“When we consider the gospel from the ground, we see clearly the work of the cross in our lives and the lives of those around us, the capturing and resurrecting of dead hearts” [Matt Chandler, The Explicit Gospel, 16].

“We see clearly…”

That little sentence is so important for the message that Chandler is trying to present.  He is really castigating Christians today; saying that we don’t see the message of The Gospel clearly at all.  We are blinded by the messages of this world.  We don’t really know the explicit Gospel.  We just think we do.

As he began his discussion of the Gospel from the ground, he spent Chapter 1 on the topic of getting to know God [guess what, Chandler  believes we really don’t understand Him].  Now in Chapter 2 he has turned to man.  We have already discussed the idea that Christians today fail to grasp that God is not that kindly, smiling, white-haired old gentlemen in the sky.   He is not a God of eternal, constant love, ready to forgive every sin, patiently waiting for our spiritual growth as we engage in our every-day half-hearted “fruit” production.  Chandler says we need to wake up: God can be “severe.”

Another worldly message that blinds us is that we are fallen.  I know that any Christian who has been to church at all has heard a preacher say “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” [Romans, 3:23].  Can we see that Scripture clearly for what it is saying?  Chandler says we don’t see it clearly at all. 

What is Chandler’s example of the ordinary response a “regular” Christian would make about God’s inquiry regarding our everyday sinning:  “But we work so hard.  We are awesome people.  Surely we deserve something! Yes, absolutely” [43].

Again, we all sin and fall short of the glory of God.  We call ourselves “Christian,” we tick all the boxes of the things that Christians are supposed to do yet we are active sinners all the while. We can’t help it.  We are born that way, the seed of Adam.  But even though God doesn’t God owe us mercy, isn’t He going to save us anyhow?

Let’s get this straight.  God owes no one mercy; based on our behavior if God owes us anything it is His justice, even His wrath.  We have no negotiating position here.  If God chooses to save us, it is because He has extended His mercy to us and we have no right to question God’s mercy.  It is a pure gift.  He is not obligated to extend it to anyone.  I have already referred to this in a previous post but it is too good not to use again.  It is a reference from Romans about questioning the fairness of God dispensing mercy to man.  Paul says it is like clay questioning the Potter.  Why are You making what You are making we ask the Potter?  We are in no position to ask that question.  We have no right to question God’s dispensing His mercy. We have no right to question an all-powerful God.

Chandler works the Old Testament idea of Gehenna into this Chapter saying that Jesus uses that word twelve times in the Gospels.  What is a Gehenna?  It’s a dumping ground, a place where He is going to burn stinking waste materials.  John warns Christians in the Gospel that Jesus is coming to earth to gather His “wheat” into the barn.  If you can’t “see clearly,” that is a direct reference to gathering His believers together.  The “wheat” will the threshed, and the chaff will be burned.  As a Christian you don’t want to be “chaff”, to be cast into Gehenna, a putrid and repulsive place, a smoldering place of destruction and neglect [42].

However, do we deserve to be in Gehanna?  You bet we do.

“How can a loving, just God create a fill a place like hell?  That’s not fair.  It’s not right.  The punishment does not fit the crime.  If I tell one lie or steal a pack of gum or say a curse word when I stub my toe, I get eternal torment?” [44].  Chandler writes about what most Christians think about eternal sin: here it is; “It’s not fair.”

What we don’t see clearly is when we discount the enormity of God’s severity, saying “I’m not really bad” and “I deserve mostly kindness,” I am discounting the enormity of God’s holiness.  I don’t know how to say this any better.  God calls the shots.  We don’t.  Today we have it all turned around in our narcissistic world. 

God is all about His glory in this world.  We supposed to operate as Christians in the world as His behest.  We exist to bring glory to Him.  He wants it.  He deserves it.  That’s what worship is all about and I am not just talking about church-day worship; I am talking about every day of the week loving Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.  Some refer to it as a continual heart attitude of bowing down in reverence and humility before the supreme Lord and Creator of the universe.  This bowing down is a daily practice.

Evangelical Christians today engage in what theologian John Piper calls “God belittlement.”  Thinking that hell could not possibly be my destination for my sinning is like saying God cannot be that “mean” to me.  “He wouldn’t do such a thing.”  Justifying one’s behavior by saying things like “I’m not that bad” is pure self-justification.  Who says you are not that bad?  Who says that you are the judge of your behavior?  Let’s be frank: isn’t that a bit “above your pay grade?”

We need to see clearly the place we have in this world.  We were not put on earth to “dismiss, deny or denigrate the severity of God, but rather to repent of our self-regard and throw ourselves back into His glorious self-regard, wondering ‘How big and mighty and infinite and glorious is God.’” [45].

What keeps us from seeing clearly?  “A refusal to be satisfied with the all-sufficiency of the God of the universe” [45]. We need to get our eyes examined.  We are sinners.  We need God’s grace.  If we can’t see that, we are indeed missing the point of the explicit Gospel and we may pay the consequences.