You the preacher...

This past Sunday Paul preached on the importance of preaching. Specifically, he delved into why preaching is necessary and central in building a house of God. Certainly we cannot overestimate the importance of the public preaching of the gospel. As mentioned on Sunday, such preaching is essential in establishing absolute truth, discerning false gospels, destroying Satanic strongholds, promoting repentance & humility and strengthening us to face opposition, persecution and trials.

What comes to mind when you hear the words, "preaching the gospel"? Is that something that primarily takes place on Sunday mornings in church? Do you take a passive approach to preaching? (I just show up on Sundays and listen while someone else preaches...) Do you realize that you are called to be a preacher? Yes, little old you. Male, female, young, old, high-school-drop-out or PhD in theology - you are called to be a preacher of the gospel. You are called to preach the gospel to your unsaved friends, to your saved friends, to your children, to your spouse, and perhaps most importantly, to yourself!

Jerry Bridge's book, The Discipline of Grace, contains one of the most helpful chapter(s) on preaching the gospel to oneself. Here he provides a helpful definition of what we mean by "preaching the gospel to yourself":


"To preach the gospel to yourself, then, means that you continually face up to your own sinfulness and then flee to Jesus through faith in His shed blood and righteous life. It means that you appropriate, again by faith, the fact that Jesus fully satisfied the law of God, that He is your propitiation, and that God's holy wrath is no longer directed toward you."

Do you preach to yourself like that through out the day? If not, then you run two risks. When the Holy Spirit convicts you of sin you will either fall into condemnation (trying to bear the penalty for your own sin) or licentiousness (blow-off the conviction, ignore it and continue on). As we grow in "continually facing up to our own sinfulness and then fleeing to Jesus through faith in His shed blood and righteous life" then we can expect to grow in love for the Savior, holiness, joy and freedom from sin. So, ready to preach today?

The Cross as the all-encompassing foundation for Christian growth

Here is something that has elevated my appreciation of the Cross in preparation for our worship service tomorrow. This is from Jerry Bridge's The Great Exchange:

"The cross is not a mere first step toward spiritual development: it is the all-encompassing foundation for Christian growth. The cross does not mystically infuse spiritual life or experiential sinlessness. Instead, it first provides complete forgiveness of past, present, and future sins, and then it becomes a means of the deliverance by which we are freed from bondage to sin. As Paul affirms, "[Christ] gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age" (Gal 1:4a).

"By tying the transformation of the believer to the cross, Paul makes his point abundantly clear: everything we need for life and eternity is provided by virtue of Christ's great atonement. Furthermore, in everything God is for us; he is for us in Christ the wisdom instead of ignorance, justification instead of condemnation, sanctification instead of sinfulness, and redemption instead of slavery... In view of this, it is no wonder Paul is adamant and unwavering regarding the centrality of the cross of Christ. The fulfillment of every hope we have is blood bought by the atoning work of Christ on the cross. And the work of Christ on the cross must remain our only hope." (p. 45)

Reading that helps to me become freshly amazed at the awesome power of the Cross. I can't wait to sing about it tomorrow morning with the rest of the body.