From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

Part one of a series

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 delivered 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.

After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time.

For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed. (1 Corinthians 15:1-11)

In a series beginning today, I want to focus our attention on the essence of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The word translated "Gospel" in the New Testament is the Greek euangelion - "the evangel" - from which we derive the English words "evangelism" and "evangelical." A church that is truly evangelical is a body of people who have believed the Evangel, and they proclaim the Evangel - the one true Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Without the Gospel, there is no reason for a church to exist, no reason for people to gather on the Lord's Day. It is because of the Gospel that true churches of Jesus Christ exist. People who have been saved by the power of Gospel have every reason, and every responsibility, to gather to worship their God and Savior and to proclaim to the lost world the Gospel by which they were saved.

The Apostle Paul by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit gives the essence of that Gospel in the words above from 1 Corinthians 15. In this series I want to call our attention to those words, because we must have a clear understanding of them. If we are to believe the Gospel, if we are to proclaim the Gospel, we must be clear on the content of the Gospel.

We live in a time when much about the Gospel is unclear. Many uncertain trumpets are sounding. Many of the essentials of the Gospel are being confused, and even denied, in churches that call themselves "evangelical." Such confusion is not a minor matter. It is soul-damning. For the Gospel to be preached well and effectively it must be preached accurately. The body of people who call themselves a church would be better off to close down permanently rather than to confuse people about the way to God, in all likelihood inoculating them against the truth, causing them to believe that all is well when they remain on the road to Hell.

What are some of the false gospels to be found in the church today? How do they differ from the true? Why are they false? Where do they lead? We shall address these questions as we continue.

Next: False Gospels and the True

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