Calvary
Chapel Eastside

“Till I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine.”
I Timothy 4:13

"A primary distinctive of Calvary Chapel is our endeavor to declare to people the whole counsel of God. We see this principle illustrated when Paul met with the Ephesian elders in Acts 20. As they were on the shore of the Aegean at Miletus, around the coastal area of Ephesus, Paul said that he was innocent of the blood of all men, “For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God.” (Acts 20:27).

Now, how is it possible for a person to claim to have declared, ‘the whole counsel of God?” The only way a person could make that claim to his congregation would be if he taught through the whole Word of God with them, from Genesis to Revelation. Once you’ve taken your congregation through the Bible, then you can say to them, “I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God.”

This can’t be done with topical sermons. Topical sermons are good, and they have their place, but when you’re preaching topically, you’re prone by nature to preach only those topics that you like. And there are topics in the Bible that aren’t very inspiring. They don’t excite the people, but they are necessary issues that have to be dealt with. The human tendency, however, is to avoid these. If you’re only preaching topically, you may also tend to avoid controversial or difficult topics, and the people won’t gain a well-balanced view of God’s truth. So the value of going straight through the Bible is that you can say, “I have not shunned to declare to you all the counsel of God.”

-Chuck Smith, Founder of Calvary Chapel