A new Gospel?

This has been on my mind a lot lately, maybe because it's popped up so much in my life in the past few months.

There have been many conferences like Passion that have happened recently. Several of Passion's main goals from what I've heard was to challenge our faith and act it out, and to stop sex trafficking in the world.

On Tuesday in chapel, James Choung challenged us to live out our faith and make our Christianity more than just a way to get to heaven. In evangelizing, he came up with the "big story," which was a drawing/diagram of what he said was the Gospel. Obviously there is so much more he could've added to this drawing, but he said that it is only a drawing and serves to help with discussion. Here you can watch it for yourself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCVcSiUUMhY

These are both very great intentions and good things that we SHOULD be doing as followers of Christ.

James Choung also talked about how two generations before us asked the question of: "What is true?" They were mostly concerned with truth and how to convince others that Christianity was true. The generation after that asked the question: "What is real?" This was the hippie age where everyone was so skeptical about there being any truth or there being any reality. Our current generation asks the question: "What is good?" We are mainly concerned with doing good in the world, regardless of whether we're Christian or not. That's where my main concern lies.

So many of my Christian friends post and talk about how they are excited to go on missions trips and going to help these third world countries. We are definitely called to do good in the world and to be lights in the world in that respect. I am worried that we have lost sight of the true Gospel: that we fell into sin by Adam, that we are all born sinners, that God came down to earth in the form of a man (Jesus), that he was sinless and perfect, and because of that, He was our perfect sacrifice; He died on a cross to save us from the sin that we were born into. We cannot do anything to be saved; we are helpless and lost without Christ. After He died, He then rose from the dead and is alive and sitting at the right hand of God, waiting to come back again. We will be judged by God according to our actions and our hearts.

If we're only doing good, how are we any different from the rest of the world? One of the Islamic pillars is to give alms. Most other religions promote doing good/being good. If we don't tell others the true Gospel, in the deepest love, everything we do is meaningless. We can do good in the world, but will this world last forever? No, of course not. I think a lot of us forget, especially me, that none of us can change people. That is God's job. This is a hard thing for me to accept because I want to be the one to bring people to Christ and to experience this amazing relationship I have with Him!

We are only called to obey Him. We must go and do good, but just WHO is it we are doing good for? Is it for ourselves so that we can feel better about our lives? Or is it the obedience of God's call to go and make disciples of all nations, sharing the true Gospel with the lost?

I fervently pray that this go-and-do-good craze is not something that becomes the new false gospel (like the prosperity gospel). I hope and pray that we as believers and followers of Christ would go out and do good, but to also bring to the lost this beautiful Gospel of the Bible that Jesus cried out to the crowds in the beginning of Mark (1:15): "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel."

I hope that you are encouraged by these things I write about!