Getting Inside the Gospel

The message of the Gospel is not “God so loved the world ...” Or rather it is not just that. It is that we must love our neighbours. The message of the Gospel is truth and grace.

John 1:1

John 1:17

For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.

There’s a transition from the law, for the law was not a full understanding of the word. Through the Old Testament, the prophets give a glimpse of the word, but people didn’t really grasp it. But now we don’t deal with the law, but with truth, which is a great thing. Sometimes it’s a painful thing too. We are given truth and grace – such a lovely combination. It is the ministry Christ places into our hands as well – truth and grace.

It’s easy for us to read the Bible and just see the words. Our mind is at rest. We aren’t really thinking about what’s going on. The Bible is filled with so many amazing stories. As an actor I want to challenge you to come to it alive. Ask what is going on.

In Luke there are two meetings which happen with Jesus. Jesus is doing miracles and speaking with people, but He is also laying down a new concept of who God might be. Even the people who aren’t comfortable going to the synagogue are sitting eating with Jesus. He is relaxed, and He is saying, “This is God the Father.” Not “What do you think you’re doing?”, but “What are you doing right now? Would you like to have a meal with me?” God the Father wants to spend time with us.

He comes to an area and there is a man who is young, rich, one of the city councillors. He’s been doing the right stuff for a long time and people really think he’s the sort of person Jesus would want to meet. He was the shining example of their community. Days before, when they knew Jesus was on His way, they were getting together and debating what Jesus would think about their community and their councillor.

I can imagine a delegation coming to meet Jesus with the rich young man. And being a wise man, he says, “We hear of all the wonderful things You’ve been doing. I have a question for you. What must I do to have eternal life?”

Jesus says, “You know the commandments.” Jesus the word, places this amazing challenge.

The man says he’s kept the laws perfectly since he was a child. He has certificates on his wall attesting to his life.

I want to go back to is quickly. I want you to see this in the context of the totality of the word. What Jesus is getting ready to do is not a foreign concept. It didn’t just happen when Jesus came on the scene.

I love the prophets because I’m an actor. We tend to read the prophets very “nicely”. But the prophets were unusual people. They were the performance artists of their day.

Isaiah 58:1-4

These might be the very words coming out of the mouth of the rich young ruler. In is it seems as if they have been righteous, but it is only a veneer, an external keeping of the ways of God, the law without truth and without grace.

Isaiah 58:5-8

Even in this text, God is trying to get the people to come back to the heart of who He is. The law was there to bring us back to understand the heart of God. But in trying to do this in a fashion, they were losing the very heart of who God is. That is a continual problem within the hearts of all mankind – to try to keep a law, but to lose out on the heart of what motivates us to do it.

If I have the form and say “I’ve done it all” and then look at you and say, “Have you done it all?” ... I can fall into this righteousness of comparison which the Pharisees and Sadducees had. And we miss the heart of what God wants – truth and grace. Jesus was able to sit down with sinners and make them feel comfortable and love.

Back in Luke, the man says he’s done everything. He is the righteousness of God. And Jesus says, “Ok ...” I want you to hear the comparison with Isaiah. “I think there’s one thing standing in the way of your being free.” Jesus wanted him free of his prison of self-righteousness. He says, “Sell all you have and given to the poor.” He says, “You’re forgetting the poor, the widow, compassion, grace, mercy.”

“Sell everything you have.” It’s fun to look at a text from the Bible and ask questions. We won’t find the exact answer. I think Jesus was trying to create a dialogue. That’s what God wants with us.

Jesus would have said, “You understand where God wants to go with you. Start with part of it. Set yourself free from this obsession with the material.” But instead, the man simply turned and walked away. The truth of his life was painful, and he didn’t want to remain in relationship with Jesus and obtain that grace.

Elsewhere in Luke, Jesus comes to another town. And in this town is a man who is the opposite of the rich young ruler. His name is Zaccheus.

Luke 19:1-3

The text doesn’t give us a lot, but it gives us something. As an actor, I look at the text. The tax collectors were working for the Roman Empire. They were, in effect, traitors to their own people and they were often taking more than was right. Why did Zaccheus take the job?

Let’s go back to when Zaccheus was a child, and he was rejected because he was too short to take part in games, and he was bullied and teased. Zaccheus decides that one day he’ll get his own back. When the Romans come to town, Zaccheus sees the fear on the face of his neighbours, and he goes and makes a deal with the Romans. He signs up as a tax collector, and then goes to visit his neighbour to screw money out of him. And that is who Zaccheus became – the guy everyone loved to hate.

Let’s imagine ourselves into this text. Zaccheus wants to see Jesus. He is shunned by his community. They see him as the bad guy. And then he hears of a rabbi who is saying that God is opening up his heart to every man, woman and child. Not “What are you doing?”, but “What are you doing now – I’d like to spend time with you.”

He never goes to the synagogue. No one would accept him there. But he’s intrigued by Jesus. There’s a crowd waiting to see Jesus, and he can’t push his way through. In the end, he runs ahead of the gathering crowd and climbs a tree so he can see what this rabbi might look like who is speaking about a God of truth and grace.

Luke 19:5

“What are you doing tonight?” It’s the last thing Zaccheus imagined would happen. He knows who he is. He just wants to get a glimpse of this rabbi. And Jesus says, “What are you doing tonight?”

This is the person we say we are following – the Christ. And we take our title from this radical man who went into a community and knew the man everyone loved to hate, and stirs up the hornet’s nest.

I’m sure this community too had a man everyone wanted Him to meet. And Jesus stops at the wrong place.

Zaccheus quickly comes down and welcomes Jesus joyfully. And all those who saw it began to complain. “We thought this was a teacher of the law, and He’s going to stay with a sinful man.” But He wasn’t a teacher of the law – He came to bring grace and truth.

The response of Zaccheus is amazing:

Luke 19:8

Jesus did was invite Himself to Zaccheus’s house, and the response from Zaccheus is the response Jesus was looking for from the rich young ruler.

We often miss what God wants to do in our lives because we are looking at the commands and trying to be perfect, and we want the world to be perfect as well. And the heart of God is speaking to us over and over again – “Grace and truth for yourself and for your neighbourhood.”

The thing I want to plant into our hearts tonight is just a simple rearranging of our thoughts about Christianity. What is the message?

In many ways we’ve come to the place where we have understood the message to be “For God so loved...” so everywhere we go, that’s what we say. What I want to suggest is that this the vehicle through which the message came. The message is truth and grace. God is saying to you and your community, “What are you doing right now? I want to meet with you, be with you, cause my heart to be with you.”

It’s one of the biggest problems with communication. We don’t know how to deliver the message because often we don’t know what the message is.

There was a young Christian rock and roil musician, and he was asked about the communication of the Gospel. He said, “I think Christians have it wrong. We say, ‘Have you heard the good news – you’re going to hell!’ ”

There is an interesting sense of pushing the idea that Jesus died for us, when people aren’t ready to understand what that means. Jesus told many stories which come back to what is spoke about.

A man went on a journey and he was attacked by robbers and they left him for dead. And then along came one of his community members. He was a worship leader in a church. The man on the ground called out for help, but the leader was preoccupied in worship to God, and believed his worship was acceptable because it sounded nice. Another man came along who was a teacher. Again the victim called out, and the teacher told him off for interrupting his train of thought. He believed he could please God through his intellect. And Jesus said, “Along came a man who was a Samaritan.” He said this to a group of people who had trouble with the Samaritans. This man looked after the victim like a neighbour.

What’s the message? It is that “God so loved the world ...” “God loved the world so much that He gave His only son” is what God did for us to treat us as that neighbour. That’s part of the message. But the message is that we must love our neighbours. It is not theological or social. It is truth and grace.

Gets people to think of their favourite restaurant meal and describe how to get to the restaurant, and what the meal tastes like. The route doesn’t require you to be creative. But when it comes to describing the meal, you have to be creative. In listening to the description of the meal, was it more interesting than the directions? I suspect so. But I think we often get the two caught up.

You are the light of the world. The church is the place where we come to be edified so we can go out and minister. We are the ministers of the Gospel, but we are to go out from here to do the work of ministry. Often we don’t know what that means, and we end up giving people directions – how to become Christians – when we need to tell them about the meal.

Who is God in your life? Sometimes it’s just an action like being the good neighbour Samaritan.

In 1 Peter, Peter says to be ready at all times to give an answer. But often we come with the answer before they ask the questions. Directions aren’t interesting.

Jesus said those who hunger for righteousness will be satisfied. But that hunger has to be in their lives. In Zaccheus’s life it came because he had heard about this man who was presenting a different picture.

You’re it. Go into the world and be witnesses of what you know. Be like the blind man who said, “I don’t know how to explain things, but this one thing I know. This is what God is doing in my life.”

We don’t have to be theological giants or amazing street evangelise. We just have to be people who have tasted the goodness of God, and who see other people not as enemies, but as people with whom we’re prepared to spend time.

You are the ministers of the Gospel in the world. Let your light shine in such a way that people will see the works of your life and give glory to your father in heaven.

This place where we come is a place to hear, to be together and encourage one another. But it’s not the greatest place of ministry. The world you live in is that place. Sometimes the job of being that light seems overwhelming, and we love to come back here where we feel safe. It feels good. But your calling is to go into the world and be light, to be like the one you call yourself after, the word made flesh, who introduced truth and grace.

Let the message of your lives be loving your neighbours as yourself and loving your God with all your heart, soul and mind.