The Church Needs the Gospel

Written by Warren |Posted on February 25, 2009 | Comments

It is rampant nowadays that Christian churches become so tired of hearing the verses: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…”, “No one is righteous, no not one…”, “Wages of sin is death….”, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only son…”, etc.

Yeah yeah, we’ve heard that for so many years. Yeah we know we are sinners. Yeah we know that we have offended an holy God. But so what? Now that I’m a “Christian”, I’ve “accepted” Jesus as my Lord and Saviour, why else would I need to hear the gospel? How should it be related to me? Some would claim that they have enough good works to merit their salvation. So why need it anyway?

Before we see the “why”, let us first see its importance.

The Gospel is the theme of the Bible
The Bible repeatedly makes effort to make the gospel known to many. In fact, the whole of the Bible is the gospel itself. It is impossible to read from scripture and not relate it to the gospel message. For example,

1) The Bible is the Gospel:
the whole of the Old Testament shows us that no one can be saved by observing the Law. Then the New Testament shows us that only Christ can observe the Law and He did it for us to be saved. So putting the Old and New Testament together we see the gospel message.

2) Jesus is the Gospel:
Jesus is saying “this is the Law, but you cannot obey them. I am the King, but you cannot accept me. You don’t have the capacity.” One of the reasons why Jesus died for us is to show us that we have no capability to accept Him as our King because later we see that He was crucified. Again, we see the gospel there.

3) Paul Preaches the Gospel:
Paul himself says he preach Christ (1 Corinthians 1:23) even to those who are already Christians (1 Corinthians 1:24).

And when read through the scriptures, even dig deeper into its meaning, you will still find gospel messages practically everywhere.

Jesus says that the Old Testament speaks about Him (John 5:39). And we see that the New Testament speaks about Christ. Therefore the whole of the Bible speaks about Christ. And we know that Christ’s purpose here is to save the sinners (Matthew 9:13). Therefore, the whole of Scripture is speaking of the gospel.

From Old Testament to the New Testament it all points us to the one that can save us: Jesus Christ. We see how the gospel was emphasized by the whole of Scripture. Therefore it would be reasonable enough to see its importance. But now that the Christian is saved, wouldn’t it be logical if he just quit reading the Bible since it is the gospel. Why else would we need the gospel? Especially now that we are saved?

Why the Church Needs the Gospel
Paul says that even after we are saved sin is still within us(Romans 7:21). He says that “when he would do good sin is there.” And as a Christian, it is normal to always desire to do good. Therefore sin is always there in our presence. It is clear that we are all sinners. Except that Christians are all sinners saved by grace. Therefore sin is still active and struggling within the Christian’s life. But whenever we would sin, we’d feel guilty about it. But the good news is Jesus is there advocating for us in our defense(1 John 2:1, Romans 8:34). Paul also says that it is Jesus who sustains us so that we become blameless to the end(1 Corinthians 1:8). Jesus didn’t stop His work on calvary. No. He is still actively working in our behalf making us pure in front of God the Father.

In the Old Testament we see priests interceding for the people of Israel. This priest must do certain rituals before he can communicate and pray to God for His people. But when Jesus was raised from the dead, He sat at the right hand of God and He is there praying for us! Without His work sustaining us we would loose our salvation. That is why Jesus says “Never will I leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5). Because once He does, we are lost forever. That is why we need the gospel. To remind us that Jesus is continually sustaining us to the end and making us blameless.

As we grow and mature within our local churches, it becomes too easy to criticize others for their mistakes. After all, it is made up entirely of sinners so it is not hard to find something to complain about. This is where Satan is really good at. He is busy of accusing us of our sins. He is saying “you are a sinner!” and would leave us feel miserable about ourselves like Judas who ultimately killed himself. But the gospel says “you are a sinner! but Christ died for your sins” Peter too felt miserable for his sins against Jesus, but unlike Judas, he repented and turned to Christ for salvation. Whenever we sin against God, Jesus would simply point back to the cross “I’ve died for this man. My righteousness was now credited to him” The gospel message is about God seeing the righteousness of Christ in the Christian’s life and not the righteous deeds he has done.

The Church needs the gospel to be reminded of who is doing the good works and who gets the final credit. Like the parable of the labourers in the vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16) the early labourers felt they deserved more reward because they came in earlier and worked more hours than the rest. But in the end all of them got equal pay even for the ones who worked only for an hour. Thus the last shall be first and the first shall be last. Therefore the gospel equalizes Christians. The pastor who spent his whole life pastoring his church and sacrificing his relationship with his wife and children will also get the same eternal life as the person who believed in Christ just a few days before he dies. Even Paul himself will be equal to us when we get to heaven. Only Christ is our King. We need the gospel to remind us that it is Christ who is our King and that we are only His servants.