lamb as if slain, and it would have no meaning to us. We would not have fellowship because we would not understand what He had gone through.
The gospel declares that while we are yet sinners, at our worst, God demonstrates His own love towards us, His greatest and most sacrificial love. It kills the idolatrous faux-God of the judge-self. This is the way in which we are baptized into Christ’s death (Romans 6:3).
Grace overcomes at the exact point where judgment has its power. Under the law, we cannot and must not let go of our capacity to judge. It is the one thing we have which is right! So we see, where judgment thrives, grace wins.
15 It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. 16 Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would […]
There is a transformation that happens to us right exactly when we believe. However, it is not the transformation we were looking for, having been immersed our whole lives under the threat of the law. The real change is a shift in trust away from self to God. If the change were a change in success at keeping the law instead of a change of trust, why would we need the new testament imperatives?
If you live and breathe and think and exist in an environment where you believe in the power of Christ’s blood shed for sinners, you have escaped the two-dimensional prison. You really have come to believe, not simply that you alone are forgiven, but that there is a possibility of real lasting definitive forgiveness at all. You believe in substitutionary atonement.
Here is some counsel I gave someone who is a true and beautiful believer but who is having trouble, perhaps because of some bad teaching in their past, accepting that their faith in Christ is true: When Jesus died and said “it is finished”, it was finished. It is not dependent on some change in […]
In a recent post, Peter Rollins brings up an interesting idea about how many people base their relationships on what I would call false grace: … religion doesn’t simply offer a set of positions to conform to, it also offers the acceptable ways in which one can transgress these positions: it tells us both how […]
A freewheeling discussion about discipleship under grace with Jim McNeely and Dax Swanson. How did Jesus actually do discipleship? The answer is surprising! How does the gospel of grace inform our notion of discipleship?