From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase

Part 5 of a series. Read part 4.

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... (1st Corinthians 15:3-6)

Once again we are taking up the question, "What is the essence of the Gospel?" In previous installments of this series we have seen that this is the most vital of all questions. We must understand the Biblical, darkness-and-light, eternal-life-and-eternal-death distinction between the thousands of false gospels and the one true Gospel. We have also seen that there is no one true Gospel without the deity of Jesus Christ, God who became man and died for sinners. Further, we have seen that the essence of the Gospel includes the fact of the most stupendous event in all history: that Jesus Christ, God made flesh, actually, physically, died.

In our last article we noted that many of the false gospels contend that Christ died as an example of self-sacrifice or martyrdom, or for many other purposes that Scripture does not teach. Some false gospels teach that Jesus died only "spiritually" but not physically. The Word of God leaves no doubt as to the falsehood of such claims. Jesus died physically, as we have seen - and for one purpose: "Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures." We shall now focus on this great truth which is likewise of the essence of the Gospel.

It is often said that that if there had been only one human being, and only one sin, God could have done no less than to die on behalf of that one human being. But Adam's sin was more than personal. The very first sin brought a curse upon mankind, and upon the entire creation. Romans 5:12 declares that "through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned."

God had to deal not only with sins - sinful thoughts, words, and deeds, which in every case without except are principally an offense against Him - but moreover with sin, the curse that had been brought upon the entire human race through our father Adam. Christ dealt with both, living the perfect life that Adam failed to live and that none of his cursed descendants could ever live, and dying the death that all of Adam's sinful race deserve to die, on behalf of the redeemed.

Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous. (Romans 5:18-19)

In Romans 8:3-4 we read:

For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

When our first parents sinned, they became sinners by nature. And we, as their descendants, share in that sin nature. We are not sinners because we sin. We sin because we are sinners. Psalm 51 tells us that even a little baby in the womb, not yet born, has that sin nature which the child has inherited from Adam. And it does not take long for even a little newborn child to exhibit the fact that he is a sinner by nature.

And our sins are our sins - we are personally and individually responsible before God. In Jeremiah 31:30 the Lord declares that "every one shall die for his own iniquity." In Deuteronomy 24:16 Jehovah declares that "fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor shall children be put to death for their fathers; a person shall be put to death for his own sin." In Ezekiel 18:20 the Lord again declares this unfailing principle: "The person who sins will die. A son will not be punished for his father's sins, and a father will not be punished for his son's sins."

And then the Lord adds this: "The righteousness of the righteous person will be his own, and the wickedness of the wicked person will be his own." The child is not righteous in the eyes of God because the parent is saved. Family position or lineage does not save. Church membership does not save. Ethnicity does not save. Salvation is not corporate in any sense - it is always individual.

Even the Old Testament priest who served as a type of Christ, the great High Priest who was to come, needed individual salvation. And so, as the Holy Spirit declares through the writer to the Hebrews, Jesus,

such a High Priest was fitting for us, who is holy, harmless [i.e., completely innocent], undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens; who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people's, for this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. For the Law appoints as high priests men who have weakness, but the word of the oath, which came after the Law, appoints the Son who has been perfected forever. (Hebrews 7:23-28)

Jesus fulfilled the Law perfectly in His life and death so that God by His infinite grace could credit that perfect law-keeping righteousness to our account, and mark our sin-debt, "paid in full."

Because Christ's victory over sin was complete, sin shall be banished from the entire created order:

In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace which He made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth - in Him. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of His glory. (Ephesians 1:7-12)

Therefore "we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells" (2 Peter 3:13).

The essence of the Gospel is that Christ died for our sins - and thereby accomplished not only the redemption of a people for Himself, individual by individual, but also the redemption and complete renovation of the created order, new heavens and a new earth in which we shall live with Him forever.

But there is yet more. Christ not only died for our sins, "He was buried, and...He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures." These historical facts are also essential to the Gospel. We shall examine both as we continue.

Next: The Essence of the Gospel Is That Jesus Was Buried

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