Featured What the Gospel is not

To Christians, not to the unsaved.

Yes. He said it to churches, not to the unsaved.

As Christians, yes, not to the unsaved.

You won't be able to find a single instance in the Bible where Paul enumerated sins to the unbeliever. Only to the church, as chastisement, not for winning to salvation, because they were already saved.

You need more study, my friend.

When Paul went to a new city, he went to the local synagogue and reasoned from the Law as to why Christ was the Messiah. In other words, he preached Christ, not sin. Yes, I'm sure in the process of many thousands of conversations, Paul told the unsaved they lived in sin, but he didn't write it down in the Bible, and he did not do so as though striking them with a club -- obviously you missed the analogy.

Paul loved people. If he lived today and wasn't a Christian, he'd be the greatest psychologist of all time because he understood how people ticked, how they thought, why they did stupid things, and he had a loving answer for every one of them.

You go ahead and do things your way. I'll do them my way. I won't ask for a comparison in heaven. I'll just do what Jesus said to do: Love God, love others.

 

No. I stated quite clearly that it is people who have changed.

Did I say anything about the lack of effectiveness of the Gospel today? NO!!

Did I say anything about the blood of Christ and His resurrection being somehow ineffective today? NO!!

Did I say anything about the failure of love in this day and age? NO!!!

I said, quite specifically ...

... which is all about the state of the man/woman in this culture. It says nothing about the truth and effectiveness of the Gospel. Spurgeon, Billy Sunday, Ironside -- they could get away with preaching "fire and brimstone" repentance. There is no way that message works today.

I'd like someone to explain to me -- you or anyone else -- why you believe repentance must be preached with a vengeance. "Meeting them where they're at" simply means reaching out and relating to them, loving them -- for example, my own experiences with PTSD, problem drinking, disordered gambling, and adultery enables me to speak directly to any man in any of those sins. I don't condemn anyone.

It is quite obvious to me that the Christian culture of today is far more interested in condemning sinners for being sinners. That isn't going to win anyone of them to Christ. Perhaps we've forgotten where we came from before we knew Jesus.

As long as it expressed with love and not condemnation, certainly.

And you gather from what I've said previously on this thread that I don't preach repentance, exactly how?

I could rival Paul as the "foremost" among sinners. I'm well aware of that. I am well-heeled in the knowledge of from where I came. When you repent of your arrogance, I'll repent of a pride I do not have. Fair enough?

 

Really? You don't think the advent of the communication age, with radio, television, smart phones, the Internet, Skype, etc., has changed people?? For one thing, Americans' attention span has dropped significantly just in the last 15 years. Additionally, both politically and socially, polarization, fragmentation and division have become familiar themes and make it far more difficult for people of differing social, spiritual and political opinions to find common ground. Far more likely, they will reject and label one another without actually learning anything about one another. This is just as true of Christians as it is the lost.

Sin hasn't changed. Mankind has changed dramatically. And the Bible confirms this will happen, and in fact, it already is:

2 Timothy 4, NASB
3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine ; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, ​

You can make all the claims you want that men have not changed, the fact is they have, and the opportunities to present the Gospel are becoming more infrequent, and the hearts that are open are fewer and farther between. Nonetheless, we are to keep speaking it, at every opportunity. But we will not reach them with outrage, anger, vilification, and temper. We will reach them with love.

And I see on this thread that loving others is disparaged. I have something to say to those who think thusly:

1 John 4, NASB
8 The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. ​

That's in the Bible, too. There is no limit on love. You are not allowed to withhold it from anyone. "Love God, love your neighbor." Jesus said these are the two greatest commandments. Your neighbor is everyone, not just those you want to love. It includes the bum, the drunk, the wife-beater, the thief, the murderer -- the homosexual.

Get over yourselves. Love God, love others, and preach the Gospel, which is the truth spoken in love.

 

Did you read the question? Because to say that is not true is utter fallacy.

The statistical information that follows that selectively quoted line proves your answer incorrect. Likewise, the entire post would have been better quoted, with a full response.

 

If anyone honestly believes that, today, the Gospel is spoken more than is condemnation of the sinner, they are out of touch with reality. Graham's grandson, William Graham Tullian Tchividjian, pastor of Dr. D. James Kennedy's Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Ft. Lauderdale, doesn't agree with his grandfather.

We in the church have a far greater tendency to condemn others, particularly lost, hopeless and helpless sinners, rather than share the love of Christ and His good news with them. That's a fact, like it or not.

 

One, it stands to reason if I'm railing against such behavior, I most likely am not participating in it, but rather calling attention to a problem I see (though I admit some would be that two-faced and double-minded).

Two, 17, almost all of whom came to me as clients suffering addictions. How about you, since we're asking?

Statistics, not opinion, prove the point. As Tchividjian said, ask the "religious nones" why they left the church and feel they have no relationship with Christ. It isn't because they felt too loved.

You keep saying that as though it is a point of issue. It isn't. It goes without saying. I'm not writing about what is said on this board. I'm writing about what is going on in the hearts and minds of Christians across this country, and what I see disturbs me. Like it or not, we're going to be seen, as the body of Christ, as bigots in the next five to ten years, given our focus on condemnation of, for example, gay marriage -- and not it alone, but it is certainly the most visible issue -- if we are not actively pursuing heart change in the very people who foment this evil in our land. Railing against sin doesn't curb or stop sin. The Gospel does. We need to preach it. With love.