Don't Miss the Main Point of the Bible | Theocast Clips

Seeing Christ at the Center of Scripture

And with all due respect, you go and you hear all this stuff, and you're kind of like, like you said earlier, but before we recorded, you're like, where's Waldo? You know, like, where's Christ?

That's right.

And so we understand that the scriptures contain law and gospel, and that it's appropriate to go to any portion of the scripture with that framework in mind. And that's helpful to us in understanding the scripture.

The same could be said of a redemptive historical framework of the Bible with Jesus at the center. What does that mean? It means that the scripture, first and foremost, is a revelation of God's work in history to redeem, and all of it centers on the person and work of Jesus Christ to accomplish that redemption.

That's the main point. And so what we're contending for is that we would go to any passage of the Bible with these tools in our backpack so that we interpret any passage of the Bible in light of that main point that is redemption through Christ and the coming of Christ to redeem.

And we would also go to any passage of the scriptures and understand that the law of God that is holy, upright, and good, that we can't keep as fallen men in Adam, is revealed in all of the Bible, as is the gospel revealed in all of the Bible, namely the promises of God to save us through Christ.

And we want to understand any passage in the whole thing in light of these great truths. Or we are prone, as Martin Lloyd-Jones said, if you don't understand the whole, you are going to do terrible things with the parts.

Law, Gospel, and the Whole of the Bible

That's true. So you need to understand the whole of the Bible from these historical, tried-and-true perspectives. Law, gospel, covenant, theology, those things, so that you don't blow it up when you go to a part of the Bible and then interpret it here and do bad things with it.

We don't want to do that.

Go ahead.

No, that's why Paul says that the elders cannot be novices. And I think in many ways, he says they have to be able to properly defend the gospel.

It's a sound doctor.

Right.

Be able to give a defense of the hope that lies within you. And you have to do that from all of scripture. And so we're going to get into some dangers here and some examples of what we mean by this by multiple sources.

But a lot of what Theocast is about is that we are trying to say a lot of the frustration and the confusion is happening because we're ignoring tried-and-true, sound biblical structure and theology that's been handed down to us to help us to interpret rightly how the Bible is supposed to be understood.

Christ-Centered Ministry and Reformed Posture

Yeah.

And our podcast, so much of what we talked about, have talked about over the years, and so much of what people have gravitated toward over the years is we aim to herald Christ and his sufficiency, and we aim to point the center to Christ, not themselves.

And that's a historical reformed posture. Extranose, right? We're looking outside of ourselves to Christ always, and that's all we're trying to do.

Here.

But we have observed, along the lines of what we're talking about today, John, you go to many, many, many evangelical church services. You go to many church services in places or in churches that would even claim to be Calvinistic.

And you go in there, and there's a lot of things said about God and his sovereignty and all these kinds of things and his holiness and his mercy and his grace, maybe, as well. But then there's a lot said about us and how we need to live and our sincerity and our reverence and all of these kinds of things.

And with all due respect, you go and you hear all this stuff, and you're kind of like, like you said earlier before we recorded, you're like, where's Waldo? You know, like, where's Christ?

That's right.

We ought not have that takeaway. When we gather on the Lord's Day, this is just an indication of a systemic problem,.

Right?

When we gather on the Lord's Day, if you're asking the question, like, where is Christ for me? Where's Christ for me in what we're doing today?

Corporate worship.

That's evidence of a real problem underneath in terms of our theological framework and grounding, because we're not understanding that the Scripture ultimately, according to Christ himself and according to the apostles, is a testimony about Jesus.

Moses, the law, the prophets, the writings, it's all a testimony about Christ. And we're clearly not understanding that well when we go to church and we're having to ask ourselves, like, where is Christ for me in what we're doing?

The Bible as a Testimony About Jesus

And so that's sparking this too. And I think if you hear John and I passionate about this, it's because, my goodness, this is wrecking people.

That's right.

And this is why folks are exhausted. This is why people are discouraged. This is why everybody's, like, deep down, if we're honest, we lack assurance. We're troubled. And God, oftentimes, we struggle to see God as benevolent and loving and merciful and gracious because we've been so often presented with a God that's harsh.

And, man, it's just not helpful.