The Gospel in Short
The Bad News: Everyone has disobeyed God. The One who made us said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind," (Matt. 22:37) yet we do not and we show it by our actions. God has declared the punishment for disobedience is eternal separation from Him in a place of everlasting torment. Jesus describes it as a place "where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." (Matt. 13:50) That's the bad news. All people deserve the wrath of God.
The Good News: But there is good news (that's what "gospel" means). Jesus (God in the flesh) came and obeyed perfectly as a man and for man. He then died on the cross as a man for man, though he did not deserve death. He took the punishment we all deserve. When we turn from our rebellious hearts to Christ - if we stop trusting in our own "good" deeds and rest in the finished work of Christ (the sacrifice that He accomplished on the cross), God promises that He "will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." (1 John 1:9)
Bad News: We all stand condemned as law-breakers.
Good News: Christ obeyed and died in our place as a righteous substitute.
What must I do to be saved?
The Good News: But there is good news (that's what "gospel" means). Jesus (God in the flesh) came and obeyed perfectly as a man and for man. He then died on the cross as a man for man, though he did not deserve death. He took the punishment we all deserve. When we turn from our rebellious hearts to Christ - if we stop trusting in our own "good" deeds and rest in the finished work of Christ (the sacrifice that He accomplished on the cross), God promises that He "will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." (1 John 1:9)
Bad News: We all stand condemned as law-breakers.
Good News: Christ obeyed and died in our place as a righteous substitute.
What must I do to be saved?
- John 3:16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
- John 5:24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
- 2 Corinthians 5:21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
- Colossians 1:19-23 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.