Always Preach the Gospel

Non-Christian listeners need instruction in the truths of Scripture, particularly concerning Christ and his redeeming work, if the preacher’s call to “believe” is to be meaningful to them. Christians likewise need instruction in the truths of Scripture, if preaching is to achieve its objective to edify them. Apart from the truths of the gospel of grace, preaching to edify sinks into moralism, for imperatives ungrounded in the indicative of God’s gracious initiative breed in hearers either self righteous hypocrisy or self-condemning despair.

Dennis Johnson, Him We Proclaim