398. Two ways the Gospel is misunderstood and how to address it
The gospel is the good news of Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection—and what that means for us. Although we now live in a post-Christian age, if you ask anyone on the street what is the message of Jesus, I’m confident maybe 99% of people could give some sort of response. In other words, everyone is familiar with the gospel story.
The challenge in today’s youth ministry context is this: many young people are familiar with the gospel story, but don’t really know it truly. However, because they are familiar with it, they can come to the false conclusion that they “tried Christianity, but it wasn’t really that life-changing.” They may feel this way because they bought into one of two big ways the gospel is misunderstood by young people today and that is the therapeutic gospel or the golden rule gospel.
The therapeutic gospel is the gospel the idea that faith is the ultimate way of feeling better about oneself. Now, faith can tremendously help us feel better about ourselves, but sometimes faith can make us feel worse about ourselves. Remember, the gospel reminds us we were so bad Jesus had to die for us. The Bible can convict us of sin and pride which in the moment can make us feel bad about ourselves. So it would be incorrect to believe faith is always therapeutic. On the flip-side, the golden rule gospel is the idea that Jesus came down to preach some version of this rule: “do to others as you would have them do to do you.” Studies show those who believe this way tend to read the Bible less, attend worship service less, and be less passionate in serving the church and/or social needs. Jesus did not come and die so we can follow the golden rule. He came and died so we could follow Him.
As a church that does intergenerational ministry, we have a huge opportunity to encourage and strengthen the faith of the next generation through organic, natural discipleship. This happens even in simple, everyday conversation with those around us, including those younger than us. The biggest shift researchers found in that can help move away from the therapeutic and golden rule gospel is speaking less about beliefs and concepts, but more about Jesus.
Please pray for the youth ministry team as they prepare for the winter youth retreat that many conversations would be had about Jesus. Please consider also joining in the relay prayer happening in December to pray with us for youth to put their faith in Jesus. Lastly, try to speak more about Jesus than anything else in your discipleship. After all, Jesus himself is the gospel (Mark 1:1).
