In my last post, I briefly explained rehearsing the Gospel in a corporate worship setting. Mike Cosper wrote a book called Rhythms of Grace in which he explains this idea in far greater detail, but basically, to rehearse the Gospel in corporate worship is to lead the congregation through three over-arching ideas: (1) Call to worship, (2) Call to confession, and (3) Call to assurance.
Rehearsing the Gospel in prayer and Scripture reading can be a great way to grow in discipleship. This doesn’t mean re-reading one of the four Gospels, necessarily. It means acknowledging who God is, acknowledging the bad news, then rejoicing and resting in the good news. If you’re like me, certain devotional practices can seem to lose their effectiveness—or rather, my heart just grows impatient and dull over time.
Hopefully rehearsing the Gospel in devotion won’t become another adventure that eventually grows stale, but rather one that remains dynamic and truly connects your heart to Jesus—renewing your understanding of his love as your understanding of the Gospel deepens.
So, how does this work? It works the same way as rehearsing the Gospel in corporate worship: first, reading or praying about reasons to praise/worship God, second, confession of personal sin and/or lament over the brokenness of the world, third, acknowledging assurance in Jesus Christ.
Call to Worship
Taking a lesson from Job we know there is always a reason to praise God, for though our hearts are fickle and circumstances can be extreme, God remains unchanged. This is God’s immutability. He is infinitely and eternally benevolent—good all the time. Blessed be the name of the Lord!
Search Scripture for reasons like this to praise and worship God. They’re everywhere. Acknowledge who God is. Not to sound like a mystic, but let your mind go wild! Declare to yourself something about God’s character, or something about his actions and make connections back and forth, finding more reasons to praise. Command your soul to recognize the goodness of God that is revealed in Scripture and in your own life.
An easily accessible yet deep location in Scripture for this is the Psalms:
“Oh give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever!” (118:1)
“I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.” (34:1)
Let your heart and mind profess, declare, confess and affirm God’s praiseworthiness. Meditate on a whole Psalm or just a verse, for example, and dwell in the truth of God’s character, letting your heart and mind exalt him.
Lord, you are indeed great! You are so much greater than I. May my soul acknowledge it! Blessed be your name. Thank you that you are who you are. May my heart lift you up and bless your name, may I proclaim your goodness, steadfast love, your holiness, for you are blameless and set apart, unstained by the world. There is no one like you.
Call to Confession
Contrition and broken-heartedness humble us and bring us closer to Jesus. From our realization that we fall short comes dependence on Jesus. Confession is difficult and rightly so. It is important to address and confront sin. Without doing so we leave hindrances and barriers between Jesus and us. We also surrender opportunities for growth, and more importantly, we surrender the experience of grace!
Regardless of apparent sin, there is always something to confess, from habitual sins of commission and omission to sneaky attitudes or unexpected behavior. If nothing seems apparent, ask the Lord to show you how He wants to work on you.
When He shows you these things, its okay to lament. The contrast between our sin and God’s holiness is sharp and drastic. Let this be an opportunity to feel a significant need for grace.
But my people have changed their glory
for that which does not profit.
Be appalled, O heavens, at this;
be shocked, be utterly desolate,
declares the Lord,
for my people have committed two evils:
they have forsaken me,
the fountain of living waters,
and hewed out cisterns for themselves,
broken cisterns that can hold no water.
Jer. 2:11b-13
Lord, indeed I am full of sin! Have mercy on me. I fail to uphold Your commandments and whether intentionally or unintentionally, I rebel against You. May I feel the need for grace as I realize how far short of Your holiness I fall. Show me the areas of my life you want to reprove, but be gentle as You bring about that reproof.
Call to Assurance
Here’s the good part. If you are indeed in Christ, your sins are forgiven! This is so simple yet so profound. Forgiven! Don’t move on from that sentence too quickly. Rejoice in Jesus’ work on the cross to wash away your sins and reconcile you to the Father. The objective reality of your status in Christ provides objective assurance for your salvation. You weren’t, but now you are. Just like Peter writes, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (1 Pet. 2:9-10).
Elation! What praise this invokes! It is the simple yet profound truth of the Gospel. You and I were in a poor, forsaken state, but not anymore. Though our struggle with sin continues until Christ comes again, our status is secure before the Father.
Along with elation and praise, hopefully this invokes an urgency of serious discipleship and obedience. Like many have noted, the cost of our security in Christ is too great to take discipleship and obedience for granted. Costly grace vs. cheap grace. The heart that realizes the cost of grace and the extreme transition from “not a people” to being “God’s people” is a heart that takes seriously the importance of obedience leaving God’s grace honored and His love requited.
There is no exact formula here. These are general steps to work through. Call to worship, call to confession, and call to assurance. Try it out!
Mathétés Project 