A Growing Omission in Modern Day Preaching

(Not Presenting the Gospel Plan of Salvation)

By Robert R. Taylor, Jr.

Why are more and more of our preachers omitting the inclusion of the plainly stated stipulations of the Gospel plan of salvation in EVERY sermon they preach? I would not dare do this. I am now in my 63rd year as a preacher and each time I have given the invitation, I have told people what to do to be saved. I emphasize hearing, faith, repen­tance, confession and baptism (Rom. 10:17; John 8:21, 24; Acts 17:30; Rom. 10:9-10; Acts 2:38 or Mark 16:16). I also make a point to tell any erring member of the church who needs to be restored what God’s plan of salvation states (Acts 8:22; James 5:16; 1 John 1:9). I have done this consistently from 1949 to 2012 and plan no change in this. I feel strongly that we are not ready to sing the invitation song until the above has been done. Should this not be the sentiment of EVERY Gospel preacher?

I preached in a West Tennessee meeting some years back. I gave the Gospel plan of salvation at the initial service. Present for that service was a visitor from the state of Washington. He had come back to his West Tennessee home area to visit relatives and dear friends. As he shook my hand at the door he said, “I have not heard my local preacher in Washington give the plan of salvation in a dozen years. I commend you for doing it today in your first sermon of this meeting.” I asked him, “Do you not have elders there?” He assured me they did. I asked, “Why have they not corrected it?” He knew they had no justification for their lack of corrective action. In this case, both preacher and elders were at serious fault.

Our elders here at Ripley, Tennessee, insist the plan of salvation be given at EVERY service. I did this for 36 years and our new preacher, Justin Paschall, continues this well established practice. No one leaves a Sunday morning, Sunday night or Wednesday night service without hearing spelled out the Gospel plan of salvation. This is the way it should be everywhere, but alas it is not!

Some years back we were having a Gospel meeting here at Ripley. Consistently, we have always had excellent attendance with many from the community in attendance. On a particular night of that meeting we had a well-known religious leader visit the meeting. This was the first time I had ever seen him at one of our services and he has not been back since. The visiting preacher did not give the Gospel plan of salvation anywhere in his sermon. After the meeting was over one of our alert elders said in my hearing, “A man like ____ should never leave one of our services without hearing the Gospel plan of salvation. The visiting preacher had to be corrected on this for the rest of the meeting.

I remember hearing the late and lamented Guy N. Woods say, “If I were preaching to a group of elders and preachers, I would still give the Gospel plan of salvation at the end of the service. I do not want to get out of the habit of doing it. That is my sentiment 100%. Why is not such the sentiment of ALL our preachers?

Some years back when I preached at Ripley, Mississippi, I preached Sunday morning, conducted the funeral for our oldest member early that afternoon and drove to Middle Tennessee to begin a Gospel meeting that Sunday evening at 7:30 near Columbia, Tennessee. On the way, late in the afternoon, I picked up on radio the evening service from a nearby congregation. The program came on at 6:00 and lasted one hour. Hence, I heard its entirety. At no time in all that sermon did he tell his congregational audience or his radio audience what to do to be saved. Surely, there were many people traveling or confined at home listening to that radio sermon. In all probability there were people listening to that wonderful medium of radio who did not know what to do to be saved. If there were, they did not learn it from this incomplete radio sermon.

From 1974 to 2010, I preached about 4,500 radio sermons on WTRB, our local radio station. I was on three mornings each week. I never grew tired of quoting the Gospel plan of salvation at the end of each radio message. We have many non-members who listen to this on a regular basis.

More and more we hear it said at the end of a lesson, “If you have needs, come as we stand and sing.” Why not tell how they are to come — obeying the Gospel plan of salvation with both God’s first law of pardon and His second law of pardon? Back up each demanded command with a “thus saith the Lord.”

This growing omission needs to be corrected, YESTERDAY!! &

C. E. N. I.

By Bob Myhan

CENI is an acronym for the three ways in which the New Testament authorizes: Command, Example and Necessary Inference. Actually, a command is only one form of direct statement. Any direct statement regarding a practice or teaching that is acceptable to God grants authority to act. It can be an imperative statement (command), a declarative statement (a simple statement of fact), an exclamatory statement (excited utterance) or even a rhetorical question (interrogative statement). An example, of course, must be of approved activity in order to authorize. And one must distinguish between possible (or simple) inferences and necessary ones. A necessary inference is an inescapable conclusion. For example, we are specifically told that Nicodemus “came to Jesus by night” (John 3:2), but the reason he “came to Jesus by night” is neither directly stated nor implied. Hence, one reason or another might be inferred, but no reason can be “necessarily inferred” for he may have had any number of reasons for doing so “by night.”]

Most religious fellowships do not limit their practice and teaching to what they can show to be authorized in one of these three ways. Frequently, they are heard to say, “Well, I do not see anything wrong with the practice/teaching.” Friends, it really does not matter whether you or I can see anything wrong with it. What we should care about most, as we consider a particular practice or teaching, is whether it is authorized by God.

Jesus used these same three methods (and only these three) to establish authority for that which He practiced and taught.

1.       He taught what His Father commanded Him to teach (John 12:48-50).

2.       He did what He saw His Father do (John 5:17-19).

3.       He taught what was implied by His Father (Matthew 22:23-34).

[This writer knows of no fourth method ever used by Jesus to establish authority for either His teaching or His practice, but will accept any method that either is self-evident or can be established by one of the these three.]

By their very nature, commands [and other direct statements] issued by persons with authority MUST BE authoritative, that is, usable to establish authority (Matthew 8:5-13).

The commands of Jesus MUST BE authoritative, because He has all authority (Matthew 28:18). Since those who receive/reject His apostles receive/reject Him (Matthew 10:40), the apostles’ commands MUST ALSO BE authoritative. Since the New Testament prophets had "the mystery of Christ" revealed unto them (Ephesians 3:1-5), their commands MUST BE authoritative, as well.

The commands of Moses and the Old Testament prophets, on the other hand, are no longer authoritative (Matthew 17:1-8; Mark 9:1-8; Luke 9:28-36; Hebrews 1:1-3).

We are commanded by the apostles to recognize approved examples as authoritative (1 Corinthians 4:16; 11:1; Philippians 3:17; 4:9). Of course, Jesus is the ultimate example (1 Peter 2:21) and He left us an example of using implication to establish authority (Matthew 22:23-34).

 [By way of clarification, a writer or speaker implies and a listener or reader infers. Hence, implication is also called "necessary inference.” But a thing cannot be necessarily inferred unless it is implied.

The apostles used implication to establish the fact that Gentiles do not have to submit to physical circumcision to be saved (Acts 15:1-31).

1.       Peter necessarily inferred [from his experience in the home of Cornelius, recorded in Acts 10 & 11] that binding circumcision on Gentile converts would be tempting God and putting a yoke on the neck of those disciples (vv. 7-11).

2.       Barnabas and Paul necessarily inferred [from their first missionary journey] that Gentile converts did not need physical circumcision. They never demanded it as they spoke by the Spirit and God endorsed their preaching with "miracles and wonders" (v. 12).

3.       James stated that Peter's inference was in agreement with the prophets. He then quoted Amos 9:11-12, inferring necessarily that to bind circumcision would be to "trouble...them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God" (vv. 13-18).

4.       The apostles and elders, with the whole church" implied in their letter that physical circumcision was not essential to salvation, by stating that those who were binding circumcision were "subverting…souls" in so doing (vv. 22-24).

5.       Finally, the disciples at Antioch used necessary inference when they read the letter and “rejoiced for the consolation” (vv. 30, 31).

6.       This letter was circulated among other Gentile churches. The members of these congregations also necessarily inferred that Gentiles did not need to be physically circumcised to be saved. (Acts 16:4-5)

We have shown three methods of establishing religious authority.

1.       It is self-evident that commands and other direct statements [of one who is in authority] are authoritative.

2.       We are commanded to follow the approved examples of the apostles and others.

3.       We have approved examples of Jesus and the apostles using implication (or necessary inference).

Is there a command, approved example, or necessary inference regarding a fourth method that may be used? Or is a fourth method self-evident? If so, what is that fourth method? &