Christianity Explored

The following is an excerpt from an interview with a funny British guy named Rico Tice. Rico has developed a course called "Christianity Explored" that intends to introduce non-Christians to what we believe. If this whets your appetite, the whole interview, "Using the Gospel to share the Gospel," is certainly worth reading.

I have to understand that God loved Jesus, but also at the cross God was punishing Jesus for my sin; that is how serious my sin is. And I will spend eternity in hell paying for my sin if I reject the death of Jesus. And particularly, I think the battle is to persuade people that right at the heart of sin is not believing in Jesus.

Now I have two nephews, Dolton and Patrick, and they’re lovely little boys. If they walked into the room now and you ignored them, cut them down, or were unpleasant to them in any way, we’d be enemies. We must get people to understand that they may think they are living thoroughly pleasant lives, but in holding God’s Son at a distance when he sent him to die makes them God’s enemy. It’s the heart of sin. We find in England ... we really don’t have a big enough view of sin. It takes weeks to persuade people that sin is the problem.

We’re saying to people, “Jesus didn’t come for good people but for bad people” so the qualification for being a Christian is not are you good enough, but are you bad enough? Jesus said, “I didn’t come for the righteous, but for sinners.” And if they still think they’re okay, we say let’s look at Mark chapter 7. And see that the heart, Mark 7 in verse 20, is a fountain of evil. It’s what’s within us, and no good work can cover up. That would be like using a Band-Aid on a gaping wound.