I am shamelessly borrowing this through from my friend Steve Cuss who posted it on his twitter feed yesterday because i found it fascinating. Here is what he said about the gospel.

The gospel is redemptive and preventative – it can redeem us from any trouble we get ourselves into and can also prevent us from getting into trouble. However, I don’t believe it is a 50/50%. I think it is FAR more about redemption than prevention. However SO many parents see it primarily as preventative. ‘If we raise them right, they will not stray’ A loose quote of Proverbs. Yeah, but. When we apply the Gospel as primarily preventative rather than primarily redemptive, I think we slip into well meaning but deadly legalism. We teach too much ‘live right’ Gospel and not enough, ‘and while he was a long way off he came to his senses’ Gospel. We want our kid’s behavior to reflect well on us, we want them to avoid pain and unforced errors But in that effort, we might lose the utter beauty of God’s ‘no matter what you’ve done, no matter what has been done to you’ Gospel. That God redeems all things, makes all things new. That in Christ, you are a new creationI am mostly musing out loud on this one. Prevention vs redemption. As a parent, I get it. And yes to Romans, ‘what shall we say, shall we sin more so that grace may abound? No!’ But also, lost sheep, lost coin, lost son. God enjoys redeeeming. It is God’s great pleasure.

I just love this thought about the redemptive and preventative nature of the gospel. It builds on some thoughts I have had already but I thought this language was so helpful – thank you Steve.