1.     Last week I spoke on the power of the Gospel.  The Gospel of Christ is the power of God.

2.     My text last week was I Corinthians 1:18, “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.”

3.     The apostle Paul did not say the Gospel was a message about the power of God.  He said the Gospel is the power of God.

4.     I Corinthians 1:24 says, Christ is “the power of God, and the wisdom of God.”

5.     This morning I would like to continue with this theme. In the book of Acts we find sixteen sermons.  Seven are by Peter and seven are by Paul.  One is by Stephen, and one by James.

6.     As we study these sermons, we see the apostles preached Christ the power of God.  This power is seen throughout the book of Acts. 

7.     In Acts 17, we read that the Jews in Thessalonica accused the apostles of turning the world upside down.  The apostles did that by preaching Christ the power of God.

8.     By studying their preaching, we see that they preached Christ historically, Biblically, and doctrinally.

I. WE ARE TO PREACH CHRIST HISTORICALLY

1.     When I speak this morning of “preaching Christ,” I am not just referring to preaching from the pulpit.

2.     I am referring to Sunday School work, Children’s Church, soulwinning, etc.

3.     The Lord Jesus Christ must be central in all our preaching, teaching, and soulwinning. Spurgeon once described his preaching by saying, “I take my text and then I make a bee-line to the cross.”

4.     In his great book, The Soul Winner, Spurgeon wrote, “I believe that those sermons which are fullest of Christ are the most likely to be blessed to the conversion of the hearers. Let your sermons be full of Christ, from beginning to end crammed full of the gospel. As for myself, brethren, I cannot preach anything else but Christ and His cross, for I know nothing else, and long ago, like the apostle Paul, I determined not to know anything else save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. People have often asked me, ‘What is the secret of your success?’ I always answer that I have no other secret but this, that I have preached the gospel — not about the gospel, but the gospel — the full, free, glorious gospel of the living Christ who is the incarnation of the good news. Preach Jesus Christ, brethren, always and everywhere; and every time you preach be sure to have much of Jesus Christ in the sermon.”

5.     Now when I say we are to preach Christ historically, I am referring to the detailed accounts of actual historical events from the life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

6.     Most Bible colleges offer a class called, “The Life of Christ.”  The reason this is a standard course is Bible preachers must know how to teach and preach Christ historically.

7.     Many people today think they know who Jesus is but their Jesus is as unreal and as unscriptural as Santa Claus or the Easter bunny.

8.     In Acts 10:36, Peter preached, “The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ.” True peace can only come from knowing Jesus.  Reconciliation with God, forgiveness of sin, peace with God, eternal life, assurance of salvation, etc. can only come through the Lord Jesus Christ.

9.     Notice that in this message, Peter preached many historical facts about our Lord:

·        “He is Lord of all” (Acts 10:36b).  Is Jesus Christ your Lord?

·        These facts were “published throughout all Judaea” (10:37).

·        Peter also refers to John’s baptism (10:37).  It is a fact that our Lord was baptized by immersion in the Jordan River by John the Baptist (Matt. 3:13-17).

·        Peter preached that “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power,” and that He “went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil” (10:38).

·        Peter added that He and the other apostles were “witnesses of all things which He did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they slew and hanged on a tree: Him God raised up the third day, and shewed him openly” (10:39).

10. These historical facts include our Lord’s earthly ministry, His healings and great miracles, as well as His death and resurrection (10:39, 40).

11. Notice Peter stressed the solid historicity of the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Peter was careful to mention that there were “witnesses chosen before of God” (10:41).

12. These historical facts about Jesus are not unsubstantiated.  The apostles stressed important historical facts about our Lord.  Peter said in Acts 3:14, 15, “But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses.”

13. In Acts 26:26, the apostle Paul said to King Agrippa, “for this thing was not done in a corner.”  In other words, Paul was saying that the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ are well-documented historical facts.  There were eyewitnesses.  These things were not “done in a corner.”

14. In I Corinthians 15:6, Paul said the resurrected Christ “was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.”

15. In Acts 10:41, Peter refers to “witnesses…who did eat and drink with Him after He rose from the dead.”

16. Twenty-five years later Peter wrote, “For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty” (II Peter 1:16).

17. The apostle John wrote in his first epistle, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life” (I John 1:1).

18. Even as Peter and John were getting near the end of their preaching ministries, and the end of their life here on earth, they still strongly stressed the historical accuracy of the Gospel message.

19. It is important that we preach and teach Christ historically because we are living in a day and age when few people know anything about the Jesus of holy Scripture.

20. Some people actually believe Jesus is the actor who portrayed Christ in Mel Gibson’s “Passion” movie.   This actor admitted in an newspaper interview that he felt funny when people bowed down and worshipped him.

21. Some people think the “Passion” movie is accurate historically, but in fact it is not accurate historically or Biblically.

22. Richard Bennett was a RC priest for over 20 years.  He recognized that Gibson’s movie was corrupted with RC teachings.  He wrote this about the “Jesus” portrayed in Gibson’s movie: “Creating a visual representation of the Lord Jesus, by definition, is to portray ‘another Jesus.’ The Lord Jesus in His Person, character, and work is divine and perfect. No Savior other than the One proclaimed in Scripture is permissible. Those who claim they are only depicting the humanity of Jesus Christ…end up with idols produced by the imaginations of their own hearts. The Lord God gave believers a Wordbook, not a picture book...The visual works of a man’s devising, for all their emotional power, are too dull a tool to bring to the individual conviction of sin and the explicit Gospel of grace that the Written Word and the truth preached bring” (Richard Bennett and J. Virgil Dunbar, “The Passion of Christ: Mel Gibson’s Vivid Deception,” cited by David Cloud).

23. Mel Gibson’s “Christ” is not the historical Christ of the Bible.  Neither is the Jehovah’s Witness “Christ” or the Mormon “Christ.”

24. Cf. II Corinthians 11:3, 4, 13-15.

II. WE ARE TO PREACH CHRIST BIBLICALLY

1.     I realize this sounds a bit redundant since all we know about the Lord Jesus Christ historically is what we find in the Bible.

2.     The apostles frequently referred to the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they stressed that they were eyewitnesses to these historical facts.

3.     But in addition to preaching Christ historically, they preached Christ Biblically.  What I mean by this is they always referred to the Bible, the Word of God, as their authority.  Of course the only Bible they had at that time was what we call the Old Testament.

4.     Peter and Paul and the other apostles preached from the OT because they knew it was the infallible Word of God.

5.     They preached from the OT because they knew their Jewish listeners believed it was the infallible Word of God.

6.     They preached from the OT because they wanted to establish that God had planned and foretold the Gospel of Christ long before it happened (cf. Acts 2:22-24).

7.     James said in Acts 15:18, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.”

8.     Peter said Christ’s death “was foreordained before the foundation of the world” (I Peter 1:20).

9.     John refers to Christ as “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev. 13:8).

10. The apostles preached Christ Biblically. Notice in Acts 2:16, Peter said, “But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel.”

11. Peter referred to David as a prophet (Acts 2:30).  Peter and the apostles emphasized that the Lord Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection were a fulfillment of many OT types and prophecies (cf. Acts 3:18, 24; 3:21; 7:52; 10:43).

12. Peter preached that our Lord was the Prophet promised by Moses (Acts 3:22).

13. In stressing the authority of the OT Scriptures, the apostles were following the teaching and preaching pattern established by our Lord Himself (cf. Luke 24:44, 45; John 3:14, 15).

14. Furthermore, the apostles were helped and guided by the indwelling Holy Spirit.  Our Lord had told the apostles that the Holy Spirit would teach them all things (John 14:26), and would testify of Him (John 15:26), and would guide His disciples into all truth (John 16:13).

15. Consider this: we have a big advantage over the apostles because we have the complete Bible.  Our Scriptures are more extensive than theirs.  With the NT we have the four Gospels, and the book of Acts, and the epistles, and the book of Revelation.

16. So we are to preach Christ historically, Biblically, and doctrinally.

III. WE ARE TO PREACH CHRIST DOCTRINALLY

1.     Consider the strong doctrinal content in Peter’s preaching:

·        The Lord died and rose from the dead (2:23, 24; 3:15).

·        Jesus is declared both Lord and Christ, i.e., Messiah (Acts 2:36; 10:36).

·        Jesus is declared the “Holy One” (2:27; 3:14).

·        Jesus is the promised king in the lineage of King David (2:29, 30).

·        The Lord Jesus is the One who gives us the Holy Spirit (2:33).

·        Jesus is revealed as the promised seed of Abraham (3:25).

·        Jesus is the chief corner stone (4:11).

·        Salvation can only come by believing in Jesus (4:12).

·        Jesus is the Judge of the quick and the dead (10:42).

2.     These doctrines take us deep into the immensities of God’s revelation of His only begotten Son.  The heart of Gospel preaching is the substitutionary death of Christ. 

3.     In Acts 10:39, Peter says the Jews slew Jesus and hanged Him on a tree.  Have you ever considered why Peter chose the word “tree,” rather than the word “cross”? 

4.     (By the way, Peter uses the word “tree” again in I Peter 2:24.)

5.     Deuteronomy 21:22 says, “And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree: His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God).”

6.     The apostle Paul quotes this Scripture in Galatians 3:13, “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.”

CONCLUSION:

1.     In preparation for this message, I read a Gospel tract (written by Luis Palau) entitled, “Who is Jesus?”

If someone walked up right now, as you’re reading this article, and asked, “Who is Jesus?” how would you respond? 

Many Americans are confused about who Jesus Christ is and what it means to follow Him. While most believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God, for instance, 42 percent believe that when He lived on earth, “Jesus Christ was human and committed sins, just like other people.”

2.     Forty-two percent is a very high number!  The Bible teaches that Jesus Christ was the sinless Son of God.

3.     “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin” (II Cor. 5:21).

4.     Jesus said to the Jews, “Which of you convinceth me of sin?” (John 8:46).

5.     Hebrews 4:15 says Christ “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.”

6.     Hebrews 7:26 says Christ “is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.”

7.     First Peter 2:22 says, “Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.”

8.     First John 3:5 says, “In Him is no sin.”

9.     Sinners need to learn about the true Lord Jesus Christ.  Therefore we must present Him historically, Biblically, and doctrinally.