I read a book a couple of years ago now written by a woman who was a missionary to the Philippines in the 1950s (and 60s). She recounts in her book that once she had gained the ear of the leaders of the tribe, they would gather every day to hear about the Gospel. They would ask her questions and she would offer biblical answers. This is fairly unremarkable work for a missionary except that the leaders of the tribe did this, day after day, for months and they asked the same questions again and again. The missionary began to feel like a suspect taken in for questioning by the police, made to repeat her story over and over.
Finally, one evening, she pressed the leaders to explain why they wanted to hear again the Gospel they had heard many dozens of times already and why they always asked the same questions of her as they listened. The chief of the tribe was silent for a time and then he replied, "If what you are telling us is true, it will change everything about our lives. We will have to live for God. We must, then, be certain it is the truth before we will accept it."
The missionary was shocked. She had never before encountered people who were so aware of what believing the Gospel would mean to their living. Respecting their carefulness, she continued to repeat the Good News of salvation to the tribespeople and answer their questions until, one day, the entire tribe came to faith in Christ, totally transforming, top-to-bottom, as a result. Old customs and beliefs had to be immediately abandoned - which actually led to a supernatural showdown between the local witch-doctor and the missionary (that the witch-doctor lost, of course); war had to be set aside for peace; superstition had to be forsaken; sin had to be recognized for what it was and rejected. The effects of the Gospel upon the tribe were far-reaching and profound - and difficult and dangerous, too. Ceasing the lethal feuds with neighboring tribes, which had endured for many generations in some cases, was particularly risky. If enemy tribes realized this converted tribe would not fight back, a massacre might have resulted. God preserved His own, however, and used the converted tribe to lead other enemy tribes to faith in Christ.
It struck me how the tribe leaders anticipated how dangerous the results of their conversion could be, not just to themselves, but to the entire tribe. Following Jesus might very literally have meant death for them all. But this prospect did not divert the tribe leaders from discovering the truth. If the Gospel was true, regardless of its attendant dangers, they wanted to know it and live by it.
I haven't ever encountered this sort of attitude and thinking concerning the Gospel in the West. Instead, in my experience, salvation is presented as an accessory to living, a religious/spiritual dimension to a well-rounded life; as a get-out-of-hell-free card (if hell is mentioned at all) and an eternal, life-after-death retirement plan; as an invitation to friendship with God, who becomes a sort of life-coach, a chummy and thoroughly innocuous "Man in the sky," who encourages and supports you as you pursue your vision of success.
Because the Gospel is characterized in these ways, the lost treat it, not as urgent, lifesaving truth, but as a product to be consumed, or a helpful perspective to be considered. The Gospel is not capital "T" truth, but just one way among many by which to spiritualize one's life a bit.
But this isn't the Gospel - as the Filipino tribespeople understood. The actual Gospel is not a one-way offering of a gift, but is, actually, an exchange: Your wicked, fleshly, rebellious, death-producing life for a new, eternal, spiritual life in Jesus Christ; your weakness and sin for Christ's strength and perfect righteousness; your will and way for God's will and way; the throne of your heart, heretofore occupied by Self, yielded up entirely to Christ instead.
This Gospel of exchange is costly. Really, it costs everything. Not that you buy salvation by way of this exchange, however; God benefits not at all from the exchange, your old godless life being utterly valueless - and repugnant - to Him. The exchange is akin to a beggar yielding up his ragged, filthy life for one sustained by the riches and grace of a wealthy benefactor who clothes, and feeds, and houses him. In the case of salvation, however, our divine Benefactor comes to us as the Maker of Heaven and Earth, the Lord God Almighty, who deals with us only as He is, possessing the unique right to demand of us all that He wishes and doing so aggressively:
Matthew 10:37-39
37 "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.
38 "And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.
39 "He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.
Matthew 16:24-25
24 Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.
25 "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.
John 12:24-25
24 "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.
25 "He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal.
Yikes! This all sounds very grim, doesn't it? Who wants to die? What would induce anyone to move in such a drastic direction? The answer, paradoxically, is: Life. We come to really live, to live as we were made to do, and to live eternally, only as we first die to our Self-directed, Self-centered manner of living. At the heart of this "real life" is God Himself, the Greatest Thing in all of Creation, greater than all of Creation, whom we can know, and enjoy, and glorify as He made each of us to do. Only in exchanging our rebellious, sinful living for the Life He offers to us in Himself, only in dying to ourselves, do we find the Life for which we were made.
To this end, there are injunctions all throughout the New Testament to live as one who has "taken up one's cross" and died upon it.
Romans 6:22
22 But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.
Romans 8:14
14 For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.
Romans 12:1
1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
Galatians 2:20
20 "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
Galatians 5:24
24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
Galatians 6:14
14 But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
James 4:6-7
6 But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, "GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE."
7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
James 4:10
10 Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.
1 Peter 5:6
6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
As you can see, the Gospel is actually an invitation to the crucified life, a life of Self-death. But this self-crucifixion isn't an end in itself, as some come to believe. It is merely the doorway, the means, to full, rich, joyful fellowship with God. This is the goal of dying to oneself: Life and joy in God!
Are you living in death that you might gain Life? I hope and pray so. This is the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.
John 10:10
10 "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.
John 20:31
31 but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
1 John 5:11-12
11 And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.
12 He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.
Finally, one evening, she pressed the leaders to explain why they wanted to hear again the Gospel they had heard many dozens of times already and why they always asked the same questions of her as they listened. The chief of the tribe was silent for a time and then he replied, "If what you are telling us is true, it will change everything about our lives. We will have to live for God. We must, then, be certain it is the truth before we will accept it."
The missionary was shocked. She had never before encountered people who were so aware of what believing the Gospel would mean to their living. Respecting their carefulness, she continued to repeat the Good News of salvation to the tribespeople and answer their questions until, one day, the entire tribe came to faith in Christ, totally transforming, top-to-bottom, as a result. Old customs and beliefs had to be immediately abandoned - which actually led to a supernatural showdown between the local witch-doctor and the missionary (that the witch-doctor lost, of course); war had to be set aside for peace; superstition had to be forsaken; sin had to be recognized for what it was and rejected. The effects of the Gospel upon the tribe were far-reaching and profound - and difficult and dangerous, too. Ceasing the lethal feuds with neighboring tribes, which had endured for many generations in some cases, was particularly risky. If enemy tribes realized this converted tribe would not fight back, a massacre might have resulted. God preserved His own, however, and used the converted tribe to lead other enemy tribes to faith in Christ.
It struck me how the tribe leaders anticipated how dangerous the results of their conversion could be, not just to themselves, but to the entire tribe. Following Jesus might very literally have meant death for them all. But this prospect did not divert the tribe leaders from discovering the truth. If the Gospel was true, regardless of its attendant dangers, they wanted to know it and live by it.
I haven't ever encountered this sort of attitude and thinking concerning the Gospel in the West. Instead, in my experience, salvation is presented as an accessory to living, a religious/spiritual dimension to a well-rounded life; as a get-out-of-hell-free card (if hell is mentioned at all) and an eternal, life-after-death retirement plan; as an invitation to friendship with God, who becomes a sort of life-coach, a chummy and thoroughly innocuous "Man in the sky," who encourages and supports you as you pursue your vision of success.
Because the Gospel is characterized in these ways, the lost treat it, not as urgent, lifesaving truth, but as a product to be consumed, or a helpful perspective to be considered. The Gospel is not capital "T" truth, but just one way among many by which to spiritualize one's life a bit.
But this isn't the Gospel - as the Filipino tribespeople understood. The actual Gospel is not a one-way offering of a gift, but is, actually, an exchange: Your wicked, fleshly, rebellious, death-producing life for a new, eternal, spiritual life in Jesus Christ; your weakness and sin for Christ's strength and perfect righteousness; your will and way for God's will and way; the throne of your heart, heretofore occupied by Self, yielded up entirely to Christ instead.
This Gospel of exchange is costly. Really, it costs everything. Not that you buy salvation by way of this exchange, however; God benefits not at all from the exchange, your old godless life being utterly valueless - and repugnant - to Him. The exchange is akin to a beggar yielding up his ragged, filthy life for one sustained by the riches and grace of a wealthy benefactor who clothes, and feeds, and houses him. In the case of salvation, however, our divine Benefactor comes to us as the Maker of Heaven and Earth, the Lord God Almighty, who deals with us only as He is, possessing the unique right to demand of us all that He wishes and doing so aggressively:
Matthew 10:37-39
37 "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.
38 "And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.
39 "He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.
Matthew 16:24-25
24 Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.
25 "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.
John 12:24-25
24 "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.
25 "He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal.
Yikes! This all sounds very grim, doesn't it? Who wants to die? What would induce anyone to move in such a drastic direction? The answer, paradoxically, is: Life. We come to really live, to live as we were made to do, and to live eternally, only as we first die to our Self-directed, Self-centered manner of living. At the heart of this "real life" is God Himself, the Greatest Thing in all of Creation, greater than all of Creation, whom we can know, and enjoy, and glorify as He made each of us to do. Only in exchanging our rebellious, sinful living for the Life He offers to us in Himself, only in dying to ourselves, do we find the Life for which we were made.
To this end, there are injunctions all throughout the New Testament to live as one who has "taken up one's cross" and died upon it.
Romans 6:22
22 But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.
Romans 8:14
14 For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.
Romans 12:1
1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
Galatians 2:20
20 "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
Galatians 5:24
24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
Galatians 6:14
14 But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
James 4:6-7
6 But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, "GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE."
7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
James 4:10
10 Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.
1 Peter 5:6
6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
As you can see, the Gospel is actually an invitation to the crucified life, a life of Self-death. But this self-crucifixion isn't an end in itself, as some come to believe. It is merely the doorway, the means, to full, rich, joyful fellowship with God. This is the goal of dying to oneself: Life and joy in God!
Are you living in death that you might gain Life? I hope and pray so. This is the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.
John 10:10
10 "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.
John 20:31
31 but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
1 John 5:11-12
11 And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.
12 He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.
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