What Happens

Today I went canvassing for three hours.  Most of time, I go out preaching, but for various reasons, I canvassed.  Nevertheless, I preached the gospel to an 80 year old woman, who did not know it.  I was putting a packet on her door, and there she stood looking at me, so I introduced myself.  She sat down on her porch, so I sat down on her porch, and we talked.  In most ways, it was a very typical conversation, which means she did not know the meaning of the gospel.  She had heard the word, but it was almost meaningless to her, and that is normal today in the United States.

Very often when I preach the gospel, I say something like this:

I have given the gospel to thousands of people.  When I finish, I always ask the person hearing it if he believes what I said was the truth.  I can’t remember the last time someone didn’t answer, “Yes,” to that question.  Everyone to whom I explain the gospel says they believe it is the truth.

At the end of my presentation, she also said it was true.

How the Gospel Breaks Down

In my experience, gospel preaching breaks down on nearly every occasion (probably 95% plus) in one of three places.

1. The listener will not relent on considering himself to be a good person.
2. Someone doesn’t believe he deserves Hell.
3. A person refuses to believe in Jesus Christ.

The third of these is the biggest problem, but all three connect with or depend on the other two.  On many occasions, I’ve gotten by the first and second of them.  The third is still the deal-breaker when it comes to salvation.  Believing the gospel unto salvation requires believing in Jesus Christ.  It is vital, absolutely necessary that someone believe in Jesus Christ for salvation.  In one sense, this is the gospel.  Someone can believe everything else within the gospel message and not believe in Jesus Christ and still reject the gospel.  The first two become irrelevant without the third.

It’s important that believing in Jesus Christ is in fact believing in Jesus Christ.  The hearer must believe in Jesus Christ.  It can’t be something someone calls, “believe in Jesus Christ,” but isn’t.  For this reason, the preacher must explain belief in Jesus Christ.  He must.

What “Believing in Jesus Christ” Isn’t

1. It isn’t merely praying a prayer.
2. Believing in Jesus Christ isn’t accepting Jesus into your life.
3. Neither is it merely accepting Jesus as Savior.
4. Believing in Jesus isn’t asking Jesus to save you.
5. It is not asking Jesus into your heart.

All of the above are not what it is to believe in Jesus Christ.  They are, just maybe, a piece of it, a small one.  More than these five could probably be listed, but they at least give the essence of what’s wrong.

Some so-called “evangelists” don’t even use “believe in Jesus Christ” as the terms for salvation.  If they go to those verses, they very often just ignore those statements and what they say.  They use the Bible, but they don’t rely on it.  It results in preaching a false gospel, because it doesn’t get to “believing in Jesus Christ,” which is required in the true gospel.

What Believing in Jesus Christ Is

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