The Gospel

I am not ashamed of the gospel.

What is the gospel? Do you even know what that word means? Gospel means good news. Let's say that first line again: "I am not ashamed of the good news." Again, do you know what the good news is? To first understand good news we must understand the bad news, and yes, if there is good news, then there has to be bad news, or else the good news isn't good, it's just news.

So let's start with the bad news:

All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23

The wages of sin is death. Romans 6:23a

Paul sums up the bottom line of the bad news pretty well in the book of Romans. For a more in depth look at the condition of man read Romans 1:18-32 and Romans 7:7-25. This all started in the beginning: God created the earth and everything in it (Genesis 1-2), God put man in the garden of Eden to care for it and gave him freedom to do what he pleased, but He gave man 1 rule: "Do not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil." (Genesis 2) Man didn't obey the one simple rule, ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and the Lord introduced death into the perfect world He had just created. (Genesis 3)

You see, God's original design did not include death. We chose death. Don't believe me, go read Genesis 1-3. Now we live in a depraved state, but wait, there is more! God, in dealing out His consequences for their actions, left us hope. He said, "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike His heel.” Right there is the foretelling of Jesus Christ, savior of the world. For that reason we find the good news in John 3:16 and the second half of Romans 6:23.

Bad news: we are destined for death and eternal separation from God.

Good news: God has made a way for us to be reunited with Him.

For it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes

The power of God: You see, the Lord could have wiped us out in the beginning. We disobeyed, we knew the consequences before we sinned, God would have been justified to wipe us out and start over again. Man 2.0. But because God is God, He knew what would happen to us if He did that, He knew we would be eternally separated from Him and because of His great love and compassion for us He did not want to do that. So instead He made a way for us to reconcile with Him, but justified in His presence, and once again clothed with righteousness. He started that with a substitute and instituted the sacrificial system in Genesis 3:21. He made garments of animal skin to cover them. He had to shed the animal's blood because we all know there was not an animal running around without its skin. This is the foreshadowing to the sacrifice of Jesus.

How do we receive this salvation? By believing. Paul says it here in Romans. Jesus also said it in John 3:16. What does it mean to believe? It can't mean we just believe there is a God and that Jesus was on the earth and we will be saved. James explains that even the demons believe that and crap their pants in fear. (James 2:19 Simplified Cowboy Version) So just the knowledge does not save. No, it is belief.

To believe we must cling to, rely on, and trust in the Lord. Cling to His promises, rely on His word, and trust His ways. That is how we are saved.

To the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

To understand this you have to understand God's account from the beginning; starting from Genesis. Genesis 1-2: Creation. Genesis 3-5: Man's sin. Genesis 6-9: God's judgement for man's grievous sin with His remnant. Genesis 10-11: The Table of Nations and filling of the earth. Genesis 12-50: The linage of God's chosen people to carry the good news of the Lord through the earth. In Genesis 12 we again see the promise of the Savior through these people. All knew about the Lord and His ways for all came from Noah, the remnant of God's faithful people. We have just chosen to reject it as described in Romans 1: 18-32. God never forsook His promise.

The Jews were then entrusted with the gospel. They were a people, a nation, holy unto the Lord; meaning they were set apart for Him as He is set apart from us. But then God turned it all upside down. The Jews were not faithful to the Lord because they were only man and had that sin nature. That is the whole rest of the Old Testament, the story of man continuing to disobey God and how He rescued them from it.

Then came Jesus. He came and explained the Law of God to man and He did it perfectly because He was Himself a man and yet God. God the spirit came and dwelled in the flesh of a man to make His ways known to man. Jesus Himself said He did not come to abolish the Law (Law of Moses found in Exodus through Deuteronomy), but to fulfill it. (Matthew 5:17) He came and lived the Law perfectly, without sin, because He is God and cannot sin. He also offered Himself as the substitute for man and sacrificed Himself to pay the penalty for our sin. He used His blood shed on the cross to cover our sin, just as the first animal was sacrifice in Genesis 3 to cover them in their sin.

Once He accomplished that He left us with a new command to "Go into all the world and preach the gospel." So no longer were God's people confined to the nation of Israel and the world had to come to them to learn the good news. Now they were sent to go into all the world, preach the good news and live among the Gentiles (non Jews) and as Paul called them at that time, the Greeks.

That is worthy of praise. Now go, preach the gospel and do not be ashamed of it. #CornerstoneVerseOfTheDay