If you only one chance to 
share the good news of Christ with someone what would you say? What should you say? Should you talk about heaven and hell?
While it’s common to hear preachers appealing to heaven and hell, I was surprised by what I found while teaching through the book of Acts. Acts is the best place to discover how the first Christians presented the gospel or good news of Jesus Christ to unbelievers. And that’s because the Gospels conclude too early and the Epistles are letters written to believers. Only in Acts do we find examples of the first Christians presenting their messages to non-Christians.
So how did they do it?
Peter and Paul’s Sermons in Acts
For the sake of brevity, let’s get straight to the call to action in the following messages:
- Peter’s address to the international crowd in Jerusalem: “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins” (Acts 2:38 ESV).
- Peter’s message to the astonished crowd at the temple in Jerusalem: “Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out” (3:19).
- Peter’s appeal to the Gentiles at Cornelius’ house in Caesarea: “To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name (10:43).
- Paul’s address in the synagogue of Antioch in Pisidia: “Let it be known to you therefore, brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you” (13:38).
- Paul’s speech to the high court of Athens: “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent” (17:30).
According to Peter and Paul, everyone should repent from their sins and receive God’s forgiveness through Jesus.
Why?
Heaven and Hell?
In answering the why question, some modern-day preachers insert a heavy dose of heaven and hell. We should repent, so that instead of suffering in hell, we will enjoy the bliss of heaven. But you won’t find that approach used in the book of Acts. The apostles end their talk of the future with the day of judgment.
- Peter said, “And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead” (10:42).
- Paul declared, “because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (17:31).
Notice that Peter and Paul don’t go into detail about the life to come. Their gospel presentation stops at the day of judgment. Of course, they probably said much more than we have recorded in Acts, but the record was left behind for a reason.
So the first preachers didn’t scare people with hell fire and they didn’t ask, “Do you want to go to heaven?” Who doesn’t want to go to heaven anyway? Who doesn’t want to avoid hell? The gospel is not ultimately about heaven and hell but about being reconciled to God. The first preachers believed that they had received the ministry of reconciliation, and therefore, they implored people, “Be reconciled to God” (2 Cor. 5:18-20).
Conclusion
When we share the gospel we don’t have to give a tantalizing view of heaven like placing a carrot on a stick in front of a rabbit. We also don’t have to scare our audience by describing the horrors of hell. The emphasis should be on getting right with God.
For more on this topic see my book below.
After graduating from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, I served as a high school Bible teacher in Asia. I enjoy traveling, writing, and playing the drums. For a deep dive into church history and the character of God, see my book Surprised by Hell.
“Repent for the forgiveness of your sins.”–I have to work hard to generate any kind of emotional response to that. I don’t know if it’s caused by an over-saturation with that verbiage from my formative years, but the words seem lifeless. Maybe I’m not a good enough Christian to really appreciate it to my core after hearing it every Sunday and Wednesday for years on end. I agree that there is much more to the gospel message than heaven and hell, but the neat, little wrapping of “Repent for the forgiveness of your sins” seems to boil it down to something still too small.
After reading some of the passages you mentioned above, it seems to me the repent/forgiveness part of the apostles’ sermons was not their message but rather their final hook. Their message centered on Jesus–him as God in the flesh, crucified, and resurrected. In fact, in a few instances, the repent/forgiveness lines came after a long discourse on Jesus and the crowd-pleasing statement of “You are all murderers of the God-Man.” I don’t know about you, but as I’m writing this and thinking about my place as a co-murderer of the God-Man, “Repent for the forgiveness of yours sins” is starting to take on new meaning.
On a different note, it seems a mistake to de-emphasize the message of Jesus in the gospels in favor of the message of the early church. Surely, the apostles got their message from Jesus himself. Matthew seems pretty explicit on what that message was: “Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand”. Now, I may never understand all that the kingdom call encompasses, but it implies the forgiveness of sins along with the reconciliation of myself to God. In the kingdom of God, I get to take my place as a subject under the servant-King of all creation and join him in his endeavors. (Wow, just writing that gave me tremendous pause. Could this really be true?) In summary, I loved that you brought up the “be reconciled to God” aspect of the apostles’ message. This seems synonymous to me with the kingdom language of Jesus.
Cheers
Ben,
I think we can all relate that hearing the same thing over and over can leave us feeling numb. Preachers and teachers should be more sensitive to the fact that their repetitiveness could be turning people off to their message. Also if we’ve already repented and put our faith in Jesus, I’m not sure that the message to repent and believe should produce a big emotional response.
You’re right that the emphasis of each speech is Jesus. Most of the speeches spend a great deal of time focusing on Jesus (Acts 2:22-36; 3:13-26; 10:36-43; 13:23-39). Even when Paul spoke in Athens where he was unable to name Jesus but made only make a passing reference to his resurrection and final judgment, Jesus was still the climax of his speech (17:22-31). But the whole reason for focusing on Jesus was so that people would repent–for how they treated him and for how they acted in ignorance–and believe in him. I think that was the early preachers punch-line or final hook as you say.
So my primary point is that the gospel should be presented in a way that emphasizes a Person and not a place. Our relationship to God is the ultimate issue and that leads to our final destination.
Not once in the book of Acts is hell mentioned. In the fourteen book of the N.T written by Paul, not once does he mention hell. Don’t you think that if there was such a place that both Peter and Paul would have at least mentioned it?