Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:05 All right. Good morning, bill church. Good morning. Good morning. My name is Michael fueling and the lead pastor here. And we are finishing our fourth Sunday. It's the last Sunday of our series called practical evangelism. And so far we've shared with you a handful of tools. We shared with you the tool of prayer, that when you have an ambivalent world who just does not care about the things God cares about, you need a spiritual awakening that comes often through the power of prayer. We also also talked about the skill and the gift of hospitality that somehow in the context of actually real relationships, people's hearts are softened to the gospel in ways they would not otherwise be last week, we talked about how to show the gospel in a hurting world. We talked about the power of your authenticity, just simply being boasting in the cross and not your awesome newness.
Speaker 0 00:00:56 Amen. On how on, right? Leading with your weakness and your frailty and your brokenness, because people actually need to seek God's snowbird stories, not stories of your great deeds and awesome self will. Today. This last Sunday, we're going to be talking about the gospel and the first three are preparation, but the gospel is actually the key. It's the key that unlocks the door and we can give people this key, but they have to turn it. If they don't have the key, they have no access to salvation. So we together, we need to make sure as followers of Jesus that we understand clearly, and simply what the gospel is. I want to show you one passage or one verse in Romans chapter one, verse 16, I put it in the screen for you. And here's what Paul says. He says, the gospel is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes that there's some things that we already know and we've taught on that.
Speaker 0 00:01:57 There is no human being on the planet who comes to Jesus, that if they trust in him, that the blood of Christ can not cover. If you gave us all the worst despots of all of world history, and they all simultaneously came to Jesus and asked for genuine sincere forgiveness, the blood of Christ is powerful enough to cover them. But here's what I want to do. I want to take out all the prepositions and phrases of this document, all the modifiers. And I want to just show you the sentence in its purest form. Here it is. The gospel is the power to hear this. The gospel is the power. You take out all the modifiers and at its core, this is what the apostle Paul is trying to say to you. You are not the power. Your great stories are not the power. That there is something about this gospel message, that it is imbued with power to save people.
Speaker 0 00:02:55 And now God has imbued many things in creation with power. So for example, the family unit has power imbued into it. People will die for their family and betray their country for the sake of loyalty to their family. They will give their own lives up for families, sexuality. This is another one is the power to create life. It has the power to establish the covenant of marriage. It is one of the most powerful forces in humanity, but it's interesting that the most powerful of all things in creation is the gospel. It is imbued with the power to save people from sin, death, and hell. I want to read to you a portion from a book called the gospel primer. And it says this outside of heaven, the power of God in its highest density is found in the gospel. This must be so for the Bible twice describes the gospel as quote, the power of God.
Speaker 0 00:03:50 Nothing else in all of scripture is ever described in this way, except for the person of Jesus Christ. Indeed God's power is seen in erupting volcanoes and unimaginably hot boy boil of our, of the massive of our massive sun and the lightening speed of a recently discovered star seen, seen streaking through the heavens at 1.5 million miles per hour. Yet in scripture, such wonders are never labeled quote the power of God, how powerful then must the gospel be that it would merit such a title and how great is this salvation it could accomplish in my life. If I would only embrace it by faith and give it a central place in my thoughts each day. In fact, the word power comes from this word dynamism, we get our word dynamite, but it's this idea of something that is imbued with power. And oftentimes the power that it's imbued with has the ability to do great damage. But here the damage is to sin and not to the person. So a five-year-old comes up to you and says, what is the gospel? What are you saying? Your child or your friend, they come up to you and they ask the question, how can I have my sins forgiven? You know, the answer is the gospel, but what words come out of your mouth? A while back, I sat down with a mom and dad and I asked them this question about their daughter and here was their answer. I would tell them if they are a good girl, they could go to heaven. And if they are bad, they might not. Is this the gospel?
Speaker 1 00:05:35 No.
Speaker 0 00:05:36 And if it's not the gospel, it has no imbued power to save.
Speaker 1 00:05:45 Uh, my ninth
Speaker 0 00:05:45 Grade priest, I went to an all boys Catholic high school. He came up to the board and he wrote with chalk, faith plus works, equals salvation. He decided to talk for a while about how salvation and forgiveness of sins it's through your personal trusting in Christ. Plus the accrual of your good works. Is this the gospel? No. And if it's not the gospel, then it has no inherent power to save. So here's my sermon flow for the morning. We're going to answer the question. What is the gospel then I want to, I want to answer a question. Why is it such a threat? And then we're going to go through a handful of some of the most common, false gospels so that you can kind of have your eyes open and despite, or determine that just running where you live and the people you shepherd and take care of whether they're in your home or whether they're your friends or neighbors, you should really identify some of the false gospels that the people in your sphere are going to be most susceptible to.
Speaker 0 00:06:43 And then finally, we're going to conclude with, so what in the next week we jumped right back into the book of Exodus. All right, open your Bibles. First Corinthians chapter 15, verse one, first Corinthians 15 verse one. This is the most probably succinct gospel articulation in the whole Bible. It's really important. And I want you to remember this, that the apostle Paul has spent many, many, many hours teaching and training the Corinthian church in a simple and pure gospel. Now I want to, I want to give you an illustration of why the apostle Paul has, has to do this. When I sit down with a kid who goes through our Awana program at church, and almost always, if I ask them, what is the gospel? They will give me a simple, pure, clear gospel, almost every, almost every time. But something happens when people grow up and it is not uncommon.
Speaker 0 00:07:46 And by not uncommon, I mean, it is very common. I will ask an adult who has maybe even been a Christian for a while. What is the gospel? And it is like very frustrating. It takes a very long time to get a clear answer. Then here's, here's what I will often do. And some of you we've been in this conversation together, I will say to you, I'm going to now tell you the gospel. And then I'm going to ask you the question, say it back to me. And I just want you to listen to what I'm saying, and I want you to give me your best version back. And then I will tell them the gospel message. And I will say, okay, now say it back. And they can't, there's something that happens. I don't know what it is. As you get older, somehow we just complicate things.
Speaker 0 00:08:34 And it's really hard for us to get this clear. I cannot tell you how many times I've heard gospel presentations, where things are added to the gospel subtracted from the gospel substituted for the gospel and not with ill intentions. It's because there is something about the gospel that is really hard for adults, especially to get their head around and then to remember. And then when you have this opportunity to share the gospel with somebody, you want to make sure you share with them a simple, true, pure gospel. Because if you add to it, subtract from it, take away from it, substituted ceases to become the gospel. So we want to make sure we get this thing really, really clear. Here's what he says in first Corinthians chapter 15, verse one, he says, now I would remind you brothers after many, many, many hours of training of the gospel that I preach to you,
Speaker 2 00:09:28 Which you received
Speaker 0 00:09:30 In which you stand. So Paul with clarity had confidence. He had trained them. They received it. They understood it. They were standing in it. They believed it. And let me just give you the simplest definition of the word gospel. Literally it means means good news. It's good news. That's what the word gospel means. Sometimes I wish we didn't actually use the word gospel because Americans don't really use this word apart from Christianity. I wish we actually just said the good news of Jesus Christ and left it at that. I think if I said to most people, what's the good news of Christianity. They might get a little bit clear of an answer, but once we use the word gospel, we go, whoa. And when you're talking to, by the way, people who don't know Jesus, most of them don't even know the word gospel. That's not even in their normal vocabulary.
Speaker 0 00:10:19 And if you ask them to define it, they're not going to know it. Either. Chapter, verse two, he says this, he's still referencing the gospel by which you are being saved. If you hold fast to the word, the word is the gospel that I preached to you, unless you believed in vain, we get diverse three. And this is where he going to start the articulation of the gospel. And we're going to see for Paul, this is a 10 out of 10 issue. This is a tier one issue. This is a primary issue. And he says, this verse three, I delivered to you as of first importance. And what did he deliver? Everybody on the count of 3, 1, 2, 3, the gospel. There we go. Right? You're like, Jesus. No. Well, yes, but the gospel has what we're talking about for, I delivered to you the gospel as a first importance.
Speaker 0 00:11:08 And it's what he received. And who did he receive the gospel from now in church, you can say Jesus, 1, 2, 3, Jesus gave him the gospel, but what he's giving to them was given to him by Jesus. And now he is giving it to the Corinthian church. He has trained them. He has left them and he has confidence. You know, the simple, pure gospel you get it. And then he recites it to them. Again, 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. And at the end of first Corinthians 15, he references. Then the second coming of Jesus, we need to notice a couple of words. Christ died. Sins raised. These are going to be really important words. Now here's the deal. When he is writing this, he had already trained them personally, on what Christ meant is Christ some generic person or concept?
Speaker 0 00:12:15 No, it's actually Jesus. And so he spent time with them, training them. He's giving a summary, but he's giving them a summary after he had already trained them in the vocabulary. So when he says the word Christ, he's referencing Jesus, who is the promised one from the old covenant, he's fully God and he's fully, man. They already, they already knew this. When he says died for our sins, he'd already taken time explaining to them that you are sinners and your sin is going to be paid for by either you or Jesus. Take your pick. He'd already explained all of these things. So when he gives this to them, this is the most simple, condensed version of this Christ died for our sins. And then he was buried, reiterating the death part like no, historically he actually was dead. There were a bunch of liars at the time saying, ah, did he really die?
Speaker 0 00:13:09 No, no, no. He was buried. But that he was raised that in order to believe the gospel, you must believe in a literal resurrection. So to be a Christian to say, I believe Jesus died for my sins, but I don't believe in the resurrection. In fact, the new Testament is so clear. You're not a Christian. Like you're not saved if you don't believe in a historical resurrection. So let me just give you a simple gospel message. If I were to go to you and say, what's the gospel, I would hope you could look back at me and say something. This Jesus is God. In the flesh. He died for our sins, rose from the dead and we'll return to make the world right now. If you're dealing with a non-Christian, there's a demand and this is what you would say, trust him. And to be saved in its most simple form. If you add anything to this or take anything away, it ceases to be the gospel. If you take away the resurrection, is that the gospel? No. If you take away the second coming, is that the gospel? No. If you take away the reality of our sin, is that the gospel? No, if you take away the reality of Jesus's Dady and humanity, is that the gospel? No, if you make this whole thing a metaphor instead of a real thing, is it the gospel?
Speaker 1 00:14:31 No. If I add
Speaker 0 00:14:34 To this, if I say, and you have to be a good person, is that the gospel? No, don't you don't you see how easy it is to add or take away because you know that you might be sitting down with somebody and one part of this might offensive to them. You're like, I really want you to be a Christian. Well, do I have to believe in the resurrection? Well, I mean, maybe you can just set that one aside. If you have the rest of them, you're you're okay. But, but apparently the, the gospel without the resurrection is not a gospel. It actually has no imbued power by God into it. It's just a statement. And so you see here is a couple of things I want to, I want to show you this. The gospel is a handful of things. Number one, the gospel is a set of factual statements.
Speaker 0 00:15:19 You can't add to these statements nor can you take away from them. You want to make sure you get God, right? Jesus has God in the flesh. You want to go straight and make sure you get humanity, right? We are sinners. You want to make sure you get the connection, right? Jesus died and rose again from the dead. And he's coming back and salvation is in Christ alone. You want to make sure you get all these, who is God, who am I? And how are we connected? That's number one, it's a set of factual statements. Number two, it is a personal invitation.
Speaker 0 00:15:49 So when you sit down with someone here is the option trust in the gospel or reject the gospel. And those are the options that humanity has. And when we die and we face Jesus, there will be two kinds of people. Those who have trusted the gospel and those who have rejected the gospel as we kind of wrestle through. And some of us, it took you a while to come to faith in Christ. Some of you're wrestling through it right now. And you had to really think about each of these to make sure you really believe them. That is a really good and noble process. But as long as you're even in the process, you need to understand you were in the position of rejecting the gospel. So you are in one of two positions. One is maybe not ready yet, but still rejecting. And the other is trusting in the gospel.
Speaker 0 00:16:40 It's a personal invitation. Number three, the gospel is essential for salvation trust in what it teaches and says to us, belief in this is essential for salvation. You can actually have a whole bunch of wrong ideas on a whole bunch of other things, but these are the minimal things that have to be right. And lastly, it's, God's only method for salvation. I think this is the part that probably drives so many people in our culture. Crazy. I would love, let me just say this. I would love it. If there were multiple pathways to salvation, would that not make our lives so much easier? It would make us so much less offensive. We are bound by the teaching of Jesus, that there is no other way to salvation, except through him. He is the door. The gospel is the key, and that is the only door that we can walk through.
Speaker 0 00:17:37 If we are to truly be saved. And it's, God's only method of salvation. Now there are many creative ways to share the gospel. Are there not, there are many creative ways to help people understand their need for the gospel, but at the end of the day, may we not add to subtract from, or take away from the essential statements of the gospel. Now I'm going to answer a second question. Why is this simple message, such a threat? Some of you are sitting here and you're like, yeah, Jesus has God. I'm a sinner. Jesus died on the cross for my sins. He was raised from the dead he's coming back and heck there's no good works. I can even do to earn that. I trust in the gospel. I trust in Christ. Most of you in this room are watching. You're like, yeah, why is that so bothersome? I want to give you two reasons why this is so bothersome. Number one, because of my sin, the gospel is an inherent threat to every person who hears it. Sin it's like drugs. It promises freedom. It promises autonomy. It promises so many things in for a moment delivers on the promise, but then it leaves you helpless. It takes your soul and your joy and your body in the process.
Speaker 1 00:19:05 And many of you know that personally,
Speaker 0 00:19:07 You knew that promises of sin and then you realize it failed to keep its promises. It delivered for a moment. And so here's what sin is doing. Sin is promising every one in your life. You can do what you want when you want, how you want. You can be who you want to be. You can think what you want to think. Nobody will judge you. Everybody is right. There are no wrongs. You be you. And the gospel says,
Speaker 1 00:19:39 No,
Speaker 0 00:19:41 You're a sinner and you need forgiveness. And it's only coming through Jesus Christ. There's no good works that you can do to get this forgiveness. And in fact, when you're trusting in Christ, this isn't like a get out of jail free card, although it is. But it's not just that. Like, you're actually saying no, Jesus, you are my God. You are my master. Like intuitively like Jesus even says, count the cost right before you do this, before you follow me, count the costs. You don't go to war. You don't get on a boat, not count the cost. And so there's this implication that even when the disciples right, are talking to people about following Jesus, they're having to count the cost and the whole process here. Hey, like here's what this might mean for your life. It means, you know, Jesus is your master. It means you're going to have to do what he says.
Speaker 0 00:20:34 And you mean I'm not in charge of my own life. You mean my awesome, great intellectual wise thinking is not the final authority of my life. Any more do you mean I don't live for myself anymore? Do you, do you see why? When you share the gospel with somebody intuitively they know they are moving from being their own God and master to allowing Jesus, to be their God and master it is a transference and whoever's God in your life. They determine what is, what is true. They have authority over what you, you do and do not do. And so for many people, when you share the gospel, they will find any reason they can to reject it. Because the demands on them are far greater than what they want to submit to. But here's the deal. Eventually the promises of sin will Worthen and eventually it will leave you destitute because that's what it's wired to do.
Speaker 0 00:21:29 There's a second reason that gospel is a threat and it's because of my enemy. And I want you to just to hear the Satan hates the gospel because he hates you. It's why everything, God imbues with power. Satan wants to destroy. Why is there a cultural attack on the notion of the family unit? Because when you destroy the family, you destroy lives. Why is there a cultural attack on sexuality and all of its forms? Because when you destroy someone's sexuality and you remove it from God's, will you destroy people in the process? Why is there an attack on the gospel all throughout history? Because when you destroy pervert, add to subtract your substitute, the gospel you steal from its power, and now you leave people in their sin to say, didn't have a vested interest in perverting. The gospel, the answer is, of course he does. And Jesus even says this, John 10, 10, I want you to hear, he describes the very nature of the evil one. He says the thief Satan comes only to steal and to kill destroy. So if you're in a conversation with Satan and you think it's going well,
Speaker 2 00:22:36 And you're like, I think we can bargain. You will lose. You can't
Speaker 0 00:22:40 Win that one, but Jesus, I can do. They might have life and have it abundantly. And here's, what's interesting everywhere. Paul went with the gospel. There were riots, there were religious leaders. There were, there were a cult practice, worshipers everywhere. He went he'd come in and he preached the gospel. It's almost like demons were watching him. And they had to go ahead of him just to kind of prepare the way to rile people up and to make sure false notions of Jesus and the cross. And all of this stuff were already there before he got to these cities, then he would go and preach the gospel and riots would ensue. Why that doesn't make any sense for a, for a, an empire that loves philosophies and other ideas. What is it about this guy that everywhere he goes, people are riled up and they try to kill him and beat him and imprisoned him. It's because Satan is at work and is going beforehand to try to confuse and distract as many people as humanly possible.
Speaker 2 00:23:38 I want you look
Speaker 0 00:23:39 At this passage. It's Galatians chapter one, verse six and seven. And this is written just about 15 after the resurrection of Jesus. And there's this region called glacier in glacier. There's a handful of churches. And Paul was preaching the gospel to these churches, preaching the word, teaching them, establishing these churches were 15 years after Paul writes a letter to this region of churches. And they are all ready, getting attacked by false gospels and false teachers. This isn't a time without electricity, automobiles technology, the internet speed of communication. I mean, it could take a hundred years for things to get across the world and back again and back again, which happens in a second. Now
Speaker 2 00:24:25 Could take months war,
Speaker 0 00:24:27 Imagine going to war and this kind of concept, how are you on the front lines? Send a messenger. He'll get back to us in a month and a half. Like this is the kind of world we live in. We're 15 years in and Satan is already up to something. Galatians chapter one, verse six. He says this, I am astonished as Paul happy. No, he's not. They, you are so quickly deserving him. Who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel.
Speaker 2 00:24:59 What I
Speaker 0 00:25:00 Sat with you, I trained you. I warned you about all these ridiculous notions that were going to creep into the church. You knew this stuff was coming, come on. And then one false teacher comes in. Well, maybe he's right. Maybe the apostle Paul doesn't know what he's talking about. You did look pretty sickly recently. Maybe he's losing his mind. He doesn't really talk that. Well, maybe they're all right. And the apostle Paul is like, oh my goodness, I am astonished. You were there. You understood it. I warned you about this. You knew that if you lose the gospel, you lose power. You also knew that the reality of your salvation, whether or not your conversion is true or not, is contingent on your ability to continue and believe in the gospel, right? That's how you know, whether there's a true conversion or false conversion, they continue in their belief in the gospel throughout life.
Speaker 0 00:25:48 And then he says, this you're turning to a different gospel in verse seven. Not that there is another one. Don't you love that? Like he's like, there's a different gospel. And then he hears himself, wait a minute. There is no other gospel, but if there was one, this one, isn't it because there's only one. Okay. Now that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ 15 years. And this is already happening now we're 2000 years later. How many false perversions of the gospel do you think exists all over the world? We're going to go through just eight of them in a little bit, but they're everywhere. Ever since there has been a gospel. Satan has stood, ready to sabotage
Speaker 1 00:26:28 From the very beginning. Okay. He
Speaker 0 00:26:30 Has stood ready to sabotage it. And if he can get you to doubt it, to lack confidence in the historic resurrection, the nature of the deity of Christ, whether or not that thing in you is really sin or you're just need to be self-actualized. Whatever it is, he will do everything in his power to sabotage the gospel in you. I want you to just to be encouraged. Christianity is not a crazy religion. We believe in the true power of God has revealed in the gospel that God loves you. God gave Jesus who's. His son died in the crossroads. Again, coming back. Salvation is in Christ alone.
Speaker 1 00:27:10 This is not,
Speaker 0 00:27:11 This is not crazy, but the evil one wants you to believe it is because if he can get you to doubt it, he can steal your power because the Christian who doubts it doesn't share it.
Speaker 1 00:27:21 And the person who doesn't hear it
Speaker 0 00:27:23 Can actually be saved because you need to hear it in order to be saved. I mean, Satan has a vested interest in getting you. You doubt the gospel. All right, what are some common, false, false gospels do? One of three things they add to the gospel. So track from the gospel or substitute something for something else in the gospel. So let's look at subtractions first, and here's my encouragement to you. I want you to ask, have you personally, either in the past or currently are tempted to believe in any of these false gospels. Number one, the God is love gospel. Now let's just agree on something is God love is that all God is no. The God has loved. Gospel says basically God is required to be nice and to make me feel good. So the God of love gospel is sometimes called the God is always nice gospel, right?
Speaker 0 00:28:24 That's what I like. Right? Because that's what people are actually saying. What can for never do that. And what it does is to subtract sin. You'll find very often that sin is not called sin. It's attracts the need for salvation because they will not have any belief in hell or God's justice or God's punishment for sin. You'll also find it. The God has love gospel. This idea of Jesus substitute death is not a real thing because if you're not being saved from hell, then you actually really don't need salvation at all. And so God is love inherently behind. This is subtracting all of these essential things. If you talk to somebody who believes in the God has loved gospel, they will not believe in sin, or if they do it's in mostly other people, or it's not a big deal. They don't believe in your need to be saved from sin because in the God of love gospel, there is no hell.
Speaker 0 00:29:14 There is no justice. Everybody goes to heaven and they're not going to believe in the substitutionary atonement or death of Jesus on the cross. This idea that somebody needs to die for your sins, that that's actually irrelevant to them. Here's another subtraction, the spiritual metaphor gospel. And this is the idea that what happened with Jesus was by and large mythology. Um, yes, most of them will say to you that there was a real Jesus. He actually was killed by Rome, but the idea of the resurrection was a metaphor. And so what they sort of tracked is an actual historical resurrection. You'll find this actually with a lot of people who grew up in the church and then maybe they stopped believing in some of the more miraculous things. They're also going to deny things like a Virgin birth or really any of the other miracles in scripture.
Speaker 0 00:30:04 Let's talk about gospel, false gospel additions. Here's one that I speak about quite a bit, which is the good works gospel. This is probably the most insidious false gospel in American culture. And this is the basis for all theistic religions outside of biblical Christianity. And it's also the basis for all cults, any version of Christianity that adds something to it. All of the cults are always going to add good works to salvation. And that's what they add. The good works gospel. This is all throughout history and every land in every nation and every century, you're going to find the good works gospel is the one that most easily dupes humanity. Here's the, here's the second edition, the fourth false gospel, the polytheistic gospel. I use this actually more because of where we live in Bartlett, but this is the idea that there are many gods, but Jesus is my God.
Speaker 0 00:31:04 And you're going to see this most often in some forms of Hinduism. And what they do is they add multiple pathways to salvation. So you'll find religious people who affirm Christianity and all of its doctrine, but also what you're not seeing is that this is a part of a polytheistic Pantheon of gods. And then that's your personal God. I want to talk about substitutions. Well, substitutions almost always do is they substitute our greatest problem, which is sin and they replace it with another real, but lesser problem. Okay? The prosperity gospel, this is the money or distortion. It's on TV. They substitute lack of prosperity in place of forgiveness of my sins as my greatest need. So when you go to a prosperity church, they're not talking about your need for Jesus to redeem you from your sin. First, what they're talking about is the things you want and need and deserve. And that if you come to Jesus, Jesus is a means to get you what you want now, what you actually need, which is your forgiveness from sins. You have the liberation gospel, which is essentially MLK's gospel, which substitutes freedom from social oppression in place of forgiveness for my sin as my greatest need. Now is social oppression bad? Yeah. Is it our greatest need?
Speaker 1 00:32:35 No. And in
Speaker 0 00:32:36 The pulpit, is this my primary that God is here to release an oppressed people. But if the oppression is from sin, then yes, but the liberation gospel doesn't actually teach that they teach that our greatest need is freedom from social oppression. You usually find this in more minority groups. Number three, you have the social justice gospel. Now you could call this the critical race theory gospel, or the BLM gospel. It's substitutes, power imbalances in place, the forgiveness for my sin as our greatest need, or problem that if you hear some preachers, particularly progressive churches preach that your greatest problem culture's greatest problem. Society's greatest problem is a power imbalance, and we need to flip the power and balance on its head. And you won't hear salvation from sin as the good news of Jesus Christ. Number four, you have the self-help gospel. We call this Oprah's gospel substitutes not achieving.
Speaker 0 00:33:41 My potential is my greatest problem in place of forgiveness for my sins. Do you see that every one of them are actually dealing with a legitimate problem that society or the individual faces, and they substitute that real problem. And they call it the major problem. They take a, what is fundamentally a smaller problem, and they make it the biggest problem. And in doing this, you ultimately land with a gospel that is no gospel because the good news that is preached is not forgiveness from sin, but something else become your best self. Be liberated, invert the power balance,
Speaker 1 00:34:20 Get more money. It's not the promise of the good news of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 0 00:34:26 This side of heaven, Jesus never promises prosperity. He never promises. Justice will come to the entire world until he comes back again. He never promises that oppression will be reversed. If you believe in Jesus, then we can reverse that and never promises. Should we pursue that? Yes, but to tell people that now this is the good news that your felt needs that are real problems are your biggest needs. And that if you come to Christ, he can deal with those. No, that is no gospel. Our biggest problem is not out there. It is in the human heart. That is fundamentally society's biggest issue. And it is our individual biggest issue. And this sin inside of me, and you has separated us from God. And when you take the second thing or the third thing and you make it, the first thing, it becomes no gospel.
Speaker 0 00:35:18 And it doesn't mean the second. And the third thing, aren't real problems that the church should come together and figure out how to address. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is they're not the first thing, which is why Paul says, I gave these things to you as of first importance. They're the most important may it never be said of us that we are making them of anything other than essential tier one most important issues, right? A couple of spots, true conversion requires two levels of understanding. And I think this can help you make sense of some things that are happening maybe in your personal life with some friends, with some family members. And the first required level of understanding is intellectual understanding that somebody actually needs to understand in their brain, the gospel message. I love that God has made this message so simple that a four or five-year-old can understand it.
Speaker 0 00:36:19 I love that it is not complicated. Hey, four year old, are you a sinner? Yep. Is there a God? Yup. And when you share the gospel with them, it has power. Jesus loves you died for you rose again from the dead coming back. Do you believe that? And if the gospel is at work, I believe it or not. The gospel works in three, four. And five-year-olds, I know that's crazy for some of you, it does it after they understand it to the depth that you do. Nope. Can somebody who has some level of, uh, uh, a mental deficiency, inability to comprehend some things like, are they able to understand the gospel? Almost always because it's so simple. The simplest that people can understand it. I love that. Let me, let me illustrate this. I've got incredible news for you. Um, everyone in this room you have just one, 155 million, 254,000 Venezuelan sovereign bullet. How many of you know what that means?
Speaker 2 00:37:13 That's a hundred bucks. Yay. Let's go to Venezuela.
Speaker 0 00:37:19 Say it again. 155 million, 250, 4,000 Venezuelan sovereign boulevards. Oh my goodness. My life is forever changed. It's it's a hundred bucks. Don't get me wrong. A hundred bucks is great. Right? But it's a hundred bucks. Now. Here's another one. I have incredible news for you guys. Everyone here gets one. Bitcoin.
Speaker 2 00:37:38 Some of you, I know there's applause. It's Oprah guys. This morning. One Bitcoin was worth
Speaker 0 00:37:44 3,159. Us dollars. My goodness. Here's the point. Sometimes the gospel needs to be translated. I want you to remember that before Paul wrote for screens, hands 15 here, he'd already spent time with them, teaching them, clarifying for them. The terms. I think some of us think that if I just, if I just share the gospel, then they're going to get it. They need to understand it. The gospel has inherent power when it's understood. So what that means is we have the essential categories, but it might take some time to work with somebody to talk with them about what it actually means. I think one of the most challenging parts of this is, is that there are words that we use that used to have shared definitions and meaning, but no longer do. And one of these words is Jesus. I don't actually know what you're thinking.
Speaker 0 00:38:34 When I say word Jesus, another one has died for me. This issue of, of like, what does it even mean that somebody dies for me that doesn't even make sense to people who have no religious upbringing salvation. When you ask them what they're being saved from again, if they're believing their greatest issue, isn't sin, but their poverty or their lack of self-actualization. Then actually we have to kind of define some of these terms. And this is why the gospel is best shared in the context of loving relationship, because it takes time to actually talk about some of these things. Billy Graham could get up in front of tons and tons and thousands of thousands of people proclaim the gospel. And they had shared understanding culturally about what these words meant. And probably many of the people there who had already been in conversations with other Christians or grew up in a church and rejected it and had some kind of shared vocabulary.
Speaker 0 00:39:24 Those days are gone, which is why the best gospel presentations are in the context of a relationship. It's in the context of hospitality. It's in the context of authenticity because that's where you're going to have to probably spend the time unpacking things. If they want to. Here's the second required level of understanding. And it is spiritual understanding and spiritual understanding happens after somebody understands intellectually the gospel. In fact, the apostle Paul would say it like this. He would say, there's a veil over people's eyes that they get the gospel. They can articulate it, but they can't really understand it for their soul because it requires spiritual understanding. I want to read this to you from second Corinthians chapter three, verse 14, Paul says, but the Israelites minds were hardened. And he says this for, to this day when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains remains unlifted because only through Christ, is it taken away?
Speaker 0 00:40:27 Yes. To this day, whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. So what's interesting is, is you may find that somebody intellectually understands it, but their heart is not inclined to it. And this is where the power of prayer comes in because until the Lord removes the veil, there will not be the understanding that they need. And so the first part of this is I want to help you intellectually understand the gospel, but you're not going to turn to Jesus until the veil is removed. And this is why we pray. Here's my second. So what for you, if a five-year-old can't understand your gospel, you have made it too difficult. I have shared the gospel with many kids and I am astounded at how confusing I made the gospel to kids. And they'd look at me with that tilts face, like, huh.
Speaker 0 00:41:29 And I'd be like, okay, I have overcomplicated this. Let me, let me just out, start over, erase everything I just said. Okay. And so this might take a little bit of work. And honestly, this might mean you sit down with a friend or a pastor and say, could you, could you help me? Here's what I shared with my friend. Am I missing something? Is this right? A sermon is not going to resolve all of your issues. Although I hope it brings you clarity. You're going to have to do something with this as you leave. And then finally, here's my last. So what for you, as we close out this series use the four tools that God has given to each of us, prayer, hospitality, authenticity, and then the gospel. And remember the first three are preparation. The fourth, the gospel is the key that you give to them.
Speaker 0 00:42:10 And when they put it into the door of Jesus Christ and they turn it, anybody who enters to the door she'll be saved no matter what they've done. Now, I think this is an appropriate time. As we end this series to turn our hearts toward communion. And there are two kinds of people here. There are those who have personally believed and trusted in the gospel. And when we celebrate communion, here's what we're doing. We're read, declared our personal commitment and conviction and belief in the gospel. And this is really important because the apostle Paul says in first Corinthians 15, that you have to continue standing in the gospel. And every week that you partake of communion is a reminder that the spirit of Christ is in you. As you commit and read, declare your belief in the gospel. So the first group of people are going to be partake of communion.
Speaker 0 00:42:59 You're going to be those who are already believers. You have trusted in Christ. There's a second group of people here. And that is those of you who have not personally trusted in Jesus. And our ask of you is not to partake of communion because when you partake communion, we don't want you to declare your belief in a gospel that you don't believe in. And so if you don't believe it, Jesus is God. And that he died on the cross for your sins and was raised from the dead. And it's coming back. If you don't believe that we don't want you out of social pressure or guilt to partake of communion. But today, if you believe that and you are to trust in Jesus Christ, if you are ready to believe in him, I want to encourage you. When we partake of communion, would you partake with us and let this partaking be your personal declaration?
Speaker 0 00:43:43 You believe Jesus has gone in the flesh that he died on the cross for your sins was raised from the dead and he's coming back. It's a declaration that you believe that what Jesus did was good enough to save you. If you're ready to do that today, we'd love to share communion with you. We'd love to read, declare the gospel together with you. We'd love to support you. Find one of us up front here and just tell us today. You decided to trust in Christ. We lived a resource. You encourage you and champion you and help you take your next steps with Jesus. So here's our community is going to work. We have elements of each of the beams over here in the back and then a beam over here. And we're going to just have a time of silence. It's a time of reflection for you to talk to God when that's done, I'm going to, I'm going to pray and we're going to sing together. And during the music, if you haven't received communion elements, you can go to each one of these three locations. You can grab them. If you'd hold onto it until the end of the song, I'm going to come back up and I'm going to read some scripture and then we're going to partake together as a symbol of our unity in Jesus. Let's have a time of silence together.
