What Gospel preaching should do

Nathan Cole, a Connecticut farmer converted in the 1740's, put it clearly when describing what happened to him under the preaching of George Whitefield. "... my hearing him preach gave me a heart wound. By God's blessing, my old foundation was broken up, and I saw that my righteousness would not save me." (Tim Keller, Ministries of Mercy, p.37)

Not all revolutions are liberating

I believe Leonore J. Weitzman's book The Divorce Revolution offers a helpful look at the effects of no-fault divorce laws. She began her study assuming no-fault divorce was a breakthrough for women, but she concluded that it had devastating effects. Perhaps her most explosive finding was that men's standard of living went up 42% in the year following divorce, while women's standard declined 73%, even counting alimony and child support payments. (Tim Keller, Ministries of Mercy, p. 21)

Mercy means more than fruit baskets

I started reading Keller's book of mercy ministry this morning. The framework for the book is found in Jesus' Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37).

For decades evangelicals have avoided the radical nature of the teaching of the parable of the Good Samaritan. At most, we have heard it telling us to prepare a fruit basket for the needy each Christmas, or to give money to relief agencies when their is a famine or earthquake in a distant nation. But it is time to listen more closely, because the world, which never was "safe" to live in, is becoming even less so. We are finally beginning to wonder why there are suddenly hundreds of thousands "stripped and lying half dead" in the streets of our own cities.

Only a small number of people in the history of the world have lived in relatively "safe" conditions. War, injustice, oppression, famine, natural disaster, family breakdown, disease, mental illness, physical disability, racism, crime, scarcity of resources, class struggle - these "social problems" are the results of our alienation from God. They bring deep misery and violence to the lives of most of humanity. The majority of people who read this book, however, probably belong to the the relatively small group of folk who, through God's kindness, lead an existence generally free from these forces.

This comparative comfort can isolate us in a fictitious world where suffering is difficult to find. But this isolation is fragile, for suffering surounds us - even in the suburbs! We need an accurate view of the world in which we live. Perhaps we need to see that, instead of living on islands of ease, we are all living on the Jericho Road. (Tim Keller, Ministries of Mercy, p.13)