Christian Cooperation and Separation - John R Rice

Christian Cooperation and Separation
he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.
Notice, what is the Gospel? That Jesus died. Yes, and He
was buried and rose again. But something else. Only once it is
mentioned here that He died, only once that He was buried
and rose again, but twice that statement, that official, divinely
inspired statement of what the Gospel is, said it had to be
“according to the scriptures.”
Then the only center of cooperation is the Christ as
presented in the Scriptures, “according to the scriptures.” The
Gospel “according to the scriptures.”
Back to the text verse in Psalm 119:63, “I am a companion
of all them that fear thee [heart-trust of Jesus Christ], and of
them that keep thy precepts,” Christian fellowship, is Jesus
Christ of the Bible.
Now the doctrine of Christ must be as it is recorded in the
blessed Word of God. You can’t be a good Christian without
coming the Bible way. You don’t have the right Saviour unless
you have the Saviour presented in the Bible. There is no way
to have a Gospel unless it is the Gospel of the Bible.
So the inspiration of the Bible and the facts about Christ—
His deity, virgin birth, bodily resurrection, blood atonement—
are the essentials around which we can unite; and one cannot
properly unite with anybody on another basis.
We Are Expressly Forbidden to Give Christian
Recognition or Fellowship to a Modernist
We come to a closing word. You are not to have such a man
in your home as a preacher nor are you to have him in your
23