The Mature Gospel-Centered Church
Since our founding our church has been, and continues to be, a gospel-centered church. We believe the gospel alone has the power to make us into a people of joy, freedom, and righteousness. But the gospel-centered movement has received some criticism of late—namely, that since its constant aim is to motivate the Christian life by God’s grace, it can at times fail to give practical instructions to believers about how to live as a Christian.
In a recent podcast, we hosted a discussion about the relationship between the law and the gospel in the life of our church. My guess is that many people saw the title (“The law gospel interview”) and maybe thought it didn’t sound that interesting. However, it really is a crucial topic for the life of our church, and I hope everyone listens to it.
Since our founding, our church has been (and continues to be) a gospel-centered church. By that, we mean that every aspect of the Christian life and the life of the church is energized, motivated, and enabled by the grace of God given to us in Christ. We believe the gospel alone has the power to make us into a people of joy, freedom, and righteousness. Or, as 1 John succinctly summarizes the gospel-centered vision, “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:7). We believe that every page of the Bible is about Christ, and that Jesus is the hero of the Bible (and we are not). When we are constantly reminded of God’s supreme grace in Christ, he is the one who is glorified; we are not. As even the great Apostle Paul knew, “Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Cor. 3:5).
The gospel-centered movement is rightly concerned about legalism in the church; but that fear can tend to hog-tie churches from offering practical counsel on how to live.
But the gospel-centered movement has received some criticism of late—namely, that since its constant aim is to motivate the Christian life by God’s grace, it can at times fail to give practical instructions to believers about how to live as a Christian. How should I be married or raise children? What ambition should I have for work? How should I go about dating people? What spiritual disciplines should I incorporate into my life? The gospel-centered movement is rightly concerned about legalism in the church; but that fear can tend to hog-tie churches from offering practical counsel on how to live. An unintended consequence can be that people feel comforted by regular gospel-centered teaching while experiencing little in the way of sanctification.
Recently, it occurred to me that this issue of maturity is actually addressed in an important passage in the Book of Hebrews. This might be kind of a blocky quote, but it is important to hear the whole thing:
“About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits” (Hebrews 5:11-6:3, emphasis added).
I find this passage to be immensely enlightening about how a church becomes mature. They must not only receive milk, but must also move on to solid food.
WHAT IS THE FOUNDATIONAL MILK OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE?
One might be tempted to interpret this passage to mean that once you have received milk, you should no longer need it. But there are two surprising things that the author of Hebrews says. First, that the milk (or elementary doctrine of Christ) is the foundation of the Christian life—meaning you never move on from it; and so, that doctrine had better be straight and solid. Therefore, we need to be reminded of it often! Even in the church addressed in Hebrews, they had lost track of the gospel and were needing it to be explained to them again.
But the author of Hebrews also says that if a community only focuses on the fundamentals, it will not mature.
But second, the author seems to say that this foundational milk is basic gospel truths. That might be surprising for a gospel-centered church to hear—that the gospel is milk instead of solid food. He calls it the “doctrine of Christ” and then lists six elements that make up its content. These six elements might not seem so elementary to you, but let me illuminate a bit here:
“Repentance from dead works and faith toward God” - This is conversion, both the acceptance of Christ by faith and the pattern of the Christian life, a lifetime of repenting of sin and believing in Jesus. This is the heart of gospel-centered spirituality.
“Instruction about washings” - This is a reference to baptism, the initiating rite into covenant with God and membership in the church.
“The laying on of hands” - This is a reference to ordination (1 Tim. 4:14; 2 Tim. 1:6; Acts 6:6). When a person becomes a Christian, he or she needs to learn about the authority Jesus has given to his church and to her officers. This is basically church membership.
“The resurrection of the dead” - This is the Christian hope of eternal life in the age to come.
“Eternal judgment” - This is the truth that God will judge our lives, and it is the foundation for all morality.
Again, while these elements might not sound elementary, they really are: repent and believe, get baptized, join a church, hope for eternal life, and know that in the end, you will be judged by God. This is both the milk for new Christians and the foundation for the whole Christian life.
Therefore, in a gospel-centered church we will constantly be checking that these fundamentals of Christian spirituality and confidence in God’s grace are central in our hearts. We know that we need to be reminded of these gospel truths over and over. We as a church are absolutely committed to this.
Hebrews is clear that the defining quality of the mature is their ability to know what is good and evil.
But the author of Hebrews also says that if a community only focuses on the fundamentals, it will not mature. Or as the author of Hebrews puts it, “for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child” (Heb. 5:13). How then do we not stay as children but grow into maturity?
WHAT IS THE SOLID FOOD OF MATURITY?
The verse in which Hebrews describes maturity is one of the key verses that has shaped our church’s passion for discipleship groups. Verse 14 reads:
“But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.”
This alludes back to the garden of Eden, where our first parents were not given the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They were children. Eventually, they would have grown into eating of the tree, once they were mature enough; but they needed to wait until God granted it. They were impatient, and took what had not yet been given.
Hebrews is clear that the defining quality of the mature is their ability to know what is good and evil. They can look out on the world, and all the questions around work, and family, and relationships, and culture, and say, “This is good, this is evil.” It is that same maturity that was once envisioned in the garden that the Lord wants his children to grow into.
Now obviously, not everyone is equally equipped to do this. We all know Christians who make decisions that we think are foolish. The mature are people who have had their “powers of discernment trained by constant practice.” This means that they have applied the Bible to their marriage and parenting, and seen good fruit. They have applied the gospel to their community life and relationships and have seen good fruit.
We should see the mature not primarily as people who have a lot of theology in their heads and can debate why their views on theology are right; rather, we should see them as people who have applied the law and the gospel into the practical matters of life and have seen God’s blessing.
In addition to this we should expect, as a church, that the way people become more mature is by learning these powers of discernment from the people who are already proven mature people.
I can’t even begin to express how much that has affected my own life. When my wife Shannon and I were newly married, I was a fairly new Christian. We looked for people with strong families and faithful involvement in church and asked them, “What do you do?” And we just did the same. Sometimes, even if it didn’t make sense to us, we could see by results that they knew how to discern good from evil.
IS THERE A DANGER OF LEGALISM?
Now, the concern of many gospel-centered churches is that if the church gets into practical matters, it will start saying, “These things are good; these things are evil,” and therefore will start making rules that aren’t in the Bible. This is legalism: thinking that God is primarily concerned with law-keeping, and so subtly attaching laws to everything in the Christian life.
This is how I have talked with our staff about this issue. Our church has to live in the midst of two paradoxical biblical statements:
“Do not go beyond what is written” (1 Cor. 4:6).
“And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus…” (Col. 3:17).
We are both supposed to avoid adding commands that are not given in the Bible, while also applying the Bible to every aspect of life, including areas that aren’t mentioned in the Bible. The Bible doesn’t talk about iPhones or sports games on Sundays. This is one of the many paradoxes given to us in the Bible. God is three in one. Jesus is God and man. Don’t go beyond what is written, and also, go beyond what is written! The Christian life is paradoxical.
But as the church begins to give counsel on the thousands of moral questions we face in this world, is there a danger that the church’s wisdom turns into a growing list of laws that go way beyond what the Bible ever said?
The answer is yes, that can happen. But that doesn’t mean we can or should avoid telling people how they should live. We have to teach people practical Christian living, or they won’t mature. And as the people of a gospel-centered church, it should be our expectation that we are going to hear that kind of instruction. What then is the solution for avoiding legalism? Two guidelines for us:
Root practical application in the gospel of Christ. For example, as we encourage people to become church members we might say, “Christ has bound himself to you with promises, which gives security and strength to your relationship. Church membership is how you become like him in making promises to God and to his people.”
Focus on principles, then offer examples of how to apply the principle. This is often how we speak in Renew Northwest. This magazine is meant to be a place where we offer more practical application. Whether it is regarding cannabis or child-rearing, we say, “Here is the biblical principle which we are all obligated to fulfill, and here are some suggestions on how you might live that out in your life.” The principle is fixed and binding, but the application might vary from Christian to Christian.
If we want to be a mature gospel-centered church, we need to continue preaching the grace of Christ week in and week out. This is the foundation of everything we do, and if it is not straight and strong, everything else will become crooked. But we can’t stay nourished only by this milk; we must also move on to solid food, discerning what is good in both the Christian life and in the culture around us. Let us not be afraid to do that! But may it be with wisdom, guided by the Holy Spirit and rooted in the word of God, striving to never go beyond what is written in the Word.
