Paul's Politically Incorrect Gospel

When I read my Bible and examine what the Apostle Paul preached and compare that to what is preached in the majority of our churches in America today, I see little similarity. If Paul were to show up today and enter a pulpit and preach the message that he preached in his day, he would be quickly escorted out of the church by the good deacons. I submit to you friends that the Apostle Paul preached a politically incorrect gospel and he'd be not allowed to preach in the majority of the churches in America today.

And not only that, he would be persecuted by the very church he preached in for preaching the message that he preached in his day. Some of you may be saying to yourself, how can you come to that conclusion, preacher? That's a pretty bold statement, but it's true, friends. If Paul came back today to the church in America, they would persecute him and reject his message.

Well, you might ask, what in the world did Paul preach that would make him an enemy of the church today? I will tell you, friends, he preached the unvarnished gospel of the Son of God. And if you start preaching that gospel to this generation, to the churches in America today, they will surely hate you for it. You'll be considered a troublemaker, a church divider, and a heretic.

Well, what did Paul preach? The best place to look is in our Bible. Let's first turn to 2 Corinthians 4 or 5. For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord. Well, let's start there, friends, because that's where Paul began.

The apostles preached a risen Lord, Christ Jesus the Lord, Christ on a throne, sitting at the right hand of the Father. And he earned that right by way of a bloody cross. Jesus is Lord.

If you want to come to Him savingly, you have to come to Him there to where He is on a throne. He reigns there. And if you want to be savingly converted, you better listen to Paul and receive Christ as Lord.

The church in America parted with the gospel about 60 years ago when they separated Jesus from Lord. They made two things out of one. The church in our day and mine declares you can have Christ as a Savior and go to heaven, but you don't have to submit to His claims on your life as Lord.

You can accept Jesus as your personal Savior and go on in your sins and still reign on the throne of your heart and still go to heaven when you die. But that's the gospel of our day. But not in Paul's day.

No, sir. Paul preached Jesus the Lord. And if you wanted Him, you had to approach Him there and bow to Him there in utter surrender.

If you don't bow to Him now, He will surely put His foot on your neck at a future day and make you bow then when He makes His enemies His footstool. Any person, any church member or non-church member who is not submitted to the Lordship of Christ is lost. Now, you start preaching that and the good deacons will wring your neck.

They'll take their shiny shoes off and throw them at you because the church in America today has told folks you can have Jesus as a Savior, but you don't need Him as a Lord. And thousands upon thousands and millions upon millions have walked an aisle with a grin on their face and accepted Jesus as their personal Savior, but they never saw themselves as lost in a ruined estate and an enemy of God. They never threw down their shotgun of rebellion and surrendered to the King of Kings who is Lord.

They were never awakened to their lost position, never convicted of their sins, nor were they ever converted because they never repented from their sins. They were never filled with the Holy Spirit, yet they call themselves Christians. These are the people who run our churches, our seminaries, and our denominations.

If Paul came back today, he would have a hostile audience to address anytime he got up before a major denomination, and if he dared preach that message that he preached in his day, he would not last long at the podium because the heads of that denomination would be crying for his head. The Apostle Paul preached the Lordship of Jesus Christ, a risen Lord who sits on a throne, and you have to do business with Him there. Now that's what the old boy preached.

The next thing Paul preached is found in Ephesians chapter 2 and in verses 1 through 4, and this will really make you mad as well. And you, hefty quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also we had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. Now Paul mentions several things here that are foreign to many in our churches today.

They've not heard this message because it's not preached. Many pastors grab their sermon texts from inoffensive passages of scripture that are politically correct and preach nice little messages that don't offend anybody. After all, you don't want to upset your congregation.

They may stop giving to you, and we live in a day of a positive message and an encouraging word. Christian radio and television evangelists only preach positive, encouraging messages of self-empowerment on how to be a better you. But society isn't getting any better.

Rather, it's falling apart at the seams. People drop into hell by the minute with this positive message. The apostle Paul was honest with folks.

He told them they were dead in trespasses and sins, that they served the devil because he is the prince of the power of the air. They come into this world with a rune nature and a bent toward sin, and they live their lives in a kingdom of darkness. That man drinks iniquity like water because he can't get enough of sin, because he has a rune nature and is an enemy to God, that they are children of wrath.

They are objects of God's wrath for sin. Do you think the modern church would tolerate that message long today, friends? They didn't like it in Paul's day, for he was mobbed and stoned and arrested and beaten and whipped and run out of town for preaching that message. Paul's unpopular, unpolitically correct gospel brought him persecution, but it had power to save.

He planted churches all over Asia Minor, and with that gospel of the son of God and him crucified, many came to a saving knowledge of Christ. Well, let's look at the thing Paul preached, turning your Bibles to Acts 1730. Paul was addressing the pagans in the city of Athens, and if Paul came back to pagan America today and addressed it, he would preach the same message to it that he preached to those pagan Greeks, and this is what he said to them.

In the times of this ignorance, God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent. Paul preached man's duty of repentance, that God commands all men, Greek and American, Chinese and Russian, African and Indonesian, and all men everywhere to repent. You start preaching man's duty of repentance a day, friends, and you'll have a mob at your door calling for your head.

Mordecai Ham preached repentance up and down Texas, and they horse whipped him and pistol whipped him and tried to torn feather him as they ran him out of many towns. For 50 years, he preached you must repent or go on to hell, and 2,000 souls came to Christ under his ministry, and one of them was Billy Graham. But we soft-soap the gospel today, and we are not honest with men and women and boys and girls, because we don't tell them that Jesus declared, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.

That means you, friend, even if you are the chairman of the deacons. But Paul knew that if you preached on repentance, you'd have to mention sin, and if you did that, then you had to warn folks about hell and God's punishment for sin. Why, that's not politically correct.

Paul had a politically incorrect gospel about a bleeding and dying savior on a bloody scandalous cross. The gospel of Paul's day and the gospel of our day are two different animals. One is a lion, one is a lamb.

Become hell or high water, Paul could proclaim. For I've not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. Paul preached the undiluted gospel in all its purity and proper order.

He preached the full counsel of God of ruin, redemption, repentance, regeneration, because he did not fear man, but he did fear God. He was not ashamed of it like we are today. He boldly said, For I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

Our modern gospel lacks power because we've watered it down and have taken out of it all its threatenings and terrors and warnings to sinful man. We refuse to warn sinners to flee from the wrath to come because we don't want to offend them. We just want to tell them that God loves them while society crumbles all around them.

But Paul wasn't afraid to be honest with folks and tell them the truth that they were ruined individuals who were rebels against a sovereign. Paul called a spade a spade. He said sin was black and hell was hot, and a future judgment awaited all mankind.

Well, let's look at the next thing that Paul preached in Ephesians chapter 1 and in verses 4 through 5. We read, According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestined us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will. Paul preached up the doctrine of election, that God is the author of salvation. If Paul preached election in our churches today, he'd be thrown out on his head for by grace or he saved through faith and not of yourselves.

It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. But the modern gospel has taken salvation out of the hands of God and placed it in the hands of men. But we must ask ourselves a question, friends.

Are men saved by a decision they make or by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit? Paul knew better. Paul believed if you were saved, it was because God gave you saving faith. Well, what was the next thing that Paul preached that we won't preach today? Paul preached on the crucified life.

In Galatians 2.20, he said, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. In the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

If he preached that message of the cross in the life of the believer and then he preached that today, it would incite a riot in our churches today because most church members would stand up and scream, we will not have this man reign over us. Paul preached that when we come to Christ, we have a new master. Our life is not our own.

Our body is not our own. Our time is not our own. Our money is not our own.

Christ must be a complete master. The apostle Paul didn't finish his ministry with accolades and applause, but with a falling axe. His message was of a scandalous cross and a glorious Christ, who is a risen Lord.

But we refuse to preach that message. We'd rather preach our politically correct messages today because we don't want to upset anyone. But the trouble is, our cheap and gospel can't save anyone either.