Much of our full gospel literature and much of our preaching tend to perpetuate a misunderstanding of what the Bible says about obedience and Christian discipleship. I think the following is a fair statement of what I was taught in my early Christian experience and before I began to pray and study and anguish over the whole matter: "We are saved by accepting Christ as our Savior." "We are sanctified by accepting Christ as our Lord." "We may do the first without doing the second." What a tragedy that in our day we often hear the gospel appeal made in this way: "Come to Jesus! You do not have to obey anyone. You do not have to give up anything. Just come to Him and believe in Him as Savior!" The fact that we hear this everywhere does not make it right! To urge men and women to believe in a divided Christ is bad teaching-for no one can receive a half or a third or a quarter of the divine Person of Christ!
