A Challenge for the Modern Christianity

 The Gospel Jesus Proclaimed: Rediscovering the Message of the Kingdom of God

When we return to the beginnings of the Christian faith, an important question naturally arises: What exactly was the gospel that Jesus proclaimed? 

A careful reading of the Gospel narratives reveals that the central theme of Jesus’ preaching was the Kingdom of God. The opening proclamation of his ministry clearly expresses this message: “The kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe the good news” (Mark 1:15). Likewise, in Luke 4:43 Jesus states explicitly, “I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.”

These statements reveal the heart of Jesus’ mission. He did not come primarily to establish a new religious system. Rather, he came to call human beings back under the reign of God. According to Jesus, God is the true king of the world, yet human beings live as though they are independent of God’s rule. Much of Jesus’ teaching describes this condition of alienation from God.

One of the most powerful illustrations of this reality appears in the parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15). In the story, the younger son leaves his father’s house and ends up living in misery, even among pigs. This image powerfully symbolizes humanity’s spiritual condition: people who have wandered away from the life of God. Yet the turning point of the story occurs when the son “comes to himself,” regains his sense, and decides to return to his father. When he returns, the father receives him with compassion and restores him.

The message of this parable highlights the essence of repentance. Entry into the Kingdom of God does not occur merely through adopting a religious identity or accepting certain doctrines. Rather, it happens when human beings recognize their lost condition, turn back to God, and accept God’s reign in their lives.

Jesus explained the nature of the Kingdom of God through many parables. One of the most striking is the parable of the yeast in Matthew 13:33. Just as a small amount of yeast eventually leavens the entire dough, the Kingdom of God begins in seemingly small ways but gradually transforms the whole. Similarly, the parable of the mustard seed (Matthew 13:31–32) illustrates how something that begins very small can grow into something large and influential. These images portray the Kingdom of God as a transforming power that spreads quietly but profoundly within human life and society.

Jesus also emphasized that the Kingdom of God is not merely an external political reality. In Luke 17:20–21 he states that the Kingdom of God does not come with visible signs, but that “the kingdom of God is among you.” In other words, the Kingdom of God is fundamentally the reality of God’s reign being accepted in human lives.

However, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, some scholars have observed a shift in the emphasis of Christian proclamation. The German theologian Albert Schweitzer famously summarized this observation with the statement: “Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God; the church proclaimed Jesus.” This remark does not deny the importance of Jesus but highlights a historical development: while Jesus’ own preaching focused on the coming reign of God, the early church increasingly centered its proclamation on the person of Jesus himself.

Historically, this development is understandable. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus profoundly shaped the faith of his followers. As a result, the apostles proclaimed Jesus as Lord and Messiah. For example, in Acts 2 Peter’s sermon focuses on the death, resurrection, and exaltation of Jesus. The central claim of that sermon is that God has made Jesus both Lord and Christ.

Yet this raises an important theological question. Do beliefs about Jesus, by themselves, bring people into the Kingdom of God? The teaching of Jesus suggests that something deeper is required. Throughout the Gospels, the fundamental condition for entering the Kingdom is repentance and transformation of life. Jesus repeatedly calls people to repent, warning that without repentance people cannot share in God’s kingdom (Luke 13:3).

Beliefs about Jesus may inspire people to listen to him and take his message seriously. They may draw attention to his authority and significance. But belief alone does not automatically bring a person into the reality of God’s reign. The Kingdom of God becomes real in a person’s life when that person turns toward God and willingly lives under God’s rule.

This insight presents an important challenge for the contemporary church. In many contexts Christian preaching has focused primarily on doctrines about Jesus—his identity, his divinity, and the meaning of his death. While these beliefs are central to Christian theology, there is a risk that the message Jesus himself proclaimed—the good news of the Kingdom of God—can fade into the background.

The world today is marked by deep spiritual confusion and longing. People search for meaning, reconciliation, and hope. In such a context, the message that Jesus proclaimed remains profoundly relevant: human beings are invited to turn back to God and live under God’s life-giving reign.

Therefore the church in every generation must continually ask itself an important question: What is the primary message we are proclaiming to the world? Is it merely a set of beliefs about Jesus, or is it the transforming call to enter the Kingdom of God that Jesus himself announced?

The future vitality of Christian faith may well depend on rediscovering this original emphasis. When the good news of the Kingdom of God is proclaimed again with clarity and conviction, people are invited not merely to accept doctrines but to experience a profound change of life. They are called to repentance, restoration, and participation in the life of God.

In this sense, rediscovering the gospel of the Kingdom is not a rejection of Jesus but a return to the heart of his message. It is the good news that God’s reign is near, that reconciliation with God is possible, and that anyone who turns back to the Father can enter the joy and freedom of life in God’s Kingdom.

Jesus’ Good News

(A summary of the sermon given at St.Paul &St.Peter’s church, Houston on June 23, 2019)

Today we heard from Matthew’s Gospel the story of Jesus sending his disciples with the good news -- the Kingdom of God is at hand. I have always wanted to know the meaning of the good news proclaimed by Jesus, and recently I have got a very clear understanding of what it means. This is what I am going to share with you now.

In order to understand Jesus’ good news, we need to live in the time and place of Jesus. Although we are far removed from Jesus’ time, we may imagine that we are living at that time and place. Let us imagine that we live in the fist century Israel, and we are among the people who listened to Jesus’ good news.

People had an extremely miserable life there. That place was occupied by the Romans, and under their rule, the Jews had no freedom to live a normal life as they wanted. Their economic situation was very bad, as they had to pay taxes to the Romans in addition to the temple tax. Many of them sold themselves into slavery. There were robbers everywhere, and life was not safe. Contagious diseases spread, and there were lepers everywhere. There were also mentally ill people everywhere, who were thought demon-possessed.

The people believed that they were in such a miserable situation because the world had been ruled by Satan. They had a story that originally Satan was a good angel, who turned evil by rebelling against God. They hoped and prayed that God would soon appoint a new ruler in place of Satan, whom they called the messiah, the anointed.

It is in this context that Jesus proclaimed the good news that God was already ruling the world. People were excited to hear the news. They approached Jesus for more details. They wanted to know if the messiah would come in the clouds, if he would do a judgment, and who would be on the right side of the messiah at the judgment.

Jesus made it clear to them that God was already ruling the world. If the people were under the rule of Satan, God was not to blame for it. They were free to remain under Satan’s rule or to escape from there and be under God’s rule. Jesus made his idea clear with the story of the prodigal son. He left his father and worked under a cruel master. When he realized his mistake, he left this master and ran toward his father. He was not kept in bondage by his master. He was free to leave. God, our heavenly father, is like his father, and Satan is like his cruel master. We are always free to leave Satan and go to our heavenly father, who is always willing to accept us.

In order to turn to his father, he needed to have two primary realizations of his father. He needed to realize that his father was right and he was wrong, and also that his father loved him unconditionally. We need these two realizations of God for us to turn to God.

1. We need to realize that God loves us, and God has nothing against us. God is willing to forgive us the worst crimes. God is always there with stretched arms to receive us.

2. We also need to realize that God is the only one who is always right, good and holy, for God is the only one who knows everything. We, with our limited knowledge, do mistakes. If we realize this we will be willing to admit our mistakes and seek forgiveness. We will also be willing to forgive others.

The prodigal son was willing to admit his mistakes, justifying his father, but his older brother justified his mistakes placing the blame on his father.

In the Garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve disobeyed God, they had the option to say sorry. But instead they justified themselves and put the blame on others. God, you are wrong, and I am right! That is how Adam said. The prodigal son said in the other way: father, you are right, and I am wrong.

In our Kauma, we say Holy art thou O God, and then we say, Lord have mercy on us sinners. Like the prodigal son we also admit that God is right (holy) and we are sinners (wrong).   

The realization that God alone is holy helps us to seek forgiveness and also forgive others. When we admit our mistakes, and forgive others, the world will transform to heaven-- a place of love, joy and peace.

May God bless us to transform our families, our communities, our workplaces, and our world into heaven!           

The Gospel of Evangelical Christianity

“Millions of people in this country whose lives have never been changed believe themselves born again because we have so reduced the gospel of Jesus Christ that it means nothing more than a simple decision that will only take five minutes of your time,” admits Paul Washer, an American evangelical missionary in Peru.

 

He explains the evangelical method of making people born again as follows:
“You walk up to someone and ask ‘Are you a sinner?’ If he says ‘yes’, then you ask, ‘Would you like to go to heaven?’ If he says ‘yes’, then you ask, ‘Would you like to ask Jesus to come into your heart?’ If he says ‘yes’, he prays that simple prayer. Then you ask him if he was sincere, and if he says ‘yes’ then you declare him to be born again. “

 

Paul Washer admits that the evangelical Christianity has done more harm than all the heresies combined by its simplistic method of making people born again. He asserts that the greatest need in the evangelical community today is that they need to know the gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

Paul Washer has given an excellent diagnosis of the illness of evangelical Christianity. He correctly assesses that the evangelical Christianity has become a show off without any real content. It has become a Christ-less Christianity. It does not serve its purpose anymore. It is a movement without power. Therefore, the evangelical Christian community needs to turn to Christ before it can help others to do so. It has to hear anew the gospel of Christ, and repent.

 

With this introduction, Paul Washer proceeds to a proclamation of Jesus’ Gospel as he understands it.  Although I fully agree with him in his analysis of the present state of evangelical Christianity, I cannot agree with him fully in his understanding of the Christian Gospel. In order to explain how I differ from him, I will present my own understanding here first, and then present his understanding.

 

The Gospel of Jesus Christ in my Understanding
Jesus’ Gospel is the good news of salvation for humankind, which is in the captivity of sin. Unlike the rest of the creation, humankind disobeys its creator. The Sun and moon, the earth and heaven, plants and animals—all of them obey the creator, but not human beings. We live a life according to our own will rather than according to the will of God. Not only that we are sinners, we don’t even know that we are sinners. Because we don’t see the glory of our creator, we don’t see the heinous nature of disobeying Him. Just as the fish in water do not know that they are wet, we don’t know that we are sinners.

 

This is the Christian diagnosis of the human condition. I don’t think any Christian tradition would disagree with this diagnosis. We, human beings, have to live our life according to the universal laws set by the creator. All of our problems in our life are caused by our disobedience. All our sciences and other branches of learning are our attempts to discover the universal laws. They all tell us that a healthy life depends upon the obedience of the natural laws set by the creator.

 

The Christian gospel is that this problem of humanity has a solution. It is possible for humanity to establish the right relationship with the creator so that they can live a life of obedience. Here is a short passage from John’s epistle, which clearly summarizes the Christian view of the problem and the solution.

 

God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.  If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.  If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us. I john 1: 5-10

 

According to John, the problem of the humanity is this: There exists an enmity between God and man. Why? God is light, but we live in darkness. Not only that we live in darkness, but also that we deny that we live in darkness. We can have a friendship (fellowship) with God only if we also live in light. The solution is simple: all that we have to do is to admit that we are in darkness, and come to the light. This is like a sick person admits that he is sick, and goes to the doctor. Once we establish friendship (fellowship) with God, we will also have friendship with each other. We will have a life of obedience. Like the rest of the creation, we will also live according to the will of God.

 

John also mentions that the blood of Jesus purifies us from all our sins. This statement implies that Jesus’ death on the cross was like a sin offering, one of the sacrifices in Jewish religion. In Jewish religion, they were supposed to sacrifice animals on the altar to pay off for their sins to God. The early Christianity understood Jesus’ death by relating it to a sacrifice-- the ultimate sacrifice which paid off all the sins of all humanity. However, in order for someone to establish the right relationship with God, he/she doesn’t need to know about this. All that a sick person needs to do is to admit that he is sick, and comes to the doctor; similarly all that we have to do is to admit that we are sinners, and come to God.

 

This is the essence of Jesus Christ’s gospel as I understand it. It correctly diagnoses the human problem, and prescribes a working solution. 

 

I used a passage from John’s epistle to explain this. I can also present a passage from Paul’s epistle to Romans. “But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.  This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.  God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith” Rom. 3:21-25

 

Although we are sinners, we deny this, and remain self-righteous.  In order to be justified (establish fellowship with God), we need to replace our self-righteousness with God-righteousness. In other words, we need to agree that we are wrong and God is right. We need to have faith in God to do so. This is like a sick person approaching a doctor when he has faith in him. He also needs to admit that the doctor is right.

 

Paul also relates Jesus’ death to a sacrifice. “Faith in Jesus Christ” means faith that Jesus taught us or that Jesus exemplified. It does not mean faith in Jesus Christ as opposed to faith in God.

 

This passage is easier to understand in the light of John’s passage, but if we go to this passage straight, the ambiguous expressions such as faith in Christ and righteousness of God will be harder to deal with. The Christian exegetes have been wrestling with these expressions for two millennia to resolve the ambiguities.

 

There is a problem in the relationship between God and man, and this problem is caused by man. If man repents and reestablishes his lost relationship with God, it will solve the problem. This is how most of the Christian traditions understand it.

The Evangelical Version of the Gospel

Unfortunately, the evangelical Christianity built up a mountain of complicated set of beliefs and doctrines based on this passage of Paul.

 

Paul Washer presents the Gospel of Jesus Christ in his sermon as he understands it from his evangelical tradition. Using the passage from the Epistle to the Romans, he begins the diagnosis of the human problem as sin. He correctly defines it as disobeying God. The complication begins at this point. God is introduced as a righteous judge and man as a criminal standing in front of God awaiting the judgment. God pronounces capital punishment upon man—eternal death, which is life away from God in eternal hell. But justice is only one side of God; God has also another side—of love. When the justice of God pronounces punishment upon man, the love of God saves man from that punishment. How does the love of God do this? The love of God makes God (or the son of God) incarnate as a human being and accept the capital punishment from the justice of God upon himself. Jesus experienced a separation from God on the cross as a punishment.  Anyone who believes this will go to heaven after death, but to those who do not believe this awaits eternal hell.

 

I don’t know in whose brain originated this circumlocutory story. But this story occupies the central place in the creed of the evangelical Christianity. According to this story, the essential human problem is not our sin, but God’s wrath toward us. So primarily we have to deal with God’s wrath and not with our sin. How do we do this? There is only one way. We have to hide behind Jesus, because if we appear before God as we are, God’s wrath will consume us.  

By salvation the evangelicals mean going to heaven after death. When one's soul reaches the gate of heaven, the gatekeepers will look for his/her name in the Book of Life.  Unless his her name is found in the book, he/she can't enter heaven. No one's name is in the Book of life when he/she is born. Once he/she believes that Jesus died for his/her sins, and he/she accepts Jesus as his/her personal savior, his/her name gets written for the first time in the Book of life, which guarantees his/her entry to heaven.  They call themselves "the saved".

 

They give undue stress to the second coming of Jesus Christ. They believe that when Christ comes down from heaven, all the  "saved" people get to receive him in the mid-sky. The dead ones rise and the alive ones get transformed, and with a new transformed body they rise up to meet Jesus.

Because they focus on the other world, they ignore this world. They don't care for the world in which they live. Once they rise up in heaven, this world is going to be burned along with all the unsaved ones. Whenever there is a war somewhere or when there is an earthquake somewhere they rejoice, for they see it as a sign of Jesus' return.

 

Because they sharply divide people into saved and unsaved, they refuse to cooperate with the "unsaved" ones. They look down upon the "unsaved" ones who include not only the people of other religions but also those Christians who are non-evangelicals.

 

Conclusion
A good friend of mine forwarded the link of this sermon of Paul washer, and I took time to watch it.  At the beginning, I found in this a wake-up call to evangelical Christianity which has come from within itself. I had a faint hope at the beginning that he might present the gospel of Christ in a sensible way. However, he disappointed me toward the end. He proclaimed the same corrupted evangelical version of gospel.  He argues that this is the true gospel of Jesus Christ, and he wants the evangelical Christian community to regain this powerful gospel.

 

Paul Washer needs to realize that the gospel he preaches is a version of the Christian gospel which was corrupted by the evangelical tradition. Its circumlocutory story is an insult to human intelligence. It won’t help anyone to be in right relationship with God, but it will only keep people away from God, for who can be in friendship with a wrathful God? He has realized that the evangelical Christian community is in need of the true gospel. But he hasn’t realized that he himself needs the true gospel. May God help him!

Paul Washer is a gifted person and I admire him for his oratorical skills and his courage to speak out what he believes to be true. Personally I have nothing against him. I am talking about him here as a representative of evangelical Christianity. Similarly I am not pointing finger at the evangelical Christianity representing some other form of Christianity. I do not represent any organized community or tradition here. These are my personal opinions.

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