Fishing for Souls: The Gospel

Hello, I’m Jonathan Scott, and thanks again for joining us on Strengthen Your Walk. This is actually the last of the series, and if you haven’t watched the previous episodes, I encourage you to go back and watch.

We’ve talked a lot about the gospel. Here’s the thing: we thought that in closing, we’ve talked about it, how to communicate it, and the importance of it so it makes sense that we probably should talk about it. In other words, what is the gospel?

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I’d like to take the time to communicate that to you in a way that you can use for someone else. A lot of people have a philosophy of how life is supposed to happen. We call that a worldview. A worldview is the sum total of our values, beliefs, and perspective. It’s how we see the world, how we see other people, nature, even God. A person’s worldview usually answers these questions: How did we get here? What’s our purpose? What went wrong? Why are things so wrong? How does it get fixed? And then maybe also, what’s the ultimate destiny of humanity?

You can find worldviews in religion, science, the arts, humanities, and philosophies. Christianity has a worldview that’s informed by the scriptures, the inspired Word of God. God’s personal self-disclosure through the scripture to tell us what His view on life and reality is. For those of us that follow Jesus Christ, we believe that although there may be many worldviews, Christianity is the most significant worldview that logically, rationally explains how life was intended to be, how God enters into the picture, and how He redeems it and restores it to what it was always meant to be and even better.

And here’s the aspect of the gospel that mankind was created by God. Mankind was created by God to reflect God’s nature, to reflect God’s character, but also to experience a living, dynamic communion with God forever. But the reason why things have gotten so wrong is because man chose to rebel. Man chose to receive his significance from creation for himself rather than from God, and that plunged the world into what we call the fall of man. Falling short of God’s intentions, falling short of God’s authority and God’s love. And because of that, the entire creation has been affected by that choice. So much so the result of that is that man would experience death and not just the end of this life, but eternal separation from God. But this God Who is so rich in mercy and grace doesn’t just stand from afar and ask man to fix the problem. No, He comes into the problem, into the person of Jesus Christ.

John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only begotten Son, that whoever would believe in Him would not perish, but have everlasting life. The Son of Man didn’t come to condemn the world” – it’s already condemned – “but that the world would be saved through Him” and through His death. Then prophesied three days later His resurrection from the grave, showing that Jesus Christ not only defeated death, but also sin – and that His gift of life is available for us.

The wage of sin is death. That’s what we deserve, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ for those who by faith receive that gift. So, the gospel is really God’s desire for humanity, how humanity damaged itself because of the choices that were made, and how God graciously redeems, reconciles, and rectifies the problem of mankind and restores us to what we were always designed to be, but even better.

I said before in one of our earlier sessions, there are basically three responses. A person can say, “No, I don’t want it,” and they can reject it. That is a choice that a person can make. Or a person can say, “I need to hear more. I need to revisit this. I need to review what’s been heard. I need more information.” And there are some that are saying, “I’ve heard enough. I know that this is true and I have heard enough to know that I need Jesus now.”

If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ and you’ve heard this story, I hope that this can help you tell the story to others.

But would you please pray that God would so impact your own heart to put on your mind someone you can be praying for that you can share the gospel with, or that someone can share the gospel if you’re not near them. But if you’re here today and you’ve never received Jesus Christ and you’re looking for more information, the folks here at Inspiration Ministries want to help you take that next step in your fellowship with Jesus Christ. As a matter of fact, ToFindGod.com is a website where Inspiration Ministries can help you take that next step so you can experience the reality of the power of Jesus Christ for your life. It’s the gospel, the good news of Who He is and what He’s done, available for us right now.

Thank you for joining us for this series of Strengthen Your Walk, dealing with the fishing expedition of evangelism of making an eternal difference in the life of people that are around us through your willingness to follow Christ. May God bless you and may He make you a blessing as you follow Him in the family business of proclaiming the gospel of God for the salvation of everyone.

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