Message

I want to talk about the gospel and how it is presented today.  It seems like we hear so many different messages today from the pulpit, on the television or the computer.  Some seem to be so commercialized and some seem so watered down they have no real substance.  We have the inspirational speakers, we have those that speak of a ‘works’ gospel, then there are those that speak more about our mistakes than our sins and very little about confession, repentance and contrition, or being sorry for sins.  Many leave out the substitutional work of Jesus Christ on the cross for mankind all together, the fact that He was crucified, died and was buried and also about the blood that Jesus shed for our sins.  Like I said if there is no real substance in the message then there is no real message.

How many times do you hear about the conviction of the Holy Spirit and the true condition of the soul of man before his or her conversion?  I am not saying that no one is preaching these things but in many cases they are not being taught.  How many times do you hear about God being a just God, who is angry at sin every single day because He hates what it does to people?  John the Baptist, Jesus and His disciples didn’t start out their ministries preaching repentance because it wasn’t important.  John’s baptism was for the person who repented of their sins.  

When is the last time you heard that a person had to be born-again to enter the kingdom of heaven like Jesus talked about in John chapter 3, read it for yourself.  About 35 years ago when I was committed to the Lord, asking Him to come into my heart and life, repenting of my sins and asking for forgiveness, these things were preached and taught about quite often but it seems to be rare these days.  How many times do you hear about hell and being separated from God as a result of rejecting Him and sinning against Him, which is still true today?  Today we hear a lot about God’s love, mercy, grace and forgiveness which is true, but far too little about God’s wrath against sin.  What do you think caused the separation between Adam and Eve and physical death, it was sin and it still holds true today.  God’s Word says that all have sinned and fell short of the glory of God; it does not say all have made mistakes and fell short of the glory of God.  We need to call sin what God calls it, sin, and say it from a heart of love and compassion sprinkled with salt and not worry so much about offending people.  

If people don’t know their condition before God, before their conversion, then how will they ever get themselves right with Him?  How will they ever realize their need of a Savior, if they don’t have a clear understanding of what sin is and what it does in a person’s life and how it separates them from the Lord in the first place?  What will you say and how will you feel when you stand before the Lord someday and someone says that you didn’t preach these things from the pulpit but if you had they might have gone in another direction?  The fact is, we are all guilty of sins before the Lord and deserve nothing but God’s wrath and punishment and people need to be mindful of it.  

Read Romans 5:12, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

Sin entered into the world by Adam and it caused death to come on all people and we all became enemies of God because of sin, since we are all guilty of sin.  But there is good news, God loved us so much that He provided a way that we could be reconciled to Him and that is through His Son Jesus who was willing to shed His blood and become the sacrificial lamb for us because there could be no forgiveness of sins without the shedding of blood which had to be done through a perfect sacrifice.  

In Exodus where it talks about the plagues, the last plague was the death of all the first born, whether man or animal.  Read what it says in Exodus 12:3-13, “Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: ‘On the tenth of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household. And if the household is too small for the lamb, let him and his neighbor next to his house take it according to the number of the persons; according to each man’s need you shall make your count for the lamb. Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats. Now you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month. Then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at twilight. And they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses where they eat it. Then they shall eat the flesh on that night; roasted in fire, with unleavened bread and with bitter herbs they shall eat it. Do not eat it raw, nor boiled at all with water, but roasted in fire—its head with its legs and its entrails. You shall let none of it remain until morning, and what remains of it until morning you shall burn with fire. And thus you shall eat it: with a belt on your waist, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. So you shall eat it in haste. It is the Lord’s Passover.

‘For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the Lord. Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you; and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”

When the angel of death passed over the house with the blood of the innocent lamb on the doorposts and the top of the door, no harm would come to anyone in that home because of the Passover Lamb, a male Lamb without blemish.  God’s Word says that without the shedding of blood there is no remittance, or forgiveness of sins.  Jesus was the Lamb of God for us, the innocent for the guilty.  To satisfy God’s wrath, Jesus was crucified, died and was buried and on the third day He rose from the dead for the sins of mankind.  He shed His precious blood to cleanse our sins.  

Read John 3:16-17, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”

This is the good news; if you, in all sincerity, repent of your sins, which means to turn away from your sins, and ask the Lord to forgive you and be the Lord of your life, you can also have eternal life.  The choice is up to you.  I pray that you will make the right choice.  I hope this was a message of encouragement because that is what I want all my messages to be.  I want them to be a blessing and not a discouragement or an offence to anyone.  May you have a great day and may the good Lord bless you and yours, whoever you are.  And let me say this, I think this would be a great day to thank and praise the Lord!!