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| Photo by Kirsti Pennels |
"Or do you despise the the riches of His goodness, forbearance (tolerance), and longsuffering (patience), not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?" - Romans 2:4 (emphasis added)
Some preach hell-fire and brimstone, others the wrath and the judgement of God and still other "preachers of the gospel" will hammer on what YOU need to do in order to inherit eternal life. The above mentioned scripture clearly indicates that it is the "goodness of God" that draws men unto Him.
If we are to continue as generations have done before us and try to scare people out of hell, instead of loving them into heaven, then we will have learnt nothing from their mistakes. Fear motivates to a certain extent, but as soon as the reason for the fear (hell) is forgotten, then there is no reason to have faith in a loving God, anymore. Love and acceptance are much stronger motivators: " There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment (torment)" (1 John 4:18 emphasis added)
In Psalm 103:5 the psalmist has his revelation of God's nature, "For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations" If our God declares Himself as being good, gracious, loving and faithful, why would we preach a gospel of condemnation that is contrary to His nature? I think the main problem is that not everyone, preachers included, see God as being all good. They have a warped view of His true nature, a nature that is revealed from the beginning through loving covenants, which culminated in Him sending His only Son to reconcile man to Him.
We can't afford to see God as the big-man-upstairs who is going to strike us down when we do something wrong. We owe it to ourselves and we owe it to the world to get a first hand revelation of who He is, by studying the Word and spending time in His presence. Then it will be the goodness of God that motivates us towards a victorious Christian life and our motivation for seeing the lost saved will take on a new dimension. Presenting a good and loving God to people will bring the world to it's knees, it will drive out all fear and it will bring hope to a generation holding on to the thinnest of threads.
Translations used: New King James and NIV (1984) with emphasis added
2 comments:
Like it!
I agree absolutely, but there is such a huge pile of teaching from very influential preachers for the last few hundred years that make the case for preaching the hellfire message. It's a lot of repentance I still need to do because a lot of the time I hear the niggling voice telling me I'm being to nice and hell is partf the gospel too.
@Jbosvark: Absolutely, we can't ignore the reality of eternal damnation; however at the same time we can't afford to focus on it. The gospel is the good news to those who believe it, how can they believe if no-one preaches to them (Rom 10). We must preach the good news of Christ and Him crucified and what the ramifications of that are. It's the understanding of this good news that will change peoples lives forever and lead them to repentance. Hell/death-preaching is way inferior to the message of grace and love!! Thanks for the comments, keep them coming!
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