Where have all the good preachers gone?
During the past few decades we have been fed a "gospel" of self, of humanism thinly veiled as Christianity. We have heard how we can get all we want from God, only by commanding Him to do by holding Him to His promises. We have heard how we can have all our best life now, our wishes and dreams by having faith. We now also hear that the grace of God gives us all kinds of permission to live in sin and that God is only good and impotent to make any judgement on our behavior since Jesus already paid for it all. Someone actually said that the purpose and center of the gospel is man(humans).
Now, if any or all of this sounded good and great to you excuse me for busting the bubble. None of it is the true gospel. All of it, in its purest form, is just man using God for his own pleasures, plans and designs. Just take any of the above statements, or any like it, and follow it to its most extreme conclusion and the ugly truth will be that this is a false teaching.
The gospel of Jesus Christ, the Bible, is about God. It is the history of an eternal, all powerful, all-knowing, ever present Being's relationship with a finite, weak, ignorant and barely conscious specie. It is the revelation of the magnificent to the insignificant, for the sole purpose of the good pleasure of the former. It is God limiting Himself in order to communicate, relate and interact with people for no other reason than He wants to do it. He does what He does for His own pleasure. His good pleasure, His choosing is the source, the center, the genesis of all.
One would therefore imagine that His ministers would spent the bulk of their time, educating the people on this awesome Deity. One would expect to hear wonderful expose' on His attributes and His wondrous deeds. Is that not what one does with the object of ones affection? Praise and exultations comes naturally, easy, when a person is overwhelmed with affection. The question then begs to be asked: what is wrong with the majority of His ministers, His agents? Why do they not inform the people of His greatness? Why do they not speak of His wonders? Why do they replace the fantastic, unfathomable, adventure of knowing Him with the weak, milk toast diet of man's limited, confusing, speeches? Do they not love Him? Or maybe they do not really believe in Him.
( Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God...; Philippians 2:13 it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Isaiah 53:10 But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. Isaiah 40:5 Then the glory of the LORD will be revealed, And all flesh will see it together; For the mouth of the LORD has spoken. Psalms 50:6 And the heavens declare His righteousness, For God Himself is judge.2Samuel7:24For You have established for Yourself Your people Israel as Your own people forever, and You, O LORD, have become their God. and so, so many other scriptures)
