Thick Gospel vs. Thin Gospel

When one things about evangelism and reaching peole wioth the Gospel one must look to the Centrality of sovereign, saving grace because the quickening grace of God in salvation completely exalts God. Grace is God-honoring and humanity-humbling. We must see the Gospel of Jesus Christ as a “Thick Gospel” and not a “Thin Gospel. ”

You may be asking, What in the world is a “Thick Gospel”? We all know that God initiates grace and that this grace frees us from the rejection of others in Evangelism. We know that evangelism is impossible without grace, for grace is what frees nonbelievers from their enslavement to sin. The problem with our understganding of the Gospel is that we stop our understanding of its relevance at the point a person profession Christ. For many Christians the Gospel is only for unbelievers becasue believers need to go beyond the Gospel in the the deeper-life.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The source of all grace is the Cross of our Savior Jesus Christ. The fact that “grace” continues its effect beyond our initial liberation from unbelief and continues to energize Christians should show that the Gospel of the Cross needs to be preached to Christian and non-Christian alike. What Christians need to understand is that after their salvation, the gracious power of the Holy Spirit upholds them through their Christian Journey. Saved under God-Centered and grace oriented evangelism, they have a wonderful framework for a Christian life of God-centered, grace oriented sanctification. And the basis for this grace in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. All grace was purchaced for us at the Cross and that is why the Cross is the center of preaching is the early church and should be the basis of every Sermon we preach to people today.

see also www.disciplemaking.net