Thursday, June 19, 2008

The Message Proclaimed

“And how shall they hear without a preacher?  And how shall they preach unless they are sent?  As it is written: ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!’ ”   (Romans 10:14–15)

From the original Greek, we could translate the final question in Romans 10:14 as, “How shall they hear without one preaching?”  The Phillips translation puts it this way, “How can they hear unless someone proclaims Him?”  Therefore, we see the emphasis is not on a preacher, but on preaching.

We may think the work of evangelism is only for those who are called to be evangelists.  Granted, there are people in the church whom God has raised up to be evangelists, and certainly evangelism is not limited to those who preach to hundreds or thousands at a time.  I have seen many individual believers who obviously have this gift.

While it is true that some are called to be evangelists, it is also true that every Christian is called to evangelize.  Many times, however, we avoid sharing our faith, deciding instead to just live it out, be a good witness, and leave the preaching to others. 

Yet in 1 Corinthians 1:21, it says, “For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” 

This does not mean that we need to scream and yell and wave a Bible to get the point across.  What it does mean is that we are to recognize the primary way God has chosen to reach the lost is through the proclamation of the gospel–by people.  God has chosen the agency of His proclaimed Word to bring people to salvation.

Copyright © 2008 by Harvest Ministries.  All rights reserved.  Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New King James Version, copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. 

For more relevant and biblical teaching from Pastor Greg Laurie, go to  www.harvest.org. 

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-Greg Laurie

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