If you have not read the first post from this series, you can do so by clicking here. I ended by asking how God can both punish and pardon sin. Here’s the answer.

Our God Pardons Sin by Punishing Evil

“At the cross, all the attributes of God win.” That is how Tim Keller describes the meeting of God’s justice and mercy in the blood-drenched cross of Calvary. What’s terrible and beautiful about Jesus hanging on the tree is that the living God punished evil as a holy judge and displayed His abundant mercy by pardoning the sins of those who believe in Christ. God maintained the integrity of His justice and poured out His steadfast love when the Savior stood in our place. Christ “fell into the hands of the living God” so that we could be embraced tenderly by those same hands. Hallelujah, what wonderful news! This is the gospel of God’s grace. We are saved from His wrath by His own gracious substitution.

What’s at Stake Here?

You may be thinking to yourself: “Why is any of this important?” If so, let me affirm the validity of your question by offering three reasons grasping the tension of God’s justice and mercy is critical:

1. The Bible is at stake. As I’ve tried to briefly demonstrate, the Biblical witness puts forth a God who is both the punisher and pardoner of sin (see Rom. 3:26). If we fail to maintain both of those attributes, we are contradicting what God has said about Himself in His Word. When we throw out the Bible, we reject the very resource that He has given us to know Him truly. It is important to let our view of God be shaped by the whole of Scripture and not cultural norms, which are ever-changing.

2. God’s character is at stake. It is crucial that God cast judgment upon sinners. If He does not, then He is wicked, just as the police officer who lets the criminal get away without attempting pursuit. We cannot believe in a God who will continue to let evil flourish. There must be a day of reckoning for all of the wrongs that we observe and experience in our world. The goodness of God depends upon it.

3. The gospel is at stake. If we don’t really need to be saved from God’s righteous judgment, then why did Jesus come to earth at all? Throwing out God’s wrath makes all of Christ’s agony for us irrelevant. How tragic it would be for us to rob ourselves of God’s greatest expression of love toward us. Instead, may we embrace the wonderful reality that God would be without fault to eternally punish us for our sins, but He pardons them by punishing Jesus in our stead.

(by Dustin Smetona)

The glory of the gospel is this: the One from whom we need to be saved is the very One who saves us.
~Mike Bullmore, teaching from the book of Zephaniah

Rob Bell was torched and esteemed by many in the evangelical blogosphere back in March 2011 for his controversial book on hell, Love Wins. Though the controversy has settled down, there are still references being made to the significance of Bell’s treatise on the eternality of hell, post-mortem salvation, and the very character of God. It’s that third one, God’s character, that is most compelling to me. In his promotional video, Bell contests the idea of a God who is like the one Mike Bullmore describes above. He asks, “But what kind of God is that that we would need to be rescued from this God?”

Bell’s question is a rhetorical device, but it holds enough weight to warrant some examination. If we believe God exists, then we must come to conclusions about what He’s like. Should we love Him or fear Him? Is he merciful or just?

A Just God Punishes Evil

Imagine a highway patrolman watching a car drive by at 120mph, and deciding that it’s too much effort to pursue. If you observed an officer doing that wouldn’t you be offended? That’s because humans have a godly impulse that drives them to resist reckless law-breaking. We know deep down inside that having an ordered society requires judgment. That impulse gives witness to our role as image-bearers of God. Because He is good and because He is just, God punishes evil. In fact, He is now and will be forever worshiped for judging those who transgress. Consider the angel in Rev. 14:7 who cries out, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come…” Just as we praise the police officer who catches the criminal, so we praise God who punishes the wicked.

A Merciful God Pardons Sin

If I stopped writing after the previous paragraph, we should all have cause for concern. If God was only defined by His justice, we would relate to Him as guilty criminals before a righteously condemning judge. That would be horrific.  It makes me tremble to consider, but many will have that kind of relationship with God — consider Rev. 6:16. Fortunately for us, God is characterized by more than justice. He is characterized by mercy. “But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Ps. 86:15). This merciful God expresses that mercy by pardoning our sins. As Micah 7:18 reads, “Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love.” This judge, obligated by his own righteous justice, punishes sinners for their sins. And yet, He is also merciful, forgiving the guilty and passing over their sins. How can this be?

Stay tuned for part 2.

A brilliant post from Joe Thorn:

There is more in God’s word than the gospel. God has given us his law to show us the way, uncover our corruption and condemnation, and point us to our need of redemption. There are commands to be obeyed, there is wisdom to learn and practice, and affections to feel and be moved by. But, the law itself is unable to create within us new hearts, or empower us to obey its demands. So let me say it this way: The gospel is the main thing, it is not the only thing. However, it is the only thing that brings life, power, and transformation. The gospel isn’t everything, but it does connect to everything, and preachers and teachers in the church must be able to show that connection lest we allow the church to drift (or even be led) into various kinds of hopeless, powerless legalism.

Read the whole thing.

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”
(Romans 1:16)

This has always been one of those verses that calls for a particular pause in my life. I know the God I believe in, and I am overwhelmingly thankful for my new life in Christ. And yet there is often a conviction in not responding to others in a way that truly reflects the joy that has welled up in my heart. I mean, the power of God saved me! Spending a bit of time in this text, however, has been most encouraging.

Not ashamed

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel”. What a peculiar statement to start with. After Paul’s lengthy introduction in Romans 1, that is what he says: I am not ashamed. Why would Paul say he is not ashamed? We generally don’t defend a position this way unless there are accusations from those who may not like what we have to say. If we take a look at Romans 1:14, we see that the gospel is for the Greeks, the Barbarians, the Jews, the Gentiles. These are the philosophical and learned, the social outcasts, the religious elite, and the worldly. Sound familiar with our culture today? Paul may have been addressing the Romans, but God is surely addressing us. In verse 16, the God of grace reminds us that the gospel is not one to be ashamed of regardless of how others respond!

Some mocked… some believed.

In Acts 17:32, we are given an account of Paul’s message with two completely different responses: “Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said, ‘We will hear you again about this.’ So Paul went out from their midst. But some men joined him and believed…”

Some mocked, some joined Paul and believed. Same message, two completely difference responses. Paul was faithful to the gospel message. He wasn’t ashamed.

Why was Paul not ashamed? Because he just didn’t care what others would think of him? No. Was it because he felt obligated to preach the gospel? That’s not what the text says. Paul wasn’t ashamed of the gospel because “it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes”! It is a regenerating power, a transformational power, a resurrecting power. It is the power that changed Paul and every other believer. God’s power is the means of salvation.

It’s not about you or me

Proclaiming the gospel boldly has nothing to do with our personality nor is it related to how fascinating our particular life story is. The story of the 6-year-old child conversion is just as amazing as the 40-year-old man that was saved after a life of drug abuse. Why? Because the gospel is about the power of God. It is about the work of Jesus Christ on the cross and what He has accomplished. It is not about our message. It’s about God’s message—the message of his sovereign grace and power to save sinners. And that is a message to never be ashamed of.

The implications of this perspective are far reaching as our message will never change, regardless of the responses we receive. Some of us will want to to change the message in order to reap a certain response. Don’t. Let us remain faithful to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Some will mock. Let them. Others, however, will receive the words of eternal life. The gospel is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in “accountability groups” where there has been little to no attention given to the gospel whatsoever. There’s no reminder of what Christ has done for our sin—“cleansing us from its guilt and power”—and the resources that are already ours by virtue of our union with him. These groups produce a “do more, try harder” moralism that robs us of the joy and freedom Jesus paid dearly to secure for us.

….

Christian growth…does not happen first by behaving better, but believing better—believing in bigger, deeper, brighter ways what Christ has already secured for sinners. I need my family and friends to remind me of this all the time.

The bottom line is this, Christian: because of Christ’s work on your behalf, God does not dwell on your sin the way you do. So, relax and rejoice…and you’ll actually start to get better. The irony, of course, is that it’s only when we stop obsessing over our own need to be holy and focus instead on the beauty of Christ’s holiness, that we actually become more holy!

Read the rest.

The gospel is for all of life, not just the point of conversion. We are saved through the gospel, we are sustained through the gospel, and we are kept eternally secure in the the gospel. The good news is about Jesus’ efforts, not ours. And when he said, “It is finished,” you better believe he meant it. It would do us a whole lot of good if we preached this message to ourselves, and each other, daily. Never forget it.

A simple animation. A simple song. A simple speech.

I love this video because it reminds me of the simplicity of the gospel. The animation reminds me of a child-like joy and simplicity that is found in the gospel. The song, The Gospel Song, is beautiful. It is only four lines long, but they are strong and powerful. They capture the essence of God’s character, His radical love for us in His becoming incarnate, living the life we were supposed to live, and dying the death we were supposed to die, all so we might live and, ultimately, glorify Him!  In the video (1:20), John Piper summarizes the gospel  truth in a few words. Nothing elaborate, but so worshipful.

I pray that you are reminded that simplicity in our faith is not bad.  Sometimes, I think it is necessary and refreshing for our souls. The Gospel is such that a child can understand it in an instant and a scholar can search the depths of it for a lifetime. As we all grow in our passion for the Gospel, searching the depths of its truth, let’s never ignore the beautiful simplicity of it!

Holy God, in love, became
Perfect Man to bear my blame
On the cross He took my sin
By His death I live again

* “The Gospel Song” Lyrics by Drew Jones. Music by Bob Kauflin.

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
(Ephesians 2:1-7)

Earlier this month, one of my co-workers publicly declared her life as Christ’s through baptism.

Pretty exciting, right? I had asked her to come to church with me back in May, not really thinking much of it. She came, the Lord changed her heart, and now she just got baptized.

At our church, when you get baptized, you’re asked to share a little testimonial about how you came to this place in your life. She came to me last week and asked if I would read her testimonial and see if it sounded alright. Being a grammar-lover, I happily obliged.

After reading her testimonial, it struck me how much bigger God is than I ever give Him credit for, so I wanted to share a part of it with you.

Here’s a part of the testimonial:

“I was at the end of my rope, literally and figuratively. I was suicidal, planning ways to end it so my kids would have the least amount of pain. After a particularly grueling Saturday ‘planning session’ night, I fell into a deep sleep. I awoke Sunday morning with a random thought in my head: ‘I wonder if Rachel would mind if I asked her if I could go to church with her?’

Less than two hours later, she sent me a text asking, ‘Wanna go to church with me next Sunday?’

My plan: To say one last good-bye to God. I was done. I knew I would never enter His kingdom as my sins were far too great.”

Obviously this story has a happy ending, and she is now a believer and active member of our church.

What struck me was how unaware I was of God’s moving. I sent her a text message, really not thinking anything would come of it. If she came, great, if not, oh well. I tried. Christ was completely removed from the picture. I wasn’t trusting that He would change her heart, I was just doing what I thought was the right thing to do.

Looking back with her perspective added, Christ’s hand was all over this situation. Sending that text message was divinely inspired. The timing was dead on—a feat that I couldn’t accomplish on my own and appears too intricate to write off as coincidence.

Beyond that, the pain my co-worker was going through was far more than I could’ve ever known. The thought to invite her had been tugging at me for a while, but I knew she had lost faith in the church a long time ago, due to past experiences. To me, it was just a case of a believer asking a non-believer to church. In her eyes, it was a follower of Christ throwing her a lifeline.

I write this to not only encourage you to invite your unbelieving friends and family to church, but to also show how much work God is doing outside of our limited awareness.

From Joshua Harris’ blog: