ALL SAINTS ANGLICAN CHURCH, HOKITIKA, NEW ZEALAND

In August 1964 I was preparing to leave home to travel to Durham University, England for my theological education. You can imagine that it was a great adventure for a twenty three year old to leave all his friends and family and embark on a ship that would take five weeks to get to London via Tahiti, Panama, Jamaica, Miami and Bermuda. The pastor of my church where I was baptized, confirmed and committed my life to Christ, asked me to preach on my final Sunday. I came across that sermon as I packed my files to leave Amelia Plantation Chapel after eighteen years’ ministry there. I thought I would share it with you as one of my first attempts to preach the Gospel before a congregation that had known me warts and all growing up in a small town, including my parents! 

As you can all well imagine this is necessarily a difficult sermon? In it I have to do many things that should more correctly be spread over several Sundays. I realize that there are young people to challenge, the indifferent to arouse, sceptics to convince, loved ones to comfort, and many friends to encourage. How can I hope to do all this in one short sermon?

“For necessity is laid upon me. Woe is me if I do not preach the Gospel” (1 Corinthians 9:16).

These are the words of St. Paul written at a time when the Roman Empire was the mighty power in the Mediterranean world. It was not an age conducive to a faith of love, joy and peace. Paul suffered greatly at the hands of the enemies of God, but through it all came his conviction: “For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel.” He had to do it – he was compelled to pass on the message and the experience that changed his own life and brought him into contact with God.

It is still the same today. Conditions in the world at this time are not conducive to a faith of love, joy and peace. Many couldn’t care less about their faith. They are living on the legacy of the Christian past which may soon peter out. Many are wrapped up in their own selfishness and are more concerned with what they own rather than what they are. Things and possessions, so easily take the place of people.

But through all this indifference and antagonism comes the cry of the convinced: “For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel.” It is all very well for the church to cry out this kind of thing but is it being understood? Do you know what is being done here week by week? Is it to you a living reality or a lot of mumbo jumbo? Do you read the Bible with understanding or is it unintelligible? And now I bring a verse out of the Scriptures and expect you to wholly understand it.

What is the Gospel? The Gospel means Good news. It is the Good News that God has done something about man and the painful way he lives, which is called sin. It is the Good News that God allowed himself to suffer so that we could be forgiven. It is the Good News that man can be forgiven his evil deeds if he will come to God through his Son Jesus Christ and ask for that forgiveness. It is the Good News that God has sent us help in the person of the Holy Spirit to strengthen us as we live for good and fight for God against all that is evil in this world. It is the Good News that God has given us ways of knowing the right way to live through reading the Bible, praying and in the fellowship of the Church. It is Good News that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead and therefore has defeated Death. It is the Good News that one day Christ shall reign and his reign will be of peace and love.

“For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel.” Paul the apostle says this – this is the apostolic testimony – this is part of the apostolic succession by which the truths of God are passed down from one generation to another. These are the words of God to his church. Woe to the church if she does not preach the Gospel. And if this verse is the expression of St. Paul’s conviction – if it is the expression of my conviction (which it is) – if it is the word of God to his church – then it must express your conviction: “For necessity is laid upon the church. Woe to us if we preach not the Gospel.”

The Archbishop of York (Donald Coggan) recently has said: “The tragedy within the Church today, all too often, is that the Gospel that is preached is but a section, a fragment, of the Gospel as it is given to us in the New Testament.” And one of the things he suggests needs emphasizing is the nature of Death. And I say this tonight well aware that there are some here whom I may never see again in this world. To the Christian death is no fearful thing. It is the entrance to a new and greater life with him who is Life itself. “I am the Resurrection and the Life,” said Christ. “He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.”

“Again, it is possible,” continues the Archbishop of York, “to preach a pseudo-Gospel or to embrace a pseudo-Christian faith, which is no wider in its interests than the confines of its own congregation or of our own race. It is much more important that the Christian task should be got on with in Africa than that my parish church should have a new luxury organ.”

Could not this congregation take a more active interest in the world-wide work of the church? Should not there be an active interest in the missionary work of our church whether it be here or overseas? Should we not be more practical in our concern for the only two missionaries our church possesses? Could there not be a regular visiting program organized to assist the pastor in his work? “Woe to the church that preaches not and practices not the Gospel?”

This is the Gospel of Christ. This is the message of the Christian Church. This is the Gospel I preach. “For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I preach not the Gospel.” Am I a fanatic? Am I insane? Am I wasting my opportunities by giving my life to a task such as this – the task of giving life to dead men, sight to blind men, and fighting evil?

If I am not and you think this Christian Gospel has something to commend it, what does it mean to you? Can you say with me, “For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I preach not the Gospel.”