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Summary

David Pharr discusses the essence of evangelism, focusing on the kerygma, or the core message of preaching, which centers on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He emphasizes the importance of understanding what the good news is and how it should be the focal point of evangelism. Through examining Paul’s preaching, Pharr illustrates that the resurrection is not just an event but the foundation of the Christian faith, urging listeners to ensure that their evangelism reflects this central truth.

Chapters

00:00 The Importance of Evangelism
01:58 Understanding Kerygma: The Core Message
08:43 Paul’s Preaching in Acts: A Case Study
18:41 The Resurrection: The Heart of the Gospel
26:50 Practical Applications for Evangelism

Transcript

David Pharr (00:02)
All right, let’s see if we can get this popped up also. Wonderful. It is good to be with each and every one of you. I’m a little loud, I’m gonna turn me down. I’m loud all the time, but it is good to be here. I am so thankful for the invitation to be able to come to speak to you this morning and be a part of this lectureship. Schools of preaching have a special place in my heart back in 1988. Many, many years ago, my grandfather started ⁓

working as the director of, at that point in time, was called the East Tennessee School of Admissions, affectionately called as Stopham in my household. ⁓ And then ⁓ later became ⁓ Siebs or the Southeast Institute of Biblical Studies. ⁓ But I kind of grew up around the school of preaching there in Carnes near Knoxville, Tennessee. ⁓ And my grandmother ran the bookstore there. And so I had a lot of fun as a little kid.

Getting to meet the different preaching students, getting people from New Zealand who had come in, who are learning to be missionaries and such. And so I appreciate the opportunity to be here and the good work that the Florida School of Preaching, the congregation here at South Florida Avenue. I also send greetings from Orlando, just right up the road at Concord Street. As I mentioned, we’ve been there working on our fourth year. Been there since August of 22.

And it’s a great, great congregation, great work. And if you’re ever a little further north than here, ⁓ please feel free to stop by and see us. Our topic this morning is talking about the sense of evangelism and has already been mentioned. I believe that there is already a lecture ⁓ yesterday about this is talking about evangelism in general. Right. These these words that we use, these words we find in the Greek many times are not really

translate as much as they are transliterated, right? And so we have these two different words basically meaning ⁓ to tell the good news and what that good news is. But closely related to that, what I want to try to focus in on this morning is thinking about, well, we are supposed to be proclaiming good news, but what exactly is that good news that we are proclaiming? I dare say that all of us that are at least associated with preaching

preach the gospel. And we might have an idea about what gospel is. Maybe we can go to a place like 1 Corinthians and in chapter 15 and kind of see the gospel in nutshell that Paul tries to give us there. But I want to focus in on a couple of other of these Greek words. One is caruso. And for those of us that have gone to preaching school or done work to become a preacher, this word is very, very familiar to us, right? That is

part of the ⁓ command that is given to us over in 2nd Timothy and in chapter four about preach the word, right? And this is the idea of this Caruso. But another word that’s very closely related to that is not the action of preaching, but what is the actual content of that preaching? That’s the carigma. And in fact, in theological circles, this word has just been ⁓ anglicized to

talk about what is the kerygma of the New Testament or what is the kerygma of Paul, Paul’s kerygma or the Apostles’ kerygma. Sometimes people try to differentiate between Peter’s kerygma versus Paul’s kerygma and all those things. But what we want to focus in on this morning is thinking about what Paul preached, and that is my contention, that this is also the entire kerygma of the New Testament and it becomes the center of our evangelism or the content, if you will.

of our preaching. When I think about the word kerygma, it has behind it the ancient crier or the ancient herald of ancient times. And what I oftentimes think about is maybe it’s from cartoons, maybe it’s from nursery stories and stuff like that. But I think about someone coming out with a scroll and saying, hear ye, hear ye, a message from the king. Right? That’s what kind of

what the preachers of the New Testament were supposed to be. They were supposed to be messengers, supposed to be heralds of the king. In fact, that’s what Paul even refers to himself as twice over in 1st Timothy and chapter two and verse seven, and also 2nd Timothy and chapter one and verse 11. There are English translation says that I was appointed to be preacher, but that’s that same word that basically means that you are a herald. You are a town crier. You are someone

that is proclaiming, that is preaching the message of the kink. And so what I want to try to do just very quickly this morning in the time that we have is look at some of the message that Paul gave, listen to his message, if you will, so that we can know what the content of that message is, so we can know ⁓ exactly what Paul is trying to bring forth.

about his message. And what I see in Paul’s kerygma, first of all, first and foremost, the most basic thing that we see is that his kerygma, the content of his preaching was that Jesus is the Son of God. Back in Acts and in chapter nine and in verse 20, they’re right after Paul’s conversion. It talks about how that he goes and he preaches Jesus. There’s a textual variant there. Some have preaches Christ, some have preaches Jesus.

But then the basic point of his preaching is that Jesus is the Son of God. So we start to see that the content of his preaching is that Jesus is the Son of God. And it was also interesting over in Acts 19 and in verse 13, here we get about some Jewish exorcists and those Jewish exorcists are trying to have more success in casting out demons. So they decide to call upon the name of Jesus.

whom Paul had been preaching about. In other words, this was so much of Paul’s content. This is what he preached all the time that even those that were outsiders, if you will, those Jewish exorcists, they saw what Paul was doing and they want to try to use that same name too. Over in Acts in chapter 20 and verses 20 through 25, where Paul is talking to the Ephesian elders there at Miletus where he has met them.

and he is discussing all the things that he is trying to do and is encouraging them. There in verses 20 through 25, he kind of summarizes some of the things that he has done in Ephesus and that he has done elsewhere. And again, the basic point is that he has been preaching the kingdom of God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. So we again see, and this may seem obvious to us when we think about what is the content of the good news, it has to do with Jesus.

But this good news about Jesus that we want to, that he talks about over in Romans and chapter 16, he gets to the end of that book. He says that basically, this is my gospel that I have preached to you, the gospel about the Lord Jesus Christ. But what about Jesus? And that’s what we want to talk about this morning. What about Jesus is really the message? And so when I think about this, again, the idea of kerygma,

about a herald of the king, it becomes it’s not just a message from the king, but it’s a message about the king. So that’s what Paul ends up doing. A lot of times you think about, again, that the ancient town criers, a message from the king. But what Paul is doing and the other apostles and what I’m saying that we should do also as New Testament Christians is not just have the message from the king, but the message

from the King is actually about the King. And that message is going to be good news. But when I think about a good, I guess, case study for us to look at, I want to turn over to Acts in Chapter 13. And this is where we’ll spend some time this morning in Acts and in Chapter 13. And look at Paul’s charigma there. our goal is, we’ll be starting around verse

verse 13, Acts chapter 13 and verse 13. Our goal is to look at what Paul preached. And after looking at what Paul preached, we can try to outline or try to understand, what was the content of his preaching? And if that is content that we should also have in our preaching, try to understand what is the center of evangelism, the center, if you will, of proclaiming the good news.

So there in Acts 13, starting in verse 13, we find that Paul has found himself now, he is in Antioch, not Antioch-Syria, but Antioch-Pasida. And as his common practice there in verse 14, he goes into a synagogue on the Sabbath day.

This is an awesome opportunity for Paul. Obviously, Paul being of Jewish background and he himself had been a Jew for many years until his conversion. He is in there. He is around people that he knows. He is around his brethren, if you will, in the Jewish faith and of Jewish nationality. And the people there at the synagogue, they offer Paul the opportunity to speak. In fact, in verse 15, it says, men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation, if you have anything you want to preach,

for the people, say on. What an awesome opportunity that would be, right? I would love to A, be invited to some place where they maybe not of brethren, but of people that they would invite me to. Do you have something you want to preach on? Well, most certainly. And notice what Paul decides to preach on at this time. And I think this is so very important. He could have preached upon anything.

He could have talked about some of the things that those people as Jews were doing wrong. Maybe he could have spent some time talking about how that circumcision is of no avail, right? He obviously spends time talking about that in other places, in the book of Galatians and so on. But instead of going in on those rabbit trails, if you will, notice what Paul preaches on. He preaches on the good news about Jesus. So starting in verse… ⁓

⁓ In verse 16, when Paul stands up and starts speaking, the first thing that he does, and he’s in this synagogue, is he starts giving them an Old Testament history lesson. Yes, they know these stories. Yes, they perhaps have known these stories growing up for many, many years. But he starts off in talking about how the Israel chose our fathers, the God of Israel chose our fathers, verse 17, when they dwell as strangers in the land of Egypt and uplifted arm.

He brought them out. Now, the time was about 40 years. And he continues on on this history lesson. He goes and talks about them coming to the land of Canaan. He talks about the time of the judges. He talks about Samuel the prophet. And then he talks about how that the people wanted a king. And so they wanted a king and so they chose their own king. And in fact, so God gave them Saul, the son of Kish, a man of tribe of Benjamin for 40 years. And when he had removed him, this is important now, verse 22,

He raised up for them David as king. Something I found interesting as I was going through this sermon is this word that keeps being used of raised. There’s two different Greek words that are being used here, but they’re kind of being used least in our English translation almost interchangeably. And there’s going to be an interesting thing that’s going to take place in a moment. But this David has been raised up for them as a man after God’s own heart, meaning not necessarily that David was doing God’s will all the time.

But God’s will was that David would be king, not Saul. Saul was not part of God’s will, if you will. That was of the people’s will. But it was God’s will that there be from the tribe of Judah that David would come up as king. And then we find this passage right after that in verse 23. It is from this man’s seed, according to the promise that God raised up for Israel a Savior, Jesus.

Notice again that that word raised being used there. David was raised up, meaning that he was brought up through the process of time through God’s power and God’s providence that he would be the King of Israel. And in the same way, God also raised up a someone else to come from the line of David. Someone else is a savior that is Jesus.

And of course, we realize that all of those things of the Old Testament has been pointing to this. In fact, that’s what Paul does next. He uses different witnesses. He brings up John the Baptist, who many of them would have feared, many of them who have respected. Maybe some of them had even been followers of John the Baptist. And how that John the Baptist pointed that Jesus is the Savior. How that all those Old Testament prophets pointed out that Jesus is the Savior.

Of course, that’s what Jesus himself does over in John chapter 5 verses 39 through 47, saying, all those things that you they all point to me. I know you read about the Passover lamb, but…

I know the Red Mount crossing over the Red Sea, the crossing of the Red Sea points to me. I know you know about the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. All of that points to, I know you know about the rock where the water, but that point, I know you know about the manna, but that points to me. Jesus has been trying to tell them that all those old has meant things point to him as savior. And that same thing that Paul is trying to do here. But this Jesus, those people did not believe

And so he was crucified. Now, the word crucified is not there in the text, but it mentions the tree that he died and that he was on that tree and was buried. But notice this, but God raised him up. There we have the idea of raised ⁓ yet again. And it is because of this resurrection that they can have salvation.

Pick up there in ⁓ Acts and in chapter 13, and we’ll start in verse 28. It says, though they found no cause for death in Him, they asked Pilate that He should be put to death. Now, when they had fulfilled that was written concerning Him, they took Him down from the tree and laid Him in a tomb. But God raised Him from the dead. He was seen for many days by those who came to Him from Galilee to Jerusalem.

who are witnesses to the people. And we declare to you glad tidings, the promise which was made to the fathers.” You can tie that word in verse 32 of promise back to verse 23 and promise that God has fulfilled for us their children in that He has raised up Jesus as is also written in the second Psalm, you are my son, today I have begotten you and that He raised Him from the dead.

No more to return to corruption. He has spoken as thus, I will give you the sure mercies of David. And therefore, in another Psalm, you will not allow your Holy One to see corruption. The point that I’m trying to make here is that Jesus was raised up. He was raised up as Lord, as Messiah, but it was through his actual raising from the dead that he is confirmed to be

that Lord and Messiah. And what something that Paul does here in Acts chapter 13, very similar to what Peter does in Acts chapter 2, when he mentions the patriarch David, when he mentions going back to David, that king who is that archetype of what the Messiah is going to be, he mentions the point that David was raised up, but David died and he’s still dead. And you can go and view his tomb if you want to, is kind of the point being made.

But Jesus was raised up. So it’s not that he was just raised up, but you see the play on words there. He was also resurrected from the dead. And so this raised and resurrection that they play off of each other. So what ends up happening, this is my point that I’m trying to make, the point I try to make in the book also, is that what ends up happening is that the carigma of the New Testament, the carigma

of Paul’s teaching, the charisma of all of the apostles ends up being a resurrected Lord. It is awesome. And we’ll talk about this a little bit more in a second. It is awesome that Jesus died for our sins. is wonderful. But his death for our sins is of no power if there’s not a resurrection. You can, I can die, you can die.

Every one of us is going to die and we may die for some noble cause. There are men and women that are fighting for our freedoms that die, that people die in the line of duty. Maybe someone dies for a child in some way, but to raise from the dead, that is where the power is and that is what solidifies him as being the Christ. And so this resurrection takes the center stage

And first and foremost becomes the thing that Paul preaches about more and more and more. I have a lot of passages up here on the screen. We do not have time to read them all, but you can read them in your own good time. We just had Acts 13 just a moment ago in his preaching to the synagogue group. But then Acts 17, we have a whole different audience. Now we don’t have people that have some of the same base like Paul does.

where he can appeal to Old Testament scriptures and use that to point to Jesus. Now we have a whole different audience. This is him before the pagans. People that care about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But notice something that is brought up again and again, verse 18 and verse 31, is about the resurrection. In fact, that’s the whole reason they want to talk to Paul in the first place is because he preached a resurrection.

And it’s because of this resurrection that they need to realize that there is a judgment coming and that Jesus is that Christ because of resurrection. Here in he is before the Sanhedrin, which obviously, if we understand some of the context about what we understand about the Sanhedrin, are people that don’t believe in a resurrection. And so now Jesus is preaching a resurrection even to them there in Acts 23. Acts 24, he is before Felix.

Verses 15 and 21, again, point to part of the reason why he is on trial is because he has been preaching the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And then also in Acts 26, verses 6 and also verse 23, this is a different audience. Now he’s before King Agrippa and he again is preaching the resurrection. So the point that I’m trying to make is that the kerygma, the content of the preaching of the gospel has to do

with Jesus, of course, at the center. But what about Jesus? It’s about His resurrection. Over in 1 Corinthians and in chapter 15, a passage we already referenced where Paul gives a summation of the gospel or a gospel in nutshell, if you will, about the death, burial, and resurrection. But notice what he spends his time on in 1 Corinthians 15. He spends his time on talking about the resurrection, that you can believe in that resurrection.

And if there is not a resurrection, then we are all men most pitable, right? That there has to be that resurrection. Over in Luke, chapter 24, verses 44 through 48, where we have kind of Luke’s version of the Great Commission, there we find out that those apostles were supposed to be witnesses of Jesus. What were they supposed to witness about? What were they supposed to testify about? Well, yes, they can testify about the death of Jesus.

But there’s all kinds of people that could testify about the death of Jesus. There’s all kinds of people that were around there. The point that he was trying to make, they need to also testify, is about his resurrection. The sequel to Luke, of course, in the book of Acts, Acts 1, verse 3 and 8, that’s what they are supposed to be doing. He has appeared to them. And so now they need, in his resurrection, so now they need to preach that resurrection also.

With that being said, kind of the question that I want ⁓ to ponder for just a moment and that will leave us with as far as application too is are we preaching the kerygma of the apostles of Paul?

of the New Testament? Are we preaching that same kerygma? What is this at the center of our evangelism? And I think this is an important question for us to ask because I think that the obvious answer that we would say, well, of course, that’s what we’re doing. mean, of course we preach the gospel. Of course, that is the goal of our evangelism, you know, to preach the gospel, to preach the resurrected Lord. But

Really, is that at the center of our evangelism? Something I want to challenge you with is thinking about what is the church of today? What is our charisma? And the first thing I think about is that perhaps the the charisma of the church sometimes has become different doctrinal differences and maybe even nuances and opinions. And the reason why I’m saying this is because not that there’s anything wrong with teaching about doctrine. That’s so very important. You have to have

not only the man, but also the plan, right? You have to have the doctrine of Jesus and all of those things. But I think sometimes we can focus in on so much of the doctrinal teachings about things and showing people the differences between denominationalism and the Lord’s church and all that stuff that perhaps if this becomes our focus and if the nuances become our focus or perhaps even our

opinions become our focus, we’ve missed the point. We’ve missed the actual center of it all that Jesus Christ has raised from the dead. That he is the Christ because of the resurrection and how that makes all difference in the world. Maybe part of our charisma is baptism. I’m a big fan, Bible talks about it.

I think it’s important that we need to talk about baptism. But something I think we mess up in the church sometimes, and this is something I encourage our brethren that are doing the Perseverant evangelism and all of those things, is that baptism is of no avail if you are not saving someone in a resurrected Lord. And the point I’m trying to make is sometimes we focus so heavily on trying to get people in the water.

that we forgot to get them in the Christ. And that is where salvation is actually found. In fact, the passage we use oftentimes over in 1 Peter in chapter 3, right, that baptism does now save us. Remember, even the point that Peter is trying to make, not the removal of the filth of the flesh, not just going and dipping in the bath.

Not going and getting wet in some water, but what is it in connection to? It is an appeal or an answer of a good conscience towards the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because that is the the carigma. That is the point that is trying to be made. We think about the carigma of the church is Christ and Him crucified.

I mean, that’s kind of what Paul said, right? Over in 1 Corinthians and in chapter one, I can’t know nothing among you except for Christ and Him crucified. But even with that, Paul has in mind preaching about the crucifixion of Jesus to preach about the resurrection of Jesus. If our sermons, if we stop with Him being crucified, we’ve missed the most important part.

that he also rose from the dead. You can go back in the annals of history and you can find all kinds of people that were crucified, but you will only find one that has risen from the dead to never die again. And that is the Lord Jesus Christ. And that is the separating thing. That is the point that is trying to be made throughout the New Testament over

and over and over again. So what should be our kerygma? What should be the content of our preaching? Yes, preach doctrine. Yes, preach baptism. Yes, preach Christ and Him crucified. But the basic center of it all is to preach about that there is life now and eternal life later in a resurrected Lord. That is what we are trying to

to offer. That is what the New Testament is trying to point out time and time and time again, is that there is a different way. It is a resurrected way. Of course, to be resurrected, you have to die. That’s that baptism part. But let’s not forget that the death is the living that we need to also be focusing on and encourage those people to live.

You know, I love we have some some good brethren at the congregation when I preach our excellent personal evangelism and over, know, I think in the last year we had almost 20 baptisms and it’s just wonderful. That’s just great. Praise God for the things and praise God for those efforts. But one thing that we kind of continue hark on, what are we saving? Are we saving them just to just to wet?

dry off and to go on and continuing the way that you live? Or are we saving to a resurrected life? And that’s the whole point. The majority of the time is interesting to me that when you look throughout the epistles, the majority of the time when Paul focuses in on baptism is not to teach on baptism. He is teaching on baptism as that that is a given. He’s teaching about baptism to tell about the life that they need to have later on.

Should we continue to sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. For how thus who have died to sin live any longer in it? That’s not a discussion about baptism. That’s a discussion about the resurrected life that we need to live. Brothers up here, so means I need to be quiet in a second. So let’s talk about some practical encouragement real quick. First of all, remember, there is good news about the King. It is good news. And I think sometimes we maybe miss that boat.

This is not something that, it’s good news. There is a King and that King is Jesus and he lives and he reigns and he saves. Not just that he died, but that he lives. And that’s even the point of that first gospel sermon in its entirety there in Acts number two, that let the whole house of Israel know it’s surely this same Jesus whom you crucified, God has made both Lord and Christ. Well, is he crucified?

Well, he was crucified, but now he’s living. Now he is Lord. Now he is Christ. And that makes all the difference in the world. So how do we have this as a center of our evangelism more readily? Well, we need to experience it ourselves, live in it ourselves, and then be able to share it. I think part of the problem, maybe one of the reasons why our evangelism lacks sometimes is that we have not

actually lived in and experienced the good news the way that we should. And if we do that, you’ll want to share it with others. It kind of goes like this. Evangelism is a joyful necessity. I have to do it. And I want to do it because of what the Lord has done for me, that Jesus is the center of that evangelism. But what about Jesus? His resurrection that he is raised

so that I can live a raised life so that in the resurrection I can have life also. Jesus and His resurrection, the center of our evangelism. Thanks for your time this morning.