Gospel

“It is a throne of grace, all the needs of those who come to it will be supplied.” Come to the throne of grace, that you might know that God is the Just and Justifier. That He is from first to last. Before all things were, He was God. You must not bring Him anything, just your sinfulness, that He might show you His awesome power, in His Awesome Son. “Come then you who are poor as poverty itself, having no merits and destitute of virtues and reduced to beggarly bankruptcy by Adam’s fall and your own transgressions.” “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price (Isaiah 55:1).” It is the free gift of God for those that believe. “…Because if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead you will be saved (Romans 10:9).” It is not by works, but by God. Excluding boasting because man does nothing in his own salvation, it is entirely a work that can only be initiated by God and finished by Christ. “Come, then, you who are not only poor but also wretched, whose miseries make you long for death, and yet you dread it. You captive ones, come in your chains; you slaves, come with the irons upon your souls; you who sit in darkness, come forth all blindfolded as you are. The throne of grace will look on you if you cannot look on it and will give to you, though you have nothing to give to in return, and will deliver you, though you cannot raise a finger to deliver yourself.” “For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption of Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith, this was to show God’s righteousness, because in His divine forbearance He had passed over former sins. (Romans 3:22-25)”

Giglio and Laminin

Christian or christian?

"But alas, how little fit for heaven are many who talk of 'going to heaven' when they die, while they manifestly have no saving faith, and no real acquaintance with Christ. You give Christ no honor here. You have no communion with Him. You do not love Him. Alas! what could you do in heaven? It would be no place for you. Its joys would be no joys for you. Its happiness would be a happiness into which you could not enter. Its employments would be a weariness and burden to your heart. Oh, repent and change before it is too late!" ~J.C. Ryle

To get directly to the point, are you Christian or merely christian? Is God the end to your means, or is He the means to your end? If He is not the all sufficient, all Sovereign, soul satisfying, Creator of the Universe in your life, than do you really believe He is God? Do you only speak Christianity, or do you live it? My fear is that most American Christians are not Christians at all, they are christians with a little c, meaning they acknowledge God as God with their mouths, but not with their lives. They see God as some sort of giving deity, that all they have to do is ask for anything and it will come. That is not Christianity, that is idolatry, exalting gifts above the Giver. This is the "prosperity gospel" this is not the Gospel. The Gospel is Christ and Him crucified. Not a clean bill of health.
"'Come let us reason together,' says the Lord, 'Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool.'"* Go to God, and reason your salvation out with Him, be completely assured of it, do not be as a wave tossed about in the sea. Know that God is your Savior, and soul satisfying shelter. Do not lean on the belief of your parents, or friends, make your faith your own. Not just a Sunday morning, Wednesday night belief, but an all the time belief, that God is great and greatly to be praised. That God is the Gospel. "When we celebrate the Gospel of Christ and the love of God, and when we life up the gift of salvation, let us do it in such a way that people will see through it to God himself." **
* Isaiah 1:18
** John Piper "God is the Gospel" p 16

Dricoll ranting on tolerance

Spurgeon quote

"I love thee, Lord, but with no love of mine,
For I have none to give;
I love thee, Lord; but all the love is Thine,
For by Thy love I love.
I am as nothing, and rejoice to be
Emptied, and lost, and swallowed up in Thee."

Flight to Uganda East Africa

During the transatlantic flight from Detroit to Amsterdam, right after take-off, just after the plane had risen above the clouds, beauty unfolded before me. The sun was setting creating a vast array of colors, over what appeared to be rolling hills, and high mountains of bright yellow, and sinking oranges as they crested and began to descend into deep canyons of dark purples and rich blues, stretching out as far as my eye could see, canyon after canyon and mountain after mountain, each stretching toward the heavens or sinking into the depths of the known world. This awesome spectacle that God spread out before me, causing me to forget all the worries of what might happen during the coming trip, and to extol my glorious King. All of this while the screen in front of me says, “It’s all about you.”
Seeing this beautiful sight, and trying to reconcile in my mind, if it is all about me then, what is this. The sun is not setting and creating this gorgeous landscape for me. The clouds did not form into high mountains, and rolling hills, and deep canyons for me. It was, and is, an irreconcilable thought. None of this can be happening for me. Why would a sun that is millions of miles away be setting for a being that can’t even be seen from its place in the heavens. The clouds that, from their place only see the cities, and those from afar. The lie that it is all about us, that we deserve everything, is completely wrong. It is all about God, about His Son, about Christ and Him Crucified, there can be no higher meaning to the spectacle I saw (or to life), than the praise of the King of Kings, the Creator of the sun and of clouds. He created that image, that beautiful site for His own pleasure. So we on the plane might see it and be amazed by its beauty, and comprehend, for an instant, our smallness. While He sits in Heaven and says, “Can you hold the Pleiades in your hand? I can. Can you loose the belt of Orion? I can.” God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. We can do nothing outside of His grace. “No one can restrain His hand, or say to Him, ‘What have you done?’”