The Riddleblog

B. B. Warfield -- We Preach, God Grants the Increase

This is taken from a Sunday afternoon chapel talk given at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1916.

Warfield’s text was 2 Corinthians 4:13. “And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, ‘I believed and therefore I spoke,’ we also believe and therefore speak.” He told those assembled, presumably seminarians and colleagues . . .

When we really believe the Gospel of the Grace of God—when we really believe that it is the power of God unto salvation, the only power of salvation in this wicked world of ours—it is a comparatively easy thing to preach it, to preach it in its purity, to preach it in the face of a scoffing, truculent and murdering world. Here is the secret—I do not now say of a minister’s power as a preacher of God’s grace—but of a minister’s ability to preach at all this Gospel in such a world as we live in. Believe this Gospel, and you can and will preach it. Let men say what they will, and do what they will—let them injure, ridicule, persecute, slay—believe this Gospel and you will preach it.

Men often say of some element of the Gospel: “I can’t preach that.” Sometimes they mean that the world will not receive this or that. Sometimes they mean that the world will not endure this or that. Sometimes they mean that they cannot so preach this or that as to win the respect or the sympathy or the acceptance of the world. The Gospel cannot be preached? Cannot be preached? It can be preached if you will believe it. Here is the root of all your difficulties. You do not fully believe this Gospel! Believe it! Believe it and then it will preach itself!

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B. B. WarfieldKim RiddlebargerMarch 14, 2025Preaching the gospelComment

"The Mandate to Proclaim the Gospel to All" -- Article Five, Second Head of Doctrine, Canons of Dort

Article 5: The Mandate to Proclaim the Gospel to All

Moreover, it is the promise of the gospel that whoever believes in Christ crucified shall not perish but have eternal life. This promise, together with the command to repent and believe, ought to be announced and declared without differentiation or discrimination to all nations and people, to whom God in his good pleasure sends the gospel.

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Having labored in articles 1-4 to establish that the purpose of the death of Christ is to be found in the satisfaction of God’s wrath toward sinners who have sinned against his infinite holiness, the Canons now make the point that the very nature of the saving work of Christ demands that it be proclaimed universally to sinners. The proclamation of the cross of Christ (i.e., the gospel) is the primary means by which God calls his elect to faith.

In article 3 of the first head of doctrine, the Canons teach that God has not only ordained the ends (who will be saved), he has also ordained the means by which he will save them (the preaching of the gospel). Scripture connects the end (the salvation of God’s elect), with the means by which God saves his elect; the death of his only begotten son, whose shed blood is more precious than gold or silver.

The previous articles under the second head of doctrine (1-4) make the case that the death of Christ is the only possible means by which God’s anger towards sinners can be satisfied and turned away from them (as a propitiation). Therefore, it is the gospel–defined by Paul as the proclamation of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:1-8) proclaimed in such a way that Christ’s death is publicly placarded before sinners (Galatians 3:1)–which must be proclaimed to sinners. This is so that sinners might understand that God’s anger toward them is satisfied only by the death of Christ. Called to faith through the message of Christ crucified, sinners will trust in the satisfaction of Christ to save them from God’s anger toward their sin. Once in Christ through faith, sinners receive the forgiveness of sins, and the free gift of eternal life.

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The Canons of DortKim RiddlebargerApril 17, 2024Evangelism, Preaching the gospelComment