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Now, it's nice to be here with you again in Leven. It's, um, a pleasure to be here. Um, it's turned out to be a lovely day, so thank you for coming out and going sitting in the sun. We were sitting down at the front of, uh, just in front of the sea there just before we came along. It was, it was a beautiful night, but, um, it's nice to be here and to say something about the Lord Jesus Christ. Um, I want to commend you on your singing as well. Um, we've been without a, uh, not quite a pianist because I've been there and I'm the pianist at Kenway, but uh, the hall's been renovated and unfortunately there's not enough room to stick a piano in as well as a, uh, as well as all the other people as well at night. So, um, it's uh, nice to hear you. Um, I was looking the other day just at um, some of the songs in scriptures, um, and very often singing comes after a victory.
Uh, singing comes, um, after something victorious has happened. If you think of Exodus fifteen, you have the children of Israel as they've gone through the Red Sea, and they lift up their hearts and they sing about, uh, how the Lord has delivered them. And interestingly enough, you go through Revelation fifteen, you find them singing the same song. The same song, the song of Moses, and, uh, we find that a greater victory has been won there. So it's good to sing about these things. It's good to lift up our hearts because a victory has been achieved, and we're going to consider something about that tonight. We're going to have a look at the gospel message. But what is the gospel message? We use a lot of jargon in our everyday lives, don't we?
We, uh, sometimes it's useful, sometimes it's beneficial to do things like that, and then other times it just hinders us a wee bit. I remember when I started, um, when I worked for Smile, I worked for, uh, the IT department in the College of Life Sciences as part of the University of Dundee, and when I first started, I, I've never felt so out of my depth going into that kind of department. Uh, I did my degree in computing, so when we went to the, the team meetings on a Monday afternoon at four o'clock, we would talk about all these different things, and some of them I could remember way back in the dim and distant past when I did my degree, and then other times just completely confused, I didn't have a clue what was going on, and then other times I knew something of what they talked about.
But very often, I would go home with a notepad full of all these different terms because I don't know if you've had the fortune or the misfortune to know anybody who's in the IT line, but they don't suffer fools gladly. So it's important to know all the different terminology. But with these things, some of the things I needed to know about, and some of the things weren't really relevant to me at all. They just didn't matter at all, weren't to do with my job, and so I could just forget about them. But when we consider the gospel message for each and every one of us, it is something of the utmost importance. It is something that we need to consider in our everyday lives and consider very, very seriously.
So what exactly is it? Well, I went to a dictionary and I looked up a dictionary definition. I went online, one of these big fancy dictionaries. It's got, goodness knows how many translations and how many different things. I looked up what the gospel was, and here's some of the definitions of the gospel. Number one, the teachings of Jesus. That's correct. Number two, the story of Christ's life and teachings, especially as contained in the first few, first four books of the New Testament, namely Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Well, that's true as well, isn't it? We call the first four books in the New Testament the Gospels. That's a, a perfectly, um, correct term, I suppose.
Number three, something regarded as true and implicitly believed. That's a good one as well. How about a doctrine regarded as of prime importance? Glad tidings, especially concerning salvation and the kingdom of God as announced to the world by Christ. And now we're getting slightly closer to the meaning of the gospel message, aren't we? If we were in the kids' meetings, then we would say to the kids, well, the gospel is the good news. And I once heard a kid speaker, um, standing up and saying, if you think about the letters in gospel, it was God's only son providing eternal life.
GOSPE, I've got that right, that's fine. So the gospel is the good news. But it's all very well looking at dictionaries and all these different things, but when we consider things about Christ, when we consider things about God, it's always good to turn to our Bibles and to see what our Bibles have to say about these things. So if you have your Bible with me, with me, with you, turn to First Corinthians chapter fifteen, and we'll read some verses there, and then we'll consider some things about it. I should perhaps in advance apologize to my daughter. She has found her voice, um, in the past couple of weeks, uh, so we might get some dadas, we might get some mamas, uh, we might get some cheers if we're lucky, and as long as she doesn't start blowing raspberries, then we're good to go.
So, um... It's just a mother you've got to worry about, but never mind. Right, First Corinthians chapter fifteen, and we'll start reading at verse one. Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I deliver to you first of all that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, and that he was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve.
Let me just read those last couple of verses again, because that is kind of what we're focused on tonight. Verse three: For I deliver to you, first of all, that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, and that he was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. And we ask that God be blessed to our hearts, the reading of his words tonight. This passage that we've read tonight gives us a very good definition of what the gospel is, especially that verse three, Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and he was buried, and he rose again for the third day.
So I'm going to try and pick apart that passage and try to just learn a few lessons from it and try to see what we can get from it. When we consider that phrase, Christ died for our sins, before we can even begin to understand why Christ died, we need to have a proper definition of the word sin. Now, I remember standing up in front of a group of kids, um, I think it was at camp, um, during the summer, and one of the questions I asked them was, what is sin? And I was surprised at how many kids couldn't tell me what sin was, because I suppose it's a, it's a word that has fallen out of everyday use.
It certainly doesn't get taught in schools anymore, um, and we perhaps don't talk about it terribly much. But we need to understand exactly what sin is. Now, to do that, we need to go right back to the start. We need to go right back to the beginning of our Bibles and to look at when sin came into the world. We all know, don't we, the start of how creation began. God, in his power, was able to create the world and everything in it within six days and then rested on the seventh day. And God, as he would look down on his creation, could look down and say that it was good. In fact, when it comes to day six and he looks down, he looks and says it's very good.
So everything was absolutely perfect. And God created two beings who would be above the whole of the rest of creation, of whom he would put in subjection everything else. Adam and Eve. Adam was formed from the dust of the earth, and even Eve was formed from Adam's rib. And they were in the Garden of Eden, and everything was perfect, and they had harmony with God, and as far as things were concerned, that was the way things were going to be, and they would live eternally in harmony with God, in fellowship with God, and that was going to be fine. And then as we look at that scene in the Garden of Eden, as we look at the the Adam and Eve there, we find that the serpent, the devil, has entered the garden.
And he comes up to Eve, and he starts to whisper to Eve, and he starts to tell Eve things, and he starts to make Eve doubt what God had said to him. And eventually we find that Eve, although she had been commanded not to eat of that specific tree, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, although she'd been commanded not to eat of that, the devil manages to, in his wily ways, convince her, and she takes the fruit and gives it to Adam. And sin enters the world from then on in. Sin is disobedience to God. Sin is disobeying God's command, and this is what we find right at the very start of our Bibles. From that point on, Adam and Eve's eyes were open.
Let me ask you this, and it's a question that's asked by people quite a lot. Who is to blame for sin entering the world? I remember a couple of years ago when I was, when I was in our growth assembly, one night after the gospel meeting, a man came out and he had for, when he was a lot younger, he had come along to the kids club meetings at Arbroath, and he knew his Bible. He had obviously read his Bible and all, all these different things. And he was of the opinion that God was to blame for sin entering the world. Because he said to us, he says, well, I don't leave guns lying around my house so that my children can pick them up and harm them.
So why would God put something in the garden that was going to cause such great harm to Adam and Eve? And that was the way he looked at things. So perhaps we think that maybe God was the, the cause of sin in the world, but that's not something that I accept, and hopefully you don't accept it either. Perhaps it was the devil's fault. Perhaps that was why sin entered the world. We see the sin, the devil coming up and trying to do different things to Eve, trying to persuade her and use clever arguments and try to turn God's words around. So perhaps it's the devil's fault. Or was it mankind's fault?
You see, mankind had a choice. Eve knew perfectly well what God's command was, because we see in the book of Genesis, right back at the start of our Bibles, Eve telling the devil exactly what God had said. They had a decision. They knew God's command, and they knew that the devil was telling them another thing, and they had a decision to make, and they chose the wrong one, the sin end of the world. You know, each of us has a decision to make, a very important decision to make. Now, it's not whether we eat of the fruits or not eat of the fruits. My wife sometimes thinks that I'm of the persuasion of not to eat the fruits rather than go for the chocolate and the biscuits instead, but we have a decision as to whether to obey God's words, obey God's commands, or to ignore them.
And whether we like it or not, it's a decision that we will make either consciously or subconsciously. I was used to be con- confused when I was a child as to why something that happened all these thousands of years ago would have any bearing on my life today. I am so far removed from Adam and Eve. Why would it, why would sin, why would this problem that came in at the garden of Eden still cause a problem today? Well, I once heard a fantastic story of somebody who explained it very well. In an assembly, I don't know where it was, there was a woman, and she didn't have any children, but when it came to the time of kids meetings or kids parties and prize givings, she would make.
She liked to make jelly. She had a, this fantastic jelly mold, and it was wonderful, and it was carved, and when the jelly came out of the mold, it was all different fancy shapes, and the kids loved it, and it was wonderful. And then over the years, as she used that jelly mold, it started to get a bit chipped, and it started to get a bit damaged, and it started to get a bit worse for wear. You might start to say, well, what does that have, what effect does that have on the jelly? Well, every time that jelly came out of that mold, it bore the marks of the original damage. So every time something came out of the mold, every time, uh, a jelly was formed from that, it bore the marks of the previous damage.
That's a very good illustration of how Adam and Eve sin kind of transfers onto us. It transferred down through the ages, transferred to my mother and father, and it's transferred to me, and now I've transferred onto death, and it's a very, very big problem. Wait a minute, we said the gospel means the good news. That's what we said right at the start, and it doesn't sound like it's good news so far because we find that we are no longer in fellowship with God because of sin. How do we sort that? Well, this passage gives us the answer, doesn't it? And we consider that Christ died for our sins. Well, why did he need to die?
Why did he need to die? Couldn't God have provided another way out, another thing so that Christ would not have to die, so he would not have to go through the sufferings that he did? Well, to understand that, again, we have to go backwards. We have to go back into our Old Testament times, and perhaps you've heard the story of the Passover. To set the scene for you, the children of Israel have entered the land of Egypt when Joseph was at the top of the ladder. He was the second most powerful person except Pharaoh, and he had welcomed his father and his father's children, his brothers and their families into the land.
And Genesis forty seven verse six says this. This is Pharaoh talking. The land of Egypt is before you. Have your father and brothers dwell in the best of the land. Let them dwell in the land of Goshen, and if you know any competent men among them, then make them chief herdsmen over my livestock. The children of Israel were welcomed into op- welcomed with open arms into the land of Egypt. They were given the best of the lands, and they were given authority over the best of the livestock, over all the livestock. Does that remind you of something? Does that remind you of the Garden of Eden? Mankind was welcomed into the Garden of Eden with open arms, and they were given the best things.
They were given this beautiful garden. They had that tree of life there, never had to worry about death. They had fellowship with God. They had everything. And yet, when we go back to the children of Israel, we find that things change. Very soon, a new Pharaoh came in, and he had forgotten the past, and he had forgotten what Joseph had done for the, the nation of Egypt, and somebody new had come in. You know, we have let a new master into our lives. We have let the devil into our lives, and for m- many of us, before we were saved, he was lord and master of our lives. And there is only one way that that can end, and it's not good.
Well, you see, the children of Israel cried out to God. They cried out to him for help, and God heard their plea for help, and he heard their plea for deliverance, and God sent a man to deliver them, Moses. And Moses went in, and he went to Pharaoh and said, let my people go. Nine times he does that, and nine times Pharaoh refuses, and nine plagues are sent, and still Pharaoh refuses to let the people go. And then the tenth plague comes, the big one. This is when the firstborn of, in every household was going to die. The children of Israel needed protection from that coming judgment, needed protection from that coming judgment.
How is that going to happen? Well, God said, you need to take for yourselves a lamb. Now, it wasn't just any old lamb. You know, my father-in-law used to have sheep, he's, and he's got two now, but he used to have goodness knows how many sheep, and in spring it was nice, you go up to the farm and you'd see all these little lambs, um, going round about. And some were nice, but some were spotted, some were black, some were, uh, perhaps a little lame in their legs, some perhaps had, um, different problems and all these different things. They wouldn't do. It was only a perfect lamb, a spotless lamb, something that hadn't been tainted, hadn't been damaged. And that little lamb had to be taken, and the blood had to be shed.
The blood had to be poured out, and as the blood was poured out, it was put upon the doorposts and on the lintels. And when that angel of death came across the land, and as it was killing all the firstborn in the, in the nation of Egypt, when it saw the blood, it passed over. That's where we get the name, isn't it? It passed over that household, and nobody died in that household. You know, there's a coming judgment day for us as well. There is a coming a time when we will have to answer for our sins, and if we are not under the protection of the blood, then we will die as well. We will have to put up with that judgment. So what exactly do I mean about the protection of the blood?
Well, this is what when we come back to Christ died for our sins. Christ was the perfect sacrifice, just like the perfect lamb was required back when at the time of the Passover, a perfect sacrifice was required to protect us from the coming judgment. There's a verse in Romans chapter six and verse twenty three that says, for the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. You know, wages are something that we deserve. Every month, at the end of the month, paycheck comes onto my desk at work, and hopefully, if they've done all the sums properly, I can pay all the bills because they've given me money because I've worked for them for that month, and that's all fine and well.
Something that I have deserved, something that I have worked for. Well, you know, this verse very clearly tells us that the result of our works is death, the wages of sin is death, but thankfully God has given us a gift, eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. Christ died on that cross for us, his blood was poured out, and it will protect us from the coming judgment. So we understand that the gospel message tells us that we are sinners, that we have to deal with our sin. We understand that Christ needed to die, there needed to be a perfect sacrifice, there needed to be a sacrifice that was unblemished, untainted, and just perfect.
Well, how can we be confident that he can save us from our sins and give us eternal life? Well, the passage that we read there goes on to say that he was buried and that he rose again on the third day. You know, the people who followed Christ, on that day that he died, perhaps they were fearful that the kingdom that had been promised, that the Messiah that had been promised, the one who they thought was going to restore them to their previous power, that all that was over. You see, the Jews always had in mind the past glories. In fact, when we read in the book of First Kings, I think it is, of the time of Solomon, we find that all the nations from round about came to hear Solomon's wisdom.
We find that in those days, silver was as common as stone, the Bible tells us. These were wonderful days. And perhaps the people thought that this man whom they thought was going to take them out of Roman, uh, authority, who was going to restore the nation, the Jewish nation. It was all, uh, to no avail. But you know, Christ accomplished something much, much greater that day. He wasn't envisioning a, a glorious kingdom in the way that they thought he was. But remember what the original plan was back in the Garden of Eden, to live in harmony with God eternally. He rose again on the third day, gloriously.
He wasn't going to stay in that, that grave for long. He wasn't going to see corruption like all, all of us will do in, in some form someday. In fact, the prophets of old had actually prophesied this. In Psalm sixteen, it says, therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices. My body also will rest secure because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your holy one see decay. You have made known to me the path of life. You will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand. Death's sting had been removed. No longer did we have to worry that we would come under that judgment, that we would only, the only thing we'd have to look forward to is death. If we put our faith and our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, we can be sure that he will save us and he will, uh, cancel out that judgment for our sins.
But, you know, this passage goes on to say something else. Do we believe that Christ rose from the dead? That's one of the things that Paul says here. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, that he was buried and that he rose again on the third day. In fact, if you go on to later in the chapter, down to verse 12, it says this. Now if Christ is preached that he has been raised from the dead, how do some of you, some among you, say there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there's no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty, and your faith is also empty. Yes, we are found false wi- we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he did not raise up, if in fact the dead do not rise.
If the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen, and if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile. You are still in your sins. So you see, the resurrection is tied into all this. We need to believe that he rose from the dead. If Christ didn't rose, rise from the dead, then that, what this passage says here, our faith is futile. So he rose from the dead again. So Christ has done everything. There is no need for us to do any more. You know, I've heard some people say, there are some people who will think that Christ, his death and his resurrection only paid for past sins, only paid for sins up until the point that you were saved.
Well, to think that diminishes the power of God. It diminishes what Christ accomplished at Calvary. It diminishes the power of God to save sinners. There's nothing that we can do to save ourselves from the coming judgment. In the time of the Passover, the people could take the lamb and they could sprinkle the blood, and that was fine, but as far as their sins were concerned, there wasn't anything that they could do. There isn't anything that we can do. But there isn't an obligation on us to receive it. That's what Paul says, wasn't it? Brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which you stand, by which you are saved.
I'm going to take you to Romans chapter ten, verse nine. It says this, that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. We have to confess that the Lord, that Jesus is our Lord and Master. This isn't just an acknowledgement that Jesus is a real person, because even the demons acknowledge that he was there. Even atheists will acknowledge that Christ was a real person because there's historical evidence to to that fact. But it's a real deep inward conviction that Jesus is Lord and Master of our lives, and we need to repent from our sin. But the verse goes on to say that we need to believe that God has raised him from the dead.
If we don't wait and believe that Christ rose from the dead, then our faith is futile. But thankfully, God is able to say that he is able to raise people from the dead again. The verse concludes by saying, you will be saved. No ifs, no buts, no maybes, no we'll wait and see, or we'll wait and see how faithful you are to the church or to the assembly, or we'll see how good your good works are, or we'll see how much you give to charity. You will be saved. Belief on the Lord Jesus Christ. You know, finally, just in closing, this passage says twice here, according to the scriptures, according to the scriptures.
This is something that had been talked about for thousands of years. It had been talked about for many times, it had been prophesied about, and the people were watching and waiting for the coming Messiah. They were watching and waiting for somebody who would deliver them, and Christ fulfilled those prophecies. But, you know, they're still watching and waiting for Christ coming back again. Christ is going to come back at some point. We may see it, we may not see it, but he will come back to the air and he will take his people to be with him. You know, the clock is ticking. The clock on that wall, quarter past seven, it will, the meeting will conclude and our time here will be ended.
That clock may reach quarter past seven, it may not reach quarter past seven. Something may happen, something may happen to this building, and we won't see it. We don't know how long we have left. We don't know when Christ is coming back again. We don't know if it's today, tomorrow, fifty years time, a thousand years time. For those who were at the Lockheed conference, yesterday we had John Grant speaking on the subject, and people had said to John, well, you know, the promise is now two thousand years old. You would have thought he would come back again. Well, the promise of his first coming was four thousand years old. We were promised, uh, just after, uh, that Garden of Eden scene when, um, God was judging Adam and Eve, we promised one who would crush the head of the serpent, and the serpent would crush the heel.
So the original prophecy, the original promise was four thousand years old by the time it was fulfilled by Christ. Now, as John says, we're not saying that we're going to be another few thousand years on top of our time here today before Christ comes back again, because we don't know when it'll be. But you know, that clock is ticking. It's ticking away, and we don't know how long's left. We think there's nothing more secure, nothing more certain than second following second following second. But one day, time is going to run out. Any opportunity you had to accept Christ as your savior is over. Thankfully, it's still ticking away, and still the opportunity arises for us to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and to have our sins forgiven.
So there we go. That's the gospel message. I hope I've tried to explain it. I hope I've tried to make it clear. Let me just close again with those verses from scripture that give a very good definition of the gospel message. So I deliver to you, first of all, that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again on the third day according to the scriptures. If you haven't believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, make tonight that time, make tonight the time when you will accept him, you will have your sins forgiven, and you will have the knowledge of a home in heaven. You'll be assured that you won't come under the judgment that is due to all of us for our sins.
Shall we pray? Our Heavenly Father, we give you thanks for our time, time here this evening, our time gathered around thy words, reading it and trying to understand the wonders that are contained within it. We give you thanks, our Father, for the Lord Jesus Christ, of one who gave himself selflessly on Calvary. We give you thanks, our Father, that as the very worst of mankind was displayed at that cross at Calvary, the very, very best of the Godhead was raised up on that tree, was, as he could look down on us, he could say, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. We give you thanks, our Father, that we can be assured of our home in heaven, we can be assured of our sins forgiven, we can be assured of eternal harmony and fellowship with, with you.
We give you thanks, our Father, for this. We just pray you take us to our homes in safety, and we ask that you be with us until Christ shall call, until he shall come. We just ask this in the Savior's name.