Of course, that story is fiction and will probably ever remain fiction. But wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to die, leaving this world with some sort of blessing like that? It used to be common among young people to yearn to find a way to make the world a better place to live. They wanted to become doctors in order to save lives, not to become rich. They wanted to be teachers in order to lead other young people into some of the beautiful things of life. They wanted to be scientists so that they could solve one or two of the problems of the world. Instead of becoming powerful politicians they wanted to become noble statesmen striving for peace. I’m sure that some of those people still exist, but they are becoming more rare with every generation. It seems that the majority of young people today grow up just trying to happily exist or subsist. But even their numbers are dwindling as more and more people live for their own selfish pursuits, not caring whether they are a blessing or a curse to the rest of the world. They want to be as rich as Bill Gates, but they care not whether they put a computer in every home. They want to be as famous as O.J. Simpson, even if they have to kill some people to get that fame. They want to be baseball or football stars, frivolous movie actors, and popular singers, who leave behind nothing whatsoever except for a couple of temporary records.
What do you want to make of your life? Could we say that the greater our legacy, the greater person we were, or the better we spent our lives? The men who first harnessed electricity have left us with blessings incalculable. The Wright brothers are worthy of their fame and their name. The people who discovered a cure for polio, the discoverers of insulin and penicillin are note-worthy people. And a cure for cancer, as I just described, would be a great legacy.
But there is a human legacy, which is not only possible, it is even greater. Though a man be able to fly around the world a hundred times and see all the great sights, but if he lost his soul, he would spend eternity in misery. And though a man pioneered the development of the heart transplant, but his own heart was never regenerated, his value to humanity would be, at best, limited. Edison may have blessed the world with his practical application of electricity, but I can’t tell you whether or not he is in hell right now, or whether he helped another soul to see the Light of the World. If there had been someone stubborn enough to give Thomas Alva Edison the gospel over and over again, until the Holy Spirit drove it home to that man’s heart, that evangelist would have been more far more important to Edison than Edison was to the world. Man can live without electricity, but he can’t live throughout eternity without salvation. “What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”
I would like to submit to you that the greatest work that any man could do, and, as a result, the greatest legacy that any man could ever leave, is described in these few verses. Let’s think about the Greatest Gift and the Greatest Work that God has left in the hands of man.
And then we come to the subject of grace – God’s unmerited favor. I hope that we are all clear on the fact that if it wasn’t for grace not a single soul would ever be saved. The depths of our sin, the thorough nature of our depravity and the helplessness of our case render us all completely incapable of contributing a single thing to our deliverance. We are forced to agree with the words of the Apostle Paul, “we believe that through the GRACE of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved…” But as I suggested this morning, the Lord has never saved anyone against their will, grace or no grace. In every case, the saved soul has been given a heart and desire to be saved. That soul has been given a new will and a desire for the things of God. And when that is present there follows humble repentance before God and heart-felt faith in the perfectly satisfactory sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” And obviously, whosoever shall not call upon the name of the Lord will never be saved.
The question is: how are those sinners going to know about repentance and faith if they are not told? The Lord could have sovereignly and omnipotently saved and glorified whomever He chose, without telling them or asking anything of them, but that is not what He chose to do. He chose to reveal Himself before all mankind, and He chose to expose our wickedness; Furthermore He chose to command “both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.” And it is in the pages of God’s Book, the Bible – the Holy Scriptures – that He revealed these things.
Christianity is a religion of the Book. Generally, I don’t like to use the naked word “Christianity,” because it has become such a misused term. When I want to speak of true Christianity, I say something like “Bible Christianity.” True Christianity is the kind that we find in the Bible. True Christianity is a religion of one Book – the Book – the Bible. True Christianity is not subjective – it is not subject to the mind and the depraved heart of any human being. And man has no authority to paraphrase the scriptures, generalize them, restate or rehash them and still call that corrupted book “the Bible.” The Holy Spirit gave it to man in sixty-six volumes, but He intended it to be one book. And yet today we find that one book transcribed into a hundred different books all bearing much the same title. Those various renderings of God’s perfect revelation may be ranked among the worst crimes man has ever committed against his own soul. The Bible was meant to be the immutable measure and perfect standard of all that is right and holy. And it must be understood so that we can understand ourselves. It must be understood so that we can begin to understand the Lord. And it must be understood so that we can understand the Lord’s salvation.
For some reason, the Lord decided to make the preaching – the public declaration of the gospel – his primary means of communication. We have examples of gospel preaching throughout the New Testament. It began with John the Baptist preaching repentance and faith. And then came the Lord Jesus with the same message. Deacon Philip “went down to Samaria, preaching Christ unto them.” When he met the Ethiopian reading the Old Testament, he “opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture and preached unto Him Jesus.” Paul was a preacher, Peter was a preacher, then there was Apollos, Timothy and a host of others.
Paul’s testimony to the Corinthians began: “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness.”
I don’t look at myself as a great preacher. In fact, I consider myself a pretty poor example of the servant of God. I don’t think that I need to mention all of the skills and talents which I don’t possess, and which are fully possess by many others in the ministry and some who are not. But I will rejoice in this: the fact that the Lord has called me and has sustained me in His work for forty years, is proof that He can call and sustain anyone.
“For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach, except they be sent? As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!” Have you wondered what the Lord meant when he referred to the preacher’s feet? Generally speaking feet are not a man’s most appealing feature. I have knobs and knots, misshapen and unnaturally toenails, not to mention that one toe on which there is a pair of toenails. I think that what the Lord was saying is that the ugliest part of a man, a man who preaches Christ, The ugliest part of that man is beautiful both in the sight of God and in the sight of those people whom he is privileged to point to the Saviour. In the gospel the crooked are made straight and the ugly are made beautiful.
The work of the gospel preacher is a tremendous blessing AND an difficult exercise. Learning to play a musical instrument, like the bagpipes or the pan flute, requires a lot of work and training. Learning enough to become a teacher of astrophysics requires a great deal of time and effort. To be a good medical practitioner, capable of diagnosing and curing a hundred different disease and correcting a hundred more different kinds of injuries, takes years of diligent application. But I can assure you that these things are no less laborious and difficult than attempting to learn and attempting to teach “the whole counsel of God” beginning with the gospel. The work to which Paul refers in this scripture requires study, intellect, and meditation. It requires the ability to organize thoughts, find the right tools of expression, a bit of oratory, and an adequate vocabulary. Then if there isn’t some degree of humility and dependency, that preacher isn’t going to be very effective. He desperately needs a close relationship with the Lord. The Holy Spirit is as important in the preacher’s study as He is in the auditorium. What I am trying to say is that despite the honor there is in preaching the gospel, there is also no human labor with the same combination of spiritual, physical, and mental demands. If a young man was looking for a challenge as well as a means of leaving the world in a better condition – then seeking the Lord’s will in this area is well worth his time. Paul mentions a word in verse 15 which is worthy of a comment or two. “And how shall they preach, except they be sent.” The way that statement is made, it shouldn’t be left as referring to the call of God alone. I believe in the call of God to the ministry – I have experienced it; I couldn’t avoid it, shake it, or reject it. I have also seen men that entered the ministry when they were not called of God. Praise the Lord, some recognized their mistake, and I commend them for their wisdom it admitting it, and I also commend them for their zeal for the Lord which confused them in the first place. But some, although not called, never left the ministry – causing no end of problems.
But I don’t think that this verse is talking about the call of God. I think that this is speaking of the way in which Paul and Barnabas were “sent” out as preachers and missionaries from the church in Antioch. This is speaking of the sending out of Philip into Samaria, and Peter up into Syria. This is the sending of Tim Parrow under the authority of this church to preach in Stillwater, Oklahoma. This is the sending of Burt Craft into Mexico, and Mike Meredith into Australia. This sending involves you and me, together as a church of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And this brings up another point. I do not believe that godly ladies are ever called to preach; in fact neither are ungodly ladies. Furthermore, less than 2% of godly men are ever called to preach. But that does not make the 98% unimportant or useless. First, just because they aren’t called to publically preach, to pastor or become missionaries, that doesn’t mean that they are forbidden from sharing their faith on a personal level with others. Besides this they are a part of the “sending,” and they are a part of the support system of the preacher. Although I am thinking of the missionary, who can’t stay on the field without your money, I am also thinking of myself and my need of a godly wife, and your prayers, a salary from you, and your invitations to the unsaved to come and hear the preaching of the gospel in this place.
I was talking to a man earlier this week who asked me why there are so few scriptural churches in this world. Then he asked me why there are so few young men, being trained and entering the ministry. My glib reply was that these were the last days, but I don’t know if that is the complete answer. Is it because our young people aren’t being challenged to consider the ministry as the will of the Lord for their lives?
Again, why is this the greatest work that any man could ever do? Verse 17 explains it – “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” If repentance and faith are the human means of knowing and enjoying salvation from sin, and if these things are given to the sinner through the hearing of the word of God, then the declaration of that Word is the most important thing that any man could ever do. If you want to make your life into something really worth-while, seriously ask the Lord, whether or not He wants you to train for the ministry. If you want to leave this world a better place, then you must focus on being the best Christian that the Lord can make you, and using your life to point people to the Saviour.