A WHOPPING 71.2 per cent of Ghana’s population professes to be Christians, according to the country’s Statistical Service. These people deserve to be told the truth regarding their eternal salvation. The practice of modern Christianity has become so complex, especially in Africa, that it is becoming extremely difficult for many to distinguish between genuine and false approaches to salvation.
The fulcrum around which the Christian faith revolves is the eternal salvation of souls. But a believer can be denied this salvation if he or she is not exposed to the true way of accessing it. We emphasised in last week’s edition that there are many ministers today who are just interested in seeing people come to their meetings so that they can prophesy over them to receive so-called breakthroughs. They call everyone who attends their meetings Christians.
They are either ignorant or overlook this fact that a man or woman cannot just be attending church meetings for miracles and be counted as a true Christian. Jesus Christ does not entrust Himself to people, who believe in Him after seeing signs and wonders (John 2:23-25). Jesus knows that belief in Him for eternal salvation should not be based on seeing miracles, but on hearing a message.
It is in the Bible we get informed about the way the early saints received eternal salvation. They heard a message. Ministers like Peter, Philip, and Paul preached for unbelievers to hear and start the journey of discipleship. Paul, the apostle, described this message which saves as “the word of faith”, “the word of truth”, “the word of righteousness” and “the word of reconciliation” in his letters to various churches he planted for God.
A true Christian minister ought to be filled with this Word, and be sent by the Spirit of grace to deliver it to convert the sinner from the bondage of sin to freedom in Christ Jesus. People are saved and reconciled to God by the power of the Holy Spirit who creates access for them by hearing this message. It is the message the early ministers were committed to preaching everywhere they went for people to hear and souls saved for the Lord.
In Romans 10:8, Paul said it is “the word of faith which we preach”, in Ephesians 1:13, Paul described it as the word of truth that saves, in 2 Corinthians 5:19, the Apostle revealed that Christ committed to us “the word of reconciliation” and in Hebrews 5:13, he implored Christians to be skilled in “the word of righteousness” to prove our maturity.
What does this mean to you? It means “the word of faith”, “the word of truth”, “the word of righteousness” or “the word of reconciliation” is the key message given to the Church of Jesus Christ to proclaim and teach. It is for this very reason that Paul instructed pastor Timothy to study to show himself approved unto God so that he could “rightly divide the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2: 15).
Paul was a Foundational Apostle who was used to establish doctrines for Christianity. In our world, today, there is no such Apostle. I mean, there are Apostles, but none is called to be a Foundational Apostle as Paul was to establish doctrines. This places on us the need to take the words of Paul with utmost seriousness.
There is a divine reason for Paul’s charge to Timothy and to all ministers. The reason is that without the appropriate handling and presentation of this message, the Word of truth, sinners cannot be genuinely saved. In other words, salvation of souls through Jesus Christ depends upon the preaching and hearing of this message. And it is the exact message the early faithful ministers of Christ committed their lives to preaching every day.
“Now let me remind you, brothers and sisters of the Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then and still do now, for your faith is built on this wonderful message. And it is this Good News that saves you if you firmly believe it – unless, of course, you believed something that was never true in the first place” (1 Corinthians 15: 1- 2, NLT).
Sinners must hear the Word with their ears and receive it into their hearts. The way to receive the Word into the heart is by meditation through the workings of the Holy Spirit. While hearing the Word, the Holy Spirit grants the hearer a measure of faith in his heart to believe. When hearing the Word of righteousness, God assigns a measure of faith in your heart so that you can hear and receive the message. This is a free gift of God.
“…but to think with sober judgment, according to the measure of faith that God has assigned” (Romans 12: 3). Now, notice how in 1 Corinthians 15: 1- 4, Paul explained that it is the Good News that saves people. And then he went on to explain what the Good News is all about, emphasising the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
This means Paul preached and taught the people to hear and understand the purpose of the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord as the first step of their salvation. We need to understand that the Apostles first went to the various communities to preach the gospel to the people before later they wrote the letters to them.
For instance, Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus, “…In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation…” (Ephesians 1: 13). In this verse, we see that the believers first heard the ministers preach and teach them face-to-face. The first ministers of Jesus Christ preached the message of the birth, death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is called the gospel, for sinners to hear for them to believe in Christ for eternal salvation.
It is rather unfortunate that today, many ministers preach just any message and ask people to confess Christ as their Saviour to make them Christians. We hear these things in our churches and on radio and television stations. But scripturally this is not how people become Christians. People must first hear and understand the message of the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
By James Quansah
jamesquansah@yahoo.com