DEVOTION FOR THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22ND, 2018
PREACHING AND EVANGELISM
One snowy Sunday, a 15-year-old boy ducked into a church to get warm. While there, he heard a sermon from Isaiah 45:22, “Look unto me and be ye saved,” and he trusted Christ that day. The boy was Charles Spurgeon; over his lifetime, he would preach to more than 10 million people and baptize more than 14,000 converts.
The preaching of the Word in the church is one of God’s most important tools to bring people to salvation. In today’s passage, Paul begins with his desire that both the Jews and the Gentiles would call on the name of the Lord. The glorious truth of the gospel is that Christ is the hope of Jew and Gentile, of male and female, of slave and free (see Gal. 3:28). Jesus is the Savior for everyone, and everyone who calls out to Christ in faith will certainly be saved (v. 13).
But, Paul asks, how will the world’s people know to place their trust in Christ? The answer is that they need someone to preach the gospel to them (vv. 14–15), because “faith comes from hearing the message” (v. 17). This call to repentance and faith must resound from our pulpits. Though we ourselves might not be the most trained or eloquent gospel communicators, we can bring others to hear the saving message from those whom God has appointed.
Jesus told His followers: “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field” (Luke 10:2). Joining the work of evangelism means we must highly value the preaching of the Word ourselves, invite others to come hear it, and pray to the Lord to prepare more preachers of the gospel.
APPLY THE WORD
Moody Bible Institute has been training preachers of the gospel for over 100 years, preparing them to follow God’s call to the mission field, the pulpit, street evangelism, and more. Pray for our faculty to be faithful in this essential work of equipping preachers to proclaim the gospel, and pray that God will raise up a generation to preach His Word.
Today in the Word is a production of Moody Global Ministries
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