Current blog post written by Becca Wellan. A devoted and caring friend who loves coffee and talking about Jesus. Oh, and did I mention she loves coffee?

"Twinkle twinkle, little star. How I wonder what you are."

I sing this lullaby to lull the sweet babies I nanny to sleep. I can’t sing, so this doesn’t always work. Each time I sing this song, I always think, these words are so odd. I’m no astronomer, by any stretch, but I’m pretty sure stars aren’t diamonds in the sky. I’m also quite positive they’re not little.

Have you ever laid on your back during a clear summer night in the middle of nowhere? Just to watch the stars. Just to see how small you really are. It’s amazing. You know, I tried counting all the stars, once. I believe I got to twenty-nine, then I got distracted.

1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.

One billion trillion; I was a little off. That’s the number of stars in the observable universe. That’s one billion trillion stars, in the ten billion galaxies we’ve found so far (like I can somehow take credit for this).

That’s a lot of stars.

I don’t know about you, but my view of God is very small. I mean, I know that God created the world, the universe, the one billion trillion stars, me. I know the stars are designed to show us His power and beauty. (I also believe He made them just for fun. Just to paint the sky for us. Just because He’s God, and He can). I know all these truths, but as my heart’s been breaking beneath the weight of my sin, I’ve learned that there’s a difference between “know” and “believe.” The difference between chains and freedom.

And I don’t believe that this God could truly love me. In my doubt, I’ve been drowning.

Does this God actually have a heart big enough to love all of me?
Enough power to truly forgive me?
Enough grace to rescue me?
Enough understanding to heal me?
Enough mercy to let my heart rest, filled up to overflowing with peace?

I don’t know about you, but my view of God is very small. There are days my sin takes a hold of my heart and my mind and yells so loud, with such strength, that this God who counts the countless stars seems to disappear.

Do you ever wonder if God could truly love someone like you? If being fully, totally forgiven for everything you’ve ever done or thought applies to everyone else, but certainly not you?

I don’t actually believe that God would love me enough to pour grace over the dark spaces in my mind. I don’t actually believe that I can rest in His forgiveness, without doing penance to earn His grace. I don’t actually believe Him when He said “it is finished.”

But this God, who created the universe and all its stars, will not remain silent. This morning, He broke through my doubts and spoke to me:

“He heals the brokenhearted,

And binds up their wounds.

He determines the number of the stars;

He gives to all of them their names.” // Psalm 147:4.
 

Suddenly, I believed Him. If this God has enough power in His voice to tell the one billion trillion stars to shine, hanging them up like Christmas lights, then He must have enough power to heal my broken heart and bind up my wounds.

If this God is caring enough to name each and every one of the stars, then He must care enough to truly, completely, deeply, relentlessly love me.

To call me by name.

And, this God must have enough power to actually mean it when He hung on the cross and said “it is finished.”

“As far as the east is from the west,
so far does He remove our sin from us.” // Psalm 103:12.

As far as the east is from the west is pretty far, if you think about it. The edge of the observable universe is forty-six billion light years away. One light year is six trillion miles. It keeps going, and going, and going and no one knows where, or if, it ends.

When Christ died on the cross, the sin that separated us from Him is black-hole status gone. He has only grace for us, now. He is not disgusted by you. He is not ashamed of you. To endure your days as though Jesus is not powerful enough to forgive you is not just insulting, it will wreck you.

This morning, as I read these verses through my tears, I finally felt how absolutely adored I am. I could actually see myself wrapped in the arms of Jesus. Sobbing. Letting go of everything but Him. In that moment, I finally felt that I am more valuable to Him than one billion trillion stars. The weight of the guilt I’ve been carrying was lifted. All I could say was “I need you.”

“I know, sweet girl, I know,” He said. “That’s why I came down to rescue you.”  

“When Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look and see Him there, who made an end of all my sin.”

(Reflections by Dane Burgess from Bob Thunes book, The Gospel-Centered Life)

What exactly is "the gospel"? It is a question that when posed to Christians can seem to bring more of the "deer in a headlights look" then a confident explanation spoken out of true understanding of identity. A lot of the time, when you ask a Christian "what is the gospel?" you tend to get answers that are broken down to two, three or even four core principles. But the problem within those principles is that they come off as dis-genuine and they lack true conviction. And when I mean principles, I am talking about very basic core beliefs that might be true about the Gospel but when boiled down to the bare minimum of its meaning will have no weightiness to its true reality.

But when you understand "the gospel" as an intricate story of God creating, man falling, Christ redeeming and a new people created then you start to see how your own life fits within this Redemptive Historical reality. 

Creation: The Story Doesn't Start With Us, But God 

As all stories begin, it starts with a beginning. But within this story, our human tendencies is to begin with us. Yes this story has something to do with us but it isn't primarily about us but God. 

God is eternal, infinite, perfect and unchanging who created all things before there was anything (Genesis 1:1-31). We can see through Scripture that our God is one God but He exists in three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). God was perfectly happy and  completely joyful amongst himself. Which means he did not create the world because he was lacking in anything. He already had perfect glory, community, joy and worship within the Trinity. Rather He created creation out of the outpouring of His perfection, His goodness and His love. Humans were made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27). And he created us to join in and experience that perfect joy he had amongst himself within the Trinity. We are the created and not the creator. We are dependent and under His authority whether we like it or not. We are on His terms and not on our own. We were made to worship, love and serve him. Not serve ourselves. 

God's words when he was done with all of creation were "And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good." There was perfect order, perfect structure and all of creation was under submission to its Creator. 

Fall: We Batched It, Not God 

Humans were made in the "imago dei", which means we were made in the image of God. We were created by God to worship Him. All that we did was to be directed towards him. But instead of coming under full submission to God's authority, humans (We, all of us) turned away from God in sinful rebellion (Genesis 3:1-7; Isaiah 53:6). Our cosmic treason caused a great disease or an illness to saturate all of creation. God's perfect creation that he said "was very good" is now tainted. Cosmic brokenness happened because of our sin. Pain, suffering, death and sorrow to name a few happened because of us.

For now "all sin and fall short of the glory of God." Human beings, because of the great fall, are sinners by nature and by choice (Ephesian 2:1-3). Non of us truly think of ourselves as that bad or sinful. Someone is always worse then I am, we say. But in reality this view only shows our true lack of understanding of how our sinfulness is committed towards a Holy, Perfect God. 

"Sin is not primarily an action, it's a disposition" - Bob Thune

Sin is our soul's bend towards our perfect Creator. Sin has permitted everything within us. Our pride, our selfishness, our independence, and our lack love towards God and our neighbors. At times sin is very open and obvious but other times it is hidden within ourselves. Like I said earlier, sin has permeated every part of creation and there is no hope for change or is there...

Redemption: God's Acts To Save Us And What We Have Broken 

How often do we put our hope and trust in other sinful human beings to save us or save our world. We look to political systems to bring us out of bondage, we look towards self-help books to make us feel better. And yet no matter what we do, there is always that sense of brokenness and guilt that we can't seem to get rid of fully. That is why we need a hero. We need a Savior. That hero and Savior is Jesus Christ. We sinners need a Savior, a Redeemer, a Deliverer to free us from the captivity of our own sin and restore the order of the world back to its original purpose. A purpose that had a worshipful, dependent bend towards God as Creator. 

Jesus Christ being fully God (to incur sin fully) and being fully man (to pay the ultimate debt we  owe to God). God sent his Son to be a perfect substitute. One who lived the life we could not live and died the death that we ultimately deserved. 

"This is why God sent Jesus into the world to be our substitute (1 John 4:14). The Bible teaches that Jesus was fully God - the second person of the Trinity - and also fully human. He was born to a human mother, lived a real flesh-and-blood existence, and died a brutal death on a Roman cross outside Jerusalem. Jesus lived a life of perfect obedience to God (Hebrews 4:15), making him the only person in history who did not deserve judgment. But on the cross, he took our place, dying for our sin. He received the condemnation and death we deserve so that, when we put our trust in him, we can receive the blessing of life he deserves (2 Cor. 5:21)" - The Gospel Centered Life pg. 9

Jesus did die in our place. But how do we know who he said he was unless he could show us who he was? We know this by him rising from the dead, displaying his victory over sin, satan and death. All that was lost, broken and corrupted in the fall will ultimately be put right. Redemption isn't simply salvation for individual souls; it means that all of creation is being put back to the way it was suppose to be.

Restoration: Now This Is More Like It 

What is required of us to partake in this restoring process? How to we experience salvation and become mirrors of redemption towards our world? By faith alone (Ephesians 2:8-9). Faith is complete trust or confidence in Someone. It is a heart that has a whole-hearted commitment to Jesus Christ. 

When we trust in Jesus Christ we are released from the penalty of sin and from the power of sin. We were originally created "able not to sin" but through the fall we were "not able not to sin" but for those who believe in Jesus we are now "able not to sin" and once Jesus brings redemption to completion of all things we will "not be able to sin." That is an amazing hope and reality that will come one day! One day, for those who are in Christ, will not be able to sin. Are you kidding me!!

We are free to die to ourselves and live a life that has a dependent bending of the knees towards our King Jesus. We are free to serve because Christ first served us. We are free to see all the things we own as gifts given to us by God and steward them well to bless others. We are finally free in whatever we do to do it all for the Glory of God. 

Jesus promised that he will return soon to judge sin and make all things new. Until then, he is gathering under His rule a people from every tribe, tongue and nation (Rev. 7:9). As he has given us eternal life, he has also called us to participate with Him in His mission (Matthew 28:18-20). 

This is the Gospel! A story of triumph and vindication. A story of hope and longing. It is the good news, the greatest news this world has ever heard and needs to hear.

photo credit: JLM Photography. via photopin cc