Just What is the Gospel?

THE GOOD NEWS (The Gospel)

The Good News is God's message for all people in all places. You can remember the Gospel by reminding yourself of these four points: God, man, Christ, response.

GOD – There is only one God and He has revealed Himself in the Bible. He is the Holy One, who is both transcendent and immanent. He is the creator of all and as Creator He has established the laws by which His creation is to operate, therefore He is the Lawgiver. As the Lawgiver He is also the Judge who will hold His creation accountable for their attitudes and actions.

MAN – All people have been created by God and for God. But man has rebelled against His Lord and stands guilty of breaking His laws (by lying, stealing, lusting, not honoring God above everything else, etc…). All sin must be punished and so man, on his own, stands guilty before God and without hope.

CHRIST – Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity and God’s Son, came to earth 2,000 years ago in human flesh to live the perfect life that people could not live and to die on the cross bearing the anger of God for the sins of men. He was buried and He rose from the dead three days later. He did this to display the justice and mercy of God in saving a people from their sins.

RESPONSE – The Bible tells us that we are to repent and believe. Repentance carries the idea of changing our minds, that is recognizing that we are guilty sinners and desiring to stop dishonoring the Lord. In repentance we seek to turn from our sins and in belief we turn to God. We believe that when Jesus Christ died that He took our sins with Him upon the cross and bore the wrath of God that we deserve. We believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that only through His sacrifice can we gain forgiveness of sins and eternal life. We are granted eternal life, not because we are good people, but because we are bad people who have been forgiven by the good God.