The one thing that hinders the gospel
The gospel is the power of God.
So says Romans 1:16 and 1 Corinthians 1:18. The preaching of the good news of Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection is the means by which the Holy Spirit convicts hearts, grants faith and repentance, and transforms spiritually dead sinners into new creations. It is the means by which the Lord builds His church, and nothing can stop Him, not even the gates of hell. No force in this world can stay His hand.
But there is one thing that can hinder the message of the cross. It’s a barrier that comes not from the world, but from those who bear Christ’s name — from those who are charged with proclaiming the good news.
Let’s look at the Scriptures that teach this, starting with the very passage that says the message is the power of God.
A cross of no effect
The New Testament is set in the age of classical Greek philosophy, not long after the time of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Paul took the gospel into the heart of this culture as he journeyed to Athens and Corinth during his second mission trip. In Acts 17, he went to Mars Hill in Athens, where verse 21 tells us the people did nothing but hear and teach new ideas.
The Greeks sought after wisdom, as Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 1:22. If you wanted to be an influencer in that culture, you needed to be an eloquent orator. You needed to espouse profound philosophy — what Paul called the wisdom of this world.
But Paul did not give the Greeks that. He did not come to Corinth with “excellence of speech or of wisdom … not with persuasive words of human wisdom” (1 Corinthians 2:1, 4). Instead, he proclaimed “the foolishness of God,” what the Greeks considered ridiculous.
Related: God wants losers
This defied all logic; if we’re trying to reach people, why give them a message that they would find absurd? Shouldn’t we try to speak their language and give them what they’re seeking? Isn’t that what would work and get results?
But not only did Paul intentionally refrain from the cosmopolitan method of the age, but he wrote something startling in that first chapter to the Corinthians:
17 For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of no effect.
If Paul used “wisdom of words” — if he followed the way of the world — that would actually be counterproductive. It would do what nothing else can do — hinder the gospel. Make it ineffective. Do our enemies’ job for them.
Now consider what that has in common with our next Scripture.
Because of you
The second chapter of Romans has Paul calling out religious Jews for their hypocrisy. They pridefully found their righteousness in the piety of the law of Moses — but as Paul pointed out, they were lawbreakers themselves. The ones who boasted in God's law dishonored Him with their sin (verse 23).
That prompted Paul to cite their Scriptures as a witness against them:
24 For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, as it is written.
He was alluding to multiple Old Testament passages in which the Lord rebuked Israel, His nation, for besmirching His reputation with their behavior. The words most closely match those of the prophet Nathan when he confronted King David over his adultery with Bathsheba; while David’s own life was spared, the Lord would take his infant son “because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme” (2 Samuel 12:14). Do you catch that? God’s judgment was not directly for David’s sin, but for giving Israel’s enemies a reason to speak against Him. The Lord cares that much about how we make His holy name look.
We see the same idea a couple of times in Ezekiel. In the Lord’s condemnation of Jerusalem in chapter 16, He abhorred their child sacrifice and their sexual harlotry with their pagan neighbors. In verse 27, He says their whoring was so lewd that even Philistine women were embarrassed by it! The conduct of Yahweh’s people was too nasty even for the lascivious culture of Delilah!
And in chapter 36, the word of the Lord through Ezekiel judged the house of Israel for defiling not only their own land with their ungodly behavior, but in Gentile countries as well. Five times from verses 20 to 23, the Lord says they profaned His holy name among the nations. That was their worst offense — being a reproach to Him.
Israel was called to be a light to the Gentiles, a nation that glorified His holiness with theirs. They were to stand out and testify to God’s goodness by their other-ness, by not living like the rest of the world. That is also the call to Christ’s church: “Let your light so shine before men,” Jesus said, “that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). Our works can be the difference between people glorifying God or blaspheming Him.
In both of those passages, the common threat to our gospel witness is unholiness, whether in method or behavior. If we’re not holy, if our ways are no different than those of the fallen, corrupt world, if we’re just like everyone else, why should anyone listen to us? What do we have to offer? How can we represent a holy God with worldly lives? The author of Hebrews answers that:
Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord (12:14).
Our holiness is critical to our witness.
The offensive good news
A recent podcast by Allie Beth Stuckey discussed a poll in which 48 percent of Gen Z adults said Christians’ support of Donald Trump has made them less likely to go to church. That shouldn’t be surprising at all, given Trump’s wickedness and the staggering hypocrisy of Christians who decry his words and behavior in anyone except him. No matter how much we talk about Jesus, the world won’t see Him where they see Trump, the polar opposite. Unbelievers see the inconsistency, and that kills our witness.
Related: God and Trump: Does the Lord approve of his administration?
In posting a clip of that podcast, Stuckey said Trump was just an excuse and that the main reason is “we are uncomfortable seeing our own sin and our need for a Savior.” Fundamentally, she is correct, and I’ll go even further and cite the words of Jesus when He said the world hates Him (John 15:18) and that we’ll be hated because of Him (Matthew 24:9). “For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed,” He said in John 3:20.
The greatest offense to the world is the gospel itself. Unbelievers detest the idea that we all deserve eternal punishment, and they despise the call to change what they believe about God and themselves. This is an offense we should never try to mitigate; we must preach the uncompromising message of the bloody cross, and the universal command of God to repent (Acts 17:30). This also goes for all of the Bible’s moral imperatives that would impact our culture, including abortion and all kinds of sexual sin.
However, if we’re going to offend the world, it better be with the gospel, and not our own unholiness. It is an offense against Christ to put an unbiblical stumbling block before Him. If we are a reproach to the gospel, we are enemies of it. We undo the love of God that sent His Son to die for sinners. We are ushers on the road to hell, and bouncers at the only door to eternal life.
Sure, unbelievers who hate Christ anyway may use excuses to reject Him, but woe to us if we give them one.
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