SEARCH THE SCRIPTURES WITH BOB
WHAT IS “THE GOSPEL?”
A few years ago, my wife complained to our doctor that she found herself puffing and short of breath at the slightest exertion. She found it difficult to keep up with me when we were walking together. So, it was agreed that she would wear a monitor that would broadcast her heart beat to the hospital. Since it was late Friday afternoon when she put it on, we did not expect to hear anything from them for a week or two. But much to our shock yet that day, we had a call back and the hospital wanted her to come in immediately. Her heart was not only beating unevenly, but it was stopping for several seconds at a time frequently. We managed to persuade them that we would come in early Monday. On Monday, she received her first pacemaker. What was the rush, you might ask? She was not getting good blood circulation and could have had a stroke or died at any time. As the heart is to the physical body, so is the Gospel to the spiritual being. One is of this world, but the other is eternal. So which is more important? Neither, both are vital. Without physical life, it is too late to worry about the eternal. That is already settled, but the eternal, for the living yet, is the most important decision any one can ever make!
I remember that I was not yet ten when I made that decision. Our minister was preaching his last sermon as he was going to another congregation to minister. He had been preaching about the Lord’s return, and had even set the date. (Long since past.) I was so upset, even at that age, that Jesus might return before I could be baptized that I begged my mother to get me to the church that evening. Since my father, who was a travelling salesman, had not returned home that weekend, she phoned a neighbor to ask them to take me with them. They had already left the house in their Model T. Ford. Even with their large family, they made room for one more when I rushed to the road and flagged them down. I would that all men on hearing and believing the Word would so respond.
WHAT, AND WHY IS THIS “GOSPEL” SO IMPORTANT?
The word itself is used several times in the New Testament and just reading a few of them shows its importance. It has its roots long before in the messages of the Prophets. It is one of those things that the Jewish nation should have recognized, but they had interpreted the Messiah as coming to set up their nation as a world power. It is that, but not a physical power, but a Spiritual power, and not for them alone, but for all nations.
According to Webster, the ancestor of gospel is in the Old English “godspel,” literally Good News.
The first reference, I am using comes from Romans 1:1-7. Christ chose Paul to bear the good news to the non-Jewish world. The New Testament says, the Gentile world. The Jews separated the world to be Jews, and the rest Gentiles, and in a sense, so does the New Testament as a whole, then it divides the world into the saved and the not saved. It says we are all servants, either we serve God or we serve Satan and our eternal destiny is to be with the one we serve in life.
1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,
Paul makes it clear that he is serving the Lord. The gospel is the good news that there is something better than this world ahead and available to all. Now isn’t that a message we need today, and always? Christ has paid the debt of sin for all who accept and obey him. If we obey him in everything he has asked, our real life is ahead. Paul did not respond as they expected when people stoned him. He took their beatings and frequent arrests as unimportant in comparison to what they did to his and our Lord. He even counted it a privilege when the Romans chained him between two guards. He had a “captive audience” always, as he taught those who came to him to be taught, and thus it was that with the changing of the guards the household of the empire became converted as well.
2 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)
The coming of the Messiah was prophesied from of old.
3 Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh;
4 And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:
5 By whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name:
6 Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ:
7 To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.
WHY MUST WE SHARE THE GOSPEL WITH OTHERS?
Mark 16:15-16
And he said unto them,” Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but that believeth not shall be damned.” This is also found in Matthew 28:19.
This is the heart and purpose of every sermon. If it is not, then we need to reexamine why we are sent, These are the last recorded words of the Lord as he was lifted up into heaven. They are a command and they tell us what to teach and preach as we go. Don’t you suppose he is going to ask as soon as he returns is “Where did you go and what did you say?” He knows that if we take his word, it will not return void.
Paul looked forward to go to Rome , and when he finally went, even as a prisoner, still had that attitude, Romans 1:15,16, “So much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you who are at Rome also. For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.”
DO NOT BE ASHAMED OF THE GOSPEL
“Be not thou ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner.” 2 Timothy 1:8a.
Without it, there would be no saving of anyone from destruction.
Even when I was a sailor in California He spoke to me through the favorite hymn of the Navy, “Throw out the Life-line across the dark wave, There is a brother someone should save, Somebody’s brother! “ He is also speaking to you, wherever you are.
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