11:36 AM Today the evangelical blogosphere is filled with posts extolling the substitutionary atonement and rejoicing in the great Savior who died for us on the cross of Calvary. This is as it should be. Theologically, today we commemorate the time in human history when God the Father extended His hand of grace toward us and offered us, on the basis of the death of His sinless Son, His righteousness as a free gift. To be sure, this gift is conditioned on faith, to be exercised by us, but its origin is divine.
Practically, however, this faith-appropriation of “the righteousness that comes from God” calls forth, or should call forth, an ardent yearning on the part of every believer to know Christ better and better and to obey Him more completely. One gains positional righteousness so that one may gain experiential obedience. To show what this positional righteousness implies, read Eph. 2:8-10, where Paul emphasizes that once a person has received eternal salvation as a gift of pure grace through faith, that faith makes itself more and more manifest in that person’s entire conduct by means of the “good works” that God ordained beforehand. Rejecting sin and selfishness, believers now throw themselves without reservation into the work of being God’s hands and feet to turn others away from darkness and into the light. Christian faith is not mere belief. It is a living and sanctifying power.
Thus today, as we celebrate the completed work of Christ on our behalf, and as we rightly honor the One who merited all these blessings for us, should not all this enhance our love for Him and intensify our oneness with the believers of all ages? Even as we cling to the truth of the Gospel that was proclaimed to us and that we received by faith, should we not also hold forth the life-giving word to others? The Gospel needs no supplement. Yet should its influence not be seen in ever-increasing measure as we carry others’ burdens to the throne of grace or as we visit the sick and bereaved in their homes or as we give generously of our time and talents to the cause of the Gospel or as we conduct ourselves in harmony with the responsibilities of our new relationship to God — in short, as we love as He loved? Should not proper theology result in God’s children loving Him more in thought, word, and deed? The fact that our obedience is a matter of sovereign grace and has nothing to do with human effort or merit should increase, not diminish, our continuous, sustained, and strenuous effort to extend the Gospel to every nation and every people group in the world. The Gospel we have received and in which we rejoice on this Good Friday was not meant for a select few nor is it confined to any particular geographical region. Just look at the life of the apostle Paul. There was never a gulf between his theology and his service. When he embraced Christ as his Lord and Savior on the road to Damascus, he also embraced Him as his enabler and example. Little wonder he toiled and labored to the point of weariness and exhaustion in his fight against Satan and his hosts. Read 2 Cor. 6:4-10 and 11:24-33 and you will see what it means to be a missionary-theologian!
The question has to be asked, then: How is it possible for a person to receive the merits of Christ’s finished work on the cross of Calvary and yet fail to experience His enabling Spirit within their entire person? Student, you may earn straight As on every exam you take, but nothing delights the heart of a teacher more than a young man or a young women’s embrace of uncompromising commitment to Jesus’ teaching. May this Good Friday challenge all of us to follow Jesus to the margins and to live out our faith in this world, and not just the next.
Dave