Whether it comes in the form of outright falsehood, or just incomplete teaching, the great impediment to genuine gospel living is bad teaching. As I see it—and as poll after poll proves—too many people who regard themselves as Christians are utterly clueless about the most fundamental truths. They don’t understand what God says about the human condition. They don’t know what God meant to do when He made man, what happened to us to wreck us up, or what we really need. Cherished traditional notions they have in abundance; biblical truth in all its raw, intrusive, and transforming power, they lack. Consequently, they aren’t at all prepared to grasp the grandeur of what God has done for people in Christ. With that wobbly and incomplete foundation, they may claim to have “received” Jesus, may really believe they have done so—but nothing comes of it. They think and live just like the world. As I said: They don’t tilt the world. The world tilts them because of various barriers erected in their minds through exposure to bad teaching. A variety of false doctrines hold them back from enjoying the life to which God calls them in Jesus Christ. They bank on bad teaching, they’re burdened by bad teaching, and they’re bound by bad teaching. Banking on Bad Teaching Some professing Christians are naturally indolent, lazy, retiring, introspective, self-involved, perhaps even selfish—and the rotten teaching they get magnifies and calcifies those tendencies. They refuse to trust and obey; they feel no need to try and to dare and to engage. Worse, they do all this nothingness in the name of the Lord. God’s Word has good news for just such folks: The cross of Christ means far more than you’ve been told, and Jesus wants to have much more to do with your life than you have thought! Burdened by Bad Teaching Other Christians dearly want to soar, but they keep crashing. These poor souls fell into teaching that promised quick fixes and jump starts to their spiritual lives. “Just follow our instructions” (they were told), “and you will soar to victory! Pray ____! Bind ____! Unleash ____! Receive ____! Claim ____!” So they followed the instructions. They prayed, bound, unleashed, received, claimed . . . and maybe they danced a little jig, to boot. Yet they kept crashing, and crashing, and crashing. Now they feel like giving up. Maybe they have given up. There is great, glorious news in the Word for them as well: The cross of Christ means far more than you’ve been told, and Jesus has yet more grace and wisdom for your path. Bound by Bad Teaching Still others are reluctant captives who would love to break out and live boldly for God’s glory. But they have been fed a line of bad teaching that has convinced them that they dare do no such thing. It has them stalled on the roadside in a holy haze. They cannot risk making a move for fear of doing it wrong and ruining all. The Bible has wonderfully good news for them as well! The cross of Christ means far more than you’ve been told, and it brings a freedom for you that you’ve only dreamt of thus far! Once the good news grips you (as one of my blog readers gladly reported), “some major chains” will shatter, and you’ll be free to blast off. The world needs tilting, and bad doctrinal barriers need busting. —Dan Phillips, The World-Tilting Gospel (Kregel, 2011), 17–19. At this point in my life, I’m beyond blaming my error on bad teaching. I’ve simply been given too much. Still, whether or not I can identify them, I’m positive that there are things I’ve got wrong, and of those things I’ve got right, my knowledge is incomplete. That deficiency hinders my ability to live a full gospel-driven and sustained life. So while I could read the paragraphs above and conclude that they were written to folks who are far more messed up than I, I can’t help seeing myself in each paragraph. The cross of Christ does indeed mean more than I know, and by the grace of God, I’m learning.

Previously: Coming Soon: On Introversion, Worship, and Tangential Issues Last week, I promised to write my own thoughts on why The Top 5 Things Introverts Dread about Church should never be done. My intention was to divide a post into two parts, approaching the “5 things” from the anthropological (human) perspective and the theological (God’s) perspective. I’ve decided instead to write two posts, beginning with the theological reasons for scrapping each one. That way, if I never get around to part two (which I kind of dread writing), I’ll at least have covered the most important angle. So here goes: Why I think God opposes the “5 things.” 5. “Welcome! Shake a hand, give a hug, share a name!” While this, in its most minimal form, is the least offensive item on the list, it still has no place in a worship service. Why? Because it’s a worship service. This is not the time for visiting with neighbors. Our focus is to be on God and his Word. There is plenty of time for chit-chat before and after, or between Sunday school and the worship service, however your Sunday worship is arranged. Like homicide, this crime comes in various degrees. If your version is a thirty-second “greet your neighbor” interruption, I’ll let you off with a warning. If it extends to five minutes (that seem like ten or fifteen to folks like me) of wander-around-and-visit-with-everyone chaos, you’ve lost all pretense of being in a reverent, worshipful state of mind, and you’ve probably busted mine. 4. “Chelsey, what do you think?” The appropriateness of this one really depends on the group and the setting. There might be appropriate times to solicit an opinion here and there. In general, though, if you’re the leader, your job is to teach. You are supposed to have prepared in advance to declare truth. Get that: to declare truth. Not to present your opinions, but to communicate truths gleaned from diligent study in the Word. It makes no sense to solicit spontaneous opinions from people who have just shown up for class, especially if you’re going to ask anything as stupid as “what does this mean to you”—which is really the best you can expect when you put the average person on the spot like that. 3. “Let’s get into groups and pray aloud and/or tell each other our deepest, darkest struggles.” Are you utterly insane? I realize that there are plenty of exhibitionists who thrive on attention and love baring their souls in public, but I, and many others, are not among them. That kind of conversation is reserved for our most intimate friends, and appropriately so. Why this is, I’ll leave for the next post. For today’s purposes, it is enough to say that if you put others on the spot to expose themselves like this, at best you are ignorantly insensitive, and at worst, you are not loving your brother. If you are not loving your brother, you are not loving God. 2. Spontaneous Public Prayer I realize that many will disagree with my first objection, but that’s because their ecclesiology is messed up. Public prayer, along with Scripture reading and preaching, is a formal ministry reserved for the congregational elders. No part of the worship service should be spontaneous. It should be orderly and controlled. It must be, in order to ensure that all speech is biblical. (If I had nickel for every time someone in the pew prayed for something blatantly unbiblical—like God’s blessing on an ungodly lawsuit—well . . . I’d have at least several nickels.) Secondly, when you call on someone to pray spontaneously, you invite—perhaps even force—insincerity. Their prayer might be, at least in part, a performance. It’s not that they intend it to be, it’s just a natural result of normal self-consciousness. For many of us, this is exacerbated by a total inability to speak extemporaneously. But that also is for the next post. God wants sincere prayer. That means uncoerced prayer. Never, never, never put anyone in a position in which they feel pressured to pray aloud. 1. “You should be more . . .” Unless you are in a counseling/discipline situation, you have no business telling anyone to be anything other than what they are. God made them a certain way, and he did it on purpose. God, in his great mercy, didn’t give everyone big mouths that never shut up. He didn’t make everyone thoughtful and reticent. Most of us are somewhere on the scale in between, and that’s good. Will the clay say to the potter, “Why did you make that other pot that way?

I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” Our Life Is Long Christina Rossetti (1830–1894) Our life is long. Not so, wise Angels say Who watch us waste it, trembling while they weigh Against eternity one squandered day. Our life is long. Not so, the Saints protest, Filled full of consolation and of rest: “Short ill, long good, one long unending best.” Our life is long. Christ's word sounds different:“Night cometh: no more work when day is spent. Repent and work to-day, work and repent. Lord, make us like Thy Host who day nor night Rest not from adoration, their delight, Crying “Holy, Holy, Holy,” in the height. Lord, make us like Thy Saints who wait and long Contented: bound in hope and freed from wrong, They speed (may be) their vigil with a song. Lord, make us like Thyself; for thirty-three Slow years of toil seemed not too long to Thee, That where Thou art there Thy Beloved might be. —Christina Rossetti, Poems (Alfred A. Knopf, 1993). 21He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. —2 Corinthians 5 The Exchange Between The Sinful And The Sinless. In shewing favor to a criminal, an earthly sovereign must consider whether he can do so (1) without loss of character; (2) without breach of law; (3) without encouragement to crime; (4) without infringement or compromise of government. All these things have been amply provided for in the divine scheme of pardon; that scheme being the embodiment of such provision,—not only containing the prevention of any such wrongs to God and to His universe, but the development of principles and the revelation of facts, which far more than compensate for threatened evils, and bring immense glory to God and His government, out of that which otherwise would have been big with dishonour and confusion. That scheme is announced in these words, “He hath made Him who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might be made (or be, or become) the righteousness of God in Him.” Thus God is just, and the justifier of the unjust. Here are two special points: (1) The sinless one made sin for the sinful; (2) the unrighteous becoming the righteousness of God in the righteous One. I. The sinless One made sin for the Sinful. He was “without sin;” He “knew no sin;” not the shadow of evil was to be found in Him; He was the “righteous one,” the “holy one,” the “Lamb without blemish, and without spot ;” altogether perfect, yet partaker of our very flesh, our true humanity; very man, of the substance of the virgin, partaker of the dust of earth, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, still sinless in the entirest sense of that word; loving righteousness and hating iniquity, this sinless One was made sin, made sin by God: “He hath made Him sin.” The connection between Him and sin, between Him and the sinner, was one made, constituted by God. It was the Lord that laid our iniquity upon Him (Isaiah 53:6); that bruised Him and put Him to grief; that made His soul an offering for sin (Isaiah 53:10); that made Him a curse for us (Galatians 3:13). Our guilt was transferred to Him by God, and He was treated as if He were really the doer of it all. God “spared Him not, but delivered Him up” (Romans 8:32). In the Psalms He confesses our sin as if it were His own (see 38., 40, 69); during His life He acted as one shut out because of guilt; at His trial He was dumb, and answered not a word; on the cross He cried out, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me.” It is not merely that He was made a sin-offering, but he was “made sin,” as if no words could fully express the closeness of His connection with our transgressions. He was treated as a sinner from His cradle to His cross. His was a vicarious life and a vicarious death. It was this that made Him the man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. On no other ground can we account for His profound and life-long sorrow, save that all His life long He was bearing sin for us,—He was being led as a lamb to the slaughter; and this leading to the slaughter was the real meaning of His sorrowful and burdened life. He was moving to the altar with the sins of His church upon Him; He was going to the cross, laden all through with this infinite burden which was laid upon Him, when He took flesh by the power of the Holy Ghost. As sacrifice, burnt-offering, sin-offering, trespass offering, substitute, surety, sin-bearer, we find Him here on earth, till He had finished the work which was given Him to do, till He had by Himself purged our sins (Hebrew 1:2). Men call this a “fiction,” or a “make believe;” it is the truth of God, with which the whole Bible is full,—the transference of our human guilt to our divine Substitute, that He might bear it all for us,—the transference of legal condemnation and divine displeasure from us to Him, that only acquittal, and pardon, and favor and love might belong to us.[14] “Thy wrath lieth hard upon me” (Psalm 88:7), are the words of the Sin-bearer; and that this was felt in a measure all His life through (though consummated on the cross), is shewn by what follows : “I am afflicted and ready to die (“sorrowful unto death”) from my youth up” (Psalm 88:15). The sinless One made sin for the sinful is the pervading doctrine of both Testaments; such books as Leviticus and the Epistle to the Hebrews are unintelligible otherwise. It is this that so strongly and awfully establishes the doctrine of eternal recompense for sin. If sin deserves no eternal wrath, what an unmeaning thing is this divine sin-bearing! What a gratuitous expenditure of labour, and suffering, and death. II. The unrighteousness becoming the righteousness of God in the righteous One. The name of our Substitute is, “Jehovah our Righteousness”; and the justifying righteousness is called by an apostle, “the righteousness of Him who is our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 1:1). Thus the “righteousness of God” amid the “righteousness of Christ” are declared to be the same, and our common use of the expression, “the righteousness of Christ,” is amply vindicated from the cavils of Socinians and others of like mind. Luther exhorted the brethren to learn, as their constant song of praise, “Lord Jesus, thou art my righteousness, and I thy sin.” So must we, if we would enjoy Luther’s doctrine, his twofold teaching, “That a man is justified by faith, and that he is to know that he is justified.” We are “unrighteous.” There is no question as to that. Yet, says the apostle, “We become (not merely “righteous,” but) the righteousness of God,” in this righteous One. What is ours passes over to Him; what is His passes over to us. We become righteousness! As if, from the moment that we believe God’s testimony to the righteous One and His work, we and righteousness become one and the same thing. So completely are we justified, and lifted up into the same righteous level or standing which the righteous One himself occupies in the sight of God. Thus are we “complete in Him,”—“found in Him,”—recognized as one with Him in righteousness, and entitled to possess all He possesses. What a transference! And how simply effected! Receive the Father’s testimony to the righteousness of the beloved Son, and all that righteousness becomes yours! O man, canst thou refuse an exchange like this? A salvation so complete, so perfect and divine. Yes; “It is finished!” On the cross it was finished. Then the blood was shed with which the sinner is sprinkled and purged in conscience; and all that followed (both resurrection and ascension) assumed the completion of the great sacrifice on Golgotha. Then the righteousness was finished also, in virtue of which we are “accepted in the Beloved.” During all the preceding ages the voice of each sacrifice laid on the altar, morning and evening, was, “It is not finished;” but then the one voice of the one Sacrifice proclaimed before earth and heaven, “It is finished.” Nothing was from that moment to be added to it or taken from it. All was done. It is the ministry of this “righteousness” that is now preached to the unrighteous. There are many “ministries.” There is the ministry of “the word” (Acts 6:4); the ministry of “the grace” (Acts 20:24); the ministry of “the reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:18); the ministration of “the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:8). There is also the ministry of “the righteousness” (2 Corinthians 3:9). Righteousness for the unrighteous is God’s message to the world; righteousness for those whose only’ qualification is, that they need it; righteousness to the most unrighteous of the sons of men; for it is to the wretched prodigal, the wanderer in the far country, that the Father says, “Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him.” In Jesus, the sinner’s substitute, we have “the perfect One.” God sees perfection in Him. But this perfection, while it detects and condemns our imperfection, provides also for its forgiveness. It is by means of this perfection that God is enabled to deal in love with our imperfection, however great and manifold it may be. The good swallows up the evil, and yet is not tainted thereby. The sinner hands over his sins to the perfect One; and the perfect One hands over His perfection to the sinner. Thus, by reason of this blessed transference or exchange, the imperfect one becomes as the perfect One in the sight of God, and is dealt with as such in regard to all favor and blessing. Perfection covers imperfection, and the believing sinner stands “complete” in the perfect One: “accepted in the Beloved.” Crediting God’s testimony to the perfect One, and His perfect sacrifice, we stand before God on a new footing,—as men who have “become the righteousness of God in Him,”—and who now get life, and peace, and pardon, and blessing, simply because the perfect One has deserved it for them. We have all in Him. —Horatius Bonar, Light & Truth: Bible Thoughts & Themes Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. —Psalm 119:18 Thy Word Is Like a Garden, Lord Thy Word is like a garden, Lord, with flowers bright and fair; And everyone who seeks may pluck a lovely cluster there. Thy Word is like a deep, deep mine; and jewels rich and rare Are hidden in its mighty depths for every searcher there. Thy Word is like a starry host: a thousand rays of light Are seen to guide the traveler and make his pathway bright. Thy Word is like an armory, where soldiers may repair; And find, for life’s long battle day, all needful weapons there. Oh, may I love Thy precious Word, may I explore the mine, May I its fragrant flowers glean, may light upon me shine! Oh, may I find my armor there! Thy Word my trusty sword, I’ll learn to fight with every foe the battle of the Lord. —Great Hymns of the Faith (Zondervan, 1968).

According to Thomas Sowell, the fancier your education, “the more likely you are to spout off about things you don't know anything about.” Sowell discusses his book, Intellectuals and Society:

Dan Phillips presents the following as the inspiration for his book, The World-Tilting Gospel: Christianity is not just an experience, we need to remember, but it is about truth. The experience of being reconciled to the Father, through the Son, by the work of the Holy Spirit all happens within a worldview. This worldview is the way God has taught us in his Word to view the world. That is why the Bible begins with Genesis 1:1 and not with John 3:16. —David Wells, quoted in The World-Tilting Gospel (Kregel, 2011), 10. [source: The Courage to Be Protestant (Eerdmans, 2008), 45.] (I loved The Courage to Be Protestant, and seeing it cited here, in this way, makes me want to go read it again before continuing. But if I obeyed that urge every time I felt it, I'd never finish anything.) Phillips continues to explain the premise of The World-Tilting Gospel: I love compressed truth. Wells’s observation was as brilliant as it was pithy. It went off in my imagination like a thrilling cascade of fireworks, effectively illuminating and framing so much that had been troubling me about today’s church scene. People leap for an experience, fall short of truth, and wander off lost and aimless. A truncated “half-spell” has been substituted for the biblical Gospel. The “nice bits” have been snipped out, isolated, and dolled up as more marketable. Folks have signed on without any real grasp of the Gospel in all its fullness and power. Many professed Christians regard the Gospel as our ticket “in,” and then we’re done with it. It’s like a contract: We ignore the lawyer-talk, sign it, and then forget about it. We think that the Gospel was beginner’s material. Pray a prayer, pen your name, you’re “in”; now move on to something else. But what too many of us have not grasped is: who we really are what kind of world we are really living in how the world really operates and where it is really going who God really is what His eternal plan really was why we really needed Him and His plan so desperately what His terms—the Gospel—really were what difference the Gospel will really make on every day of our lives To discover the reality of these issues, to begin to understand that reality in its fullness, we simply must start with Genesis 1:1. —Ibid. I have several recently-published, yet unread, books that include the word “gospel” in the title. I'm sure most of them are quite good, but none of them start from this foundational position. And this is where we must begin.