Tullian and the Gospel: Christian Growth Doesn’t Happen By Working Hard to Get Something You Don’t Have

I enjoyed three days with my friend Tullian Tchividjian who spoke at our men’s retreat this weekend. Tullian’s Sunday morning message on Colossians 1:9-14 deeply moved many of our men. I will look into posting the audio. For now, here are three paragraphs (pulled from an earlier version of the same message) that helped us better understand the gospel and how it works in our life. Ponder these paragraphs.

Tullian is a great guy. We had a blast together this weekend. Our friendship really grew. Please pray for Tullian as he leads his church and serves as an important voice for the gospel in our generation.

It’s important to note that in these verses Paul doesn’t pray for something the Colossian Christians don’t have. Rather, he prays they will grow in their awareness and understanding of what they do have. Christian growth doesn’t happen by working hard to get something you don’t have. Christian growth happens by working hard to live in the reality of what you do have.

I used to think that when the Bible tells us to work out our salvation, it meant go out and get what you don’t have-get more patience, get more strength, get more joy, get more love, and so on. But after reading the Bible more carefully I now understand that real gospel fruit happens, not as we “work harder” but only as we continually rediscover the gospel. You could put it this way: rediscovering the gospel is the hard work we’re called to.

You see, the secret of the gospel is that we become more spiritually mature when we focus less on what we need to do for God and focus more on all that God has already done for us. The irony of the gospel is that we actually perform better as we grow in our understanding that our relationship with God is based on Christ’s performance for us, not our performance for him.