The Hope of the Gospel in Youth Discipleship

One needs only turn to the local Christian radio or television station to recognize that the church is not preaching a single theme. From the gospel of financial prosperity to the gospel of self-esteem, professing believers—and the world around us—endure a cacophony of Christian-sounding messages that are devoid of any genuinely good news precisely because they lead a person to turn to himself or herself as savior.

Even in conservative circles, the dissonance is great. Our churches may not have fallen for the likes of Joel Osteen or Joyce Meyer, but the signs of a shift in our preaching is ubiquitous. In our efforts to hedge our people from the evils of the world around us, too many of us have fallen into the trap of preaching a set of moral codes that may themselves be on the right track, but are not clearly connected to the person and work of Christ. As Jay Adams argues in Preaching with Purpose, “If you preach a sermon that would be acceptable to the member of a Jewish synagogue or to a Unitarian congregation, there is something radically wrong with it” (147).

What is it that makes the Christian message unique? Not the existence of One True God. Muslims accept this. Not the doctrine of the Trinity, for every good Romanist acknowledges one God who exists eternally in three Persons. Not even a kind of morality that is clearly different from our surrounding culture. One can hear this in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The uniqueness of the Christian message is the person and work of Christ—the message of the gospel—received by faith alone. It is God the Son becoming man, living in perfect obedience to God’s laws, earning righteousness for his people, dying the death that we rebels deserved, rising from the dead, ever interceding for his people. If we fail to preach the gospel clearly and repeatedly, then we are failing to communicate the one thing that makes our message unique. Or, to put it another way, any message that fails to preach Christ is not a Christian message.

In principle, no believer would contend with these statements. The problem may not be one’s adherence to the principle so much as one’s application in practice. To quote Shakespeare, “There’s the rub.” Most of us would define gospel preaching in purely evangelistic terms. We conduct attractional events to bring unbelievers to our property. We host a week of meetings for the purpose of spreading the gospel to the lost. We knock on doors, pass out tracts, and invite people to visit our services. In the end, our great hope is that some who do not know Christ will come savingly to believe in him under the faithful proclamation of God’s Word. This is gospel preaching, the very means by which God is pleased “to save those who believe” (1 Cor. 1:21, ESV).

But gospel preaching is not only for the lost. And here is where our problem arises. We are happy to proclaim the gospel clearly, authoritatively, and passionately to unbelievers—and well we should. But our preaching to the people of God is often woefully devoid of the hope of the gospel: the person and work of Christ.

Let me illustrate. A few months ago, I was watching a Christian television station that broadcast a rally for teenagers. I assume that the event was for believers because of the nature of the message. The preacher, a charismatic man in every sense of that term, sought to instill in these young people the importance of maintaining their virginity until marriage—an exhortation that is unquestionably biblical and appropriate. The title of his message, however, was indicative of his philosophy of sanctification: “Keep Your Underwear On.” He thundered forth the necessity of sexual purity, generously packing his address with a number of practical suggestions, the title of his message being his most repeated one. While I grant that I did not hear every word of his sermon, I listened long enough to understand Christian living from his perspective. His method for encouraging Christian young people to pursue holiness was entirely imperatival.

Now I am not suggesting that preaching in our circles is as shallow—let alone crude—as this. But there is an unsettling parallel. Far too many proclaim the gospel to unbelievers, but when it comes to urging our people to holiness, we cease preaching the person and work of Christ and rely wholly on imperatives. “You must love God. You must trust God. You must fear God. You must show mercy. You must forgive. You must not commit adultery.” And on and on it goes. And at those times when Christ is mentioned, he is identified only as our Chief Example, the One whose pattern we must follow. “You must love God like Christ did. You must forgive as Christ did.” True, Christ is our Example (1 Pet. 2:21). But that’s not all he is. Was that not the dividing line between the true gospel and the social gospel at the turn of the twentieth century? Was that not the concern raised by conservative contemporaries of Charles Sheldon when he penned In His Steps? And yet, a century later, Sheldon’s work is commended by professedly conservative evangelicals as a helpful exhortation to personal holiness. Is this not evidence of the downgrade of our gospel preaching to believers?

The gospel is as relevant for believers as it is for unbelievers. It is “the power of God for salvation” (Rom. 1:16), not merely for conversion. The apostle uses an umbrella term that encompasses every part of God’s redemptive work: past (regeneration and conversion), present (perseverance and preservation), and future (final redemption and glorification). Consequently, preachers must demonstrate the practicality of the gospel in every part of God’s salvific activity, including our ongoing sanctification.

One may wonder how the gospel is practically relevant for believers growing in holiness. This is a fair question, but it also reveals the very disconnect this article is seeking to address. The gospel is practically relevant for our sanctification in that the person and work of Christ applied by the Spirit to the believer is the grounds and hope of his or her growth in Christlikeness. Jesus’ life of full conformity to God’s moral will earned him the righteousness that has been imputed to us by faith (Rom. 5:1, 12-19). Jesus’ death on the cross fully satisfied divine wrath that otherwise was destined to fall on us all (Rom. 1:18; 3:21-26). Our union with Christ guarantees that all the benefits Jesus earned belong to those who savingly believe in him (Eph. 1:3-14). Therefore, Jesus is not merely my Example, but my Substitute, both in his life and in his death. God accepts me because of Jesus, not because of my performance. God welcomes me into his presence because Jesus was sinless, not because I am. My relationship is so secure that God considers me as already perfect (Heb. 10:14) and glorified (Rom. 8:30), though practically I am neither. And it is on this ground that the Spirit empowers me to become what I already am in Christ.

To put it another way, the indicative of who I am in Christ is the only grounds on which the imperative of what I am to be may rest. The NT epistolary authors often follow a stylistic pattern that demonstrates this point. Notice the following statistical analysis of the verbs within the main divisions of Romans, Ephesians, and Hebrews.



Each of these books divides clearly into two parts, often referred to as the doctrine and the application or the explanation and the exhortation. The analysis above highlights two key points. First, the use of the imperative drastically increases in the second section of each book. Before the author affirms the obligations of the gospel, he communicates clearly what is already true of God’s children because of the person and work of Christ. This alone should remedy any imperatival preaching that is devoid of the indicative of the gospel.

Second, notice that the use of the indicative stays relatively the same throughout a book. The use of the indicative is not inversely proportional with the use of the imperative. That means that when the NT apostolic authors were writing, they did not cease to communicate the truths of who the readers are in Christ, even when they were commanding them with the things they were to do because of their standing.

Our preaching to believers must follow this pattern of Scripture. We must begin, end, and fill our messages with the hope of the gospel. God’s children should not walk away from our sermons asking, “Where was Christ? We sang of him, but we did not hear of him.” Failing to proclaim the good news to God’s children so robs them of the very power that is at work to sanctify them.

Teenagers do not need to hear one more gospel-less message on how they are to live. They need to hear of a Savior who has lived and died in their place. Christian young people already know what they are supposed to do. What they are ignorant of is “the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe” to transform us into the image of Christ. May our gracious God “strengthen [his church] according to the gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ” so that he might receive “glory forevermore through Jesus Christ” (Rom. 16:25-27).



Related:

• Youth Discipleship (intro to this series)
  
• The Centrality of God in Youth Discipleship (Part 1 in this series)

Note: The related sermon preached at HPBC's 2009 "Don't Waste Your Summer" Conference is available here.

The Centrality of God in Youth Discipleship

The recent New York Times article, “Evangelicals Fear the Loss of Their Teenagers,” has stirred up a great deal of conversation among fundamentalists and evangelicals alike. While the article focused on broader evangelicalism, many fundamentalists are wrestling with the same phenomenon. Upon graduation from high school, far too many teenagers follow the call of the wild, drift away from the church, and (in some cases) repudiate their faith in Christ.

There is a sense in which this development should not be surprising at all. Since World War II, youth ministry in the United States has taken on a life of its own. Parachurch organizations were founded to focus on evangelizing and serving teenagers. Pastoral positions were created for the sole purpose of meeting the needs of high school students. And the Christian school movement has deluded some parents into thinking that their children’s academic environment will inevitably produce a disciple of Christ.

Such things as these are not inherently evil. But their proliferation over the last half-century has unwittingly taught our children a destructive notion: the church exists for them. For the first eighteen years of their lives, we tailor an unending succession of programs and events to cater to them. We entice them to come to church activities by telling them what they will get out of it. We create competitions based on spiritual sorts of things—Bible memory, sword drills, even personal devotional time—hoping that somehow God’s Word might lodge in their hearts. None of these things is inherently sinful, but taken together they give young people the impression that the church revolves around them. Even the phrase youth ministry implicitly teaches them to view themselves fundamentally as the objects of service.

Once teenagers graduate from high school, however, they are suddenly confronted with a church that no longer revolves around them. We explain to these young adults that God expects them to serve others and not themselves. But for years our example has taught them that the church exists for them. So when the church stops meeting their perceived needs—when the church stops existing for them—they have no reason to stick around.

Our discussion must transcend simply answering the question, How do we get them to stay? If that is all we do, then we may think that the solution is either to remake the rest of the church so that it would continue to exist for them (a strategy that surely is being tried in various quarters) or simply to create more service opportunities at increasingly younger ages. But neither of these strategies addresses the heart of the matter, for both are horizontal answers to an essentially vertical question. The problem is not primarily the loss of recent high school graduates. The drop-off between high school and young adulthood is symptomatic of a much bigger issue: a failure to teach the centrality of God in all things and to demonstrate the centrality of God in our youth discipleship. Nothing exists for them—or for us, for that matter. All of life is all about God.

For believers the thought of the centrality of God in everything almost goes without saying. The Scriptures teem with passages that speak of God as the source and the end of all things. “There is one God, the Father,” Paul writes, “from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist” (1 Cor. 8:6, ESV). Christ is the one “for whom and by whom all things exist” (Heb. 2:10; cf. Col. 1:16). Since all things are “from him and through him and to him,” God is the only one worthy of eternal glory (Rom. 11:36). Addressing the centrality of God in any matter seems virtually unnecessary since this truth is self-evident.

But far too often believers fail to live with God’s centrality in mind. Though God’s glory in all things is quite obvious, our finite and fallen minds often seek to shut God out of our thinking so that we can go about our lives in our own way, for our own purposes. Why else would the apostle need to exhort us, “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31)?

Therefore, the greatest need that our teenagers have is not a new program, a new enticement, or a new competition. Neither they nor we need a better activity than the last one or another list of dos and don’ts to govern our lives. Their greatest need—and ours—is to see God in all his glory. If our children and teenagers would see, know, and love this great God, everything else would fall into place.

Isaiah exemplifies this dynamic (Isa. 6). What brought about his willingness to be God’s ambassador (v. 8)? It was his vision of the greatness of God (vv. 1-4), a vision that brought about a genuine brokenness and humility over his own sin (v. 5) and the tender word of forgiveness from a God who is as good as he is great (vv. 6-7). We cannot make our teenagers willing to serve others. We cannot atone for their sins. We cannot force them to contrite admission of their own sin. But we can expose them to the glory of God. And we must.

Exposing children and teenagers to the glory of God sounds good and right, but it requires much more than merely implementing a new program. The glory of God is not something that we can simply add to our task lists; it is a wholly different paradigm through which we view everything. And if we ourselves are not seeing his glory in all things, can we reasonably expect the coming generations to do anything but follow our lead?

So where do we begin? We begin by following the example of Moses, on our knees begging God, “Show me your glory!” (Exo. 33:18). We begin by searching the written Word so that we might see the incarnate Word, in whose face we see “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God” (2 Cor. 4:6). We begin by exegeting life—every circumstance, every conversation, every relationship—to examine what this great Sovereign is seeking to demonstrate about himself (Ps. 115:3). In short, we must become people who are consumed, not with ministry and events, but with God and his glory. Whatever else we do in youth discipleship—or anywhere else in the church—must flow from that.

Renewing our commitment to seeing and speaking of the glory of God in all of life may not alter the direction of teenagers who insist on going their own way after high school. Discipleship is not a mathematical formula that requires only the right input in order to churn out a lifelong follower of Jesus. And no church will have a perfect track record of success. So recovering the centrality of God in our lives and in our churches is not a new strategy that we should try for a little while to see if it works. The glory of God is not a means to the end of discipleship success. The glory of God is not a means to any end; it is the end. All of life is out of him, all of life now exists through him, and all of life will return to him as the object of eternal glory. And every teenager who sits in our churches will glorify God forever—either in their salvation or their condemnation. Therefore, we must confront our young people with the reality, centrality, and glory of God early and often so that they might find him to be the sole object of their hearts’ affection. May God be pleased to use us in his gracious work of saving young people for his eternal glory.


Note: I preached a sermon based on this article for Hampton Park Baptist Church's 2009 Youth Conference, "Don't Waste Your Summer." The audio is available online.

Youth Discipleship

A couple of years ago I was asked to write a series of articles on youth discipleship for SharperIron. Since SI updated their site this month, those articles have been (temporarily?) removed. A number of people have asked me for these, so I'll re-post them over the next week.

In the meantime, let me point you to the series of sermons that shifted my paradigm on the matter. My pastor, Dan Brooks, and my predecessor, Dan Cruver, preached a four-part series on Discipling the Coming Generations in 2002. I am indebted to them for laying the theological and philosophical foundation for God-centered youth discipleship in my heart and mind.

• Brooks: That the Generation to Come Might Know (Ps 78)
• Brooks: Arrows of the Kingdom (Ps 127)
• Cruver: From One Generation to Another (Ps 145)
• Cruver: Discipleship: Why God-Centered (Is 42.8)
  

On Sanford's Confession

Like many other South Carolinians, I was stunned by the news yesterday that Gov. Mark Sanford had been involved in an adulterous relationship for the past year. I've liked Sanford since the first time I heard him on the radio, doing an interview ahead of the 2002 SC Republican Gubernatorial primary. I voted for him three times that year (the primary, the run-off, and the general election), and then voted for him again in 2006. While I thought the possibility of a 2012 race for the White House had slim chances (too many in-state fights with Republicans, rated one of America's worst governors by Time, not charismatic enough, etc.), I nevertheless appreciated his emerging national voice on a variety of issues.

Yesterday, that voice was silenced. His private choices over the past year make his public stance irrelevant at best, laughable at worst. Besides losing national influence, Sanford already had great difficulty leading his own state--his own party, even. Those problems will only grow. Frankly, I wonder whether Sanford should simply resign his position now and focus on the counseling and reconciliation that he says he wants. What better way to demonstrate the genuineness of his repentance than to walk away from his powerful position in order to restore the marriage he has broken.

But this post is not about Mark Sanford. It's about you and me. As stunned as we are (and should be) by this news, it ought to serve as a sobering reminder of our own depravity. Here are some lessons that I'm pondering today in the wake of this news:

1. We must acknowledge that our biggest problem is not "out there." It is "in here." So much of the Christian's battle against lust is directed against the "out there." We install internet filters. We block television stations. We avoid magazine covers. The list goes on and on. Don't get me wrong, these are necessary steps in applying the gospel in the nasty here-and-now. But Jesus said that the problem is not what comes in from the outside. What defiles a person is what comes out of the heart. So my biggest problem is not "out there." It's not Hollywood, the internet, or cable TV. My biggest problem is within. And so is yours. If you live in that reality, it will humble you into realizing that you're a greater sinner than you would have ever believed, it will put your battle with sin "out there" in right perspective, and it will free you to extend grace to others who have sinned beyond your expectations.

2. We must measure ourselves against the right standard. Conservatives can be absolutely ruthless in identifying other people's sins. I was not blown away last night when I turned on Fox News and watched Karl Rove explain that Sanford's sin was not as bad as Eliot Spitzer's or Barney Frank's--both of whom are (surprise!) Democrats. Of course this isn't merely a problem for conservatives; it's a problem as wide as humanity. We tend to view our sin in comparison to others and thereby justify ourselves. But the standard is not others' behavior or even our own personal code of ethics. The standard is God's inflexible law. And until you find yourself crumble beneath its weight, you will not find the gospel to be the only antidote.

3. We must guard ourselves in our friendships--and especially in our counselees. Apparently the relationship between Sanford and his mistress began with seemingly innocent e-mails exchanged between the two, some of which included Sanford's counsel to her concerning a difficult marriage. Pastors, take note! Whenever we are called on to give counsel, especially marital counsel, to a woman, we must recognize the danger of our hearts becoming intertwined with theirs. This doesn't mean that a pastor should never counsel a lady, but pastors must be very careful in that context and should make sure that they are being held accountable for those conversations, whether they occur in private or over the internet.

A broader point of application: we must be careful as to our virtual friendships. Social networking sites like Facebook are wonderful means of communicating with people we haven't seen in years. But because of our sinful hearts, they can also be used of the adversary to cultivate unhealthy relationships from that which was initially innocuous.

4. We must seek accountability. No one is above committing the kind of sin to which Sanford admitted yesterday. Not you. Not me. If we shut ourselves off from others, sin will deceive us all the more easily. Consider these words from Hebrews: "Exhort one another every day, as long as it is called, 'today,' that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin" (3.13). The process is stated in reverse: first sin deceives, then it hardens. We combat that by speaking (and being spoken to) every single day. Accountability, of course, is not fool-proof; if a person is committing adultery, certainly he/she would be willing to lie about it. But intentional accountability is one means that God gives us to help fight sin.

5. We must be sobered by how our sin affects others. "No one sins on an island." "You can choose your sin, but you cannot choose the consequences of your sin." Just cliches, right? Wrong. Tell that to Jenny Sanford and the four Sanford boys. Part of sin's deception is to tell us that we can sin and get away with it, that we can sin and no one else will be hurt. A little laziness. A little carelessness. A little fun. In the end, a lot of heartache--and not just for you.

6. We must repent of putting our hope in people. Whether you are conservative, liberal, or somewhere in between, we all tend to expect way too much out of politicians. Listen to the words that we use at our political conventions: "change," "hope," "believe," "redemption." You'd think it was a mid-twentieth-century evangelistic crusade.

(And for those who might think I'm merely referring to Obama's "Change You Can Believe In," allow me to remind you of Ron Paul's slogan, "Hope for America." Hope for America? Really?)

Our political lingo is laced with theological (soteriological!) terms. Add to that the reality that we're always looking for a savior, someone to come and bail us out of our troubles. Consequently we rest our hopes in the Next Rising Star rather than the Sovereign Christ. And for that we must all repent.

7. We must look away to Christ. He is our Savior, our wisdom, our righteousness, our sanctification, our redemption, and will some day be our eternal reward. Look within and despair; look away and rejoice. Jesus, Jesus only, is our hope.

Minnick on the FBF

Dr. Mark Minnick, pastor of Mount Calvary Baptist Church, preached a sermon last night on the recent FBF controversy. The audio is available on the church's website. I am listening to it right now. I'm sure there will be lots of discussion to come!

A Great Father's Day

For many reasons:

1. I got a new Tigers hat.









2. I got some beautiful artwork from the girls.














3. I got a Jeep.











Yeah, it was a great day!

On Marriage Vows: Traditional or Custom-Made?

Weddings have certainly been on my mind, having attended three in the last three weeks. So it was with great interest that I read this article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal. David Lapp discusses the decreasing use of traditional vows in favor of custom-made (or, as the case may be, custom-ordered) ones. For Lapp the issue arose when his pastor refused to allow him and his fiancee to write their own. "My sensibilities were offended. 'Don't you know this is our wedding?"

Eventually the author came around to his pastor's view, arguing for the traditional vows on the basis of the institution of marriage itself:

When one enters marriage, one steps into an institution bigger than oneself: It includes another person, the community and future children. Acts of this magnitude warrant precise and time-tested words. And as my pastor said: "A church acts like family: We share in the couple's vows as we witness the vows being made, as we pray for them, support them, and even keep them accountable to those vows during difficult times."

Lapp ends his article by citing Dietrich Bonhoeffer (a quotation which, incidentally, is also referenced in John Piper's This Momentary Marriage): "It is not your love that sustains the marriage, but from now on, the marriage that sustains your love." He concludes:

In the traditional vows, the institution -- marriage -- makes and forms the couple; the vows set out what marriage is and what it requires. In today's write-your-own or instant-download vows, the couple picks and chooses the promises they make to each other -- they make their own definition. The more casual attitudes toward the vows are probably a symptom of our more casual attitude toward marriage.

The author's arguments may not be finally convincing. But his cautions are worth your consideration, whether you are planning your own wedding or officiating another's.