Gospel Advancement
Acts 12:1–25
But the word of God increased and multiplied. Acts 12:24
I think of those who have tried to oppose the gospel over the centuries. There were times when Christ’s enemies tried to oppose the expansion of the Word of God by the sword, just as Herod did when he executed James. The powerful said, “If you continue to preach this gospel, we will take away your lives.” And they did. There have been countless martyrs in the history of the church. Yet the Word of God has not been bound. The more the enemies of Christ have killed his followers, the more the gospel has spread outward like ripples on a pond.
Others have tried to suppress the Word of God by ridicule. They laugh at us, saying, “Who in his right mind would ever believe a foolish thing like that? No enlightened, no modern person can believe such foolishness.” The French agnostic philosopher Voltaire tried to destroy the church by ridicule, predicting that within fifty years people would have forgotten even who Jesus Christ was. Fifty years after his prediction, the Geneva Bible society was running off thousands of Bibles on presses that had been set up in Voltaire’s former home in Geneva.
Others have tried to bind the Word of God by neglect, by pretending it no longer matters, just getting on with their utterly secular lives. Yet the gospel spreads.
People have tried to bind the gospel by creating substitutes for it, counterfeits. They say, “Well, all right, we’ll have religion, but we’ll have it without Christ. We don’t need this business of the cross and an atonement. We’ll just take the beautiful things like Jesus’s ethics.” That kind of religion, a Christ without the cross, has no power and appeals to no one except those seeking a substitute for the true thing. Thus do people fight, oppose, and ridicule the gospel we hold dear. Yet that true gospel of God goes on from strength to strength while the other secular gospels and their advocates fade along the way.
But though the Word of God is always advancing, it does not do so without human channels. God has also decreed that it is to advance by human messengers, like Barnabas, Saul, and even young John Mark, who once seemed to have abandoned the missionary call. Do you look to others who have been in the faith a long time and think they are the ones to carry the gospel on? They are, of course. They are doing it to the best of their ability. But you, like Mark, are also called by Jesus to the same assignment. Will you do it? You must, because God has determined that the Word of God shall “increase and multiply” through you, as it has through other normal people in earlier generations of the church.
Taken from Come to the Waters by James Boice ISBN 9798887790954 used with permission from P&R Publishing, Phillipsburg NJ 08865
Scripture quotations are from the ESV (the Holy Bible English Standard Version) copyright 2001 by Crossway a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. All rights reserved.