What are the three main focus messages of the bible? Redemption, Redemption, Redemption!

Is the bible a rule book, an ethical treatise, or is it the story of redemption? My answer is it is the story of redemption absolutely! Forget what is stated in the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy and its adamant assertion that the bible is not solely redemptive. It depends on whose view one takes. Jesus view was that it was solely redemptive and he passed this view onto his followers. By redemptive, I mean that it explains God’s desire to have a restored relationship with humans who were redeemed back to the status that mankind had when God looked at the human creature he created and stated that he/she were very, very good.

There are many proofs of this and it would take a dissertation to prove the thesis. What I want to acknowledge here is the fact that Jesus and his followers always defined the word of God, as one of two things. It was either the gospel (good news of redemption) or it was Jesus the living incarnate word of God. Further, it was never the scripture. It is amazing to me that Christian theologians have defined the bible as the word of God.

Under the old covenant, it is true that the Jews saw the Torah (first five books of the Law) as the word of God but not the entire Tanakh (thirty-nine book Old Testament). The fact remains that in the new covenant era, Jesus and his apostles referred to Jesus and the gospel alone as the word of God. This gives a strictly redemptive purpose to the bible as seen by Jesus (John 5:39-40 & Luke 24:27;44-45) and a quick search of the phrase word of God in the New Testament and it becomes clear that the focus is the gospel of redemption.

I cringe every time I hear an evangelical call the bible the word of God.

A Warning to the Evangelical Church:

A Warning to the Evangelical Church:

Today, John Edwards left the presidential race and for good reason. He did not have the support needed to win. Why was that? I believe that it was because the causes he was fighting for are not really important to most Americans, especially the evangelical church. I realize that John Edwards did not represent himself as an evangelical, but the issues that he emphasized are the issues that Jesus emphasized

John Edwards was a champion for the poor and disenfranchised and so was Jesus. John Edwards spoke of the hunger and lack that we have in this country. He said that he was looking for one America, not a divided America, and that one of the signs of One America would be “One America where no child will go to bed hungry because we will finally end the moral shame of 37 million people living in poverty.”

To me, it is a moral shame that the evangelical church finds it necessary to take a moral stance on abortion, homosexuality, and the family, and then, completely ignores the moral shame of poverty in our midst. This is especially in view of Jesus words in Matthew 25:31-46, “when you did it to the least of these my brothers, you did it unto me.”

This is an even further shame, when the basis for judgment is whether or not one feeds the hungry, clothes the naked, gives shelter to the homeless, refreshes the thirsty and visits the sick and prisoners. The fact that a man like John Edwards can be completely ignored speaks of the moral shame of America the Beautiful.