What is the Gospel?Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures...
(1 Corinthians 15:1-4)Who is Christ?
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God... And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth... For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
(John 1:1-2; 14; 17)Jesus Christ is God, and Jesus Christ is man. He is God made flesh, the Son of God sent to save us from our sins by dying on the cross.
Why do we need to be saved from our sins? Because, as the Bible says, the wrath of God abides on us. Our sins are a personal offense to God, and if we die in our sins, we will have to pay for them since "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). But God gave us the gospel, which means "good news" so that we can be saved from the eternal consequences of our sins. How? Here is a short presentation that tells us how by one of my favorites, R. C. Sproul:
There is no greater message to be heard than that which we call the gospel. But as important as that is, it is often given to massive distortions or over simplifications. People think they’re preaching the gospel to you when they tell you, ‘you can have a purpose to your life’, or that ‘you can have meaning to your life’, or that ‘you can have a personal relationship with Jesus.’ All of those things are true, and they’re all important, but they don’t get to the heart of the gospel.The gospel is called the ‘good news’ because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings, and that problem is simply this: God is holy and He is just, and I’m not. And at the end of my life, I’m going to stand before a just and holy God, and I’ll be judged. And I’ll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness–or lack of it–or the righteousness of another. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus lived a life of perfect righteousness, of perfect obedience to God, not for His own well being but for His people. He has done for me what I couldn’t possibly do for myself. But not only has He lived that life of perfect obedience, He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.
The great misconception in our day is this: that God isn’t concerned to protect His own integrity. He’s a kind of wishy-washy deity, who just waves a wand of forgiveness over everybody. No. For God to forgive you is a very costly matter. It cost the sacrifice of His own Son. So valuable was that sacrifice that God pronounced it valuable by raising Him from the dead–so that Christ died for us, He was raised for our justification. So the gospel is something objective. It is the message of who Jesus is and what He did. And it also has a subjective dimension. How are the benefits of Jesus subjectively appropriated to us? How do I get it? The Bible makes it clear that we are justified not by our works, not by our efforts, not by our deeds, but by faith–and by faith alone. The only way you can receive the benefit of Christ’s life and death is by putting your trust in Him–and in Him alone. You do that, you’re declared just by God, you’re adopted into His family, you’re forgiven of all of your sins, and you have begun your pilgrimage for eternity.
("What Is the Gospel?" by R. C. Sproul)We are sinners. Jesus came to die for the forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life to those who repent and believe in Him. We as Message Believers or former Message Believers have a particular sin that we often overlook. It is the sin of believing in a differnt Jesus, the Jesus of William Branham. WMB called him Jesus, but he was a different Jesus which he created in his own mind who didn't match the biblical Jesus. His Jesus was, in fact, an idol. Include that sin when you repent because if you haven't, you may still be believing in a different Jesus, and as a result, a different gospel!
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