This probably seems heretical to many Christians, but perhaps our church culture has focused too much on mercy. The mercy of God cannot be our starting place. A person must first realize that they stand condemned for his sins. If he doesn’t recognize his condemnation before a fearful God, then he cannot understand mercy. After all, the Christian message is that we deserved death from God, but we received mercy from God. You can’t understand the latter without the former. Nowhere in the Scriptures is there even a renunciation of the view that all deserve death for their sins. Unfortunately, this doesn’t pack the pews.
Our modern culture expects mercy from God. People either do not believe that they are sinful. Or they do not believe that their sins merit death. Either way, how can the gospel be preached if the hearers are firm believers in one of these two views?
The church has to learn to teach effectively the sinfulness of mankind. Otherwise the mercifulness of God will never be known.
Tags: Bible, Contemporary Christianity, God, Religion
