I'm happy to be here today. I think you're taking a step
down from Kevin to me, but that's what you get when you have someone
so gracious as Kevin to invite me here. Turn in your Bibles,
if you would, please, to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. I want to look at
some texts of Scripture here in 1 Corinthians 15 that I'm
sure will be very familiar to you, but it is, as I was talking
to Kevin about this, I never tire of hearing a sermon from
the same familiar text of Scripture, and Scripture itself affirms
this. I was talking to one of my kids and they were asking
me what I was going to preach about, something about the Bible
and how big it is, I said, well the Bible is big, but there's
not a million different things in there. There's really just
a few things. And the main thing is Christ and Him crucified.
So that's what we want to look at. 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
I've entitled this message, The Gospel. The Gospel. You'll notice it here in the
first verse. But before we read, I want to
mention the background to this chapter. The Corinthians were
a group of people in a city that Paul the Apostle had gone to
in the New Testament time. And he had preached an amazing
amount of distance into an amazing amount of different kinds of
people. In fact, as I was thinking about this and I was listening
to the Bible reading from the, I have an Alexander Scorby app
on my phone I like to listen to, I was listening through the
book of Acts, and it surprises me how far the gospel spread
in so short a time in the New Testament. Perhaps you've been
struck by that. And as I was listening to, when
it got to chapter 17, the apostle Paul came to Athens. And there
were philosophers there, and I'm intimidated by intellectual
people because I'm not intellectual. And no doubt the apostle Paul
had an intellect much greater than mine. But it was God, the
Holy Spirit, who had taught him. It wasn't his natural intellect,
but God, the Holy Spirit, who had taught him. What impressed
me is the fact that he could go to these philosophers that,
in our modern time, we look back on with admiration because of
their intellect. They were considered wise by
the world. There were people like Aristotle
and Socrates and their disciples who had been in that area for
years. And when the Apostle Paul went
there, he declared something to them they had never heard
before. And many of them were converted, many were not. But
what impressed me is that the Apostle Paul and all the other
apostles went throughout all the world at that time with the
gospel at the commission of Christ and they successfully penetrated
the whole world. Now, if you think about that,
that is phenomenal. In fact, you might consider it
the greatest miracle ever to have been given in this world,
except, of course, for the crucifixion of Christ. Think about this. Jesus told the disciples, greater
works shall you do because I go to my Father. And because he
went to his Father, he sent the Holy Spirit his exalted throne,
Christ sent his Spirit into this world, and through the Spirit
coming and working through the apostles, the gospel went out
throughout the world. Amazing, nothing short of a miracle
of the greatest proportion. Jesus told his disciples in Matthew
16 that Upon this rock, upon Christ and
Him crucified, He would build His church. And the gates of
hell would not prevail against it. Now that's amazing. The world
is held in darkness by the Prince of Darkness. And yet Christ sends
men with His Spirit into the world with this message. And
it penetrated not only the general cultures, but to people steeped
in religion, in the Jews' religion, and in the intellectualism of
this world, and into barbaric places where people didn't have
any education, and spoke languages that you can't hardly pronounce,
like in Papua New Guinea, or American Indians. The gospel
went throughout all the world, and that is an amazing miracle,
I think. Causes me to to realize that
we don't have to be intimidating because the power is not of ourselves
It's of God and that that power of God comes through the gospel
Now the Corinthians were one of those groups of people and
they had a lot of problems It's surprising when you get to chapter
15 of 1st Corinthians the problem here that's being addressed Which
was the resurrection? How could they be called Christians
and yet in their church have some division over whether or
not there was a resurrection? And so that's what Paul is doing.
And notice how he addresses that fault, that false doctrine. What does he do to address it?
Notice how he does this. He says, moreover, brethren,
I declare unto you the gospel, the gospel. Now, we want to stop
here because this is not only the title of the message, but
this is it right here. The Gospel. I'm going to declare
unto you, Paul says, the Gospel. When we think about the Gospel,
we have to hold it in contrast to everything else in religion.
Almost all religion is about experience. It's about my own
personal experience in my life. and religion appeals to that.
You know, come here and you will get your problem solved. Your
marriage, your finances, your politics, whatever it is, we'll
solve it here in this place where religion is taught. But that's
not what Paul said. I'm not going to try to get into
your mind and thoughts about how you live in your life. I'm
going to declare something to you, something outside of you,
something that occurred in time, in a place, with another person,
someone else's experience. And this gospel that he's about
to declare is going to set back in order the error that they
had about the resurrection. And not only that error, but
all the other errors that they could have, the gospel. So he
says, moreover brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached
unto you. This is the way the gospel comes
to us. We don't get involved in some
kind of an enthusiastic experience or we don't look for following
a plan in our life. We just take these steps. That's
our own personal history. The Gospel comes to us as something
that God did, in Christ, outside of our experience. And this takes
away all of our contribution. This takes away all doubt, because
God did it, not me. And this takes away all expectations
that it would fail, that it wouldn't succeed, is going to be successful. Because God did this and he's
declaring it, he's preaching it, he's holding it forth, he's
setting it out to us. And that's what preaching does.
It declares the truth. It declares the person who is
the truth in his work. And so it goes on. The gospel
which I preach to you, which also you have received. You received
it. You didn't go out looking for
it. It came to you and you heard it. And by God's grace, by the
Spirit of God, you received it. You believed. Wherein, he says,
this gospel, wherein you stand. This is where you're standing.
You're standing firm. This is the only foundation you
have. The gospel. Now, verse two. By which also you are saved. The gospel is about salvation.
If you keep in memory, when we've heard the gospel, when God has
given it to us and he's given us this gift of faith, he holds
it in our memory. He causes us to turn it over
in our minds, to meditate on it. We go to God with this truth
in our hand, like a letter sent to you. This is what you take. You take it to the one you have
to go to and present it to him. Remember in the book of Philemon,
The apostle Paul writes to Philemon, who was the master of Onesimus
the slave, and he gives that letter to Onesimus the slave.
Take this. Go to Philemon. Show this to
him. And in the letter Paul writes
to Philemon, he says, receive him as myself. Remember? And so that's what we do. We
take the gospel, God's word to us concerning his son, This is the way we're saved.
This is the way we stand. And so he says, if you keep in
memory what I preached to you, unless you have believed in vain.
If God doesn't cause us to live upon by faith, to live upon the
gospel, then we've let it go. It wasn't important to us. It
didn't produce life in us. And so we need yet to believe.
Verse three. For I delivered unto you, first
of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died for our
sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that
he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. That's where
I want to stop. The Gospel. What is the Gospel? Well, we just read it. Paul said,
I declared it to you, You stand on the Gospel and you
hold it in memory. So this is something that was
declared, something that took place. In fact, he tells us what
the Gospel is in a summary form. He says, Christ died for our
sins according to the Scriptures. That's the first part. He was
buried. He rose again the third day according
to the Scriptures. according to the Scriptures,
he was buried and rose again the third day according to the
Scriptures." He uses the word Scriptures here twice in those
two short verses. He doesn't say a lot. There's
not a big paragraph, or like I would do, I would confound
things with too many words. He says, the gospel is what Christ
has done. Who did it? Christ. What did
he do? He died. Why did he die? For
our sins. For whom did he die? For us.
He says in verse one, brethren, moreover, brethren, our sins. He died for our sins. And what
did he do when he died for our sins? Well, after he died, he
was buried. And when he was buried, after
he was buried the third day, he rose again. And all of this
was according to the scriptures. Now, notice what's missing in
what he calls the gospel. Your experience. Your experience
is missing in this, isn't it? You were not there. Not in your
person. Not in your lifetime. Somebody
else was there. In fact, he says he died for
our sins. So it was an act of Christ for
us as a substitute and as a representative. And it did not occur in the year
2022. It was a long time ago, before
you were born. God did this. Christ did this. Something was accomplished. Something
was obtained. This is the Gospel. History. That's the first thing we must
learn about the Gospel. The Gospel has to do with history. But not just history like Napoleon
or or Abraham Lincoln, the history of a man, Jesus Christ, his history. That's what the scripture is
about. It's about Jesus Christ and him crucified. That's the
history. And that's the event here he's
talking about, the historical event, a unique event, an event
you didn't contribute to. You didn't initiate it. You couldn't
prevent it. It's declared to you. History
is not something you can get into, contrary to modern art
and entertainment. You can't go back in time. You
can't go back. I can't tell you today, you need
to get involved in that history. You can't. It's already happened.
It's outside of your hands, isn't it? And so, what God has done
is held up to us in the preaching of the gospel. It's declared. And we're given this accomplishment
of Christ and what He did and we're told to believe it. In
fact, that's what happens when we hear it. We find ourselves
needy and we find this to be all sufficient for our salvation. And there's something that happens.
God operates in us and He persuades us of the truth. And that persuasion
is called faith. And we lay hold upon what is
told to us concerning Christ, and we come to Him. We call,
we ask, we seek. But all that is the effect of
the gospel preached. It's not the accomplishment of
that work, you see. So that what God does for us
in our experience is not to accomplish the salvation, it's to tell us
about a salvation already done. Now I want to use that first
part about how the Gospel is a declaration of a past event. An event that took place in a
specific location on this earth. As someone said in a sermon,
where a degree of longitude crosses a degree of latitude. Outside
the walls of Jerusalem. There, on a specific day, at
a specific time, something was done. by someone that accomplished
the salvation of all of God's people. That's the gospel. And
so when we look at this, I want to show you what the gospel is
with that outline. Look at 1 Corinthians 1, the
very first chapter of this book, and notice how the apostle Paul
says this in verse 17. For Christ sent me not to baptize. I'm not here to perform ordinances. but to preach the gospel. Why
did Jesus Christ send the Apostle Paul? To preach the gospel. Not with wisdom of words, lest
the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. Now, look
down at verse 23. What is the gospel? God sent
Paul, Christ sent Paul to preach it. He says, we preach Christ
crucified. There it is. He said, I'm going
to preach the gospel, that's what I was sent to do, and he
sums it up here. We preach Christ crucified. To the Jews, a stumbling block,
because they look for signs. Show me a sign, then I'll believe
you. No, we're going to declare to you what God has done in Christ. And to the Greeks, foolishness.
No, I need an intellectual, something I can I can use as an advantage
over others, something I can say, I can put all my ducks in
line, I figured God out, I figured out my salvation, I know how
it, I've gone to seminary, I've got it all in place. Nope. That's not the way it's going
to come to you. God's going to declare to you His wisdom and
His work. So, in verse 23, The gospel is
Christ crucified. That's what Christ sent Paul
to preach. And then look down at verse 27. God hath chosen. Now here we see that the gospel
is for those God has chosen. And what are they like in themselves?
Well, they're the foolish things of the world. They were chosen
by God as foolish things in order to confound the wise. Verse 27. And God has chosen the weak things
of the world. to confound the things which
are mighty, base things of the world, things that are despised,
hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nothing,"
or N-O-U-G-H-D, things that are, that no flesh should glory in
his presence. So when the gospel is preached,
it comes to those God has chosen, and it has an effect upon them. And in themselves they are weak,
They are foolish, they're base, they're despised. And God has
set it up that way. In fact, they're nothing. Absolutely
nothing. In order that God can bring to
nothing everything that thinks it's something in the world.
Because he's going to hold up his son. And this is the only
one who's going to receive glory in the end and in your salvation.
So he says. God has done this to bring to
nothing things that are, that no flesh should glory in his
presence, but of him, of God, the one who has chosen his people,
are you in Christ Jesus? Now, so you see that the gospel
is about Christ and him crucified for a chosen people who are by
God put in Christ. And how does he do this? Well,
he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. So he
says, of Him are you in Christ Jesus, who of God, Christ now,
is made to us. This is the way our salvation
works. This is the gospel. This is what's declared to us.
This is what you can't contribute to. This is what's done by God. It's His work. It's His design.
And it happened in history. God has put you in Christ and
has made Christ to you wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. There you have it. That's the
outline of the Gospel. Christ crucified, you chosen
before of God, by God, before, given to Christ, put in Christ,
so that all that He does, you did in Him. His wisdom, your
wisdom. Don't look for wisdom in yourself,
look to Christ for it. His righteousness, your righteousness. His holiness, His redemption,
it's all yours because you're in Him. By God's doing. Now that's
the outline of the Gospel. Look at chapter 2 and verse 2.
The Gospel. That's the question. What is
it? Paul says, I determined not to know anything among you save
Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Alright then. Now we have something
we can see from scripture what God has said the gospel is. Can
you see that? It's about the Lord Jesus Christ. It's about what he did. It's
about God's will given to him to do this. It's about what he
obtained by accomplishing the will of God. That's the gospel. And that's a historical thing.
That's an outside of your experience event. And that event happened
once. It's unique. You didn't contribute
to it. God did it. And not only is it
unique and outside of your experience, and one time, it happened once,
but it will never be repeated. It's a one time event, occurring
once, by Christ, never to be repeated, and that work of His
is perfect. Nothing can be added to it. Nothing
need be added to it, because it's complete. Everything done
by Him, and only that which is done by Him, is perfect. That's
the Gospel. That's what's declared to us.
Now, in 1 Corinthians 15, 3 and 4, it says twice there that this
was according to the Scriptures. Notice that the Scriptures are,
what are they? They're written, aren't they?
God's Word written. Can you change that? No. Did
you contribute to it? No. Do you experience those words? It's objective truth. It's truth
that is there for you to see. If you look at the clock on the
wall, you read the time, but reading the time doesn't change
it, does it? It's objective. It's the actual
time. We rely on that. It's outside
of us. That's what the scriptures are.
They're objective truth. We think in this world, no, truth
is subjective. If that's true to you, that's
your truth. Hogwash, that's the most ludicrous
thing I've ever heard. And it's only, this is what Satan
did with Eve in the garden, remember? Yay, if God said that you shall
not eat of every tree of the garden, it's called God's word
in the question. He wanted her to think in terms
of her own subjective understanding of the tree and how it looked
and tasted and what it might do and thinking about how she
could become something later. So he called God's word into
question and he directed her to think about her own perception,
her own experience. And she fell. And so did Adam,
same thing. But the Lord Jesus Christ was
also tempted in the same way. And three times he was tempted. He said, the devil said to him,
after he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, turn, if you are the
son of God, then turn these stones into bread. Now he had just been
baptized by John, the father had spoken from heaven, and the
spirit of God in the form of a dove had lighted upon him,
and the prophet John, the greatest prophet ever in this world, had
preached about him. Why didn't Jesus tell the devil,
didn't you see what just happened? I was just baptized. The Spirit
of God descended in this great show of approval and God spoke
from heaven. No, he didn't say that at all,
did he? He just said, it is written. It is written, why? Because the
gospel is according to scripture. It is written. That's our only
defense. What did God say? That's the
way things are. It is written. Jesus said, the
scripture cannot be broken. Heaven and earth shall pass away,
but my words shall never pass away. God has magnified his word
above his name. It is written. And what do we
do? The gospel is according to the
scripture. We just heard it this morning.
Coming to God in the clothing of another is the only way we
can come. In the clothing and in the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way we can be accepted.
In ourselves, foul and filthy and perverse and profane. In
Christ, accepted, approved, received even as Him. And so that's the
way we come. So, the gospel is according to
scripture. And remember when Jesus just
first began to, in his ministry, what did he
say in Mark chapter 1? Let me read this to you, Mark
chapter 1. It says, And Jesus came into Galilee, preaching
the gospel of the kingdom of God, saying, The time is fulfilled,
the kingdom of God is at hand, repent ye and believe the gospel. The gospel causes repentance,
and so the Lord Jesus directs them to the gospel. And what
was the ministry of Christ? In what way did Christ preach
the gospel? One of those ways was in John
chapter 3, when Nicodemus came to Jesus. And Jesus, he told
him, he says, you can't see the kingdom of God, you're not in
the kingdom of God, the birth that you trust to Abraham will
not get you there. And this is outside of your control.
It has to be performed by the Spirit. And He gives life to
whom He will, like the wind blows wherever the wind wants to. It
accomplishes His work. You can't prevent it. You can't
initiate it. And Nicodemus says, how can these
things be? And you know what? That's when
Christ preached the Gospel. What did He say? The Son of Man
who is in heaven. Let me read it to you, in fact,
in John chapter 3. Go there with me, John chapter
3. He says it's about the Son of
Man. He says, in verse 13, no man has ascended up to heaven.
This is Jesus Christ preaching the gospel. No man has ascended
up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son
of Man which is in heaven. Complex words, what is he saying? He's saying that I am the son
of man, I came down from heaven, I will ascend to heaven, and
I will be seated on heaven's throne. And no one else has done
this because there's one mediator between God and men, a man, Christ
Jesus, the mediator, the son of man, appointed by God to this
task, and that's the only one who can go up to heaven because
he first came down as our mediator, fulfill the work God gave him
to do, and then would be seated on heaven's throne. And so he
says, he elucidates that work, verse 14. Here's the gospel. The son of man, as Moses lifted
up the serpent in the wilderness, you know the story, they were
bitten by serpents, they were dying, many had already died,
and the rest who were bitten were crying to Moses, What should... Moses, do something! And God
said to Moses, you take a hunk of brass, and you hammer it out,
and you heat it up, and you fasten it to a pole, and you tell everyone
who's been bitten, you look on that serpent hanging on that
pole, and all who look will live. They had nothing to bring. Look! And so he says, as Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
Son of Man be lifted up. He's talking about the cross.
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal
life. There you have it. The Gospel. Christ crucified. Risen again
according to the Scriptures. He pulls both from the Old Testament
and the interpretation of it in the New. He explains the Gospel
and this is what the Lord Jesus Christ Himself did. He preached
Himself and Himself crucified and He gave that to the Apostles
and as Kevin was saying today, that was the work of the Spirit
of God, the Gospel preached. And so we see that there, we
see it in the Apostle Paul, we see it throughout the New Testament.
Jesus said, I am what? The bread of life. Whoever eats
my flesh and drinks my blood, I live in him and he lives in
me. He has eternal life. And that's the only way you can
live. That's the gospel. Christ and him crucified and
all who look to him live. Look at a couple more places,
and I don't want to belabor this because it's so many places,
but in John chapter 12. In verse 24, we're talking about
what the gospel is, is Christ and Him crucified? In verse 24,
he says, Jesus said, in verse 23, Jesus answers him saying,
the hour has come. This was a common phrase he used,
the hour has come. History is about to be accomplished. The pole at the center of all
of God's history is about to be accomplished. The tent of
God's purposes hang on this. He says, the hour has come that
the Son of Man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say to you,
except the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides
alone, but if it dies, it brings forth much fruit. There you have
it. Christ and Him crucified. Look at verse 27. Now is my soul
troubled, and what, shall I say, Father, save me from this hour? But for this cause came I unto
this hour. This is the whole purpose. This
is the work God gave him to do. This is why he came. I'm not
going to ask to be delivered from this hour. This is the reason
I was born, is came into this world. And so he says in verse
28, Father, glorify thy name. Then came their voice from heaven
saying, I have both glorified it And I will glorify it again,
because the only one who can display his glory is the Father,
and he does it in the Son. The people therefore that stood
by heard it, said it thundered. Others said an angel spoke to
him. Jesus answered and said, this voice came not because of
me, but for your sakes. Now is the judgment of this world.
Now shall the prince of this world be cast out, and if I be
lifted up, from the earth will draw all unto me, and this, he
says, signifying what death he shall die." What is the Gospel?
What did Christ preach? He preached Himself. Himself,
the Son of Man, sent by God the Father to give life to His people,
to be the propitiation for our sins, and in giving His life
To declare to us what God has done in accomplishing our salvation
is Christ. It's Him crucified. This is the
correction of all religious nonsense. This is the way we live. Look
at Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1. I want to show
you this. In Romans chapter 1, you know
the book of Romans is an exposition of the gospel. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, which
he had promised to afford by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.
What was it concerning? His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord,
which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh
and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the
spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. That's a summation
of the gospel, isn't it? But look at verse 16. Paul says,
I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ. Why? It's the power
of God unto salvation. It's like the little kids, we
used to get these things, they were called, I can't remember
what they're called now, but you hit them with a hammer, caps
or something like that, and they had this little power in there
and they exploded. That was big. I got something
bigger. Watch this. So you're always
looking for that impressive thing as a kid. And so, of course,
your older siblings or your cousins, they've got something. They pull
something out. They light it. That's impressive. I'm not ashamed
of that. No, he's got a better one. The
gospel is the power of God. The power of God. How could anyone
possibly be ashamed of the power of God? Notice, the gospel, the
gospel, not your experience, not a religious commitment, what
Christ did and what God thought of him. Notice, he says this,
the gospel is the power of God into salvation. It accomplishes
something to everyone that believeth, that's all those saved by it,
to the Jew first, also to the Greek. Now, here's why. For therein
is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is
written, The just shall live by faith. The gospel is revealed
from heaven, it's declared, it's preached, it's set forth. Paul
told the Galatians, Jesus Christ has been evidently set forth,
crucified among you. We set forth Christ, who He is
in His person as the Son of God, in His offices as Christ, and
in His accomplishments as our mediator, as our surety, as we
do every week. We're looking to Christ. We're
trusting Him. We are expecting God by His written
word, which cannot be changed and cannot be broken, to honor
His word that He will receive us by what He provided and received
from His Son. Amazing. This is mind-boggling,
especially to a needy sinner. And it's the power of God to
everyone that believe it. Because with the Word comes the
power operating in us to convince us of our need and of Christ's
all-sufficiency. And we say, it's done. Notice
here though, the gospel is the power of God unto salvation,
so it's what Christ has done, declared to us, preached from
scripture, but he says, and this is why, because in it the righteousness
of God is revealed. Now, what is this righteousness?
We read words and often say them, and we don't know what we're
talking about, don't we? What is this righteousness of
God? Well remember, the work is God's work. Look at Luke chapter
2. They are asking them questions.
His mother, Mary and Joseph come to him looking for him. They
had not been able to find him. Verse 49, he said to them, how
is it that you sought me, wishing not that I must be about my father's
business, my father's work? This is his business. This has
been God's business. Known unto God are all of his
business from the foundation of the world. Right? Acts 15,
18. God knows what he's going to
do before he ever created the world. So what's done in time? That's just the unfolding of
what God determined would be done before time. And so what
God gave his son to do had not only been determined before time,
but this was his chief business. This was all of his work. This
is that stake in the tent of history and the purpose of God.
what God gave Christ to do. So he says, I must be about my
father's business. Look at John, the gospel of John
in chapter four. Jesus had come to the Samaritan
woman, sat on a well and told her that he was the Christ. She
ran away with great delight. He told me everything I ever
did. This must be the Christ. She was convinced. He said, I
am the Christ, but look in verse In the meanwhile, after he had
been talking with the woman that she had left, his disciples prayed
him, saying, Master, eat. And he said to them, I have meat
to eat that you know not of. Therefore said his disciples
one to another, has any man brought him ought to eat? Jesus said
to them, my meat is to do the will of him that sent me and
to finish his work. I must be about my father's business,
my meat and my drink. Everything I live for is to do
my father's will and to finish his work. Adam did not do that. Christ did. You see, this is
history. This is God working. This is
God's work. This is what was accomplished
by Christ and therefore whose righteousness is it? It is the
righteousness of God, because it is the work of God given to
Christ, fulfilled by Him, working out His Father's will. Look at
chapter five, John five and verse 36. I have greater witness than
that of John, for the works which the Father hath given me to finish,
the same works that I do bear witness of me that the Father
has sent me. And look at John chapter six
and verse 38. John 6, 38, I came down from heaven not to do my
own will, but the will of him that sent me. You see? And so
we saw in John chapter 12, unless a corn of wheat fall into the
ground and die, it abides alone. But if it died, it brings forth
much fruit. Look at John 17. John 17, verse
1. These words speak Jesus and lifted
up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hours come glorify
thy son, that thy son also may glorify thee. So God's going
to hold up his son. He's going to set him forth. And in his son, he's going to
make himself known. That's what the Lord Jesus Christ
is praying here. He's about to go to the cross.
He says, as thou has given him power over all flesh, that he
should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him,
because the gospel is for a chosen people. And this is a life eternal,
that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ,
whom thou hast sent. Notice, it's directing us not
to, that they might know themselves. No. What life is there in that? That's misery. That would be
like the apostle said, we would be of all men most miserable
if that's where life was. No, it's knowing Christ and God
in him. Verse four, I have glorified
thee on the earth. I have finished the work which
thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou
me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee
before the world was. And look at chapter 19, verse
28. 19, 28, after this, Jesus, knowing that
all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled,
he said, I thirst. Now there was set a vessel full
of vinegar. They filled the sponge with vinegar,
put it upon Hyssop, put it to his mouth. And verse 30, when
Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, it is finished. It is finished. What was finished?
The work God gave him to do. What was that work? The eternal
will of God. But what was that work? I want
to know. Christ died for our sins according
to the scriptures. Now, I don't know about you,
but that puts me completely at ease. This is the work of God. This work was finished. This
work was perfect. This work is done. This work
is declared. And I am directed by Christ himself,
the Son of God from heaven, who sits on heaven's throne, who
came in humiliation, willingly submitting himself in humility,
the meek and lowly one, And he says, I'm going to undertake,
I'm going to give myself a ransom for many. As the serpent hung
on the pole, the Son of Man, the Son of God, on the pole,
made sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
This is God's work. All of God's works are righteous
and holy. Psalm 145, verse 17. And so when
he speaks of this, he speaks about a finished work, a work
perfect, a work done by him once, never to be repeated, because
when he did this work, he gave himself. And what could be more
than the one in whom the fullness of the Godhead dwells to give
himself? Can you add to that? Hebrews
chapter 10, he says this in verse 5, When he cometh into the world,
he said this, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not, but a body
hast thou prepared me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices
for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come in the
volume of the book, from first to last, from the top of the
scroll to the bottom of the scroll, It is written of me to do thy
will, O God. And what was that will? Chapter
10, Hebrews 10. Above, when he said, Sacrifice
and offering, and burnt offerings, and offering for sin that wouldest
not, neither has pleasure therein which are offered by the law.
Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away
the first, that he may establish the second. By the which will
we are made holy. sanctified through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest stands
daily ministering, offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can
never take away sins. But this man, after he had offered
one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of
God. That's the gospel that corrects
every error. That's the power of God. That's
what we are to believe. And the power of God, the gospel
that is the power of God into salvation is not just for the
unbeliever who comes to that point in his life in conversion
and he believes the gospel. The power of God into salvation
is not just when we initially understand and believe the gospel.
In fact, it's mostly in our everyday life, throughout our life as
a believer. What are we to do? The power
of God unto our salvation is the gospel of what Christ did. It's not directing us inward,
it's directing us to Christ and Him crucified, having accomplished
the work and will of God. And so he says, by one offering
he has perfected forever them that are sanctified. Whereof
the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us, for after that he had
said before, this is the covenant that I will make with them after
those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts,
and in their minds will I write them, and their sins and iniquities
will I remember no more. Now, where remission of these
is, there is no more offering for sins, having therefore, brethren,
boldness to enter into the holiest, by what? By accomplishing some
great work for Christ? By becoming a pastor? Or by becoming
whatever in the eyes of men? By gaining some degrees in a
seminary? By having a religious experience
where I just feel so good? No. Those things must not only be
looked down upon, they must be repudiated, they must be abandoned,
forsaken, loathed. Because there's only one thing
God looks upon, only one thing God accepts, the only way we
can have access, the only propitiation for sins, the only remission
of our sins, the only reconciliation, the only justification and sanctification
of our sins, is Christ and Him crucified. He did it all. There's nothing left out. And
so he says in Colossians 2.9, the fullness of the Godhead dwells
in him and you are complete in him. He always directs us to
the only perfection ever accomplished in this world. That's the gospel. That's the way we live. This
is the power of God in the life of a believer. And this is what
Paul was determined to preach. Nothing else to you Corinthians. And so he corrects every error
with this. Amazing. Amazing. Now there's
one more verse in 1 Corinthians 15. We could go on and on, and
I know that you will, and we're gone, and I'm glad to hear it. 1 Corinthians 15. A couple of
verses here, verse 20. Now is Christ risen from the
dead, 1 Corinthians 15, 20, and become the first fruits of them
that slept. He's accomplished everything, He's already risen,
we're going to rise because of Him. For since by man came death,
that would be Adam, by man came also the resurrection of the
dead. It pleased God to undo what Adam did in another man,
Christ. Verse 22, for as in Adam all
died, that's what we were, we were born in Adam, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive. So it is written, the first Adam
was made a living soul. In the garden, when God created
Adam, he formed him from the dust of the earth and he breathed
into his nostrils a breath of life. He says, man became a living
soul. He says, the last Adam, now this
is a revelation that didn't come until here. The last Adam was
made or is a quickening spirit. When we were conceived in the
womb of our mother, nature, didn't we? And his father,
he received from his father, and so on and so on, back to
Adam. When Adam took that fruit, and
he ate that fruit, we were in Adam. God said, in the day you
eat, you shall surely die. When Adam ate, he died. His spirit died within him. He
had no spirit. He had a dead spirit. All those born to him, they were
born dead in sins. In iniquity did my mother conceive
me. In sin did my mother conceive
me, David said in Psalm 51. And so you and I were born into
this world flesh. That which is born of the flesh
is flesh. The natural man, that's what
we are by birth to our parent. How then do we become the children
of God? The Lord Jesus Christ is the
second Adam. He is the one, it says here,
he was made a quickening spirit. And in Romans 8, verse 10, it
says, if Christ be in you, if Christ be in you, the body is
dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. We receive the life of Christ
in us as an effect, as the result, the consequence of Christ having
died for our sins, been buried and put our sins away from the
memory of God, and risen again, seated on heaven's throne, and
as the King and Lord of all, saying His Spirit to give life
to the Chosen of God, that He might be glorified in their salvation,
and they hear the Gospel, and they believe. That's the power
of God. He sends the truth of his word
into their hearts, and they know that Christ is everything, and
they cling to him, and they continue in this. God did it, as Kevin
pointed out. The gifts and qualities of God
are without repentance. God has done a man that he should
lie, neither the Son of Man that he should repent, as he said,
and shall he not do it? And so we see this. The Lord
has spoken. He has spoken the gospel concerning
his son by the which we're saved. What a blessing it is.