GOSPEL
The Gospel
The gospel is the centre theme of the Scripture. It is the gospel that helps us to understand about – God and His plan in our life. The centre theme of the bible is new life in Jesus Christ. Gospel helps us to receive new life in Jesus Christ and also to walk in newness of life. The meaning of the word “Gospel” is “good news”. Before ascending to heaven, Jesus told his disciples to be witnesses to the ends of the earth. ( Acts 1:6-11). In the great commission, Jesus told his disciples to share the gospel (Mt. 28:18-20).
So making disciples is our primary job as disciples. And the first step to make a disciple is to tell someone about Jesus. You can’t make a disciple of Jesus unless you tell them the Gospel.
Apostle Paul mentioned gospel – 1 Corinthians 15: 1-4
Also in book of acts gospel is practically mentioned in many places- Acts 2:36-41, Acts 3:12-26, Acts 5:29-32, Acts 8:30-38, Acts 10:34-44, Acts 13:16-43, Acts 16:30-34, Acts 17:22-34
1. problem- Sin
How sin entered into the world
How we are sinful (Actual+ Adamic)
Any way out from sinful life
2. solution –Jesus
Why Jesus came and died in our place
Why Jesus only can take our sins away
3. Application- Receiving
Repent – Baptized -Obey Jesus
How one responds to the gospel determines the destiny of the person. Sometimes people preach half the gospel by telling them to “only believe”. But the intellectual believing gospel doesn’t change you.
Whatever method you use, make sure the response you ask is
1) Repentance
2) Water baptism
3) Holy Spirit baptism
Presentation of the Gospel: It may be differing from person to person, and situation to situation, but the main components remain the same.
There are many ways to share the gospel:
- Tell the Story of the Bible story
- Four Spiritual Laws – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUaJCh-EPVA
- Torben’s Cups – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaEixMWSQ00
- Torben’s Cards – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNme1cRSODI
- Evangelism Explosion 5 Fingers Heaven is a free gift; Man is a sinner; God is loving but just; Christ died for our sins; faith is trusting Jesus alone for salvation –https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrVQTFNNFLg
- Three Circles – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W8ynRMr59k
You can choose any method which you finds good.
Which way we should not react?
- Not sinner’s prayer
- Not receiving Jesus in heart
- Just telling people to believe in Jesus
- Not just invitation to church service etc.
The gospel includes the Problem of sin- the solution of Jesus – application to receive new life.
Now, what are the myths of sharing the gospel?
- You need to know many things from the bible/ need to be a mature Christian
- You need to be very loving
- You need to give hospitality
- You need to call the person in your church building
- If you are not able to answer any question etc.
It is true that you need to be loving, hospitable, having knowledge and able to answers from the bible but these are the reason people should receive Gospel. We need to share the right Gospel that will touch their lives. We need to understand that the Gospel itself has power. It doesn’t need anything extra to convince people about the gospel.
Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.
As we will share the gospel we will face the following –
- Tough questions
- Rejections
- Persecution, Insults
How to react to it?
- Try to understand why the listener is rejecting the message.
- You can help him to understand his problem
- You may leave him for some time and approach him again
- You may have to avoid the person
We are also called to operate in the spirit. So during sharing the gospel, we can heal the sick and deliver demons.
A pattern of Gospel :
In the beginning the God created the heaven and the earth. He created all the plants, animals everything on this face of the earth. He also created first man and woman. All things were good. There was no sickness/ depression or war in the garden.
Man and woman used to live together in a place called Garden of Eden. Man walked with God daily( Gen 3:8). They were having fellowship with God. God told them to work in that place and multiply. God gave authority and responsibility. There were many trees in the garden. God told them to eat fruits from all the trees. There were two special trees in the middle of the garden – tree of life and tree of knowledge of good and evil. God told them not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. If they will eat, then they would die. Man and woman were not stuck to God but they had a free will to choose to love and obey God or to rebel and disobey God.
The enemy (satan) entered the garden. The enemy put doubts in the mind of the woman and tempted her to eat from the tree of knowledge. So man and woman choose to disobey God and ate from the tree of knowledge. As they ate from the tree, sin and death entered them (Gen 3:7, Romans 5:12). Because of sin in them, they now cannot have fellowship with holy and righteous God. Man and woman were kicked out from the garden. Angels were deployed to guard the tree of life. If they were allowed to eat from the tree of life in the sinful condition then they would have lived forever in the sinful state.
So now the man and woman went out and started living in the fallen world. The world becomes sinful and fallen because of Man’s sin. Present time we are also living in a sinful world where we can see so much evil around and people hurt each other. Man and woman given birth to children. Because of first man’s sin all children were born with sin nature. Everybody born as human is having sin nature inside. We as human being are bound to sin, we cannot get freedom from it by our own strength( Roman 7).
In general we compare ourselves with others and we do not find it so bad( 2 Corinthians 10:12). But God is going to judge us in a different way. We are going to stand before the holy and righteous God and he is going to judge us with His perfect standard ( 2 Corinthians 5:10).
When we sin, it is not the sin that counts but who we do it against- small kids, police, boss, spouses, judge, God. The great the authority of the person, the greater the consequences when we sin against them.
How we will feel if our life video is played in front of our friends and families? We all will feel ashamed and fearful. So we are ashamed in front of sinful people for our sins. What will happen when we will stand before God for judgments?
Now who will save us from all these? We ourselves cannot. We need someone who can help us. There is good news, and the good news is Jesus.
God loves us so much that he sends his son Jesus as the cure of our sin( John 3:16). Jesus was born of man and God( Mat 1:18). So he had not the same sin DNA as Adam. He had an open relationship with God, just like Adam and Eve had in the garden of Eden before they rebelled against God and sin entered the World.
Jesus had the nature of God. (Philippians 2:6)
Before he began his ministry he was baptized (fully immersed) in water and in Holy Spirit ( Mathew 3:16). He then went around sharing Gospel, healing the sick and casting demons.
Then after 3 years, Jesus was arrested by religious leaders. They could not find any fault in Him. He was sinless (1 Peter 2:22, 2Cor 5:21, Heb 4:15, 1 John 3:5, John 19:4, Matthew 27:24,1 Peter 1:18-19). The religious leaders persuaded the authorities to crucify Jesus. He died like a criminal. He died for our sins.
He was buried in a cave. But he rose again after 3 days. Te death has no power on him, because he has not done any sin. He justified us. He rose again and moved with his disciples for some time. After that one day he left the earth and went to haven. He told his disciples that he is sending His spirit on earth to empower them and make them His witness.
Now we all can receive the new life. But there is a way to receive it. Peter was sharing gospel to the Jew. They were convicted in their heart about their sinfulness.
Acts 2:37-38 Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?”38 Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the [a]remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
So it is clear we need to repent , then we need to water baptized and to receive the Holy Spirit.