I’ve had the privilege of touring a few churches in my city in the last few weeks. A rare treat in its own way, to praise with different brothers and sisters and to see how other people do things.
It’s completely unfair to judge any church from one Sunday, and I won’t say which churches I went to or even how many of them I’m talking about. I believe each one I went to is a gospel-preaching church, but here’s the thing: on more than one occasion I didn’t hear it.
I heard preaching that was incisive about the human heart, preaching that made the Christian life seem practical and gave me concrete steps to take to follow Jesus, I was inspired and challenged, but no one offered me Jesus.
I dearly hope it was happenstance.
Honestly, I don’t just mean the preaching. On some occasions we also didn’t hear the gospel in the songs, or even the name of Jesus. I don’t think it’s a checkbox thing where if I don’t hear ‘Jesus’ or ‘Cross’ or ‘Resurrection’ we have a problem; but, what exactly is it that we’re offering people?
I don’t want to call out these churches, because I think this is more easily done than we think. I think it’s easy to praise God and to preach true things about the Christian life and go through a whole Sunday without offering Jesus. I think it’s possible to do so for multiple Sundays in a row. It’s possible to forget you’re doing it, possibly even fall into the trap of thinking we outline the gospel on special occasions when unbelievers have been specifically invited like a baptism service. We sometimes talk like this, ‘a gospel message will be preached.’
There is no other message!
What we all forgot and need to hold ever before our eyes is this: Christians need the gospel. If I preach a message full of true things that doesn’t hold out Jesus as the answer to them this isn’t Christian preaching. This is not to say you can’t be practical, you should be. It’s not to say you can’t give people things to do, you should. It’s not to say that you have to take away the sting of Jesus’ demands by reminding us that we can’t fulfil them so don’t try.
Rather, it’s to say that Jesus is the treasure I have to offer. I need to rest in God and worship him each week with the people of God. I need the gospel to cover my sin, and I need the gospel as my motivation to go and do for Jesus. This stops our activity becoming law-based righteousness and keeps it as activity because I love him and doing things for him will help me love him more. It won’t make him love me more, as if such a thing were possible.
Honestly friends, here’s a secret for you: I’m the Father’s favourite. You know how I know? Because I’ve been united by the Spirit with Jesus the divine Son of the Father, and Jesus is the Father’s favourite. He loves me with the love he has for the Son. So, I’m his favourite, the very apple of his eye (Psalm 17). If you trust him, so are you. And you’re his favourite in a way that doesn’t diminish me being his favourite at all, because we are treated as though we’re Jesus because we’re in Christ.
Which means I can rest, and I can live the Christian life, and I want to worship him for who he is and for what he’s done.
If you preach, make sure your preaching offers me Christ. I need him. I need to confess my sin and receive forgiveness each week. I need to see again that I’m raised up and seated with him in heavenly places each week. I need to encounter these truths in mind, in heart, and in body; in my whole self. Every text of the Bible speaks of them, so preach them to me. If you’re telling me to be virtuous, that’s important, but remind me that it doesn’t earn me God’s favour and give me a better motivation for it; remind me that Jesus is the virtuous one and I learn virtue by following his pattern; remind me that he offers to make me like him; show me how that can be true. Call us to do hard things, but call us to do so in the grace of God.
If you choose which songs we sing, make sure that at some point we confess the shape of the gospel. There’s not a specific formula you have to fit in, the Bible tells the story in many ways, and the tone of this can be very different, but make sure it’s there. Notice that in some songs we only sing about ourselves, let’s sing about Jesus before we do that. Notice that in some songs we praise God but it’s not always clear what for, let’s make sure these are mixed in with songs that make it clear what we praise God for.
It doesn’t have to be every song: especially some of the songs we sing that worship God without being clear exactly why are great responses to songs that tell us exactly why. Commit yourself to ensuring that we are worshipping Jesus and that we know why. It’s good for us. If you want contributions in your worship you’ll also notice that when you give people meat to sing they find it easier to contribute. You gave them something to pray.
Perhaps your church missed this last Sunday, that’s not a good thing but if that’s generally not the case I wouldn’t get up in arms about it. We do make mistakes and can be blind to this, thinking we’ve done it when we haven’t. Give your Pastors the grace Jesus has given you and them. However, if it’s happened multiple Sundays in a row, why not gently challenge them. I’d appreciate it if it was me; I’d be appalled, but I do think I could make this mistake as easily as anyone else.
There’s no point gathering if it’s not to worship God. When we do so, my soul needs to be offered Jesus. So does yours.
Photo by Phil Hearing on Unsplash
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