Oh fellow believers, the gospel is the great treasure of the Christian faith with which we have been entrusted (2 Cor. 4:7; 2 Tim. 1:14). We must devote ourselves to searching out its never-ending beauty and power, and we must preach it as those who are under the greatest and gravest stewardship. As Paul declared to Timothy shortly before his martyrdom, “I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom: Preach the word!” (2 Tim. 4:1–2). The world’s greatest need is the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

The gospel is most certainly to be believed, studied, and exemplified in our lives, yet the great emphasis in the New Testament is on proclaiming it. At the very beginning of His earthly ministry, “Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God” (Mark 1:14). At the end of His ministry, He commanded His disciples, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15). 

The book of Acts bears abundant testimony that the apostles and early church understood and obeyed their Lord’s command. Preaching was their preeminent ministry, and the gospel was their preeminent theme. They literally devoted themselves “to prayer and to the ministry of the word” (Acts 6:4). They would not divert from this sacred task even when faced with other valid needs (Acts 6:1–4); even when it was contrary to the laws of men (Acts 4:18–20); even when it evoked the whip (Acts 5:40), the rod (Acts 16:22–23), stocks (Acts 16:24), chains (Acts 12:6–7; 16:26; 21:33; 22:29; 26:29; 28:20), stones (Acts 7:58–60; 14:19), and swords (Acts 12:2). 

The primacy of gospel preaching is further revealed in the epistles of the church’s most prominent missionary, the apostle Paul. The gospel was the message that he delivered as of first importance (1 Cor. 15:3). Regardless of what cultures desired or men thought they needed, Paul did not yield to their petitions but gave them the only remedy prescribed by God. He wrote to the church in Corinth, “Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified…the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor. 1:22–24). Samuel Davies wrote, 

“We preach Christ crucified!” The sufferings of Christ, which had a dreadful consummation in His crucifixion; their necessity, design, and consequences, and the way of salvation thereby opened for a guilty world these are the principal materials of our preaching! To instruct mankind in these, is the great object of our ministry, and the unwearied labor of our lives. We might easily choose subjects more pleasing and popular; more fit to display our learning and abilities, and set off the strong reasoner, or the fine orator; but our commission, as ministers of a crucified Jesus, binds us to the subject; and the necessity of the world peculiarly requires it! (1)

Such was the prominence of the gospel in Paul’s catalog of preaching themes that he declared to the church in Corinth, “I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). This does not mean that Paul did not expound on other matters of the Christian life, but he saw the gospel message as the very foundation on which the church was grounded and erected. If the church’s understanding of the gospel was faulty to any degree, it would bring ruin to the entire edifice (1 Cor. 3:9–11). Thus, the gospel was the treasure of Paul’s heart, the focal point of all his study, and the great theme of his preaching. Davies continued,  

[The preaching the gospel] was not the apostle’s occasional practice, or a hasty wavering purpose; but he was determined upon it. “I determined,” says he, “not to know any thing among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified!” [1 Cor. 2:2]. This theme, as it were, engrossed all his thoughts; he dwelt so much upon it, as if he had known nothing else and as if nothing else had been worth knowing! Indeed, he openly avows such a neglect and contempt of all other knowledge, in comparison to this: “I count all things but loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord!” [Phil. 3:8].

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