The Christian Moralist

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“I live in a vacuum that is as lonely as a radio tube when the batteries are dead, and there is no current to plug into.” that’s what Ernest Hemingway said of his life. How could that be? He was known for his tough-guy image and globe-trotting pilgrimages to exotic places. He was a big-game hunter, a bullfighter, a man who could drink the best of them under the table. He was married four times and lived his life seemingly without moral restraint or conscience. But on a sunny Sunday morning in Idaho, he pulverized his head with a shotgun blast.

“I live in a vacuum that is as lonely as a radio tube when the batteries are dead, and there is no current to plug into.” that’s what Ernest Hemingway said of his life. How could that be? He was known for his tough-guy image and globe-trotting pilgrimages to exotic places. He was a big-game hunter, a bullfighter, a man who could drink the best of them under the table. He was married four times and lived his life seemingly without moral restraint or conscience. But on a sunny Sunday morning in Idaho, he pulverized his head with a shotgun blast.

Slide - Ernest Hemmingway

Slide - Ernest Hemmingway

But there was another side to Ernest Hemingway that you may not know. He grew up in an evangelical Christian home. His grandparents were missionaries and his father was a devoted churchman and a friend of none other than D. L. Moody, the great evangelist. His family conformed to the strictest codes of Christianity and, as a boy, he was active in his church.

But something didn’t ring true for Hemingway. While he seemed to embrace all that he encountered, there was a hollow ring in his soul. It came bubbling out when he went away to WW1 as a war correspondent and observed the death and despair that only war can bring. His cultural Christianity failed him. He soured on God and rejected his cultural Christianity.

That’s what we’ve been talking about over the last 2-3 weeks in this series we’ve entitled: The Real Thing. We are trying to define what it means to really be a disciple of Jesus Christ—to have the “real thing.” What we’ve discovered is that there is a religion in this country that calls itself Christianity that is simply an expression of American Culture. In fact, as I have already told you a couple of times, Al Mohler, the president of Southern Seminary says that we are “swimming” in this American, Cultural Christianity and that this “religion” is committed to five basic beliefs:

The Beliefs of Cultural Christianity

· “A God exists who created and orders the world and watches over human life on earth.”

· “God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions.”

· “The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.”

· “God does not need to be particularly involved in one’s life except when God is needed to resolve a problem.”

· “Good people go to heaven when they die.”

We also said that this cultural Christianity gets expressed in a few specific ways and that each of those ways has a specific obstacle of faith that keeps them from really connecting with Christ. Last week we talked about the liberal Christian and saw that, because the liberal Christian fails to understand the nature of the Bible—that it is the God-breathed revelation of God—he fails to believe the necessary doctrines of Christianity that make you a genuine Christ-follower.

This week I want to talk about another expression of cultural Christianity. Let me introduce you to Danny:

Slide - Man helping

Danny is a great guy. He’s always stepping in to help his wife with housework and pick up the kids so she can be present at work. He never misses a single event that his kids are involved in, and other dudes secretly hate him because all the wives wish their husbands were more like him. By all accounts, he’s a fantastic guy. When you think of your lost friends, you’d never think of Danny, because honestly, he behaves better than you do. He’s a better husband and a better dad. There’s no glaring character flaw.

Unlike people who feel their failure and need for a Savior, you and Danny kind of feel like he’s got it covered. He seems unapproachable for gospel conversation, because neither of you know how you’d get to the part where Jesus is our only hope.

Quite honestly, you’d be afraid to bring up how lost Danny is to him because he can point to places where he actually lives a more sacrificial life, perhaps, than you do. You’re afraid that, if you bring it up, he might just begin to point out what he’s doing and what you’re not doing.

So you’d never dare imply that Danny is going to hell. Still you know what the Bible says.

Galatians 2:21 NKJV

I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.”

tells us that if eternal life depends on the good things WE do, Christ died for nothing.

tells us that if eternal life depends on the good things WE do, Christ died for nothing.

NEED

But that’s the tricky part of reaching the Christian moralist. You have to tell the best guy in the neighborhood that he is lost without Christ. That doesn’t actually begin with Danny, that begins with you and me. We cannot be in denial about Danny the Dynamic Dad. Denial (on our part, not even necessarily his) might be the biggest obstacle to reaching him for Christ.

Now, often these people have an acquaintance with the gospel and might even affirm it’s facts, but if you ask them about going to heaven, they will immediately start reciting all the good things that they have done.

And, in that, they are like most people. That’s why I want you to listen this morning. I’ve had enough gospel conversations with people to be able to tell you that, if you ask someone on the streets of Wilson why God is going to let them into heaven when they die, 90% of them will tell that it’s because they have been a “good person.”

That may make us hesitate to share the gospel with them. Just ask yourself, when most of us meet a guy like Danny:

Do we have a tendency to give him an exception clause because he’s such a nice guy?

Do we rationalize that he’s a Christian because he’s so moral or nice?

Do we mistake Christian morality for saving faith?

If so, are we the judge of who is good? Or is God?

After all, why did Jesus die? Was His death meaningless?

If nobody’s perfect, and you have to be “good” to get to heaven, just how good do you have to be? And who sets that standard?

And here may be the most telling question: Do we believe heaven and hell are real? If we do, we can’t be in denial about his eternal state. He is not an exception to God’s declaration that there is no one righteous.

You see, the Christian moralist is lost, but he really may not know it. He may not be arrogantly denying his sinfulness, he may not know what the Bible really says. What does the Bible say? Well, the book of Romans thoroughly explains the gospel. In chapter one Paul indicts the Gentile pagan for his unbelief and willful rejection of God. In chapter two, he skewers the proud Jew who thinks that just because he has been given the law, he is righteous even though he cannot and does not keep it. In chapter three he concludes both Jew and Gentile to be under the judgement of God telling both groups that the wages of their sin will be death. In chapter four, he presents the way to real righteousness. It is through faith. Trusting in Christ makes us right with God, not keeping the law.

Now all of this would have been confusing to the average Jew. On what basis was a holy, righteous God able to accept a sinful man? The answer to that question is addressed in these verses. Read with me beginning in chapter 5, v 6:

Romans 5:6–11 NKJV

For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

6 For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. 10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

TRANS:

These verses tell us that the Christian moralist doesn’t understand that:

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GOD IS ABSOLUTELY HOLY

V9 communicates what for some is a very troubling truth. Look at it. It says

Romans 5:9 NKJV

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.

“Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from (what?) That’s right: WRATH.

Now, that’s not a happy term. In fact, the second-century heretic, Marcion, when he would read

Romans 1:18 NKJV

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,

(For the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness . . .) he would omit the words “of God” so that the wrath would not be attributed to God. He was not the last theologian to try to rewrite the Bible to their own liking. For some reason, Marcion thought the concept of wrath was incompatible with his enlightened understanding of God. Countless others since then have joined the cause, seeing this concept of wrath as archaic.

But you cannot have the God of the Bible without knowing of His wrath. In the Bible anger is a part of God’s make-up. One commentator wrote:

“As long as God is God, He cannot behold with indifference that His creation is destroyed and His holy will trodden underfoot. Therefore He meets sin with His mighty and annihilating reaction.” Paul works with this same conception of God’s wrath, stressing the working and effects of God’s wrath. He speaks of wrath as a present reality under which people outside Christ stand and predicts the outpouring of God’s wrath on the future day of judgment.

If you say that God is a Holy God, it could be no other way. He must be a God of wrath. Carl Henry writes of God’s coming judgment on our country:

Our massacre of a million fetuses a year; our deliberate flight from the monogamous family; our normalizing of fornication and of homosexuality and other sexual perversions; our programming of self-indulgence above social and familial concerns--all represent a quantum leap in moral deterioration, a leap more awesome than even the supposed qualitative gulf between conventional weapons and nuclear missiles. Our nation has all but tripped the worst ratings on God’s Richter scale of fully deserved moral judgement.

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Slide - Pic - Miroslav

Miroslav Volf, a Christian theologian from Croatia, used to reject the concept of God’s wrath. He thought that the idea of an angry God was barbaric, completely unworthy of a God of love. Maybe you do too. This whole concept of an angry God turns you off and has no appeal to you. Well you and Miroslav would have been on the same page.

But then his country experienced a brutal war. People committed terrible atrocities against their neighbors and countrymen.

His last resistance to the idea of God’s wrath was a casualty of the war in the former Yugoslavia, his home. According to some estimates, 200,000 people were killed and over 3,000,000 were displaced. Villages and cities were destroyed, people were shelled day in and day out, some of them brutalized beyond imagination. In light of such evil, he said he could not imagine God not being angry.

Or think, he said, of Rwanda in the last decade of the past century, where 800,000 people were hacked to death in one hundred days! How did God react to the carnage? By doting on the perpetrators in a grandfatherly fashion? By refusing to condemn the bloodbath but instead affirming the perpetrators’ basic goodness? Wasn’t God fiercely angry with them?

He went on to write:

Though I used to complain about the indecency of the idea of God’s wrath, I came to think that I would have to rebel against a God who wasn’t wrathful at the sight of the world’s evil. God isn’t wrathful in spite of being love. God is wrathful because God is love.

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You see, this really must be personalized in your own life. Can you grasp it? God isn’t just angry at Molosivic who brutalized Croatia; He isn’t just angry at the Rwandan murderers, or Stalins henchmen, or Hitler’s syncophants. Apart from Christ, He is also angry with you.

Now this is what the cultural Christian—the “good person” totally misses. He cannot comprehend just how offensive he is to God. He cannot see how God could possibly be angry with him!

Now I know God’s wrath isn’t pleasant to hear about. In fact, it is absolutely foreign to us in this country. But that’s the problem: In this country we’ve abandoned the God of the Bible for an idol we’ve constructed out of our own politically correct opinion. We have embraced a cultural Christianity that compares our good works to one another and justifies ourselves by one another, ignoring the absolute holiness of God and the deep wrath that flows from the violations of that holiness by the filthy rags of our own feeble attempts at goodness.

But God is absolutely holy. That’s the first life-changing truth that a radical disciple embraces and a Christian moralist misunderstands. Here’s the second: God is absolutely holy and

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MAN IS TOTALLY DEPRAVED.

The biggest reason moralist Christians miss the real thing is that they miss the reality of themselves. They never connect with their true identity. So let me ask you: Do you know who you are? “Well, I reckon I do, Rusty. Ever since I’ve been breathing I’ve been . . . Well . . . Me!” Fair enough, but do you know yourself the way the Bible knows you? Have you ever viewed yourself in the mirror of Scripture?

In case you haven’t, let me tell you that this passage of scripture makes it clear who we are. In fact, four separate terms define us.

Four terms are used to describe man in this passage:

Weak

v6 calls us “weak.” It says, “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died . . .” This particular term doesn’t speak of our moral weakness so much as our human frailty. We were mere humans, unable to do what was needed for ourselves.

It is revealed in a couple of ways. As one writer said, “the weaknesses of individuals apart from God is both the limitation and steady decay of their mortal body, and their inability before the power of sin to do God’s will. We are weak.

Ungodly

But it gets worse: v.6 also calls us “ungodly.” It says, “ For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” Not only are we weakened and unlikely to do good, we are “ungodly,” and completely unable to do good. This is the same term used in chapter 1:18 when it says that the wrath of God is being poured out against all “ungodliness” of man. We are incapable of good. We are ungodly.

Sinners

But it get’s worse: v8 calls us “sinners.” It says that God shows us His love to the extent that while we were still “sinners,” He died for us. To “sin” is literally miss the mark on purpose. It is to fail to keep the law of God because we are willfully rejecting it. “Because although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became vain in their imagination and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and birds and four footed animals and creeping things.” We are not only unlikely to do good; we are not only unable to do good, we actively choose to miss God’s mark. We are sinners.

Enemies

And it get’s worse. v10 calls us “enemies.” Because we choose to reject God, He is at odds with us and we, in our foolish flesh, are at odds with Him. Imagine that: the weak creature at war with the all-powerful creator! Now who do you think will win that battle? Here’s the terrible truth that communion shouts at us: Who we think we are in our human pride is not who we really are in God’s eyes. In His eyes we are weak; we are ungodly; we are sinners; and we are enemies. Not a very flattering picture, is it.

ARGUMENTATION

And you may be saying, “Well, maybe your picture of me isn’t too flattering, but that’s ok: I reject your picture. Man isn’t bad, man is good. We all have a spark of divinity lit in our soul and if you’ll just fan the flame a little, you’ll be transformed. We’re not all bad, we’re really all good.”

Well, ok, but I think you’ll have to agree that we’re not all good, right? I mean, if you say we’re all good, ever heard of Col. Khadaffy and the Lockerbie bombing? Ever heard of Sadam Hussein and the “butcher of Bagdhad?” Ever heard of Hitler and the Holocaust? Listen we’re not all good. In fact, the Bible says that there is none good, no not one!

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Slide - Garrison Keillor

You see, when you start judging your own goodness, you really get into trouble. You may fall victim to the “Lake Woebegone Effect.” Garrison Keillor, the inventor of the show, The Prairie Home Companion, told stories of a fictional town in Minnesota named “Lake Woebegone.” In this town, “all the men are good-looking and all the children are above average.”

Psychologists talk about our tendency to, as in Lake Woebegone, see ourselves way above average as the state of “illusory superiority.” It simply means that we tend to inflate our positive qualities and abilities, especially when compared to others.

Numerous research studies have revealed this tendency to overestimate ourselves. For instance, when researches asked a million high school students how well they got along with their peers, none of the students rated themselves below average. As a matter of fact, 60 percent of students believed they were in the top 10 percent; 25 percent rated themselves in the top one percent. You’d think college professors might have more self-insight, but they were just as biased about their abilities. Two percent rated themselves below average; 10 percent were average and 63 were above average; while 25 percent rated themselves as truly exceptional.

Of course this is statistically impossible. One researcher summarized the data this way: "It’s the great contradiction: the average person believes he is a better person than the average person." Christian psychologist Mark McMinn contends that the "Lake Wobegone Effect" reveals our pride. He writes, "One of the clearest conclusions of social science research is that we are proud. We think better of ourselves than we really are, we see our faults in faint black and white rather than in vivid color, and we assume the worst in others while assuming the best in ourselves."

APPLICATION:

Most people who die in their sins miss heaven because of the Lake Woebegone effect. They think of themselves more highly than they should. Will you please grasp these truths?

Truths about us:

We are at war with God!

You are at war with God! You are not His friend and you are not just distant. You are at war if you’ve never turned your life over to Him. And by the way, there’s only one way for that war to end: You’re going to lose. Nobody ever fought God and won!

We live in guilt!

And because you are at war with Him, you live in guilt! I know you may not want to admit it. You hide it behind the curtain of your own good works. You tuck it under the temporary euphoria of pot or booze or worse. You try to outrun it in your pursuit of sexual exploits trying to fill a soul bucket full of oozing holes. But in the center of your life there is a room whose door you refuse to open, because lying on the shelves of your memory are all the promises you’ve broken; all the people you’ve hurt; all the disappointment you’ve caused. You live in guilt.

We will die in fear!

And here’s the worst part: In your current condition, you will die in fear! The wages of sin is death and not just the physical cessation of life. It is a spiritual death that goes on forever in a place called hell. says:

Revelation 20:13–15 NKJV

The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

13 The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works. 14 Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. 15 And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

You see, the Christian moralist is lost because of what he misunderstands. He misunderstands God’s holiness and his own depravity. God doesn’t labor under the illusion of our superiority. He knows that we are at war with Him, we live in guilt, and, if nothing changes in our lives, we will die in fear.

You see, the Christian moralist is lost because of what he misunderstands. He misunderstands God’s holiness and his own depravity. God doesn’t labor under the illusion of our superiority. He knows that we are at war with Him, we live in guilt, and, if nothing changes in our lives, we will die in fear.

TRANS

And I can, again, hear someone arguing, “but wait a minute preacher! I didn’t think God was that way. I thought God was loving. How can a loving God create a lake of fire?” That’s a fair question, but it’s really the wrong question. The right question is this: How could a holy, just God not punish sin? The truth is, when God punishes the sinner He is just being true to the nature of His justice.

But God is also LOVE. And because He is love He did something about our dilemma. God’s holiness demanded that He judge our depravity, even though He loved us. That’s why I’m glad that even though God is holy and man is depraved,

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JESUS PAID IT ALL

You see, we tend to minimize our failures and sins. We think that God compares us to others and not to His perfect holiness. And because we do not see our sin and His judgment, we are able to minimize what Jesus did for us because we just don’t see ourselves as really needing what He is offering. But when we see ourselves as sinners under God’s wrath, what He did becomes very precious to us.

And just what did He do?

Romans 5:7 NKJV

For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die.

V 7 says: For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. Paul, here, compares what we might be willing to do compared to what Jesus did. He says that no one would hardly die for a “righteous” man. What is in view here is probably a law-keeper; someone who was meticulous about doing things right. He says that, for someone who was a stickler about the law of God, very very few would be willing to die.

V 7 says: For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. Paul, here, compares what we might be willing to do compared to what Jesus did. He says that no one would hardly die for a “righteous” man. What is in view here is probably a law-keeper; someone who was meticulous about doing things right. He says that, for someone who was a stickler about the law of God, very very few would be willing to die.

Then says, “yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die.” In other words, while someone might not die for a legalistic law keeper, they might be willing to die for someone who was a genuinely good, moral and helpful person—someone who helped them when they were in need or, perhaps, had even risked their own life for them.

But here’s the amazing part. God didn’t die for us when we were righteous—when we were law-keepers. (The sad fact is, you and I have never been law-keepers, because no matter how many of the ten we’ve kept, we’ve not kept them all and James makes in clear in ,

God did not die for us because we were righteous and He also didn’t die to us because we were genuinely good, caring people. We were not! All of our good deeds are always tainted by our own sinful will and our own sinful motives.

James 2:10 NKJV

For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.

God did not die for us because we were righteous and He also didn’t die to us because we were genuinely good, caring people. We were not! All of our good deeds are always tainted by our own sinful will and our own sinful motives.

Romans 5:8 NKJV

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

No, God, v8 says demonstrates His love to us that when we were yet sinners. That is, when we were His worst enemy; when we were still shaking our fist in His face and giving in to that pet sin that has become our idol and hardening our hearts against His will. When we were yet sinners, Christ died for us! He, the God of the universe reached out to His worst enemy with His best gift. He made the ultimate sacrifice. That’s what He did!

And perhaps the greatest shame of all for the Christian moralist is that he is so busy trying to do things for others is that he misses the truth of just how much God has done for him, and how much he desperately need to receive what God has done for him.

So how can we internalize this message? Aaron is going to come and give us some quick application.

AARON’S NOTES ON HOW TO APPLY THIS

VIS

Slide - Pic - Chuck Colson

In his book Being the Body, Charles Colson writes about meeting a businessman whom he calls Mr. Abercrombie. Mr. Abercrombie had invited Colson to speak at a Bible study he hosted. Nineteen other movers and shakers of the business world were in attendance. Colson writes about what transpired:

Mr. Abercrombie had asked me to speak at the luncheon and then allow time for questions. Somewhere in my talk I referred to our sinful nature. Actually, "total depravity" was the phrase I used. I noticed at the time that a few individuals shifted uncomfortably in their leather chairs, and, sure enough, it must have hit the mark. Because after I finished, the first question was on sin.

"You don't really believe we are sinners, do you? I mean, you're too sophisticated to be one of those hellfire-and-brimstone fellows," one older gentleman said, eyeing my dark blue pinstripe suit just like his. "Intelligent people don't go for that back-country preacher stuff," he added.

"Yes, sir," I replied. "I believe we are desperately sinful. What's inside of each of us is really pretty ugly. In fact we deserve hell and would get it, but for the sacrifice of Christ for our sins."

Mr. Abercrombie himself looked distressed by now. "Well, I don't know about that," he said. "I'm a good person and have been all my life. I go to church, and I get exhausted spending all my time doing good works."

The room seemed particularly quiet, and twenty pairs of eyes were trained on me.

"If you believe that, Mr. Abercrombie—and I hate to say this, for you certainly won't invite me back—you are, for all of your good works, further away from the kingdom than the people I work with in prison who are aware of their own sins." Someone at the other end of the table coughed. Another rattled his coffee cup. And a flush quickly worked its way up from beneath Mr. Abercrombie's starched white collar.

"In fact, gentlemen," I added, drawing on a favorite R. C. Sproul shocker, "If you think about it, we are all really more like Adolf Hitler than like Jesus Christ."

Now there was stony silence…until someone eased the pain and changed the subject.

When lunch ended and I was preparing to leave, Mr. Abercrombie took my arm. "Didn't you say you wanted to make a phone call when we were finished?"

I started to say it wasn't necessary, then realized he wanted to get me alone.

"Yes, thank you," I said.

He led me down the corridor to an empty office. As soon as we were inside, he said bluntly, "I don't have what you have."

"I know," I replied, "but you can. God is touching your heart right now."

"No, no," he took a step back. "Maybe sometime."

I pressed a bit more, however, and moments later we were both on our knees. Mr. Abercrombie asked forgiveness of his sins and turned his life over to Christ.

Colson concludes: "Martin Luther was right. 'The ultimate proof of the sinner is that he doesn't know his own sin. Our job is to make him see it.'"