Evangelism is important, so is theology. However one without the other is dangerous. Let me make my case. It is extremely important to have right theology, though and thinking in place, to be be orthodox in other words. From correct theology come all the comforts and much of the joy in our salvation, plumbing the depths of what it means to be saved. James 2:26 says "For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead." Orthodoxy without orthopraxis is dead orthodoxy. A Christian who has no works in response to Christ's atoning work is almost certainly not saved.
But there is a danger approaching it from the other direction. Many churches do this, with one of two bad results. Either, the person thinks he or she needs to get saved by working, rather than resting in the finished work of Jesus, or the focus and mission of the church. I have seen this often, where the most important outreach of that church is a feeding program. Now feeding the poor is a good thing, but the mission of the church is laid out by Jesus in the great commission (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:15-16; Luke 24:45-48; John 20:21; Acts 1:8-9) We are to go out and preach the gospel, to evangelize. That is the primary mission of the church and it is the personal commission of each and every Christian.
I love theology, and I love preaching the gospel. But I find theology easy to do and evangelism hard. This site designed to connect the dots between the two, orthodoxy and orthopraxis, putting them in their correct order and to encourage Christians to do both.
No comments:
Post a Comment