257 Kendall Street
Burlington, WI 53105
(262) 763-3021
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We have purchased land on Highways A & W and are planning to build soon! Drive by and take a look at our future home!
“I have known many good people who did not believe in God. But I have never known a human being who was good who did not believe in people.”
John Lovejoy Elliott
September 13 th, 2009
Last Christmas, the American Humanist Association launched a campaign featuring ads on Washington, D.C., buses that proclaimed, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake.” I cannot count how many times I’ve had Christian parents say to me, “we’ve got pretty good kids.” And the thinking is that if their kids are “good,” then that’s enough...they’re okay.
Such thinking is hellish! Our goal as believers must not be “good” kids but “godly” kids. The Lake of Fire is overflowing with “good” people.
One of the most amazing statements by the Apostle Paul is his indictment of the Galatian Christians for abandoning the Gospel. In shock he declares in Galatians 1:6, “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel.” He states emphatically and unequivocally that the Galatians had failed in the crucial test of discerning the authentic Gospel from its counterfeits. His words could not be more clear: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you have received, he is to be accursed!” (Gal. 1:8-9).
The Church of Jesus Christ today desperately needs to hear and to heed this warning. We face false gospels no less subversive and seductive than those encountered and embraced by the Galatians. No doubt one of the most seductive false gospels is moralism. The basic gist of moralism comes down to this, the belief that the Gospel can be reduced to improvements in behavior. Far too many believers and their churches succumb to the logic of moralism and reduce the Gospel to a message of moral improvement. In other words, we communicate to lost persons the message that what God desires for them and demands of them is to get their lives straight. Sadly, that is the message of many Sunday Schools and Youth programs.
Please mark it down! Our goal at Grace is NOT good kids! We are seeking to produce godly kids. We want young people who have committed their lives to Christ and because they have a relationship with the Living Lord, the Holy Spirit is working in them to produce evidence of a spiritual life, usually in the shape of spiritual fruit.
This morning as we launch our Sunday School classes and Adult Bible Fellowships, please know that we are not teaching Aesop’s Fables or any other pithy moral stories. Our primary goal is not that your kids get along with you and each other, that they don’t smoke, drink, swear or do drugs. Those are by-products. Our number one goal is that they know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. The Bible is God’s revelation to us so we want to make sure that we are teaching what God wants us to know about Himself.
Yet we are paddling upstream compared to much of Christiandom and American culture. Our culture and parenting tend to instill moralism from our most formative years. We quickly learn that our parents are concerned with our behavior. Well behaved children are rewarded with parental approval, while misbehavior brings parental sanction. This message is reinforced by other authorities in young lives and pervades the culture at large.
It’s what we dubbed when I was growing up in the South, “being raised right.” A child who is "raised right" pleases his parents and other adults by adhering to moral conventions and social etiquette. A young person who is "raised right" emerges as an adult who obeys the laws, respects his neighbors, gives at least lip service to religious expectations, and stays away from scandal. The point is clear -- this is what parents expect, the culture affirms, and many churches celebrate. But churches are filled with individuals who have been "raised right" yet are headed for a Christless eternity.
