It was two nights before Christmas and I’m flipping through TV channels when “what to my wondering eyes should appear” but a choir from a very well known church singing Christmas carols. They had the words up on the screen so viewers like me could sing along…
“Hark the herald angels sing glory to the newborn King. Peace on earth and mercies mild, God and people reconciled.”
Huh???
“No way”, I thought, “they didn’t just sing that!”
With one change of a word they did what Satan has been doing from the beginning- with subtlety they had distorted the truth. Yes, God had come and reconciled people to Himself; but it was not the whole truth, or the main truth, and it totally omitted one very important truth…
“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”. (1 Timothy 1:15)
Of course Charles Wesley knew that when he wrote his song ” Hark the Herald Angels Sing”. That’s why his original lyrics were “God and sinners reconciled”.
Not God and people. God and sinners.
By changing the lyrics this church choir had just stripped the gospel of it’s central truth!
The compromised gospel
In the early 90s the Seeker Sensitive Movement stormed into the church. The premise was that we needed to be very careful about offending people with the direct truths of the gospel lest they be turned off and turn away from Jesus.
The Seeker Sensitive Movement was so afraid of offending people that they seem to have lost sight of the fact that they might be offending God!
I wonder if there was anyone in that church choir who was concerned about offending God? Did the thought ever occur that changing the gospel message might not be such a good idea?
But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! -Galatians 1:8-9
One of the most serious warnings in the Bible is reserved for those who would change the gospel message. When Wesley wrote “Hark The Herald Angels Sing” he echoed biblical truths. He used the word “sinner” because the bible uses that word. The heart of the gospel hangs on the fact that we are sinners who are in need of a Savior. We are not allowed to strip out this fact! Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.
Does singing “God and people reconciled” convey the same meaning as singing “God and sinners reconciled”? No, it does not.
No one is going to be offended if we say they are “a person”; but many people will take offense at being called “a sinner”.
Christians are not to be purposefully offensive in the sense of being obnoxious or judgmental. On the other hand, certain things must be said because they are the truth. We cannot avoid the truth simply because it is offensive!
Aware that His disciples were grumbling about this teaching, Jesus asked them, “Does this offend you? Then what will happen if you see the Son of Man ascend to where He was before? The Spirit gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. -John 6:61-63
His disciples were offended by what Jesus was telling them, but Jesus says that his words to them were actually “spirit and life”!
Nobody likes to think of themselves as a sinner, but the Bible says that we are, and to accept that fact is life to us.
We have alienated ourselves from Him because of our sin.
The need for reconciliation implies that a separation has occurred between two parties; a divide has come between them.
This is exactly what the bible tells us has happened- we have separated ourselves from God because of our sin.
But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. -Isaiah 59:2
Not only do we sin, we ourselves are sinners.
Widespread error within the church
I did a Google search with this question- “Where does the bible say we are sinners?”
I got a flood of results back where people were claiming in their articles and blog posts that the Bible never says that we’re sinners! They were trying to claim that people sin, but that does not mean we are “sinners”.
Well, let’s just look at that in the Bible!
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. -Romans 5:8
We sin because we are sinners!
God will not let us off the hook without acknowledging that fact. He sent Jesus as one who is able to reunite us with God. Jesus is able to make those who were once God’s enemies His friends- we can be reconciled to God, but not without admitting that we are at fault; not without admitting that we are sinners.
Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. -1 Timothy 1:15
Do you see why blunting this truth is such a serious offense before God? A watered down, compromised, false gospel cannot save people from hell!
When churches strip these truths out of their messages, when they take these truths out of their songs, they are lying to themselves and to the world about God’s Son and the reason He came. The Apostle Paul said…
Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. –Galatians 1:10
If I was in a church that was so afraid of offending men that they took the word “sinners” out of a Christmas carol, I’d run out of that place as fast I could- and I wouldn’t be coming back!
There’s something far worse than offending men. Offending God and lying about His gospel is pretty much at the top of the list of things I want to avoid