I am speaking to you today from
the book of Romans, chapter 1. Romans, chapter 1. I hope you
have a Bible and follow along with me. Now, if someone is truly
interested in knowing who God is, what He is like, who Jesus
Christ is, what the truth is. If there's someone who is truly
interested, and they were to ask me what to read in the Bible
and where to begin, I would tell them to begin in the book of
Romans. I would tell them to get a King
James Bible and begin in Romans chapter 1, and begin reading
slowly, carefully, and prayerfully, asking God to reveal the truth
to you. For no man can figure it out
of his self. God must reveal it. Now, hopefully
there's someone listening right now who desires to hear the truth
of the matter, what God's Word truly says. In Romans chapter
1, beginning with verse 1, The Holy Spirit is speaking through
a man named Paul, and he writes, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ. Paul, he says. He doesn't refer
to himself as the most right, reverend, father, doctor Paul. No, just Paul. The Lord Jesus
Christ, speaking to his disciples in Matthew 23, plainly told them Be not called Rabbi, for one
is your Master, even Christ." He said, Call no man Father upon
the earth. One is your Father which is in
heaven. And the Scripture forbids us to use titles such as Reverend. Psalm 111 verse 9 says, Holy
and Reverend is His name. God's name. Reverend means one
who deserves profound respect or awe. God alone is to be had
in awe and deserves profound respect. So Paul begins this
way. Paul, simply Paul, a servant
of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle or a messenger sent
by Jesus Christ. Paul, called to be an apostle. Someone once said, an old preacher
once said, no prophet ever applied for the job. The prophets were
not hired by men, except Balaam, that is, that false prophet.
The prophets were not hired by men. They were not trained in
a school and given a diploma of prophecy. No, they were called,
equipped, and sent by God himself. And the same with the apostles.
And the same with every true preacher of the gospel. And this
is how you'll know if God called that man. This is how you'll
know. The same way it was with the
apostle Paul. In verse 1, he continues by saying,
I'm called to be an apostle separated unto the gospel of God. Separated unto the gospel of
God. This is what separates true preachers
from false ones. This is what separated the true
apostles from many who claimed to be so. It was their message,
their message separated unto the gospel of God. Now, Paul
was not a politician. He was not into politics. Paul
was not in the entertaining business. Paul was not a socializer, per
se. But Paul was a preacher, and
a preacher of the gospel. He said, I'm separated. I'm sold
out, too. I'm taken up with the gospel. The gospel, which he is about
to define in these few verses. In another book, he said, now
there's another gospel. There's some preaching another
gospel. But right now, he's going to tell us what the gospel is.
He calls it here in Romans 1, verse 1, the gospel of God. The gospel, as with everything,
begins with God and ends with God, and all else in between. The gospel is not of man, by
man, or concerning man, or what man can do, must do, ought to
do for God or for Jesus. But the gospel, the gospel of
God, is the message of what God has done for some dead, helpless,
hopeless sinner. So Paul calls it the gospel of
God. It's God's gospel. He purposed
it. God the Son purchased it. And God the Holy Spirit applies
it. It's God's gospel. Paul says,
I am separated. unto the gospel of God. He said, Woe is unto me if I
preach not the gospel. The gospel which declares who
God is and what God has done. Alright, read on with me. In
verse 2 he says, It's the gospel of God which he had promised
before by his prophets in the Holy Scripture. The gospel which
God promised before by his prophets. Now the Old Testament is not
just a book or merely a book of Jewish history. No. The Old Testament is his. story, or the story of the coming
Christ, the prophecies and promises concerning the Lord Jesus Christ
who was to come. Now, the apostles only had one
Bible to preach from, the Old Testament. They preached from
Old Testament scriptures, the books of Moses and the prophets
and the Psalms. And they preached Christ from
those books. Christ Himself, when He was walking
on the road to Emmaus with two of His disciples, it says in
Luke 24 that He began in the books of Moses and in the Psalms
and the Prophets. Now, that's the whole Old Testament.
And it says, he began to expound unto them the things concerning
himself. He said, they are they, or that
is the Old Testament book, are they which testify of me. So this is an old, old gospel. The gospel of the Old Testament.
Yes, same gospel in the New is the gospel of the Old. You see,
the Old Testament types, the Old Testament stories, like the
woman's seed. That's the first mention of the
gospel is when God Almighty preached to Adam and Eve of the woman's
seed which was to come. That's Christ. Abel's sacrifice,
Noah's ark, the Passover lamb, serpent on a pole. The whole
Old Testament is a picture of Jesus Christ. The Old Testament
says someone is coming. The gospels say He's here. And the epistles And the revelations
say, He's coming again. So it is God's gospel, it's the
old, old gospel, the Old Testament gospel. And verse 3 says, it
is concerning His or God's Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, which
was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. He says
it's concerning God's Son. Now again, the gospel is not
concerning what man must do to be saved. Man cannot do anything
to be saved. If you're lost, you can't save
yourself, can you? You must be found. Someone must
find you. If you're dead, you cannot give
life to yourself. Someone must give life to you
or quicken you, as Ephesians says. The gospel is not concerning
what man must do to be saved. but what Jesus Christ did to
save his people. That's what makes it gospel or
good news to hopeless sinners. Now, self-righteous, independent
religious folk don't need this gospel, but hopeless sinners
do. The gospel, therefore, is concerning
God's Son, who He is. Why He came? What He did for
His people? Who He is? Why, He's God. That's
who He is. Isaiah 25 says, This is our God. He'll save us. Only God can. Why did He come? He came to save
His people. That's what He said over and
over and over. God chose a people, elected a
people, gave them to Jesus Christ in a covenant before the world
began, and Christ came here to save those people. What did He
do when He got here? He saved them. Because Scripture
says when He was hanging on the cross, He declared these words,
It is finished. Christ saved His people. He did all God required of him
to save his people. That righteousness they needed,
Christ fulfilled it, and he imputed it to them. They deserved to
die for their sins. Christ died in their place, in
their sin. So, the gospel, THE gospel, is
concerning God's Son, what He did. what he must do for helpless
sinners, which was made, the Scripture says, of the seed of
David, according to the flesh. This declares him to be who he
is, the right one, the true Christ, which the Old Testament Scriptures
only can tell us of. Now, verse 4. We conclude with
this verse in verse 4. It says, The gospel, the gospel
of God, the Old Testament gospel, which concerns God's Son, Jesus
Christ, our Lord, declares Him, look at verse 4 with me, it declares
Him to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit
of holiness, according to a perfect or holy life, which no man ever
did live or ever can live, but only God, the God-man, did. And by the resurrection from
the dead, God declared He was accepted by raising Him from
the dead. Now, this Gospel declares Him
to be the Son of God with power. Power. How much power? All. Power. Oh no, he's not just
a powerful man. He is power personified. He has all power. He said that
in John 17 verse 2. He said all power. Thou hast given Him, or the Son,
all power, power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life
to as many as Thou hast given Me." Now, the false gospel, the
false gospel tells men what they must do with Jesus, or that they
must do something for or with Jesus. The gospel declares what
the Lord Jesus Christ has done for His people. Another gospel
or the false gospel says, you make Him Lord. Won't you make
Him Lord? The gospel declares that God
has declared Him to be Lord. Another gospel, a false gospel,
says, won't you let him into your heart? Well, the gospel,
the true gospel, says that the king's heart, even, is in the
hands of the Lord. A false gospel says that he can,
if you'll let him. The gospel says, I will, and
you shall. Another gospel says he cannot
do it without you. The gospel says without me you
can't do it. So this is God's gospel. It's
the Old Testament gospel. It's concerning who Jesus Christ
is and what he did. and declaring Him to be the Son
of God with all power over all flesh. If you want this message
on cassette tape, write to us and we'll send it to you free
of charge. Until next Sunday, goodbye.