Why We Can't "Just Preach the Gospel"

Yes, the Gospel is infallible. It has been true, is true, and will always be true. However, just preaching the Gospel is not enough.

The Gospel is Our Foundation

Does the Bible command us to just preach the Gospel? The Gospel is our foundation for how we love our neighbor. It is the essence of how we share the love of Christ with our neighbors. Without the Gospel, we have no solid foundation on which we base our lives. We would be subject to the inconsistency of man and our fleshly desires to dictate our morality.The truth of the Gospel provides us with our instruction and command of how to love our neighbor. But the Gospel is not only the words we share with our neighbor. It is the very actions we display towards them. It is our obedience to the Gospel that compels us to act. And it is the love in deed and truth, not just in word or talk.

Let us not love in word or talk, but in deed and in truth. - 1 John 3:18

The word of God is the very reason we die to ourselves and feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, and visit the sick and imprisoned.

Preach and Live Out the Commands

Yes, preach the Gospel. Yes, live out the commands of the Gospel. To be a Christian means to do both preaching and living out the commands.

Related Post: We Have a Calling On Our Lives to Live

To preach and not live out the Gospel is counter to the very way Jesus lived among man. Jesus taught us how to live by living out the commands of His father. He preached it, and then He lived it.  For if He didn't, He would be a hypocrite.His power wouldn't exist if His perfectly obedient life on Earth didn't reflect the Gospel message he brought to the world. Instead, He is the center of our worship because his life displayed the love of God in word and deed.We will display the love of Christ to our neighbor when we preach Gospel AND live out the truth and commands of God, just as Christ did.