Ashamed of the Gospel: When the Church Becomes Like the World Copyright 1993, 2009 by John MacArthur Published in association with the literary agency of Wolgemuth and Associates, Inc. Published by Crossway Books a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers 1300 Crescent Street Wheaton, Illinois 60187 Cover design: Chris Tobias First printing, third edition, 2009 Printed in the United States of America Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are taken from the ESV Bible (The Holy Bible: English Standard Version ), copyright 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations indicated as from nasb are taken from The New American Standard Bible, copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, and 1995 by The Lockman Foundation and are used by permission. Quotations indicated as from kjv are taken from the King James Version. Appendix 4, Carnal vs. Spiritual Wisdom, is an excerpt from A Soliloquy on the Art of Man-Fishing by Thomas Boston, adapted for modern readers. This version, 1993 by Phil Johnson, is used by permission. ISBN: 978-1-4335-0929-2 ISBN PDF: 978-1-4335-0930-8 ISBN Mobipocket: 978-1-4335-0931-5 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data MacArthur, John, 1939 Ashamed of the Gospel : when the church becomes like the world / John MacArthur. 3rd ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN-13: 978-1-4335-0929-2 (hc) 1. Evangelicalism. 2. Church and the world. 3. Modernism (Christian theology). 4. Spurgeon, C. H. (Charles Haddon), 1834 1892. I. Title. BR1640.M243 2010 270.8'2 dc22 2009017997 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Rick Draa My faithful and beloved friend and servant of the Lord on my behalf who for more than thirty-five years has recorded my voice and spread it across the globe.
CONTENTS Acknowledgments 10 Preface to the 2009 Edition 13 Preface to the 1993 Edition 25 1 Christianity on the DownGrade 00 2 The User-Friendly Church 00 3 Gimme That Show-Time Religion 00 4 All Things to All Men 00 5 The Foolishness of God 00 6 The Power of God unto Salvation 00 7 Paul on Mars Hill 00 8 The Sovereignty of God in Salvation 00 9 I Will Build My Church 00 10 Interlude 00 11 Carried About by Every Wind 00 12 Spiritual Adultery 00 Appendix 1 Spurgeon and the DownGrade Controversy 00 Appendix 2 Spurgeon Speaks to Our Time 00 Appendix 3 Charles Finney and American Evangelical Pragmatism 00 Appendix 4 Carnal vs. Spiritual Wisdom 00
I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. ROMANS 1:16 Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God... which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. 2 TIMOTHY 1:8, 12 Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. MARK 8:38
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I first broached the idea of this book to Lane Dennis and Crossway sometime in late 1992. Lane s enthusiasm for the project was immediate and profound. With his encouragement, we shifted into high gear, compiling and editing the first edition within three months after getting the go-ahead from Crossway. No book I have ever written has come together so quickly and so easily. Crossway launched the book in mid-1993 at the Christian Booksellers Association convention in Atlanta. The title has been a mainstay in Crossway s catalog ever since, and they have done a marvelous job of maintaining its visibility in the marketplace. I m very grateful to Lane and the staff at Crossway for what they did in 1993 to make it possible to publish this book on such a fast schedule and for all that they have done over the years to keep it in the marketplace. Lance Quinn (then an associate pastor at Grace Church; now senior pastor of The Bible Church of Little Rock) was a major help to me during the writing of the first edition, proofreading and critiquing chapters during the initial editorial process. Numerous people at Grace to You also contributed to the project. These include Arline Hampton (who transcribed the sermons from which material for the book was drawn), Mike Taylor (who for more than twenty years has managed the editorial department at Grace to You), and Tom Pennington, who stepped into the gap to provide leadership at Grace to You while other key staff were working to meet that short deadline. Tom s heightened involvement at Grace to You was one of the most wonderful and far-reaching side-effects of the decision to fast-track this book. He spent more than a decade working alongside me first at Grace to You, then in the role Lance Quinn vacated at Grace Church when he was called to Little Rock. Like Lance, Tom proved too gifted and too valuable to the kingdom to be kept in my side office. He is now senior pastor of Countryside Bible Church in Southlake, Texas. Major thanks to Phil Johnson, who did the hands-on editorial work in 1993 to compile and edit these chapters, blending material from more than
12 Acknowledgments fifty sermons that I had preached over twenty-five years time. Phil has also edited the updates and the supplementary material for this revised edition. His fingerprints are on every page of the book, and I continue to be thankful for the nearly thirty-year partnership the Lord has given us. Phil has often reminded me that his well-known interest in Charles Spurgeon began when he edited the first edition of this book. He had never read any of Spurgeon s writings or even a full biography of Spurgeon prior to starting the editorial work on this book. While helping assemble the first draft of Ashamed of the Gospel, he did some research on the Down-Grade Controversy. Once he began reading Spurgeon s writings and sermons, he found it impossible to stop. In the years since 1993 he has posted reams of Spurgeon material on the Internet, helping to introduce countless people around the world to the Prince of Preachers, showing how supremely relevant a Victorian Baptist preacher is to what s happening in the church today. The Internet s Spurgeon Archive is thus one of the enduring legacies of this book. Phil has assembled the material in Appendix 2 for this new edition. Finally, thanks to Robert Wolgemuth, who had the vision for a revision and re-release of this book and who brought the idea of a new edition to Crossway.