The Nail

When I was about 12 or 13, I watched Terminator 2 with my dad. After watching the movie, Dad informed me that there was a Terminator 1 that had come out years earlier (I typically don't want movies out of order). He also told me, to my surprise, that Arnold Schwarzenegger was the villain in the first one.

I was intrigued and asked him to give me a short summary of the plot. "How did the good guys beat him?" I asked.

I'll never forget his answer. "Oh, they ran him over with a car a bunch of times." To this day the answer makes me chuckle, because it really wasn't that simple. When I finally went back and watched the movie, I realized there was a lot more to it than that.

We Christians are good at making things complicated. We really are. Give ten Christians a portion of Scripture, and each of them will come out with ten different "life applications" on how to be a better person. Sometimes, I listen to sermons and think, "Man, they got all of that from this verse?" I can't say too much, I've done that as well. I look back at past sermons I preached and think, "What was I thinking?" I made it too complicated.

I'm beginning to realize how simple it really is. Here's what Paul said:

And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. - 1 Corinthians 2:1-2 (NKJV)

Is it really that simple?

Recently, I attended two different churches, both conservative, evangelical Baptist churches, in which Jesus was mentioned only once in each sermon. ONLY once. This angered me. No, it infuriated me. What I received was a sermon on how to be a better person, accompanied by several practical steps to using the Bible to help me achieve this "betterness." Jesus was literally... literally, tacked on at the end - "And if you're not a Christian, Jesus wants to save you today so that you can begin living for Him."

Really? Can I ask that again? Really? Then God spoke to me. "You did this too." He's right. A good portion of my sermons I preached in the past followed this format. I repented.

It really is that simple. It's about Jesus. Specifically, about His coming to earth to save sinners. Not about making bad people good, or about making good people better. He came to bring dead people to life.

So I'm simplifying my message. No, I'm not cutting out sanctification, or doctrine, or the Great Commission. In fact, these things find their proper place under a proper understanding of why Jesus came and what our central message is to be. I'm just getting back to what the New Testament actually teaches.

Jesus didn't come to give you your best life now. ("Amen, Adam, get on those 'health and wealth' guys!")

He didn't come to fulfill your hopes and dreams. ("Now, hold on, man... don't get too carried away.")

He didn't come for you to use the Bible primarily as a handbook for moral living. ("Now you're being ridiculous. Do you not care about spiritual growth?")

He didn't come for any of those things. I know the third one will cause quite a few well-meaning evangelicals to stir, but it's true.

Here's what Jesus came to do. Here's the one nail that Paul hammered. He came to bring you back to life. Because you're dead. You're a sinner. Jesus, however, was perfect. He lived for you. He died for you. He gives you forgiveness of sins and the gift of His righteousness.

One nail. But what a nail it is... Jesus. Only Jesus.

Spurgeon agreed:

I sometimes wonder that you do not get tired of my preaching, because I do nothing but hammer away on this one nail. With me it is, year after year, ‘None but Jesus!’ Oh, you great saints, if you have outgrown the need of a sinner’s trust in the Lord Jesus, you have outgrown your sins, but you have also outgrown your grace, and your saintship has ruined you!

So over the past several years, my ministry has changed. In fact, it's even intensified in the last six months - Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This nail is the only one I wish to hammer anymore.

Because it's all I have.

I'd love to give you ten steps to a better walk with Christ, but I'm as big a screw-up as you are. And you're really screwed up.

What? Just being honest. You know it's true. That's why you hope grace is as good as the Bible says it is.

I'd really enjoy laying out a set of practical applications to becoming a "more effective steward of God's resources and responsibility." I don't know what that means, but it's probably a real thing, and someone probably wrote a book about it. But I won't, because I wouldn't keep them myself. And you wouldn't either. That's why you hope grace is as good as the Bible says it is.

So I'll keep hammering my nail, and I hope you will too. Because it's all we have.

But guess what else? It's all we need. The message that Jesus forgives totally and provides us with His righteousness is all I need. Through Jesus, I have the acceptance I look for in other people. I have the validation I try to extract from my job. I have the peace I foolishly look for in possessions.

I'm accepted. I'm His.

That's the nail I hammer. People probably wish I preached more life-application sermons. Don't care. I had a lady in my church tell a visitor, "All Adam ever talks about is grace." Great. It's true.

As the old hymn says, "It is enough that Jesus died, and that He died for me."

And when you get that... when you start to really get that it really is this simple... when you realize that Jesus is all you have and all you need... then He starts to do something.

You start to look... slowly... sometimes two steps forward and three steps back... but gradually... like...Jesus.

Adam is a husband, father, preacher, and teacher

living in Mayfield, KY. You can follow him 

on his personal blog here, Twitter here, 

or Facebook here.