THE KING’S BUSINESS
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preached. But the Jesus whom Paul preached, the Jesus presented to us in the four Gospels, is the Christ. Any other Christ than the Jesus of the four Gospels is a false Christ, an anti-Christ. As it is an indisputable fact, as Paul here declares, that the Jesus whom he preached is the Christ, it is of the highest importance that we accept Him as' such, and that we accept no other Jesus and no other Christ. If we do not accept this Jesus whom Paul preached as the Christ, an awful weight of guilt rests upon us (Acts 2 :34-37; 3 :22, 23). Paul in both the method and substance of his preaching set an example worthy of all imitation by modern missionaries and by modern preachers. Seemingly he left poli tics entirely alone. Politics in Thessalonica were in a bad enough way, and there, was sore enough need of reform, but Paul did not preach either politics or reform, he went deeper, he went to the root of things. If men and women can be led to see that the Jesus of the four Gpspels is the Christ, and be led to accept Him as the Christ, as their anointed King, their politics will be all right. Monday, February 19 - Acts 17 : 4 , 5 . God blesSed the kind of preaching that Paul did. As the result of his preaching “ some believed.” That is the usual result, when the pure gospel is preached in the power of the Holy Spirit. Paul in writing at a later date to these same believers in Thessalonica refers to how the . gospel which he preached came to them not in “word only ; but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost; and in much assurance” (1 Thess. 1:5). In his epistle to the Thessa- lonians he gives us a very charming picture of these converts in Thessalonica (1 Thess. 1:6-10). But even under Paul’s preach ing there were many who did not believe. It is not God’s purpose, in this present dispensation, to save everybody, but to gather out a people for His name (ch. 15 :14) : and the Gospel has not failed, even though the majority are not saved; for the purpose of the preaching of the gospel is
passages of the Old Testament that pre sented the Christ as the all-conquering King, overlooking those that speak of Him as an atoning Saviour. In these days we have gone to the Other extreme, and emphasize only those prophecies that set forth the coming of Christ as an atoning Saviour, and many teachers have quite overlooked the other passages that predict the coming Christ as a conquering king. Why it was necessary that Christ “must suffer,” we see in the Old Testament pre diction of Him in Isa. 53:5, 6 , and in the New Testament explanation of Old Testa ment prophecies and types (see for example Matt. 22:28; Heb. 9:22; John 19:36, 37). The. second point that Paul .emphasized was that Christ “must arise again from the dead.” This, too, he proved from the Old Testament as Peter .did on the day of Pentecost. He probably used the same passages of Scriptures that Peter used for the purpose (Acts 2:24-36). We see from these verses that Paul was preaching the same Gospel which afterwards in writing to the believers in Corinth he said was the Gospel that he preached unto them (1 Cor. 15:1-4). The third, point that Paul emphasized (and it was for the purpose of this third point that he made the first two) was “this Jesus whom I proclaim unto you, is the Christ.” This kind of preaching is greatly needed today. There are many in these days who wish to substitute some other Jesus for the one whom Paul preached, some Jesus of their own concep tion or fancy, and not the actual or historic Jesus. But it is one Jesus and one Jesus only who is the Christ, and that one Jesus is the Jesus presented to us in the four Gospels, who was also the Jesus that Paul pre,ached. This Jesus, and He alone fulfills the Old Testament predictions regarding the Christ. There are many who say in these days, “I believe in Christ,” who if you question them closely. do not believe in the Christ of the Scriptures, but some different Christ of their “own fancy. The Christ about whom Christian Scientists speak is not at all the Jesus that Paul
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