Get the gospel in there.

The Gospel is what we are to proclaim. Obviously, it ought to be central then to our lives and message. In numerous places on this blog I have referred to what it is, so I won't reiterate it here. No, what I want to talk about here is how central the message of the gospel of the cross of Christ needs to be in preaching. There are a ton of reasons for this, but here is just one.

The Bible is not our message, though the message is in our Bibles. It seems to me that we who are passionate about getting our exegesis right forget a cardinal rule: context--specifically, context at a macro level. We are quick to make sure that the verse we are looking at is understood in light of the sentences around it, the flow of the rest of the book and the intent of the author in that book (especially in the epistles) and as long as we have our exegesis right within that scope we've done our job. And this is right and good to do. But at a macro level, we have to not only look at the context of the verse in the chapter in the book; but also the context of the book in the Bible.

What is the Bible about? We cannot preach rightly without taking that into consideration. In numerous places we find Jesus telling people that the Bible is about Him. On the road to Emmaus after his resurrection Jesus said the scriptures were about him. To the pharisees in John he scolded them for studying the scriptures because they thought the right understanding of them gave them eternal life but they missed it because they didn't see that the scriptures were about him. In 1 Corinthians 15, the gospel is outlined "according to the scriptures"--that Christ's death was foretold there. Paul reminds us that his central message was the cross and that he wanted to know nothing more than Jesus and him crucified among his hearers. In 2 Corinthians, the ministry of every believer is the ministry of reconciliation--the gospel of God restoring his relationship with man through the cross. This is what the bible is about. This is what we ought to be about. It is the only hope for those sick with sin.

When our preaching does not drip with blood of the Lamb, what then have we proclaimed? The blood of Christ must splatter upon those who hear our message or our message is not the message of the Bible. Lord give us blood-soaked preachers.