Fortunately, the gospel message does not end with God’s goodness and man’s sin, that would not be good news. But in reality God has done something with our terrible condition, sent His Son to live for us, to die for us, and to be resurrected for us. Now, then, there’s a way to have a loving and reciprocal relationship with him. One day he will return and do all that is new, and we will experience eternal communion with all his holy and heavenly hosts.
What makes my heart even happier is knowing the cost to him. Knowing that Christ died for my sins gives me great emotional freedom. God certainly cares about your little people. It gives me real hope, hope and a way out of the trap of the victimization mentality. Those of us who have negative experiences in family life can retain the greatest example of sacrificed love in the history of the universe.
- As one of my friends says.
- “Jesus puts everything in the right perspective.
- I used to feel sorry for myself.
- I used to cultivate self-pity.
- I didn’t really know my father and he left me even though I didn’t know it.
- “I did something wrong.
- I was angry about it.
- But now God is my Father and loves me even when I still act wrong.
- And that gives me security.
- God doesn’t run away from me when things get complicated.
- Send your Son to die of a cruel death in my place?All this seems incomprehensible.
- A lot of people who were supposed to love us did the exact opposite.
- But here’s the one who should be mad at us?He died on a cross for us.
- That’s all that came to us when we ran away from him.
- It’s like we have an older brother protecting us now.
- Except this person is the king of the universe!.
As a young man I was in countless orphanages, foster homes and abuse situations, things have happened to me and I have done things that have made me feel guilty, embarrassed and confused as a child and then as a young man. I wanted revenge. I discovered that even at the beginning of my Christian life, I prayed that many of the people responsible for my suffering would burn in hell.
I certainly did not understand grace until that moment, I did not understand the Atonement, and that the recent peace I have experienced was costly to the Son of God, but in time God opened my eyes to see the meaning of his supreme sacrifice: all my sins were resolved; these sins no longer represent the defining reality of my life, I was no longer allowed to become them.
The supreme act of forgiveness began to filter out my way of praying for my family members, former acquaintances, and adoptive parents. As the Spirit acted in my life, prayers for his condemnation were replaced by prayers filled with tears crying out for their salvation. Sacrifice crushed my soul of love so that I could no longer cultivate this barrier of hatred. Christ’s love overcame my hatred and freed me from the cycle that was the cause of my self-destruction for so long.
Facing the most incomprehensible beauty of Christ’s sacrifice forces us to reconsider our place in the world, to abandon self-pity, to find freedom in their love, and through their Spirit to seek forgiveness and love even for those who have hurt us so much. A lot. . . My friend Stephen compares it to ‘winning the spiritual lottery’. He reflected: “I used to dream that I had won the lottery when I was a kid so I could pay for all the damage I had done. But in Christ I have been forgiven, and my sins have been paid, even if I cannot pay what I have done to the people, can I pray for their souls and expect them to find what I have found?
It is the Jesus that the poor need: the Redeemer who carries our sin, who makes atonement, who takes away our guilt, who lives forever. A Christ who simply reiterates who we are is a savior who does not save us from much.
In recent years, Christians and Christian organizations have increased their interest in helping people suffering from poverty and misery, but this renewed interest in poverty reduction is doomed to failure if it has no roots in the local church, which is God’s established way of attracting the miserable. people in a transformative relationship with him.
Emphasizing the priority of the gospel, Mez McConnell and Mike McKinley, both pastors of local churches in poverty-affected areas, offer biblical leadership and practical strategies for establishing, revitalizing, and cultivating churches faithfully in difficult places, in our own community, and elsewhere around. the world.
By: Mez McConnell. © 2016 20Seemas. Original: Why is it so important to adequately represent Christ in our evangelization?
Excerpt from the book Church in Hard Places, published by Editora Fiel © 2016 Ministério Fiel. All rights reserved. Website: MinisterioFiel. com. br.
Authorizations: You are authorized and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format, provided that the author, his ministry and translator are no longer no longer modified and not used for commercial purposes.