15. Market Place

Reflecting beyond 400 years of Baptist history and ministry, I wonder what the Baptist family can do to make a definite contribution to the advancement of God’s kingdom in this generation and beyond. Here are a few of my thoughts.

Firstly we need to recover our confidence in the gospel of Jesus Christ and in proclamation evangelism. Secondly we need to develop a dynamic gospel lifestyle that authenticates our message. Baptist forerunners were people who defended the freedom to preach the gospel with their lives, because they were confident that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the only means of securing salvation for humankind. Some demonstrated their confidence for the gospel in such a captivating manner that they defied the tyrant decrees of kings and queens and passionately sought freedom to proclaim the gospel and live the gospel. My recent observation is that many Baptist Christians and churches have lost confidence in the power of the proclaimed gospel as a divine medium of rescuing depraved humankind from the ravages of sin. We have to recapture that priced confidence in the integrity of God’s character and faithfulness to His word. Paul wrote in Romans 1.16 “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ because it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes... “. Also we need to be confident in God’s promise to back up the claims and demands of the gospel as we boldly proclaim it. Mark 16.20 states that, “they went out and preached everywhere while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs”. Recently I have known first hand the convicting power of the Holy Spirit melting the hardened hearts of sinners as I boldly proclaimed the way of salvation. Many people have responded to the grace of God and committed their lives to Jesus Christ with a dramatic turnaround. I believe God will do much more when His people confidently declare that Jesus is the only way to come to the Father.

Secondly we must reconcile our proclamation of the gospel with an authentic practice of the gospel. Francis of Assisi wrote that “it is no use walking anywhere to preach unless our walking is our preaching”. Our practice of the gospel is the only bible those around us may read. When our lives do not measure up with what we say, our hearers take us for granted and we discredit our message. It is said people do not care about how much we know until they know how much we care. We need to recover our heritage of living out the gospel message in authentic Christian communities of love, kindness, gentleness and holiness. The Baptist forbearers were noted for their kindness towards the poor and the beauty of their holy lives so that though they mingled freely with non Christians they were distinct in their way of life not because of church membership but because of a rootedness in the life of Christ which naturally flowed through them.

Let me offer a few suggestions as to how we can recover our confidence in proclaiming the gospel and an authentic practise of the gospel

1. Our ministers must begin to demonstrate this confidence in the pulpit after spending hours of prayer with God in secret.
    
2. Our Baptist denomination must shift from an over emphasis of our confidence in a Baptist identity to a Gospel identity. They are Baptist people who know the processes of a Baptist meeting and their rights but do not know the content of the gospel and the joys of being blessed and highly favoured by their heavenly Father.  There is an urgent need to redress this skewed perspective.
    
3. We must be self-critical in our attitudes and character with the demands of the gospel. Let us stir up one another to know and love God more deeply, to passionately seek to get people to know Jesus the Saviour and to diligently demonstrate God’s love through acts of love.