"Gospel" and Culture

One of the things that has engaged me a great deal over the last couple of years, both personally and professionally, is the staggering degree of conformity to culture that I see in the evangelical church today.

I came across this article today at Evangelical Outpost, and found it to be provocative and thought-provoking. An excerpt:

One famous Evangelical pastor has recently made popular the phrase, “deeds, not creeds.” Evangelicals have their doctrine right, this pastor tells us, they just aren’t living it. Against such sentiments, Dr. Horton argues that many Evangelicals actually do not have their doctrine right, or at least they aren’t preaching it correctly. Evangelicals have confused the important categories of Law and Gospel, turning the Gospel message (which is supposed to be the good news of something that Christ has already done for us), into the Gospel program. If you’ll only live out the Gospel (by reading your Bible every day, joining a certain group at church, and learning how to be a Christ-like example to others), you’ll be healthy, wealthy and wise. The question to be answered is, “What would Jesus do?” rather than, “What has Jesus done?” But Horton says that this is a confusion of categories. The Gospel, by its very nature, is not something that you can do; rather it is something that has already been done. This confusion leads to bad preaching.

Read the whole thing!