HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS
EUGENE, OREGON
Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org)
Verses marked NKJV are from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Verses marked KJV are from the King James Version of the Bible.
Cover by Left Coast Design, Portland, Oregon
David Gregory is represented by MacGregor Literary, Inc. of Hillsboro, Oregon.
THE REST OF THE GOSPEL
Copyright 2000 by David Gregory Smith
Published by Harvest House Publishers
Eugene, Oregon 97402
www.harvesthousepublishers.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gregory, David, 1959-
The rest of the gospel / David Gregory and Dan Stone.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-7369-5638-3 (pbk.)
ISBN 978-0-7369-5639-0 (eBook)
1. Christian life. I. Title.
BV4501.3.G7435 2014
248.4dc23
2013018545
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To Barbara Stone, my wife, whose simple question one day, Dan, what would you do if you could do anything you wanted to? And dont stop to think about your answer, led to more than fifteen years of travel together, sharing the good news of Christ in you, the hope of glory. Barbara died January 22, 1993, of cancer.DS
To my best friend, my strongest support, an unexpected gift from God who exceeds all my dreams: Ava, my wife. What a wonder you are.DG
C ONTENTS
I first met Dan Stone at a retreat near Tyler, Texas. His message of the believers union with Jesus Christ was not entirely new to me, but through him the Holy Spirit began opening the eyes of my heart anew to this wonderful reality. So has He used Dan in the lives of countless others to usher them into a deeper experience of Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Years later, I proposed to Dan that I put his teaching into book form. He graciously supported the project, which has resulted in this book. The book is written in the first person, as from Dan. The primary content is Dans, although he instructed me to note that he disclaims any originality of the material. So noted. My contribution has been to organize, supplement, and clarifyand to be repeatedly blessed by the content myself.
Dan went home to the Lord in October 2005. God has continued to use his teaching in the lives of tens of thousands both in America and abroad through more than ten translations of the book. I am thrilled that Harvest House Publishers has decided to release a new version of the book to an even wider audience.
May the Lord be pleased to use this book to cause the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love (Ephesians 4:16). And may you drink deeply of the water of life who is Christ, know[ing] the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:19).
David Gregory
August 2013
I spent 24 years traveling around the country talking to people about the mystery of the gospel: Christ in you, the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27). Christ living in us and through us, as us, is the only hope we have of experiencing the glory God intends for our lives. David Gregory and I have written this book to help you enter into Christs fullness in your life.
There is a flip side to the hope of glory, however. Yes, Christ in us is our only hope of experiencing Gods glory ourselves. But it is also the way that God has chosen to glorify Himself through us. As DeVern Fromke writes in Ultimate Intention , God has chosen to eternally manifest His glory by living His life in and through a host of sons and daughters. I want to begin this book by discussing not the glory we receive from God, but the glory He receives through us.
Christian books always run the risk of being man-centered. Most are addressed to a specific human need or to our deep, universal need of intimacy with God. Addressing mans needs, many Christian books, as well as much Christian teaching and thought, essentially begin with man and implicitly portray God as mans need-meeter.
If we dont begin from Gods point of view, we end up with man at the center. Thats true even in our approach to the Word of God. We often read the beginning of Genesis and focus immediately on the fall of man into sin. The rest of Scripture chronicles Gods redemption of man. All of which is true. It can appear, however, and is often preached, that Gods ultimate purpose is the rescue of man. The result is a focus on us and our need.
But if we begin before the foundation of the world, before Genesis 1:1, we start from another point of view. We start with this question: what is Gods intent? Answering that question is like Galileo or Copernicus discovering that the earth wasnt at the center of the universe (or at least our solar system). The sun was. We are not the center of the universe. The Son is.
Its easy to live as if we are the center of the universe. We would never say it, or even think it consciously, but we can live as if God is here for us. That has come across in a lot of Christian teaching. God is here to bless you. You ought to be rich. You ought to be prosperous. Its your due to be successful. Its your due to get ahead. God has to respond to your faith. God has obligated Himself to bless you if you do the right things. All of which means what? You are the center of the universe.
If we start before the foundation of the world, though, we discover that God has a plana plan conceived before time began. Paul revealed Gods plan most clearly in the first chapter of Ephesians.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ(1:3)
Is it Gods intent to bless us? Absolutely. He has already blessed us with every possible blessing in the heavenly realm.
just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world(1:4a)
God had a purpose for us before the foundation of the world. He chose us for that purpose.
that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself(1:4b-5a)
Gods plan involved having a host of sons (and daughters) who would be holy and blameless in His sight. Through the subjection of the Son to the cross, God intended to bring many children into glory (Hebrews 2:10). Why? Paul continued:
according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved (1:5b-6).
To make sure we dont miss the point, Paul repeated it six verses later:
