Guard the Gospel

The late Peter Marshall served for several years as the chaplain of the US Senate. He used to love to tell the story of the Keeper of the Spring in which a quiet forest dweller once lived high above an Austrian village along the eastern slope of the Alps.

The old gentleman had been hired many years earlier by a young town councilman to clear away the debris from the pools of water up in the mountain crevices that fed the lovely spring flowing through their town. With faithful, silent regularity, he patrolled the hills, removed the leaves and branches, and wiped away the silt that would otherwise have choked and contaminated the fresh flow of water. The village soon became a popular attraction for vacationers. Graceful swans floated along the crystal clear spring, the mill wheels of various businesses located near the water turned day and night, farmlands were naturally irrigated, and the view from restaurants was picturesque beyond description.

Years passed. One evening the town council met for its semi-annual meeting. As they reviewed the budget, one man's eye caught the salary figure being paid to the obscure keeper of the spring. Said the keeper of the purse, "Who is the old man? Why do we keep him on year after year? No one ever sees him. For all we know, the strange ranger of the hills is doing us no good. He isn't necessary any longer." By an unanimous vote, they dispensed with the old man's services.

For several weeks, nothing changed. By early autumn, the trees began to shed their leaves. Small branches snapped of and fell into the pools, hindering the rushing flow of sparkling water. One afternoon someone noticed a slight yellowish-brown tint in the spring. A few days later, the water was much darker.

Within another week, a slimy film covered sections of the water along the banks, and a foul odor was soon detected. The mill wheels moved more slowly, some finally ground to a halt. Swans left, as did the tourists. Clammy fingers of disease and sickness reached deeply into the village.

The embarrassed council called a special meeting. Realizing their gross error in judgment, they rehired the old keeper of the spring, and within a few weeks, the veritable river of life began to clear up. The wheels started to turn, and new life returned to the hamlet in the Alps.

This story illustrates well the importance of our next segment in our Legacy series which is to Guard the Gospel.

Paul writes to Timothy:

2 Timothy 1:14 ESV

14 By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.

Goal is three-fold:

Raise gospel awareness

Create gospel urgency

Encourage gospel fluency

Importance of the gospel:

Gospel serves as a means of salvation. Gospel serves as a corrective of religion

Gospel serves as a corrective of religion

It is both the road and the guardrails.

If we lose the gospel we lose the faith.

(Background to Galatians)

Paul is writing to a church or churches in the area of Galatia - modern-day Turkey. Sometime after Paul had planted these churches, false teachers had come into the church to teach the Galatian Christians that not only must they believe the gospel as had been taught by Paul, but they must also adhere to some of the Jewish laws, specifically, circumcision.

Instead of following his usual greeting with a praise of the church, Paul launches right into a rebuke of the Galatian church for not guarding the gospel against these false teachers.

Galatians 1:6–10 ESV

6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— 7 not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. 8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. 9 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. 10 For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.

Jesus is central to the gospel. (6)

Notice what Paul is stunned that they are deserting.

what

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting HIM who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel”

Jesus is central to the gospel. In other words:

The center of the gospel (of Christianity) is a person, not an idea.

The gospel is personal, not philosophical.

Buddhism - Three universal truths, Four noble truths, Eightfold path

Hinduism - Karma, Dharma, Moksha in the Vedas

Islam - Five Pillars

Atheism - Rational trust in scientism

Christianity - JESUS

This is why Paul is so adamant about the resurrection. If Jesus is not alive then there is no proof that he is who he says he is (God) and Christianity becomes one more religious philosophy among many.

1 Corinthians 15:17 ESV

17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.

1 cor 15

BUT, if indeed Jesus did rise from the dead, then Christianity stands out from among all other religions in offering us not a philosophy to grasp or rules to follow, but a person to know.

**This warns us:

You are not a Christ-follower simply because you know ABOUT Jesus; you are a Christ-follower when you KNOW Jesus. (Even demons believe [about Jesus] and tremble)

This is why Paul equates rejecting the gospel message with rejecting Jesus.

Gospel distortion is a very real danger. (7b, 10)

While there are many external dangers to the gospel:

scientism, atheism, sacramentalism, postmodernism, etc.

The greater dangers are those which are internal to the church and the human heart:

liberalism and legalism.

**When you add or subtract from the gospel you are left with something other than the gospel.

Notice how the danger that Paul decried was a religious thing. It was not something found outside the church - it was when something that was not the main thing took the place of the gospel things.

Liberalism and Legalism

Three rings of doctrine:

Die for - first-order doctrines (a denial of which represents the eventual denial of Christianity itself)

Jesus is the Son of God

Trinity

Justification by faith

Defend - second-order doctrines (upon which Bible-believing Christians may disagree, but they create significant boundaries between believers, whether as distinct congregations or denominations)

Modes of baptism

Apostacy

Predestination

Discuss - third-order doctrines (upon which Christians may disagree, but yet remain in close fellowship, even within local congregations)

View of the end times

Style of worship

When we alter one of the core areas of our faith, we alter the gospel and are left with something other than the Christian faith.

Prosperity Gospel and Nominal Christianity

One expects too much from Jesus and the other expects nothing.

Prosperity gospel says that when you give your life to Jesus you can and should expect physical and financial health and blessings. Poverty is a sin that Jesus came to overcome and prayer is the means by which we gain wealth.

I think before we ‘Amen’ too loudly we need to check our own hearts and see if we don’t truly expect our lives to be more smooth now that we know Christ.

**I fear that for far too long the church has wooed people to its pews with promises of peace and prosperity. We have preached a message of “Come and get” when really Jesus called us to “Come and die.”

Perhaps a less explicit but just as dangerous alteration of the gospel is that you can be saved ‘simply’ by asking Jesus into your heart.

The key word is ‘simply.’

The possibilities are dangerous.

A change to the gospel leaves you without the gospel

Almost every change to the gospel has been to make the gospel easier to understand or easier to follow.

**Sometimes to win a soul we lower the cost, offering an ‘easy believism’ and creating a nominal Christian. And there are churches filled with church-going, song-singing, tithe-giving, people who call themselves Christians but will be met with a blank stare from Jesus on the final day when he tells them to go away as he never knew them.

We must preach the gospel that calls us to die to self and alive to Christ.

Simply saying the sinner’s prayer no more guarantees you are a Christian than singing ‘I Want It That Way’ makes me a Backstreet Boy.

I’m not saying that the sinner’s prayer cannot be used by someone to cry out to God save them. Prayer is the communication we use to cry out to God. I am saying that sinner’s prayer is not a magical prayer that saves - it should be the communication

If you used the ‘sinner’s prayer’ or asked Jesus into your heart as the method by which you repented of your sin, and trusted by faith that Jesus took your payment for sin, then you are saved. But if you are relying on that one little prayer said a long time ago, and there is no evidence of the Spirit’s work in your life, no change in your affections, attitudes, and actions, then there is a chance you have spoken with your mouth and not your heart.

The gospel calls us to recognize our plight before God, call out to him in repentance and faith, and follow Christ by dying daily to our own desires.

Die for - first-order doctrines (a denial of which represents the eventual denial of Christianity itself)

Jesus is the Son of God

Trinity

Justification by faith

Defend - second-order doctrines (upon which Bible-believing Christians may disagree, but they create significant boundaries between believers, whether as distinct congregations or denominations)

Modes of baptism

Apostacy

Predestination

Discuss - third-order doctrines (upon which Christians may disagree, but yet remain in close fellowship, even within local congregations)

View of the end times

Style of worship

There is one gospel to know. (7a, 8-9)

There is only ONE gospel - One way to God

Isn’t it arrogant to say all other religions are wrong and Christianity is the only way?

First, we mustn’t confuse arrogance with truth.

ILLUST - There is only one way to . . .

Second, if you understand the gospel rightly, you understand there is no room for arrogance.

What is the gospel?

Do you know it? Have you received it ? Can you share it?

If it is truly the call of every Christ-follower to make disciples by sharing the gospel, how is it that so many who claim to follow Christ cannot articulate the gospel? Two reasons:

We never thought through how to articulate the gospel

We don’t really know or believe the gospel

It is no longer enough to say, “Jesus died on the cross for your sins.”

Jesus? That ancient teacher? Was he real?

Died? Everyone dies - what’s the big deal?

Sin? What’s that?

Teach the gospel to a child, and you understand how to share the gospel.

Church in Acts (where Scripture says ‘many were added to their number daily’) had only three things:

A story (God’s and theirs)

The Spirit

Relationships

And the world was turned upside-down

Gospel story.

Creation, Fall, Redemption, Restoration

G - God’s character

The gospel starts with God.

God is both loving and just / mercy and wrath.

O - offense of sin

Sin separates

The severity of sin is determined by the One who is sinned against.

S - sufficiency of Christ

Jesus was both God and Man and as such could represent both.

He accomplished what we could not and took what we deserved to give us what we could never gain.

P - personal response

You are neither saved by busyness nor by birth - only by faith.

It is not your work, but you must respond.

E - eternal urgency

Your eternal life (or death) depends on your response.

Heaven is real, and so is hell.

L - life transformation

The gospel is not fire insurance; it is life assurance.

It not only affects our eternal life, it flourishes our present life.

An encounter with the gospel does not leave you the same. It affects your allegiances, affections, and aspirations.

Conclusion

Goal is three-fold:

Raise gospel awareness

Create gospel urgency

Encourage gospel fluency

We must KNOW the gospel, GUARD the gospel, and SHARE the gospel. Otherwise, the gospel dies with us.

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