Gospel for Life: Faith comes by hearing

People will not be saved without the gospel. If there is one thing we get right, it must be this. Paul says in Romans 1:16 “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, ‘the righteous shall live by faith.’” Good examples don’t save lawyers. Community service doesn’t save store clerks. It is the gospel that makes blind men see. That is, the spoken message of God’s Word about Jesus Christ. Later in Romans Paul says, “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17), which means that in order to get saved, people need to hear the word of Christ—that is, the gospel. It needs to be spoken to them. It needs to be articulated. And in order for us to rightfully articulate it, we must comprehend it fully. Lost souls depend upon our understanding of the gospel.

Social service is not evangelism. Government involvement is not evangelism. For parents, spanking your children isn’t evangelism. High standards isn’t evangelism. Sharing your testimony isn’t evangelism (necessarily). Apologetics is not evangelism. Evangelism is the prayerful delivery of the good news of Christ, that is, the gospel, to someone who has not made him his savior.

This is the continuation of a series:

Part 1: Introduction

Part 2: The Bible

Part 3: Just one gospel