I grew up in a great church culture, but I wasn\u2019t really taught the implications of the gospel in how to grow as a Christian. In my struggle with sin, I was told to \u201clet go and let God\u201d and that any striving or struggle in growing to be like Jesus was an act of my flesh and counterproductive. I was never taught how my identity in each Person of the Trinity was the foundation for both my assurance of salvation and my growth in godliness. I\u2019m a very task-oriented person and I resonate with being told what to \u201cdo\u201d in order to \u201cget busy\u201d serving Jesus. I didn\u2019t have that great of a grasp on who I was in Christ. In seminary, one of my professors heavily emphasized \u201cbeing before doing\u201d and that has stuck with me since. In addition, the book Communion with God <\/em>by the Puritan John Owen had a tremendous impact on my understanding how I relate to each Person of the Trinity. In short, I think there is a heavy emphasis in evangelicalism on practical application without the foundation of our identity in Christ. There is a lot of pragmatism on the popular level without helping believers understand how the depths of theology actually impact their daily lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In\ntoday\u2019s culture, one of the highest values is self-expression. We hear people\nall the time saying, \u201cI just want to be true to myself.\u201d This narcissistic\nattitude impacts all of life where people are desperately searching for\nsignificance and approval from others. Many stress out that they did not get\nenough \u201clikes\u201d to one of their Facebook posts. We see the gender confusion\ntaking our culture by storm where people are defying clear biblical norms of\nmale and female identities rooted in God\u2019s plan of creation. The human itch\nthat people want scratched is to be accepted for who they are and to have the\nfreedom to express themselves no matter what the consequences may be. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nbeauty of the gospel is that for believers in Christ, the Father chose them\nbefore the foundation of the world, adopted them into His family, and showers\nthem with extravagant love. Jesus did not wait for us to get our act together\nin order to love us, but demonstrated mercy on the cross by dying for us when\nwe were rebels against Him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\ngospel takes a spiritually dead sinner and transforms them into a new creation\nwith extraordinary spiritual blessings. So many people struggle with who they\nare. They want significance. They want acceptance. And yet they are seeking\nthese things in all the wrong places. Some seek significance in flagrant\nimmorality, while others seek significance in moral living\u2014which sadly are both\ndevoid of the power of the gospel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gospel announces a radical message that we are hopeless, helpless, and hell-bound in our sins, but that Christ raises us to new life and grants us a brand-new identity in the Trinity. We are chosen, adopted, and accepted by the Father; purchase, forgiven, and righteous in the Son; regenerated, indwelt, and sanctified by the Spirit. The Triune God satisfies the deepest longings of the human heart by giving us something that is indescribable\u2014the very life of God in the soul of man! <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nthesis of my book centers of three truths related to each Person of the Trinity\nthat define our identity. I focus on what each Person has done for us in our\nsalvation. I think it would be helpful to commit this to memory and also to\nincorporate into one\u2019s prayer life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As\na believer, you are: chosen, adopted, and accepted by the Father; purchased,\nforgiven, and righteous in the Son; regenerated, indwelt, and sanctified by the\nSpirit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\nwould be helpful to meditate on these truths or take one truth at a time and\nspend time thanking and praise that Person of the Trinity for His work in your\nlife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me give you an example in how you can incorporate this into your prayer life by taking being adopted by the Father. When you pray, you can address the Father with something like this: \u201cFather in heaven, I am so humbled that you would dare adopt me into Your family. I know that before You saved me, I was a rebel. I was hostile to you. I could care less about your glory and Kingdom. But now since you adopted me, I have a home with you. I have permanent access to You. I can bask in Your love for me. I have the security of being in a family. I have the confidence that you\u2019re my Father and will never let me go. Today, I praise you that I am adopted by You as my Great Father.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gospel is an announcement of good news concerning the\nhistorical reality of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ as\nLord of lords. The gospel does not tell us what we must \u201cDO\u201d in order to earn\nGod\u2019s favor or merit forgiveness, but instead, announces to us what Christ has\nalready DONE to secure our salvation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I often hear people say that we need to \u201clive\u201d the gospel. While I understand what they mean, theologically this is not correct. The gospel is the life that Jesus lived and the death He died and the grave He overcame. The gospel is news to be heard and believed, not something we necessarily can live out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now with that being said, the gospel has major implications in how we live our everyday life. I am reminded of what Paul says in Philippians 1:27 : \u201c<\/strong>Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the key themes in my book is this statement: The more you look AT Jesus, the more you begin to look LIKE Jesus. This comes from both Romans 8:29 and 2 Corinthians 3:18. God\u2019s glorious plan for us as believers is to become transformed into the image of Jesus His Son. When we saturate ourselves in the Scriptures, dwell upon the glories of the gospel, and fix our eyes on Jesus, the Holy Spirit does this powerful work within us to conform us to Christ. There are two ditches that many Christians can fall into on a daily basis: First, we can become legalistic and prideful. We keep running on the treadmill of self-effort going from this conference or Bible study or this ministry to the next in order to keep busy doing things so that we can make sure God still loves us. We can look down on others who are not up to our \u201clevel of spiritual maturity.\u201d On the other hand, we can also fall into the ditch of despair and guilt and frustration with our lack of progress in godliness and begin to wonder if God ever loved us in the first place. We get so discouraged we simply give up pursuing Him. Both these ditches\u2014inflated pride and deflating guilt\u2014are enemies of the gospel. The gospel recalibrates us out of these ditches and set us on the firm foundation of our gospel identity. Because the Father loves us, Jesus died for us, and the Holy Spirit lives inside of us, we are secure in our salvation and have the assurance of our permanent standing before a holy God. Out of this identity, we then can begin to serve the Lord out of joy, instead of legalism or guilt. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Bible defines sin in many ways but\nfundamentally it is a continual falling short of glorifying God for who He is\nand violating His Law. The first issue\nof God\u2019 glory relates to idolatry in that we fail to worship God alone as our\ngreatest treasure. The second issue of the Law relates to how we continually\nbreak His revealed will in the Bible by our actions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n All sin stems from a lie that obedience to\nGod does not pay off in the end. Sin does a masterful job of deceiving us into\nbelieving the lie that it is good for us to surrender to our lusts. We buy into\nthe myth that sin brings pleasure, enjoyment, satisfaction, and joy. Sin makes\na tremendous promise that it cannot fulfill. Sin promises happiness,\nexcitement, and fulfillment, but these benefits are not benefits at all. Sin\nhas tricked us, and these are only fleeting pleasures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hebrews 11:24\u201325 states, “By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.” This passage tells us that sin is pleasurable. We would not sin if we did not think it brought us pleasure. Sin feels good. Sin is fun. Sin promises excitement and allures us with the prospect of enjoyment. But these promises are empty. These pleasures of sin are fleeting. They are temporary. They only last for a season. Sin is so deceitful because it tricks us into believing that disobedience is fun. If we are honest with ourselves, we know all too well that sin can be fun. We happily rush into sin because we believe that we will experience ultimate pleasure at that moment. But what does iniquity reap in the end? We experience the crash and burn of this deception when the fleeting pleasure passes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n God\nis foremost concerned with Himself as Sovereign Creator and Sustainer of all\nthings. Everything begins and ends with His glory alone. God\u2019s end goal for\nthis world is the culmination of His plan to bring all things under the Lordship\nof Jesus in the new heavens and new earth where believers will dwell in\nperpetual intimacy with the Triune God. For me personally, I am confident that\nthe Father chose me before the foundation of the world, Jesus died on the cross\nto forgive and accept me, and the Holy Spirit lives inside of me as the\nguarantee that I will spend eternity in heaven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My\nrole or purpose in this goal is to live each day to the glory of God by resting\nsecure in this identity in the Trinity and to share the gospel with those who\ndo not yet know how they can be forgiven, transformed, and also share this\nidentity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nfind joy in God\u2019s sovereignty that what He began, He will ultimately complete.\nNo plan or purpose can thwart His will. I am such a small part of His grand story,\nbut I am part of it, nonetheless. I rejoice that He quiets me with His love and\nJesus intercedes for me and that the Holy Spirit is working deeply in my heart\nto become like Christ. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not a privatized, individualized experience of me on an island by myself, but I get to share in the joy of being part of a church family on this journey together where we can all grow into maturity in our identity in the Trinity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In\nmy book, I focus the latter chapters on the means of grace that help Christians\ngrow in their identity. The first is Scripture Saturation which involves\nreading, studying, memorizing, meditating, and obeying God\u2019s Word. One of the\npractices I think we often ignore is meditating on Scripture. Meditating\nis like letting your mind become saturated over time with God’s word.\nMeditating can be analogous to taking chicken or beef and letting it marinate\nin a sauce before you cook it. Meditation involves allowing the word to soak in\nyour heart and soul\u2014to think about it, ponder it, and to let it takes its full\neffect in your life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meditating on Scripture involves\nfocusing your mind on the truths of Scripture, so you can not only understand\nwhat it says, but more importantly, obey what it says in all aspects of your\ndaily life. I have found that journaling, while not prescribed in the Bible as\na mandatory practice, is helpful in this process of meditation. I usually take\na smaller portion of Scripture and write out my thoughts, questions, and\npersonal application in a journal and then use these insights to inform my\npraying. I usually pray back the truths I have just read so that I can\ninternalize them and think more deeply about them through the day. My advice\nis: Don\u2019t rush\u2014take time! It is better to read a small amount of Scripture and\nmeditate on it than to read an extensive section without meditation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In\naddition, using the Lord\u2019s Prayer as a model helps us stay focused during our\ndaily prayer times. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We must not become legalistic about these practices and think that by doing them, we win favor with God or improve our standing. As justified believers, we rest in a permanent position of acceptance before God on account of the imputed righteousness of Christ. In our sanctification, God does command us to put forth effort by his grace to grow in godliness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gospel tells us that God accepts us on the basis of Christ’s righteousness and that on our best days when we are living wonderfully holy lives and on our worst days when we are struggling with sin he does not love us any more or any less based upon our performance. On those days when you’re arguing with your spouse, speeding in traffic, and getting frustrated with your dog, God does not love you less. Or on those days when you’re hitting on all your spiritual cylinders and having your daily devotional time, serving at a soup kitchen, and volunteering at VBS, he does not love you more. He loves us constantly and permanently based upon Christ’s performance and his finished work on the cross. When we trusted Christ for salvation, all of our sins were credited or transferred to him, and his perfect righteousness and perfect record of obedience were credited or transferred to us. Based upon what Christ alone has done, God the Father can now declare us not guilty, and permanently adopts into his family as dearly loved children. When I put my head on my pillow at night, I rest secure in the security of these truths. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus gave the church a\ncrystal-clear mission: he commands us to make disciples of all nations through\nthe preaching of the gospel so that rebels will bow their knees to his lordship\nand worship him alone. The Father sent Jesus as our Redeemer on a rescue\nmission to seek and save the lost, and calls the church to embrace this mission\nfor the ultimate goal of glorifying him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In some evangelical circles,\nbelievers feel a weight of pressure to try to \u201cget people saved\u201d using pushy\nmarketing techniques. We need a clear understanding of evangelism that takes\nthe pressure off our anxieties in sharing our faith. Evangelism involves\nverbally telling sinners about the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus\nChrist and then commanding them with urgency to repent and believe in him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You don’t save anyone. You can’t\nsave anyone. All you have to do is share the good news. All you have to do is\nopen your mouth and tell others about Jesus. As your lifestyle consistently\nbacks up your message, God will do his sovereign work of bringing sinners to\nChrist. This reality should free you up to share the gospel with confidence\nknowing that God is in control. We need to engage our culture, present the\nwhole gospel, and do this in winsome and creative ways to build bridges of\nunderstanding. I encourage you to take a risk with the gospel and realize its\ninherent power. When you testify about Jesus, sometimes you will receive\nseething hatred. Other times curiosity. Other times ambivalence. Thankfully\nthere are those times when you see God convert a sinner by his grace alone. God\nis sovereign, and he is using you to share the gospel faithfully to a lost\nculture which desperately needs the hope of redemption only found in Jesus\nChrist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think what is needed at a\npersonal level to become more strategic in our mission are two things: (1) a broken\nheartedness over the reality of eternal hell, and (2) a boldness to share the\nfull gospel in a culture that hates absolute truth. <\/p>\n\n\n\n At the church level, you cannot \u201cprogram\u201d a culture of evangelism. As a pastor, I must model evangelism and pray for God to create a gospel-centered culture where everyone is telling the good news to others out of a heart of love for sinners and a desperate dependence on the Holy Spirit to bring new life to those dead in sin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For\nthe past year, I have been preaching through the book of Exodus. I have seen\nthe glories of Christ come alive in almost every chapter in types and shadows.\nI have grown in my love for the transcendent I AM God as revealed in Exodus as\nwell as how everything points to Christ as the one Mediator between a sinful\npeople and a holy God. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Many\nbelievers are drawn to more didactic books in the New Testament that teach\ntheology and they are not that familiar with the Old Testament narratives.\nHebrew narratives grab our attention and draw us into God\u2019s story of how He\nchose, called, and redeemed a people for Himself through Christ. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When we realize that Jesus is the true Passover Lamb, the Rock from which the water gushed, and the embodiment of the \u201cmercy seat\u201d on top of the ark of the covenant to satisfy God\u2019s justice against sin, we are moved to joy, awe, and thankfulness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\nare so prone to be given five steps for growth or 3 easy ways to overcome this\nparticular sin. We are hard-wired to want a list of things we can begin doing\nthat will give us immediate results. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In order for the truths of the Bible to take deep roots into the heart, we need to reflect upon who we are in each Person of the Trinity and allow those truths to sink deeply into our souls. We are not good at taking time to ponder\/meditat\/mull over these truths and then believe them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For the person who struggles with assurance of salvation, guilt, or legalism, I cannot give them a quick fix or simple list. I would encourage them to find assurance and security and their identity in the Father who has chosen, adopted, and accepted them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I would encourage them to find solace and satisfaction in Jesus in whom they are purchased, forgiven, and righteous. I would encourage them to find strength and grace in the Holy Spirit who has regenerated them, indwells them, and is progressively sanctifying them to become more like Jesus. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nmore time we spend focusing on our identity (being) the more our obedience\n(doing) will flow out from that foundation. When we reverse the order and begin\ndoing all these things for Jesus, we may find ourselves overwhelmed,\nfrustrated, tired, burned out, and begging for His approval. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I\nwould encourage them to read this one paragraph by John Owen that impacted me\ndeeply:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo much as we see the love of God,\nso much shall we delight in him, and no more . . . but if the heart be once\nmuch taken up with this eminency of the Father’s love, it cannot choose but to\nbe overpowered, conquered, and endeared to him . . . Exercise your thoughts\nupon the eternal, free, and fruitful love of the Father, and when you do this,\nyou will find that your heart is wrapped up in delight for him . . . Sit down a\nlittle at the fountain, and you will quickly discover the sweetness of the\nstreams. You who have run from him, will not be able to keep a distance from\nhim for a moment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I would encourage them with these two\nconcluding truths:<\/p>\n\n\n\n First, being (identity) comes before doing\n(obedience).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second, the more you look AT Jesus the\nmore you begin to look LIKE Jesus. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u2019m a very task-oriented person and I resonate with being told what to \u201cdo\u201d in order to \u201cget busy\u201d serving Jesus. I didn\u2019t have that great of a grasp on who I was in Christ. In seminary, one of my professors heavily emphasized \u201cbeing before doing\u201d and that has stuck with me since…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2106,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,10],"tags":[57],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nWhat do you see as one of the most fundamental human itches that we are trying to scratch with lots of sex, fast food, selfies, religious activity, etc., and how do the implications of the Gospel lift up off the pages of my Bible and touch on those that literally dont just change my mind but my own heart and emotions and desires?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Many of us these days have short attention spans, are always on the move, and bounce from idea to idea to idea. With that in mind, what is a simple but powerful truth of our being \u201cin the Trinity\u201d that we can commit to memory and pray into?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What is the \u201cGospel\u201d and what practical implications does the Gospel make in my everyday life? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What is \u201csin\u201d and what is so terrible about it when I do sin? And what is my motivation to not sin? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What is God\u2019s end goal for this world, all humans of this world, and me personally? Where is He taking it and what does it look like for me to be a part of that goal, and how can I have a role and purpose in that goal, and find meaning, and value, and my joy in that goal? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
How can I, as a Christian who believes the Gospel and affirms orthodoxy, be compelled to genuinely desire God and the kingdom of God enough to become a true disciple, one who is willing to consider all things loss in comparison with knowing and loving Jesus? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
As a Christian, at the end of a long day (when I have done what I ought not to have done – and not done what I ought to have done) what are God\u2019s thoughts of me when I lay down my head at at night and fall asleep? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What is God\u2019s mission given to us and how do I fulfill it without it becoming a feeling of another thing I have to do for God? And based upon that, What is needed at the personal, and church level to shape culture and to be on strategic mission? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
For you personally, what has been the most compelling or powerful aspect of the story of the Bible that you delight in, has come to you fresh, and resulted in you loving God more and being excited to be a part of God\u2019s story? <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
For those who read this interview and get pricked of mind and heart; what can I do today, right now at this very moment (and beyond), that can result in the story of the Bible taking root in my own heart and shaping me as it has you?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n