Ministry Deep Dive
#298 | The Gospel Is Bigger Than You Think | Michael Goheen, Pt. 2
What if the gospel is bigger than we’ve imagined? In part two of my conversation with Michael Goheen, we wrestle with a vision of the gospel that is deeply personal but never merely private. Jesus saves sinners—absolutely. But the good news is bigger than individual salvation. In Christ, God’s kingdom has broken into the world. He is renewing his creation, forming a new humanity, and calling a people to learn what it means to live under the reign of Jesus in every part of life. And that changes the way we think about everything. Mike and I talk about the good that Christianity has contributed to Western culture while also confronting the idols that continue to shape us. We look at consumerism and the ways our pursuit of more can actually make us less human. We talk about technology and the challenge of receiving what is good in it without allowing it to quietly form us in ways that are contrary to the gospel. And we wrestle with what it means for Christians and churches to become a genuinely distinct people in the middle of a culture whose practices and assumptions are forming us every day. That leads us to one of the biggest questions in the conversation: Why have so many churches become increasingly irrelevant? Mike argues that part of the answer is our failure to disciple people deeply into the biblical story and then help them bring that story to bear on the realities of everyday life. We have often reduced Christianity to personal salvation and Sunday worship while leaving people largely unequipped to think Christianly about technology, money, sexuality, politics, education, work, and the other cultural forces shaping us. But underneath all of this is an even bigger question: What is the kingdom of God? Mike helps us recover a vision of the kingdom as God’s reign breaking into history through Jesus Christ—the beginning of God’s renewal of all things. And if that is true, then salvation is not simply about where we go when we die. It is an invitation into something much larger than ourselves: God is forming a people who embody his kingdom now as they await the day when Christ renews all things. That kind of life doesn’t happen overnight. Discipleship is a long, difficult, and deeply joyful process of formation. There are no shortcuts. But as Mike reminds us, it is in giving ourselves to that journey that we discover more fully what it means to be human. The gospel isn’t less than the salvation of individuals. It is gloriously bigger—and once we begin to see the size of the story we’ve been invited into, it changes the way we understand the gospel, the church, our culture, and what it means to follow Jesus. Takeaways: I say the gospel is cosmic; it announces God's renewal of creation, not only personal salvation. We must form the church as a new humanity that lives under Christ's rule and shows it to others. I warn that consumerism and economistic culture dehumanize us by stealing time, deep relationships, and spiritual life. We should evaluate technologies and choices by asking what goods they bring and what goods they remove. I observe that Western culture's goods were salted by the Christian faith, yet we face pagan and deChristianizing pressures today. We argue that discipleship must be comprehensive, slow, communal, and formed by practices that shape our whole lives. I claim the church became irrelevant in many places because it failed to pass the Bible's foundation story to the next generation and to apply that story to pressing cultural issues. Sign up for our newsletter Order Travis's book Blueprint: Kingdom Living in the Modern World. Join Travis's Substack, Deep Roots Society . Donate to Apollos Watered and help make the Apollos Academy a reality!
