God will fix all your mistakes if you put your faith in Christ.
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5 comments:
Define "fix all your mistakes." I mean, the consequences (at least some of the temporal consequences) will remain.
Also, what about the part of being swept up in God's grand mission of reconciliation? The work of the Holy Spirit to shape us to "will and act according to His good pleasure"?
I'd be shocked if the Gospel could be summed up in a single phrase.
Nonetheless, your phrase is interesting and provocative. I'd be curious to hear more of what you had in mind. What led to you choosing this particular formulation of the Gospel? What was your thought process?
My thought process was pretty straight forward substitionary atonement theory.
Christ's death on the cross paid the debt for all your sins; simultaneously it achieved for you the righteousness of Christ.
So, once one puts his faith in Christ, everywhere in his life where he sinned (made a "mistake"), now instead, Christ's life is attributed to him. Christ's life was perfect, and that perfection is now attributed to every aspect of the person's life who puts his faith in Christ. So, where you made a mistake, Christ fixed it.
Yes, you're right that temporal consequences remain. But in the end, He will wipe away every tear. I never said "when" he would fix every mistake.
And being swept up on the 'grand mission' is part of how He fixes some of the mistakes. The Church is the Body of Christ, and not metaphorically. When we act redemptively, that's part of God fixing mistakes, reversing the Curse.
Without needing further comment, Kenny, I just affirm both your original pithy redaction of the gospel and your brief explanation to Ben. Whether we are right or wrong, Christ will show us in the end, but your thinking and mine on these things is in complete agreement.
When I hear phrases like "the temporal consequences will remain," it sends a little thrill of fear into my spine, because that statement is at the source of the endless speculation (and of the "visions" precipitated to support that speculation) producing such concepts as "purgatory" in Roman Catholicism, or "the toll-houses" in Orthodoxy.
The subversion of evangelical faith in Orthodoxy is always being attempted by a sort of creeping Romanism, facilitated by false translations of the Greek liturgical texts, upon the heels of which comes the gradual romanisation of attitudes. An example is the use of "forgiveness" versus "remission" of sins. The first leaves room for "ah, yes, your sins are forgiven, but not the temporal consequences for them, which you still have to somehow make up." The second is more rigorously defined, "complete remission of your sins and all consequences," again, as Kenny says, without specifying the timeline, but also without further threat of God's wrath or the satisfying thereof. Αφεσις αμαρτιων, "remission of sins."
It is absolutely amazing!
Romanos, I wasn't referring to anything so deep as that. I simply meant that....say I cheat on my wife, then become a Christian and because of Jesus's sacrifice on the Cross my sins are forgiven. God sees Jesus's goodness and not my sin. I am redeemed and given a second chance to be part of God's Kingdom. That doesn't mean my wife won't be hurt and my marriage damaged.
(Understand, of course, that I have never and will never cheat on my wife. Just wanted to make that clear.)
Perhaps there should be widespread publication of the Ching Summary of the Gospel (with a footnote to the Ching Explanation of the summary).
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