Our Message And Why We Preach It

The following is a synopsis of an address delivered last month at the commencement exercises of the Moody Bible Institute of Chicago by the class speaker representing the graduates of the Pastors’ Course. We are glad to give space to this clear, forceful treatise not only because it is sane and scriptural and the testimony of the author who is one of our most valued active members, but because it is also the testimony of The Moody Church.

Some of us are about to enter upon what will be our life work. Whether we go to the people of a heathen country, or minister to our own people in a farming community or teeming city, we know we must take such a definite stand and so make clear our attitude in relation to the great truths of Christianity that it will readily be seen that our message is a positive and uncompromising message, not merely based upon the Bible, but actually consisting of the Bible, being as we believe it to be, the infallible Word of God.

Whatsoever the Bible teaches, that we preach, whether it concerns creation or salvation, God or man, heaven or hell, the incarnation of Christ or His second coming. Apart from the Bible we haven’t any message, although what we preach is oftentimes corroborated by agencies other than the Bible. God’s Word is our message, and the burden of that Word is that all mankind has sinned and come short of the glory of God, and that the wages of sin is death. Thus far it is a hopeless message—sin with its inevitable result; but we do not stop there. Our message is one of hope—“for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” And we do not even stop there because our message would not be complete without the terrible warning that “He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.”

This, then, is what we preach, and this morning I wish to set forth several reasons for so doing.

It Is Personal

The first reason is because we ourselves have proven the effectiveness of what we preach to others.

We all were sinners deserving eternal punishment, but the time came when we realized our lost condition and cried out to God to save us; and He for Christ’s sake, who died as our substitute on the cross, shedding His blood for the remission of sin, forgave us our sin and cleansed us from all unrighteousness. At that moment we became children of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. We were baptized by the Holy Ghost into the Body of Christ, and into our hearts came a deep, deep peace, the assurance of being forgiven, and of consequent peace with God. Old things passed away, all things became new, and we had an intense desire to serve our God and Saviour, and we can truly testify that the joy of serving God is greater than all the joys of the world. We are tasting real life, and are experiencing that thrill which can only come to lives surrendered to God. Moreover we believe that what the Gospel of the grace of God has done for us it will do for all who truly seek His face, and therefore we proclaim it with the utmost confidence, knowing from personal experience that our message is real.

It Is Essential

In the second place, we preach it because it is the one message the world needs.

Eight hundred million people living today have not heard it, and if they do not hear it, they will be eternally lost because there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby they can be saved other than the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Other millions who have heard but who have rejected or even neglected it are likewise doomed unless they repent and believe the Gospel. Wherever we go, we look into the faces of fellow creatures who, possessing the faculty of freewill, are able to choose eternal life or eternal death, and as we realize that many have deliberately chosen the latter by rejecting the former, our hearts are wrung with anguish as we behold them rushing rapidly towards eternity, and the love of Christ constrains us to sound out the awful warnings of God’s Word, urging them to flee from the wrath to come before they are irretrievably lost.

It Is Powerful

Furthermore, we preach this message because it is the most effective means of combating error.

False cults and isms abound on every hand, and perhaps the most deceptive of all is that system of religion known as Modernism. Modernism is being proclaimed today from thousands of pulpits and rostrums throughout the land as THE religion of the day—the most up-to-date form of Christianity. But Modernism is NOT Christian. It is decidedly anti-Christian. It is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It is like unto a whited sepulchre which indeed appears beautiful outwardly, but is within, full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness. While calling itself Christian and seemingly professing to stand for those things which we stand for, it actually denies those things essential to Christianity. It claims to believe in the inspiration of the Bible, but the statement has been qualified by the assertion that the writings of such men as Shakespeare and Tennyson are equally inspired. Modernism advocates the divinity of Christ, but its conception of the word “divine” is not the same as ours. It says that ALL men are divine, thus dragging our Lord Jesus Christ down to the common level of sinful men and women, the difference being only in degree and not in kind. Sin is not the heinous thing that we believe it to be, and therefore there is no need of a blood atonement. Thus in one way or another the great truths of Scripture are explained away.

This is merely an instance of the false teachings which are everywhere manifest today. What is to be our attitude towards them? Are we going to denounce publicly such teachings, hurling at them the anathemas of God, and calling down upon them the curse of heaven? Are we in our zeal for the truth to plunge the dagger of relentless attack into these false systems to the hilt, and then give it a twist? This is what some earnest servants of God are doing, and it may be that occasionally that kind of action is needed, but we think we know of a better way which is, to “Preach the Word”—in the face of existing error to proclaim the truth, and to proclaim it with all the earnestness of our being, and God helping us, we are going to speak the truth in love.

It Is Enlightening

And not only will the proclamation of the truth work effectively against those who deliberately abuse it, but it will also open the eyes of many who have been unconsciously blinded by false teaching.

Two thousand years ago, Jesus said, “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free”; and ever since that time, the truth has been making men free—free not only from the bondage of sin, but also from the slavery of error. A few years after those stupendous words were uttered, Saul of Tarsus on his way to Damascus came face-to-face with Him Who is the Truth, and the shackles of a mistaken zeal from him, and he became the great Apostle Paul. Fifteen hundred years passed by, and the truth—the truth of justification by faith—working in the heart of Martin Luther, started the wheels of the Reformation moving, and as a result, millions have been loosed from the snares and superstitions of centuries. And it was only a few weeks ago that the account was written of the woman missionary, home on furlough, who never having thought of the necessity of a new birth, either for herself or for those to whom she ministered, was led to accept Christ as her Saviour after hearing the truth expounded at a Bible reading, and today she is back in Turkey with a new message for those who are bound by the chains of Mohammedanism.

It Is Glorious

We little realize how many people there are who not having been grounded in the Word of God have been misled into following false prophets. And it is well known that such people have given literally hundreds of thousands of dollars for the support of false systems believing that their money was being used to propagate the truth. The very thought of such wasted effort grieves us. But we think of the donors of this [Moody Bible] Institute and rejoice that every dollar ever sent in for the carrying on of this work has been used in the training of men and women to spread the old-time religion—the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ—which D.L. Moody preached. And knowing this, were we to do other than preach that glorious Gospel we would not be worthy the name of Christian, nor the great honor of being graduates of the Moody Bible Institute.

Most of us will shortly be leaving this place with its hallowed memories to go out into the great harvest field, and as we go, we shall go with great confidence in our message because God, Who cannot lie, has promised that His Word shall not return unto Him void, but shall accomplish that which He hath pleased, and prosper in the thing whereto He hath sent it. And for our added comfort and encouragement, we know that the Word of God which constitutes our message is the sword of the Holy Spirit. It is the means which the Third Person of the Trinity uses to reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness and of judgment. Surely we have every reason to be exultant! But we must constantly be on our guard lest we go forth and preach in our own wisdom and strength. To do that would mean failure, and would bring disrepute upon the name of our Lord. The arm of flesh will fail us, we dare not trust our own. It is absolutely imperative that we go forth in the strength which God supplies through His eternal Son, giving God all the glory, and like the Apostle Paul having no confidence in the flesh, but turning resolutely away from ourselves exclaiming, “Not I”—no WE—“BUT CHRIST!” because

God’s Word has stood the fiery darts of all the sinful world;
And skeptics have thro’ ages past their fiercest blows have hurled;
It stands unmoved, a mighty rock, ’gainst cruel hate and scorn.
To bless the nations of the earth, and nations yet unborn.
The Word of God shall stand, its foes can change it never;
Tho’ heav’n and earth may pass away, God’s Word shall stand forever.

Then sound we forth His glorious Word to souls of all the earth,
To tell them of the Father’s love, and Jesus’ matchless worth.
It is the Spirit’s mighty sword no power on earth can stay;
Tho’ heav’n and earth may pass away, God’s Word shall stand for aye.

Note: Francis J. Carter was the Missionary Superintendent of the Moody Sunday School at the time this address was given in 1926.