I wanna direct your attention
back to the passage that Brother David read, 1 Corinthians 1,
and I'm going to, my main text is verse 17, where the Apostle
Paul, by inspiration of the Spirit, wrote these words to the church
at Corinth. He says, for Christ sent me not
to baptize, but to preach the gospel. That's the title of the
message, to preach the gospel. Not with wisdom of words, not
with human wisdom. That's what he's talking about
there. High sounding words that most of the time disguise the
gospel. Human wisdom, human rationalizations. So not with wisdom of words.
When we preach the true gospel, we're preaching the wisdom of
God. It's not the wisdom of my words. And he says, not with
wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none
effect. The preaching of the cross, he
says, is to them that are perishing foolishness, but unto us which
are saved or being saved, as the tense would go, in the process
of God saving us and keeping us and bringing us to glory.
It's the power of God. As I said, when we, sung that
hymn, I love to tell the story. That's what I'm talking about.
I love to preach the gospel. There are some who haven't heard
it, the song says, and that's true. You know, I was taught,
and I believe rightly so, by my former pastor, that I'm never
to assume that everyone in my audience has heard the gospel.
Some have never heard. Some of you may have heard it
and still don't believe it. You need it. And then those of
you who have heard it and believe it, it's just as fresh to you. I mean, I'm not just using poetic
language here to us. I want to hear Christ preached. I want to hear the gospel. The
gospel is a specific message. You know, the word gospel means
good news. There's a lot of good news, there's
a lot of bad news, but there's a lot of good news. The gospel's
not just any good news, it's a specific message. And it's
used of God to bring his people to know him. To know God. To fellowship with God. That's
what we lost in the garden with Adam, isn't it? Fellowship with
God. Adam fell and the whole human race fell in him into sin
and death and alienation from God. So the gospel is used by
the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, to bring God's people to know
God, to know who He is, what He's like, not just our thoughts,
not just our surmisings. I've had people tell me when
I read scripture or preach the gospel, they say, well, I don't
believe God'll do that. Well, if He says He'll do it,
you can mark it down, He'll do it. There are people who claim to
believe the gospel, claim to be Christians who really either
hate or twist or ignore certain doctrines of the scripture because
they don't like what it says about God and they don't like
what it says about them. But my friend, what you believe
and think doesn't change the truth. You know, I've always told you
about that church sign I saw one time. It said, God said it,
I believe it, that settles it. Wrong. God said it, that settles
it. Hope you believe it. Pray that
the Holy Spirit will bring you to believe it. Make it precious
to you. The gospel is a specific message
used of God to bring his people to know him as the God who justifies
the ungodly. What is it to be justified? Do
you want to be justified before God? What does that really mean? I say this on our television
program all the time. I hope somebody out there may
hear it sometime. To be justified means to be forgiven by God now. We want to forgive one another
our trespasses, don't we? That's part of love of the brethren.
Forgive like Christ. But here's what the gospel teaches. It teaches how a sinner who deserves
nothing but death and hell can be justified before God. So what
is it to be just? It means to be forgiven of all
my sins, don't stop there now, on a just ground. And what is that just ground?
The blood of Jesus Christ. That's it. It's not your faith. That's what most people preach
today. They'll say Christ's blood really didn't save anybody. They
say, oh, he died for everybody. Now all you got to do is kick
it into gear with your faith. Not so. You don't see that in
this book now. You might hear it from a lot
of pulpits. To be forgiven of all my sins on one ground. What
can wash away my sins? Nothing. but the blood of Jesus. And then to be just, now that's
what we might call the negative side. It's not negative in the
sense that we're forgiven. Our sins are washed away, put
away by the death of Christ on the cross. How did God do that?
By a legal act of imputation. He charged the debt of the sins
of his people to Christ. And Christ paid the debt. Jesus
paid it all. He paid it all. By one offering,
He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. Can you
get any plainer than that? People today, they hear a gospel
that really brings it all down to them. What I do or what I
decide to do or what I try to do. And if I don't do it, then
God's up there crying. That's not the Bible. That's
not the God of this book. then you got to keep on keeping
on and if you don't keep on keep no by one offering who's offering
not yours his offering of himself unto the father he hath perfected
finished completed forever them that are sanctified. What does
that mean? Who's sanctified? Those whom God set apart and
gave to him. He said, all that the father
giveth me shall come to me and him that cometh to me, I will
in no wise cast out. He said, this is the will of
the father, which has sent me that of all which he has given
me, I should lose nothing, but raise it up again at the last
day. Isn't that comforting to you? You know, that's how Paul
starts this off, this letter. This Corinthian church, well,
they had a lot of problems. You ever read the book of Corinthians?
I mean, this was a church, you wonder how in the world they
could survive. I bet there were groups split off of this church. It's like our day, you know.
All kinds of churches, you know, they split off of other churches.
My friend, the gospel wasn't preached to begin with, but here
it was. And he writes them starting out
with his usual salutation about grace and peace because grace
is the gift of God. It's based upon, and from that
grace, we have peace with God by the blood of Christ. He speaks
positively to them. He says, you've got a lot of
people here. You've got a lot of gifts. Gifts
of ministry is what he's talking about. You're not behind anybody on
the giving of gifts. But he says there's a real problem
here. There's a division here. And you know what it's over?
Preachers. It's over preachers. That's a common problem. You
know the worst thing? Let's put it this way. One of
the main things that you as a believer need to avoid following a man
and not following Christ. And I've seen it happen so many
times. A young lady up in Ashland who
said that, who was thinking about leaving the church when I was
pastor there, and she said, well, I'm gonna wait and see what so-and-so
does before I leave. And I said, well, is so-and-so
your savior? One of the elders. What does
God say? That's the issue, isn't it? You
say, well, aren't people following me? I hope not, but here's what
I'm doing. I'm just a signpost pointing
you to Christ. Don't look to me for salvation.
And that's what Paul says. If you look over here, he says,
there's a divisions here. Look at verse 12, chapter one.
Now this, I say that every one of you say, I'm a Paul. Some
say, well, I follow Paul. Others say, no, I follow Apollos. I'm not gonna follow Paul. Well,
here's the problem. Paul and Apollos preach the same
gospel. Some say, I follow Cephas. That's the Greek name for Peter.
And then some people say, well, I don't follow anybody. I follow
Christ. And the issue, that's what we do. We follow Christ.
But what they would say, these here, well, I'm not gonna listen
to anybody. I'm just gonna listen to Christ. That's a proud, spiritual,
Essene is what they would call him back then, you know. No,
I'll follow any man who follows Christ, who points me to Christ,
that's what I mean. And you're not following the
man, you're following Christ. But he says, is Christ divided? Christ has a body, he's the head
and we're the body. Is he divided? We're all one in Christ. If we're
believers, we're one with him in the eyes of God's law and
justice. We're one with him spiritually. We believe the same Christ. And
he says, was Paul crucified for you? If you're a follower of
Paul, is he your savior? Was he crucified for you? Or
were you baptized in the name of Paul? Now here he's talking
about water baptism. What we do back up here in the
baptistry. when somebody comes and says,
I believe in Christ and I want to confess him in believer's
baptism. That's what that's about. How do you know he's talking
about water baptism here? He says, verse 14, he says, I
thank God I baptized none of you. Now, if you come to me and
say you want to be baptized, I'm the one that's baptizing
you. But if I'm baptizing you water, it's because I believe
you've already been baptized by the Spirit of God. Baptized
into Christ and I don't do that. I don't have that power Even
though John the Baptist didn't have that power didn't know what
he said. He said I can baptize you in water But there's one
coming who can baptize you in the Spirit. That's Christ So
Paul says I thank God that I baptized none of you now if there's any
statement in the scripture That tells you that water baptism
is is not necessary for salvation, it's right there. I thank God
I baptized you, none of you. Now, if water baptism was part
of being saved, something you had to do to be saved, I guarantee
you Paul wouldn't have said, he said, I'm going to get out
and baptize everybody I can. He'd be like these preachers
today, get them down the aisle and get them into baptistry. And
that's not right. He says, I thank God I baptized
none of you but Crispus and Gaius, lest any of you should say I
had baptized in my own name. He said, I baptized also the
household of Stephanus. Besides, I know not whether I
baptized. Paul didn't keep a tally. He
said, besides that, I don't really know if I baptized in it. He
might have, maybe not. I couldn't tell you everybody
I baptized over these 35 years or more. I baptized some of y'all. But
here's the point, verse 17, Christ didn't send me to baptize. He
didn't send me to dunk you in water. He sent me to preach the
gospel. Because baptism is not the power
of God unto salvation, the gospel is. And I know what that denomination
that calls itself the Church of Christ, they say you gotta
be baptized to be saved. And they use two verses that
they take out of context, Acts 2.38 and Mark, what is it, 16.15,
I think. He that believeth in his baptism.
What he's talking about there is if you really believe the
gospel, you're to confess Christ in believer's baptism. Your confession
doesn't save you. You're confessing that you've
already been saved by the grace of God. That's what water baptism.
Catholic Church, they sprinkle babies because they think that
delivers them from original sin. But water, physical water won't
deliver you from anything except from being dry. And that's it. Baptism, water
baptism, the confession is to be immersion because it's a picture
of the death, the burial, and resurrection of Christ. That's
what it's for. And in Acts 2.38, he didn't say be baptized for
the forgiveness of sins. He says, be baptized in the name
of Jesus Christ for the remission of sin. The remission of sins
is Christ. Baptism is confessing that. So
Paul says, I thank God I didn't baptize any one of you. That's
not what I'm sent for. I'm here to preach the gospel.
I'm not here to get you down the aisle and get you in the
baptistry. I'm here preaching the gospel, praying that in the
power of the Holy Spirit, it will be, as Paul wrote in Ephesians
1, the gospel of your salvation. The power of God unto salvation. And I know I make a lot of people
mad when I do this, but I'm gonna do it anyway. I'm gonna tell
you, first of all, just a few things the gospel is not. The
gospel is not God loves you and Christ died for you. That's not
the gospel. That doesn't help anybody. You
won't find that in the scripture. You don't find any example of
evangelism where one of God's true preachers stood before a
group of people and said, smile, God loves you. Christ died for
you. That's not in the Bible. That's
a concoction of man to get numbers into their church. You see, we
want to have more than the church down there. That's what that
kind of thinking does. The gospel is not that salvation
is conditioned on you. You believing, repenting, perseverance,
no. The gospel is not a proclamation
of something you have to do. It's a proclamation of something
somebody has already done and his name is Jesus Christ. John
19, 30, it is finished. He did it and his people will
come to him. The gospel is not God loves you
and has a wonderful plan for your life. I don't know what
God has planned for you. I know if you're one of his chosen,
I know his plan for you ultimately is to enter glory by the righteousness
of Christ. Somebody said, well, the gospel's
the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. Paul says down in
here, he says we preach Christ crucified. Well, what about his
resurrection, Paul? Well, that's included because
we preach a living Christ who was crucified. He lives, he lives. Christ Jesus lives today. But
that one who lives today, who's seated at the right hand of the
Father today, having finished the work, he was crucified unto
death, but he conquered death. Let me give you these points.
This is the gospel as empowered by the Holy Spirit, not empowered
by my eloquence. not empowered by any man's words,
but empowered by the Holy Spirit. You remember Romans 1, 16 and
17? Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel of Christ, the good news of Christ, for it, the gospel,
is the power, the dynamis, or the dynamite of God unto salvation
to everyone that believeth. In other words, how do I know
if the preaching of the gospel has been made by the Spirit of
God to be the power of God unto my salvation. You know how I
know that? You believe. That's the gift of faith. So
it's the power of God unto salvation to everyone, to the Jew first
and the Greek or the Gentile also. There's no racial, sexual,
there's no economic division or barrier, it's all one. It's
the same salvation for anybody whom God intends to save. And
he says in verse 17, for therein, in that gospel, is the righteousness
of God revealed from faith to faith. That's from knowledge
revealed, that's the first faith, to knowledge believed, that's
the second faith, the gift of God. For it is written, the just,
the justified shall live by faith. I'll tell you what, I'll never
forget when I really first read that under the preaching of the
truth, I said, you know what, I better learn what that means.
Well, here it is. The gospel. The gospel is a word
of conviction. God uses it by the power of the
Spirit who comes from Christ to convince us of something that
we didn't believe before. For example, this is, first of
all, the gospel is an indictment against us in our sinfulness. in light of the justice of God.
As I said, we fell by Adam into a state of sin and death and
depravity. The gospel tells us that we're
all guilty, that we all come short of the glory of God. You've
heard that, Romans 3.23, we all sin and come short of the glory
of God. What does that mean? Well, that just means we're all
sinners. Well, it does, but put it in the right context. Here's
what it means. Romans 3.23, we've all sinned. Now that word, there's several
words in the New Testament used for sin. But that word sin is
the most, in Romans 3.23, is the most popular. It's used more
times than any other word for sin. And you know what it means?
We have all missed the mark. We have all fallen short of the
glory of God. And where are you going to find
the glory of God? In the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
So what it means is this, it doesn't mean just generally we're
all sinners, that's true. It means this, it means that
no matter how good we try to be, it means no matter how much
we try to keep the law, it means that no matter how much of a
good person that I try to be in every aspect of my life, no
matter how good, I'm still gonna fall short of the mark. That's
what it means. And what is the mark? Righteousness. And what is righteousness? It's
the perfection of the law that can only be found in one person,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And how did he reach that perfection? Well, as God manifest in the
flesh, he kept the law perfectly and he obeyed it unto death. You've not kept the law perfectly.
I've not kept the law perfectly. We're all sinners. And that alone tells you we haven't
measured up to the mark. You see, false religion, let
me tell you two things about a false gospel. False Christianity. Number one, it always makes salvation
at some stage to some degree in some way conditioned on man
and woman, sinners. That right there tips you off.
This is not the true gospel if they're doing that. You see,
the true gospel says that all the conditions of the salvation
of Christ's sheep, his church, God's elect, was conditioned
on Christ and he fulfilled those conditions so as to ensure their
salvation. So that's the first thing a false
gospel will do. It'll make salvation conditioned
on something you do or decide to do. And the second thing that
a false gospel does, it is always measures righteousness, goodness,
or holiness on a sliding scale. And that's not in the scripture.
Righteousness is the perfection of the law that can only be found
in Christ. That's why Jeremiah said, he's
the Lord, our righteousness. That's why Paul said in Philippians
three, oh, that I may know him and be found in him, not having
my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is
through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, what he accomplished.
I stand before God, washed in His blood and clothed in His
righteousness, imputed to me, charged to me. Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies.
Who can condemn? It's Christ that died. Yea, rather He's risen
again, seated at the right hand of the Father, ever living to
make intercession. The gospel says that we're all guilty and
we've all earned and deserve eternal damnation. Did you know
that? That's what the gospel says. It tells us that no works
that we can ever perform at our best can save us or make us righteous
before God. That's what the gospel says.
Now, someone might argue that the law tells us that. Not really. Man by nature, in our unbelief,
in our darkness, in our self-righteousness, will look at the law and you
know what we'll conclude? Well, if I try my best, that's
gotta count for something. That's what Paul did, he said,
I thought I was alive because I thought I was keeping the law.
I had a man tell me one time, he said, well, I know I'm not
perfect, but I've never done anything that deserves going
to hell. I said, you better read the scripture. Man at his best
state, the Bible says, is altogether what? Vanity, worthless. But when the Holy Spirit through
the revelation of Jesus Christ crucified and risen from the
dead as the righteousness of God. You know what happens? Remember Paul in chapter three
of Philippians? He said, I thought I was keeping
the law. I was a Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee. I was touching the
law. Everything that was good circumcised
the eighth day. He said, but when I saw the righteousness
of the law fulfilled by Jesus Christ, All of that I count as
nothing, even but dung that I may win Christ. That's what the gospel says.
It takes the light of Christ and his righteousness to convince
us of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. It tells us
that we're so spiritually dead, so sinfully depraved that we
will not believe God unless God does a sovereign, powerful work
by the Spirit in the new birth. You must be born again. But now, if that were the only
message of the gospel, it wouldn't be the gospel, why? Because the
word gospel is good news, and just telling me about my sin
and what I deserve and earn is eternal damnation. That's not
good news, is it? You see, the gospel is good news
because secondly, it's a word of enlightenment. It's a word
of conviction. But it's the revelation of God's
grace. God's love, God's mercy to save
His chosen people through and by the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
what we said. I'm not ashamed of the Gospel
of Christ. That title Christ means the Messiah,
the Anointed One, the Savior. And in that Gospel is revealed
the righteousness of God. Not the righteousness of man,
and what is the righteousness of God? It's the entire merit,
value, worthiness of what Christ by himself accomplished in his
obedience unto death for his people, his sheep. As their surety,
you know what he did? He took our debt, our sin debt,
and paid it in full. As our substitute, took our place. Under the law, he was made under
the law to redeem them that were under the law, died the death
that we've earned and deserved, and as our redeemer, he accomplished
it. He redeemed his people. He didn't
make a stab at it. He didn't try to save you if
you'll let him. No, and that's not biblical.
That's what false preachers preach. The righteousness of God is the
work of Christ as God manifests in the flesh. It involves who
Christ is and what he accomplished on the cross. God in his sovereignty, he says,
I'll have mercy on whom I will. I'll be gracious to whom I will.
It's not of him that runneth, nor of him that willeth, but
of God that showeth mercy. Now here's what I need to be
concerned with. See, people here, that's in Romans 9. That speaks
of God's sovereignty. God chooses whom he'll save.
That's what the book says. You can get mad at me for that,
but I didn't write that. But he says this, it's not of
him that runneth, that means the works of man, nor of him
that willeth, that means the will of man. That's not what's
gonna save you, but it's of God who showeth mercy. Now, what
I need to be concerned with is, first of all, I know I'm a sinner. I know I deserve nothing but
death and hell. I know that my works cannot save
me. Where am I gonna find God's mercy? What is that mercy? You remember
the old mercy seed in the tabernacle? It covered the Ark of the Covenant.
The high priest would come in there one time a year on the
Day of Atonement, and what would he do? He'd sprinkle the blood
of the Lamb. That's a picture of Christ. That's
where God's mercy... Christ is the mercy seat for
sinners. You seeking mercy? Do you need
mercy? You want to experience the love of God? The grace of
God? Well, the Bible says, as sin
hath reigned unto death, so might grace reign through righteousness,
justice satisfied unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our
Lord. The Bible says that Christ is the end of the law, the finishing
of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe it.
And that believing is the gift of faith. In fact, here's the
third thing, the gospel is a command. It's a conviction, it's a revelation.
God made Christ sin that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him. God gave him our sin, imputed it to him, and imputes
righteousness to his people. How do you know he's done that?
You'll come to believe this gospel. That's the evidence. And thirdly,
the gospel is a command from God for sinners to believe. Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. Repent of dead works and idolatry. There is no salvation apart from
believing, but that believing's a gift from God. It excludes
all the works that sinners do or try to do as any part of the
ground or cause of salvation. It excludes baptism. If you truly
believe in Christ, you know that water baptism won't save you.
Water baptism will not wash away your sins. The blood of Christ
has already done that. If you truly have the gift of
faith, what does it say? Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, for by
grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It's
the gift of God. lest any man should boast. Not
of works, lest any man should boast. That's what it says. It tells us that faith is a gift
of God. Repentance is a gift of God.
Perseverance is a gift of God. It's all the fruit and the evidence
of what Christ has already accomplished to save His people from their
sins. You've got to have ears to hear and eyes to see. You've
got to have life. Where does that come from? comes from Christ. He said, I am the way, the truth,
and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. So yes, the gospel is a command. Believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved. And then fourthly,
the gospel provides the motivation for all godliness and all acceptable
obedience. Turn to Colossians 3. Now, I
could come up here every Sunday And I could read you a list of
rules and regulations. And I could get into some human
psychology and give you 10, 11, 12 step programs. But that's not going to motivate
God's people to obedience. You know what is? How did Paul
start 1 Corinthians? This church had a bunch of problems
and Paul's going to address them all. But he starts off with,
listen, listen, it's the gospel, it's Christ within you, the grace
of God. And look here in verse one of
Colossians 3, if you then be risen with Christ, in other words,
if he represented you as he died, was buried and rose again, and
you have life within, seek those things which are above, where
Christ sitteth on the right hand of God, set your affection, your
mind, your heart, your will on things above, not on things of
the earth, for you are dead. How am I dead? I died with Christ.
He died for me. The law cannot condemn me. Its
penalty has been fully fulfilled in the death of Christ. And your
life is hid with Christ. And God, I'm safe and secure
in Christ. When Christ, who is our life,
he's coming again, shall appear, then shall you also appear with
him in glory. The assurance of salvation by
the grace of God. And then he says in verse five,
mortified therefore your members which are upon the earth, fornication.
Put these things to death. Fight them. Seek to obey God. Because why? Because if you don't,
you can't be saved. No. Because you already are saved. And you're already secure in
the grace of God through the blood and the righteousness of
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why. That's how it all
comes about. That's the gospel. That's what
Christ sent me to preach. The gospel.