Gathering each week, we reenact the horror of Jesus’ sacrificial death. In baptism, we see the flood of God’s judgment against sin (1 Pet. 3:20-21). At the Lord’s Table, we swallow and digest the sign of our Lord’s torn skin and spattered blood.
The preaching of sin and judgment is traumatic, to be sure. There’s some danger of presenting the gospel as mere condemnation””exactly what Jesus says it’s not (John 3:17). And an overwhelming emphasis on sin can breed a morbid obsession with one’s own wickedness. This, of course, leads not to repentance but to despair, which is exactly where the satanic powers want us.
At the same time, censoring the gospel’s painful realities doesn’t lead to tranquility. Like our children with the wild things out there, we know intuitively that a Day of Judgment is coming, even as we try to keep the fear submerged.