Bible Study Questions...

Questions from pg x. First Paragraph.

1. How is it that the church arises out of the gospel?

If a church doesn’t view God as holy (as He is presented in the gospel) but regards Him as mostly just loving, how will that distort the church?

God gives life through his Word. He created the world through his Word, and he recreates his people through his Word (; ; ; ). Therefore, good preaching & teaching is nothing more or less than speaking the burden of God’s Word, relying on the Spirit to impress this message into the hearts of sinners. God’s Word has always been His chosen instrument to create, convict, convert, and conform His people. From the very first announcement of the Gospel in , to the initial word of promise to Abraham in , to His regulation of that promise by His Word in the Ten Commandments (), God gives life and health and holiness to His people through the agency of His Word. From the reforms under Josiah in , to the revival of God’s work under Nehemiah and Ezra in , to that great vision of the Valley of Dry Bones in , where God breathes the life of His Spirit into His dead people through the preaching of His Word, God always sends His Word when He wants to renew life in His people and assemble them for His glory. The way God works is through the agency of His Word. He even says as much in :

God’s Word has always been His chosen instrument to create, convict, convert, and conform His people. From the very first announcement of the Gospel in , to the initial word of promise to Abraham in , to His regulation of that promise by His Word in the Ten Commandments (), God gives life and health and holiness to His people through the agency of His Word. From the reforms under Josiah in , to the revival of God’s work under Nehemiah and Ezra in , to that great vision of the Valley of Dry Bones in , where God breathes the life of His Spirit into His dead people through the preaching of His Word, God always sends His Word when He wants to renew life in His people and assemble them for His glory. The way God works is through the agency of His Word. He even says as much in :

"For just as rain and snow fall from heaven and do not return there without saturating the earth and making it germinate and sprout, and providing seed to sow and food to eat, "so my word that comes from my mouth will not return to me empty, but it will accomplish what I please and will prosper in what I send it to do.”” ()

God was right when he told us that he would give life through the preaching of his Word (; ; ; ; ; ; ; )

Dever, M., & Alexander, P. (2005). The deliberate church: building your ministry on the gospel (pp. 33–34). Wheaton, IL: Crossway.

You can see that if we misunderstand God, we’ll have a distorted view of the gospel and the church.

2. How do you think that God uses the church as His instrument to gather His people? ().

3. How does the church make the gospel visible?

Have you ever thought of how many biblical instructions God has built into the fabric of the church that, if done correctly, serve as proclamations of the gospel?

In pursuing a healthy culture of evangelism, we don’t remake the church for evangelism. Instead, we allow the things that God has already built into the church to proclaim the gospel. Jesus did not forget the gospel when he built the church.

For instance, baptism pictures the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. It shows how his death is our death and his life our life. The Lord’s Supper proclaims the death of Christ until he returns and prompts us to confess our sins and experience forgiveness anew. When we pray, we pray the truths of God. We sing the great things God has done for us through the gospel. We give financially to advance the gospel message. The preaching of the Word brings the gospel.

In fact, the preaching of the Word of God is what forms the church to begin with. And, once formed, the church is given the task of making disciples, who then are sent to preach the gospel to form new churches. This cycle has been happening since Jesus ascended into heaven and will continue until he returns.

Stiles, J. M. (2014). Evangelism: how the whole church speaks of jesus (pp. 64–65). Wheaton, IL: Crossway.

McKinley, M. (2010). Church Planting Is for Wimps: How God Uses Messed-up People to Plant Ordinary Churches that Do Extraordinary Things (p. 51). Wheaton, IL: Crossway.

Dever, M. (2010). What Does God Want of Us Anyway?: A Quick Overview of the Whole Bible (p. 13). Wheaton, IL: Crossway.