But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! ~ Galatians 1:8
The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice. ~ Philippians 1:17-18
Wow. Did I read those right?
Paul would rather that someone hawked the genuine gospel of Christ out of selfish ambition for personal gain than for someone to hack together a false gospel out of seemingly pure but misguided motive?
Evidently he believed that the power of the true gospel was sufficient to overcome delivery by a person of questionable character … but the character of a person who would lie about the gospel was unquestionably evil.
Is that what we believe?
Or do we accept the word of preachers who seem like people of noble character, yet teach a gospel that has no real basis in scripture or in God’s heart?
Preachers who say you must obey the gospel to be saved, but to stay saved, you must perfectly obey this doctrine and this doctrine and this doctrine and this doctrine – which scripture never talks about?
Are we in danger of falling into one of the errors of Corinth …?
For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough. ~ 2 Corinthians 11:4
Blog In My Own Eye 
wow — you are right. well, Paul was, too. the power is in the promise made by God. yet, we feel like we have to control things so everything will run smoothly by doctrines.
Because of where I was raised, I must confess that I preached a lot of stuff for too many years that had no basis in Scripture.
I wonder if it’s an ego thing or a Satan thing. A “preacher” once told me my dad (an elder for 25 years) was in eternal error because he provided communion to folks in a nursing home. He didn’t find it in the NT, therefore it’s in error.
Kent, I’ll channel my best cable-guy to respond to making that charge of eternal error, “I don’t care who you are, that’s just wrong.”
I have to agree with Greg. I’ve done the same. You’ve framed this in an amazing way. Strong bro. Very strong.
Thanks for opening our minds to the possibility that we might not have everything right. Keep writing the message.
Funny. Somehow I thought you were going to write about physicists and programmers in relation to the Gospel.
😉
Good post.