The Gospel is #1. Tell it often. Tell it well.
Nothing is more important than sharing the Gospel. Nothing. I remember like it was yesterday. I was in seminary (not ‘cemetery,’ as kids often call it) with a room full of potential pastors. I was the only kids pastor. The rest were in training for much “higher office,” aka Lead Pastors. The professor in the front of the room described a horrible situation in graphic detail that I’ll spare you. In short, a man had been in a terrible car accident and was dying on the side of the road. In this hypothetical situation, he said that we happened along the scene and had only moments to share Christ with him and usher the dying man into the presence of Jesus. One by one he invited these future preachers to the front of the room to share the Good News with this dying man and explain the fullness of the Gospel. One by one as they came up and pontificated about substitutionary atonement, propitiatory reconciliation, the intricacies of redemptive sacrifice or Old Testament covenants fulfilled through the justification and subsequent glorification of Christ, the professor would interrupt them and say, “Too late, the guys dead. Next.” Finally, it was my…