The Gospel According to Matt

There are some who say that Christianity isn’t really about the forgiveness of sins and the resurrection of Christ, but it’s really about social, or economic, or political reform. These are nice ideas, and I’m passionate about many such things, but they aren’t part of the core message of Christianity. That’s why the Apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15:14 wrote, “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.”

The highly-effective church in Acts 4 centered its message on the resurrection of Jesus. Verse 33 says, “With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.” This isn’t preaching the Gospel from a pulpit, it is sharing the message—and the message is the resurrection of Jesus. This isn’t just the preacher’s job but it is the responsibility of every Christian.

Why did they make the resurrection of Jesus the central message of Christianity? I think 1 Corinthians 1:22-23 gives us some insight. It says, “Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom; but we preach Christ…” Here the Apostle Paul insists that all kinds of things can divide people. Issues of miracles can divide people, and issues of wisdom (doctrine, understanding and interpretation) can divide people—and the Corinthian Church, to which these verses were written, was much divided over such things. Thus the Apostle offers a simple solution: “Preach Christ! Quit fighting about miracles. Quit fighting about doctrine. And preach Christ!”

The Acts 4 Church was highly effective because it was unified under one message—the message of Christ and His resurrection. They didn’t want to argue about miracles and they didn’t want to get hung up on doctrinal differences, they just wanted to preach Christ—which unified them and made them an incredibly effective church.

Today my good friend Jim is visiting us in Chicagoland—having traveled all the way from north west Missouri. I’d say he’s my best friend, but that would sound kind of juvenile, so I’ll just say that I don’t have a better friend than Jim.

Jim and I don’t share all the same doctrinal convictions. In fact, he thinks that if you’re saved right now then you’re always gonna be saved. And I think he’s crazy. If salvation comes “by grace through faith,” as Ephesians 2:8 insists, then I conclude that if one’s faith dies then his or her salvation dies as well. We have a doctrinal difference and whenever we discuss this doctrinal difference we argue and fight (all in good fun of course).

But I’ve had people in my life who wouldn’t be my friend because of such differences. And we’ve even had people leave our churches because of this specific doctrinal difference. But Jim and I don’t separate as friends (or as brothers) because, even though we have some doctrinal differences, we share the same message—a message that centers on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You might say that which unites us is far greater than what divides us. Centering on the same message makes our friendship effective and it makes the church effective as well.

Therefore, we conclude that the most important thing one can proclaim is the simple message of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection—the message of salvation for a lost world!