In The Spectator Coffee
House podcast review of the year, Michael Gove reflected that the incoming
Labour government over did the Gospel of Gloom. You remember all that stuff about
how terrible their inheritance from the Tories was, and the £22 billion black
hole in the public finances.
Christians certainly need
to realise something of the bad news before we can really grasp the good news
of the gospel. We believe in the goodness of God and in the original goodness
of creation, which original sin mars but does not entirely undo. We believe
human beings are totally depraved. The Fall affects us all, all the way down and
in every part. The human predicament is truly terrible, our plight desperate. Sin
is hellish. Only if we have a sense of some of these things will we see the value
and urgency of the gospel.
It is against this black
back cloth that the diamond of the gospel shines most brightly.
It is also almost impossible
to over emphasise the goodness of the good news. The Christian faith is glad
tiding that should make us dance and leap for joy. It is the best news in the
world ever. A merry Christmas is most fitting.
And our sense of sin and
weakness should not allow us to be gloomy about the church. Hope is essential
and despair spreads and is self-defeating.
The church is always
somewhat a human institution prey to all sorts of human failings. There is always
much of which we need to repent and there is no health in us of ourselves.
There are no biblical promises
simply for the C of E or the parish church or for any other denomination, tribe
or gathering.
But we know that Jesus will
build his church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
The gospel works. Love
wins. Christians should be an optimistic people. The war is decided so we can
venture boldly. If our little enterprise founders, well, not to worry!
The gospel is for people
in gloom and great darkness. But the gloom must be precisely understood and calibrated.
For every look at the darkness, we also need the superabundant and overcoming
Light who scatters the darkness from before our path.
https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/euangelion-gospel/
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