The Gospel

If you have grown up in church, or been a Christian for any amount of time you will notice rather quickly there is a difference of opinions on a lot of different theology. Because of differences in opinions, it creates different denominations. These differences should not alienate us as brothers and sisters. There are just some topics in the Bible that are difficult to agree on, and that is okay.

But there is one theology there is absolutely no compromise to and that is the theology of salvation. The Apostle Paul is an interesting man. This is a guy who was a pharisee of pharisees and desired very much to destroy this new sect called the “Way.” In fact, it was when he was on his way to Damascus to arrest and maybe even put to death these early Christians he ran into Jesus.

As you can imagine, this changed his life. Saul, who is now Paul, went from trying to destroy Christians to becoming one. Paul was taught by Christ Himself and became the Apostle to the gentiles.  Paul planted a lot of churches and would install pastors in those churches. Later Paul would revisit or send letters to these churches. One of his letters was sent to a church in Galatia. In this letter, Paul challenged the members on what we call a non-negotiable. That non-negotiable is the gospel. 

As I said earlier, we can have different opinions on different theologies, but the one topic where there is no room for compromise is the good news, the gospel. Paul writes this in the book of Galatians 1:6-9, “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel; 7 which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing 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 what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! 9 As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!”

Paul makes it very clear that there is absolutely no compromising the gospel. He says that anyone who teaches against the true gospel is to be accursed, that is they are to be set apart for destruction. What is this gospel that would bring such retribution? It is that salvation is by grace, and by grace alone. There is nothing we can do to inherit eternal life; it is a gift. This gift was paid for by Jesus the Christ and by His blood we are healed.  My friends, if anyone teaches salvation through Jesus and anything else, run for your lives. They are false teachers and in need of repentance. This is the hill on which we die and there is no room for compromise. Stand strong and remember, there is only one gospel, only one good news, and man has nothing to do with it. It is a gift from a loving, powerful, Holy God. On solid ground we stand, everything else is sinking sand.