Is Reformed Christianity Starting to Add Works Back Into the Gospel?

The tactic of so many preachers out there, when it comes to obedience for the Christian, is to preach

Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and justification and all that kind of stuff. But then when it comes to sanctification, it's like, well, we've got to have some skin in the game in order for people to be appropriately motivated to pursue obedience and holiness.

And so you get this kind of obey or else, dot, dot, dot. You've probably been a faker all along and we're just going to kind of smoke that out over time.

And you know, Christianity is only for the serious amongst us in order to strongly survive. You know, that's the kind of message that comes out.

And that feeds into our natural tendencies to think that we need to work for it. When biblically speaking, sanctification is a supernatural thing that Christ does through the work of his spirit in us.

And it's all grounded in our union with him. The work of finding your assurance was never given to the believer.

It's so wrong. It was the work of sharing your assurance, not finding it.

Paul makes this radical statement in 1 Timothy 4 .1 that in latter times, the church is going to be swayed.

And it says by the doctrines of demons, which means demons teaching these things. And you go on to realize what he's talking about.

He's talking about a half gospel where they're going to come and they're going to sound right.

The thing about a lie is that a lie is about 99 % truth.

Right? So we're talking about clarifying the gospel, which is really what Theocast loves to do, is making sure that we keep it clear because there is an attack on the gospel.

And sometimes we don't understand that attack is just leaving half of it off. That's the attack, right?

Giving just half the truth. In latter times, they're going to go on itching ears and you're going to move from the gospel.

And it's demonic. I'll just say this. It is demonic. They move from the gospel to humanism. And that's not the power of God.

There is how you come into right relationship with God and then the effects of it. And at times we bring the effects into the gospel.

You can't do that. And then that's where the danger comes. I do think that many Christians just kind of swing on that pendulum between self -righteousness and despair.

And the antidote to that, to both of those things, is to point the believer outside of themselves to Christ and to fix your gaze on Him for you.

And then we're getting somewhere. The distinction between the law and the gospel in that there is nothing whatsoever in the gospel for us to do.

That makes people really nervous. The narrow way is not your discipline.

And you're going to work your way. Like you're going to stay on the straight and narrow. The narrow way is there's one man who's kept the law.

He just preached the law and crushed everybody. And now there's one who's kept it. And the only way to the Father is through Him, right?

That's a narrow way understanding. Like we understand that we are pilgrims and sojourners and exiles in this life.

And that ultimately we're on our way to the new heavens and the new earth that's been promised to us. But between here and there, there are thousands of spiritual dangers and trials and temptations on every side.

And so we need protection and nourishment and sustenance. And that's what the ministry of the church is for. The gospel in and of itself, this is an important understanding that the word means good news.

And the nature of news is that it's past tense. It's not present or future, right?

It's telling you what has happened. And so that's what's so important is that there's no potential to the gospel.

There is nothing whatsoever for us to do when it comes to the gospel. The gospel is only about what

Jesus Christ has done. The good news of the gospel is that everything you could ever need to be with your

Father is gifted to you by forgiveness of sins and the giving over of Christ's righteousness forever.

And that means when Paul says, if you're going to boast, proudly put on his righteousness and boast in the

Lord. That would be our explanation of the gospel. And the most important part of that is just like, well, how do I know this to be true about me?

Like this news is true about me. And it's great because Jesus says, if you believe, you know it's true about you.