I was just reading a book that made a simple, but memorable point.  The author asked a carpenter working on his house what difference Jesus made to his life and work.  The answer was telling, “I suppose he makes me an honest carpenter.”  Is that all?

How often do we essentially preach a salvation ticket to heaven with morality for the present? How often do we fall painfully short of offering to people in our meetings what Jesus called “life to the full” or “eternal life” … now?  I believe many are failing to preach much of a hope for the future, with the watered down vesions of, or totally ignored subject of, the future.  Yet it is hard to say that the future is neglected for the sake of the present.  For many, the present life offered by Christianity is merely moral.

Have we become dulled and insensitive to the richness of life in fellowship with the God of the universe?  Have we over-simplified gospel preaching to a simple solution for guilt, but stripped it of the richness of reconciliation, regeneration, adoption, fellowship, not to mention the horizontal overflow of these vertical realities?

I’ll keep this post short and not chase down the theological possibilities.  But perhaps we would do well to evaluate the net presentation of the Christian life in our preaching – is it merely that now we can be honest carpenters?