The Power that made Christianity Revolutionary

As we prepare to launch our ABIDE Apprentice training I have been working through the material we will give to our young adults. One of the books we will start with is J.D. Greear's Gospel: Recovering the Power that made Christianity Revolutionary. It is a great book that is very approachable and easy to digest. The greatest attribute of the book is, of course, that it makes much of Jesus and the gospel. We will be using it in our "gospel-centered" section and Greear does a good job of working through the implications of allowing the gospel to motivate, inform and define Christianity for the individual and the church.

I gladly commend this book to you. Below are  some of my highlights.

"The angels never get tired of looking into the gospel. This means that there is no end to gospel exploration. There are depths in the gospel that are always there to be discovered and applied not only to our ministry and daily Christian life, but above all to the worship of the God of the gospel with renewed vision..."

"It is one thing to understand the gospel but is quite another to experience the gospel in such a way that it fundamentally changes us and becomes the source of our identity..."

"Abiding in Jesus means understanding that His acceptance of us is the same regardless of the amount of spiritual fruit we have..."

"Before Christianity tells you to do anything, it calls you to sit in wonder and amazement at what God has done for you."

"Where there is no proclamation of the story of Jesus Christ, there is no gospel ministry."

"Living a life centered on the gospel is not about praying the sinner’s prayer to make sure you’re going to heaven and then learning a bunch of new principles to master the Christian life. Gospel-centeredness is about saturating your heart in the good news of Jesus— letting it so remake your mind that you see everything about yourself and your life through its lens. Growth in Christ is not going beyond the gospel, but deeper into it."

 

 

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