Day 2 of Disclaimer:  I don’t have a clue how to reform health care in a way that addresses the essential issues.  And yet, because I am redeemed and see a cosmos headed toward final and full redemption, I am frustrated with longing and desire for a plan that truly heals bodies, minds, souls, and hearts.  Today I quote Nathan Bierma from Bringing Heaven Down to Earth on how having a large vision of the gospel impacts the way we live here and now:

“When we consider the full story of the gospel (from the Old English word godspel, meaning ‘good news’), we see a larger picture of the redemption Christ brought about, and we starve for the completion of it. The gospel stands on three legs, not one; Christ’s redeeming work was done to restore nature, culture, and human beings.  Now that’s good news.  ‘The total work of Christ is nothing less than to redeem this entire creation from the effects of sin,’ writes Anthony Hoekema.  ‘We need a clear understanding of the doctrine of the new earth, therefore, in order to see God’s redemptive program in cosmic dimensions.’

But a gospel this limited shrinks its source.

When we live in the hope of a big gospel, we see Jesus Christ not just as a serial intruder on people’s souls but the one in whom ‘all things hold together,’ in the words of Colossians 1. All things – not just people’s hearts but the infrastructure of nature, culture, and relationships.  So the hope of a big gospel is not just going to heaven to be with God, but a vision of the new earth and the heavenly city as the place where God’s authority over all of life is made complete.  Living in the hope of heaven means seeing glimpses of such a place already, and wanting more.

Price says, ‘The strong impression is given that God sent his only begotten Son, the second Person of the Trinity, to earth to be crucified and resurrected just so the Pietist can…have a blissful quiet time.’  As a result, ‘the reality of Christ is effectively limited to a source for individual sanctification, even for spiritual coziness.’

To live with this tension on a daily basis – to simultaneously occupy the two worlds Thoreau separated – requires a big picture of the world and our place and purpose within it.  We need a big gospel vision for how we are living, what we are hoping, and where we are going.”