Ethan Hoover & Matthew Maher approach the pure, unadulterated Gospel by looking at Jesus' first words in ministry, the origin of sin, God's covering, and more. As Christians, we have to get the Gospel right in order to get life right. All that and more in this episode.
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Ethan Hoover & Matthew Maher approach the pure, unadulterated Gospel by looking at Jesus' first words in ministry, the origin of sin, God's covering, and more. As Christians, we have to get the Gospel right in order to get life right. All that and more in this episode.
What’s Covered in This Episode:
Resources:
Got questions?
Learn More:
To learn more about the podcast and your hosts, visit our website.
Looking to sponsor Rechurched? Apply to be a sponsor!
Follow us on Instagram!
Learn More:
To learn more about the podcast and your hosts, visit our website.
Looking to sponsor Rechurched? Apply to be a sponsor!
You are listening to research, a podcast aimed at instigating Christians to be Christian Hey, what's up everybody? My name is Ethan. And you're listening to the rich church Podcast. I'm I'm joined by my co host, Matt, what's up? Here we are again back at it. So we are. I forget what episode number this is, but I think it's episode 10 Episode 10. Wow. So, for Episode 10, we're talking about the pure gospel. But before we get there, I want to do a little icebreaker Oh, boy. But before we get there, I want to just say, if you're listening to this episode, my suggestion would be to first go back to the beginning of the season. And listen through every single episode until this one, once you do that, then listen to this and continue on. But I think that's how the season really has worked well is listening to them sequentially, because they build on each other. This episode is not really like, doesn't build on the false gospels. It contrasts with them. But I think the way we flowed this season, it just helps to, I guess, start from where we started. But also mayor, pause, go for a walk and get read church start with the welcome episode, I think that sets the table and obviously work your way through the false gospels. And I think you'll see they're nuanced. out enough where they're separate. You can learn about different narratives, ideologies, and messages that are contrary or antithetical to the Bible and the true gospel, while at the same time, being equipped and challenged and charged to be unashamed of the pure gospel, which is what we're going to define in today's episode. Right. So before we get in to the episode, let's start with a little icebreaker to shake things out. Have you ever completed anything on your bucket list? Or have you had a bucket? I do not have a bucket list. But if I was to have a bucket list, it would be to marry Sarah Peterson, which I've accomplished. And now I can die happy, man. There he go. That's pretty great. Thank you. So my I mean, the bucket list. I sort of I kind of had one, I guess a few years back. But one of them was to go to like a lantern festival, which is like these, like Chinese looking lanterns and you'd like light, you light them. And then you just kind of like hold on there for the heat to gather. And then you'd let it go. And usually there's 1000s of people. So this past fall in 2021. My fiance sage, and I actually went to one of them in Pennsylvania. And there were probably, I don't know, maybe 60,000 People with us. Yeah, it was absolutely nuts. But when the sun goes down, you all light them and let them go. And it was like nothing I've ever experienced before just to see like, I don't know, just, I don't want to be corny, but it was it was magical. It was pretty, pretty awesome. So we got obviously a bunch of you know, pictures and Instagram stuff for that. But that was definitely crossed off my bucket list. For what years ago, I met a young gal named Rapunzel. She had really long hair. And for some reason, she just wanted to see lanterns being floated into the sky, and I made that happen. So Wow. Yeah, that's crazy. Come to find out she was the princess that was missing. Wow. And I know that ladies and gentlemen, because my daughter is almost three and she loves tangled. So I do know what it looks like for a lantern festival as you say. It's a great movie. I'm all about it. Awesome. Well, that was great. I love that. Let's get into today's episode, which is the pure gospel. So we've made our way through a bunch of false gospels. Can you rattle them off? Yes, I can go First you have the prosperity gospel. I can't give you a sticky definition. The sticky you get. Alright, so go ahead. Alright, so first prosperity gospel. All right, that is a message that tells you you always should be happy, healthy and wealthy and never mentioning the fact that you are required to be holy. So it's a promise that God wants to bless you. And he does. But it's materially based, and it's built upon the idea that prosperity define is our faith and that's not true. So it's a false gospel. So that's number one. Number two is the psychology gospel. That was a fun one that dealt with me. Or you always being the victor or the hero of every story. And while at the same time, we should certainly find practical application to biblical accounts. We're not to be David all the time, right? And the sticky statement that always comes to mind is David standing before Goliath with a stone, of course, I want to be in that position. We're never David standing before Nathan in our sin. So the psychology gospel basically bolsters or boosts your your self esteem, when the Bible really tells you about denying self. So we had a secondary episode. If you recall, Dr. Carl benzo was with us and helped us really show where the gospel should infuse psychology or Suquet, the psyche, which is the study of the soul, so it's important that we're but we are not to be the chief aim of the gospel message Christ is Christ glorified. Amen. So number three is the progressive gospel, which was a three parter. Yep. That was probably my favorite to talk about. Yeah, I think because it's the most relevant I think, and really, like, hard to navigate sometimes. But, um, might be a little biased, but I think we did a good job. So I hope so we did several parts, which included obviously dealing with some current events and some really hot topics. And the reason we did that is because a spirit of liberalism has entered into the Church of Jesus Christ, which takes certain scriptures and really stretches them beyond their intention. So progressivism can be defined by bending to sinful man, while offending a holy God, right to the message of affirmation on certain lifestyles. There's no call to repentance or accountability. It's the idea behind social justice, and everything's racist, and woke ism, which ultimately is a hateful religion that deals with canceling people's livelihoods dealt with abortion, the two political stances that people take pro life versus pro choice. And we teased out the fact that they're not political stances, right? God is pro life through and through from the womb, to the tomb. So that's non debatable, right? We talked about human rights are usually wrong when they contradict what God says is right for humans, huge difference, right? God defines what's right. God defines the biological order, male and female. God defines the family because he created every single one of those, he's in charge of all of it. So we have to look to Him and the progressive gospel ultimately, goes way beyond the boundaries of the Bible. And when you do that, you end up in bondage to Babel. So then we made our way to our fourth and final, false gospel, which was the political gospel. And that was a two parter. Yes. And yeah, give us stick it I just found the political gospel ultimately can be divided into two parts, probably more. But in my mind, it makes sense that one side of the political gospel is the state becomes God, right? So that could be a politician or a president, or somebody in that realm, we worship as the Messiah. And that's wrong state is never God. And ultimately, God uses men and women, I often say he uses unrighteous rulers even to accomplish His righteous rule. You look in the Bible, he used Nebuchadnezzar he used Cyrus he used, he used all types of robots pilot to accomplish His righteous rule. So regardless of what I think about a certain leader, God will use them however, I want to make sure my decisions, my voting, my life is in alignment with the Bible. The other side of the political gospel is Christians who are content with a godless state. Right? Well, we're not supposed to engage with the culture or separation of church and state separation of church and state, which is a lie that has caused so much damage, because when you look at the inception of America, from the inaugural address from George Washington, to the framing and founding of our governmental documents, they're explicit with Bible biblical language. So yes, this was not a Christian nation. I've I've let my quote fingers up. But this was a nation of Christians, and a nations of Christians set the tone. And that's why there are churches on every corner for decades, hundreds of years. And that is why the 10 commandments are the, let's say, the jurisprudence, which means, right, the law of the land, right, really, internationally, the 10 commandments have become the common code of man in the known world. And where does that come from? Well, it comes from a place where God establishes order for mankind. So Oh, it's a lie to say we should separate the two. So that was really good. So we have the prosperity gospel psychology gospel, the progressive gospel and the political gospel. And now in stark contrast to all the other episodes we've released, so far, we have the pure gospel. And why is that? Well, because all the other episodes, we've been focusing on the wrongness of these counterfeit or false gospels, but in this episode, we're going to be looking at the rightness of the true or pure gospel, and what that is what it looks like, why it is the pure gospel. And really, our hope is that knowing and clinging to a true understanding of what the unadulterated gospel is, will help guard your soul against any other false gospel that might try to proclaim that it's the truth when it's not. So I'm sure Matt has a lot of thoughts on the pure gospel. I know he always does. But I wanted to share some of my own real quick before we dive fully into it. This whole podcast is about being you know, researched. So refining and refocusing our worldview to be based on biblical truth is basically, what we're trying to do. And I really want to stress this upfront, is that the gospel is not just for non believers. The gospel is for everyone, believer and non believer. Why is that? Because the gospel is the foundation of our faith, if you're a believer, that gospel is the foundation of what you believe. That's why it's still important. So if you are listening to this, and you got the urge to jump off the episode, because it doesn't apply to you, because you already know because you already believe in Jesus, stay, I promise you, it'll be a great reminder for the beauty of why we believe what we believe. And it's a great reminder as a believer to know what you believe and to be refreshed in that and to be refined in that. And in for nonbeliever, if you're listening, this is hopefully a chance for you to hear what we believe and why we believe it. So what we've went over in past episodes is that the gospel is not about you. It's not about me. It's not about any of that. It's about Jesus. And we're going to go back to the basics with this one. So Matt, to kind of like we've approached every other episode Thus far, we've really attacked it from like a high level. So I want to do that in this episode as well. What is this gospel? And what is it about in contrast to the other false gospels, right, so first and foremost, let's defined the word gospel. It means good news. We know that in the Greek it's un Galleon. It can also be defined as one who heralds or proclaims. And that is why we say the gospel on proclaiming the good news that God became man. That's Jesus, that man became a lamb and laid down his life as a sacrifice for my life. So Christ took by way of the cross, the death that I deserved, that's good news. Why is that good news? Well, because the bad news is, The wages of sin is death. And everyone who has ever been given breath, as a human being is a sinner. And based on that status, is deserving of death, and not just death and extinguishment, like you no longer exist after you die. No, there's an eternity, that you remain in that state. That's hell separation from God. So good news is that Christ made a way for you to be saved. It's where we get the word salvation. So any Christian should be one who heralds the good news. Right? Now before we go all the way back to the origin of the bad news. I think it's appropriate to share an illustration because in the days of Jesus, in the days of antiquity, really, mind you, they didn't have the luxuries we have today. Ethan with showers. Scented deodorants. scented soaps. Think about that for a second. Right? How did they have running water? They figured it out, but they didn't have the luxuries that we have to take care of our hygiene. So when a soap were or somebody that was selling soap would come into the town, and he would announce his presence. He would start by saying good news. Like announcing that he had a product that he wanted To sell them and it was so literally soap to keep them clean to wash their dirty, dirty parts. Well, that's good news in a land and a culture where you smell right? And obviously the rich and the noble had the money to be able to purchase such accommodations and luxuries. But just think about that now. Right? People were excited to receive this good news message of a software. And that's exactly what it means to be one who heralds the message of the good news that Christ came to cleanse us from our sins. That's good news. Yeah. When you in and of yourself, your nature, stinks rotten to the core. And a lot of people won't admit that, right? Because we have this sense of, you know what, I'm not as bad as the next person. And I'm a good person. And that's usually what you hear sadly, at funerals, right? People that really don't know Christ, you usually hear when the open mic. Opportunity happens. What do people say? He was a good guy. He was a good guy. Johnny was a good guy, Johnny, right? And they eulogize Johnny, forgive me if your loved one who passed away is named Johnny, actually, my brother who passed away is named John. So nobody can write me a hateful email, and insensitive. Simply just saying, we have this idea that because someone is good, where's the standard that we're measuring their goodness to, which is a question that they're going to make their way to heaven. And that's not true. And I think Christians have to have the love enough to tell you that the origin of the gospel actually came out of Jesus's mouth. Did you know that? I can't say it was the first recorded words of Jesus. But maybe it was where he started his ministry. We know that he was baptized by John the Baptist. It's when the audible voice of the Father said, This is My beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. The Holy Spirit falls upon Christ, and he's driven into the wilderness by the Spirit. It says, interestingly, the spirit is the power that drove him were to a place where he'd be tempted by the devil for 40 days and 40 nights while he's fasting. And he is literally emptying himself of his flesh for his mission ahead. His ministry was about to start, the the devil comes temptin at his lowest point, and Jesus Christ is tempted. And what does he utilize to combat the temptations of the devil? The word of the Word of God, you can say, he had a biblical worldview. And these temptations came at him, loss of the eyes, lust of the flesh and the pride of life, and you can read about them in Matthew four. And he overcomes the temptation of the devil, which is really encouraging because it tells us in Hebrews, Jesus was made of the same stuff as us. Right? He is a high priest who can empathize with us in our weaknesses, yet tempted in all points, he sinned not. So he's the perfect sin, substitute for my sinfulness. Okay, right after that, it says, He enters into a certain region, it's marked chapter one. The ministry of John the Baptist was seemingly ceased as the forerunner of Christ, he basically heralded the fact that somebody's going to come after me that I'm going to be pointing to Well, Jesus shows up, John is put in prison, Jesus comes to Galilee preaching, here's the first time it's mentioned, you ready? Preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God? Jesus is preaching the gospel, the good news of the kingdom of God, what did he say? Verse 15, The time is fulfilled, the kingdom of God is at hand. Here's the message already. Repent, and believe in the gospel. And that's pretty cool. That's really cool. Out of the mouth of Jesus, that he's good. He's giving you the exact This is a formula of the gospel. This is exactly what it's not all the smoke and mirrors. It says, well, it's not just about the heat, the healings were a byproduct of the existence of God being on earth, there was going to be healings, eyes, were going to be opened ears, were going to be unclogged tongues were going to be set loose. All of those were byproducts. But that wasn't why he came, he came to herald in the good news of his life, in exchange for our dead lives. Notice it says The time is fulfilled. chronologically speaking time, in that moment, found a fulfillment in the creator of time itself. Jesus, who was God sits outside of time, as God decides to enter into time, at a certain time, to redeem mankind for all time. That's gangster that is gang, so not just chronologically. The time is fulfilled. Prophetically this moment, all of the Old Testament prophecies about this Messiah, this Christ, namely Jesus, that's his earthly name means Lord, the Lord who saves, finds its fulfillment like, in this moment, everything about the Bible and the Old Testament over 300 prophecies about the first coming of Christ, literally fulfilled in one statement that time is fulfilled like I am fulfilling all of time. And then he tells us why he's here. Repent, which means change your mind. It's a Greek word metanoia. Metta change, noia mind means change your mind, because sin has damaged your mind. sin has separated you from God. And Jesus came to redeem us from that broken state, where relations with God were severed because of sin, redeeming us and placing us back in right standing with God. So Ethan, that's the last thing I'm gonna say, then you can take over and we'll go back and forth. You said earlier about the gospel message. And in my mind, I literally went to the reason why all this matters. The reason why we took time defining the false gospel, and its derivatives, namely, the alliterations of the peas, is because all of those false gospels lend themselves to a lifestyle, you live a certain way. Why? Because behavior is determined by belief. What you believe determines how you behave. So there's the truth of the gospel, which is this episode, the truth of the pure gospel. But there's also gospel truths, right. So it's not just the message. It's also what the message does as an influence on the way I live gospel truths. Well, let me back up. The truth of the gospel is that God makes me righteous, even though I'm unrighteous. And then gospel truths are how that righteousness makes me. And I live a lifestyle of righteousness, as I live in right standing with Christ. And that is why all of those previously defined narratives, which affect how I live, how I see life, need to be called out so that I can live a life of righteous living, which ultimately, is birthed out of the pure gospel. I think it's interesting that what Jesus says He says, Repent and believe the good news. He says, Repent, turn away from That's right. But he doesn't leave it at that he does not like repent. Alright, that's it. Right? and believe the good news? Yes, so good. So the good news, there has to be some sort of interaction with it, you have to believe it. So what's another word that can be like interchanged? With believe, like, I think I've always heard it as like, belief is like trust, like sort of like a trust, like you're not just, you're not just like, oh, yeah, I believe in God. It's like, no, if you if you believe in God, like, that goes past your like knowledge. It's like, it's more than that. That's right. It's an interaction engagement. It's what you and I did when we sat down in our studio here, right? We both trusted, that our weight would be held up by the seats that were sitting in. We trusted without thinking it had nothing to do with knowledge, Ethan, when I sat down, I put all of my weight on the seat. So to believe the gospel is to literally receive the truth, that God can hold you. All of you your weight, your life, your decisions, your occupation, your children, your marriage, your future, he can hold it all. Do you believe that that's the gospel, like God loved me that much that He gave me Jesus, but he didn't just give me Jesus and leave me an orphan. He made me a son of the kingdom. So I often go in my mind again, this is the teacher in me. What did he do? He gave me forgiveness. I needed that because I'm a sinner. But he didn't just leave me in that spot. He then gave me his righteousness. So now I'm the recipient of forgiveness. And then he calls me back to himself and says, no, no, no, no, don't walk away, just forgiven. Here's my own righteousness. And he slaps on me the righteousness that I don't have, nor do I deserve. And then I walk away, and that's good enough for me. And he goes, No, no, come back. Here's forgiveness, here's righteousness. And you're gonna need this, to navigate your world and he gives me his very own presence, and he deposits His Holy Spirit within us. Now that's what it means to be a Christian forgiveness, righteousness, presence. And guess what is a natural result of having the presence of God live inside of you. Forgiveness, righteousness presents resemblance, you begin to look like Christ. So we're the replication of Christ on earth. So I Paul was like, Imitate me as I imitate Christ. In other words, the world needs to see little Jesus's that's us the body, and they need to know they can be forgiven to and they need to know they can have the righteousness of God and Christ as well. And they need to know that the presence of God wants to live inside of them, but they first need to know that they are desperately lost. without the message of the gospel, yeah, I don't know where I've heard this from. It's probably a really elementary sort of analogy, I guess. But like Jesus is known as the light of the world like the light. So if we're to reflect Christ, like I always think of like, looking like Christ as almost like being like, not a puppet, but like you're trying or a mime, or mime. No. Yeah, mine. Yeah, I guess I'm, I'm you're trying to like act like, but then I think recently, I've been just like, kind of trying to think about a different way of looking at it. And this is I think, Alan Moore Elementary, but a mirror, you know, what, what does a mirror reflect reflects light. So, if Jesus is the light of the world, we're meant to be wherever we're placed and and pointing, that's where the light of Christ should be, should be hitting, you know? So I don't know. I was just thinking about that. But that's truth. I think that it's, it is basic, and it's simple. But gosh, it begs the question, for all of us to go, am I actually reflecting the light of Christ in my life? Yeah. Because Because if, if you are reflecting the light of Christ, you should be seeing just like if you were to flash a flashlight, or a laser in a mirror, you will see where that laser where that light is hitting on the other side. So if you don't see that in your life, if you claim the name of Christ in your life, and you think that you're reflecting the light of Christ, but it's not affecting anything that you're doing. That should be a tell right there. Right? That maybe you're not reflecting as much light as you thought. Your Mirror has been blacked out. Yeah. Or tinted. Remember, Francis de Assissi said, Preach the gospel and when necessary use words. I say often, you may be the only Bible somebody reads, not to be separated from preaching and teaching and speaking the gospel. But certainly, it becomes a gateway. I know that from my own testimony, Ethan, there were guys in prison. They didn't want nothing to do with God, religion, the Bible, let alone the definition of the gospel, the good news, they had no clue what any of that meant. Remember, the sinners heart rejects. Or let's say the sinners hearts dark. And what's the first thing that you do not want flooded upon your bedroom in the morning when you just wake up light? Like, that was not a trick question. I was like thinking, like you don't want somebody to just come in and turn the light on. Yeah, that's what we think we should do with nonbelievers, like turn the light on and but now, it just scares them. You have to ease your way in so that their eyes can finally adjust to the light. And in prison, it was my actions brother, it was my conduct as a reflection of Christ, loving the unlovable, trying to reach the unreachable, trying to teach the unteachable. All of that was birthed out of my conduct. And when they realized, and Theodore Roosevelt says, said this, people don't care what you know, until they know that you care. It's true. And when my peers began to notice that there was something unique about the way I was living, that's when they asked the question, that's when they were curious, that's when they were thirsty for it. And that is when I was able to verbalize the gospel, right. So yes, you can verbalize it and preach it. And the God that we serve can turn any heart to himself. But I'm convinced when we live it, people see it. And they'll be curious about it. The wonder where you get your peace from and in a non peaceful world. And I think those are the questions that give us the opportunity to say, Oh, my the peace, oh, it's not my peace, and then I can insert gospel, absolutely. So how do we know that? What we're calling the pure gospel is the actual pure gospel, right? Bible. God know the Bible. God speaks Bible. So God defines the gospel for us out of Jesus's own mouth and ministry, Jesus, the fulfillment of the gospel, the good news that God sent himself to redeem sinful man. The reason that's important is because way back in Genesis is where we get the fall of humanity. It came through our forefather Adam and Eve. And through their act of disobedience, mainly Adam's disobedience. It says in the scriptures, Eve was deceived by the serpent, that Satan to defy God, thrusting themselves and mankind into a state of sin. Remember, they were in a perfect state, in the Garden of Eden. They were in paradise we call it Paradise was lost. And it tells us when they realized they had sinned against God. Genesis chapter three, verse seven, one verse, it says, Then the eyes of both of them were opened. And they knew that they were naked. Okay, so prior to this, the knowledge that they were naked, as far as shame goes was not present. So they were naked, it was pure. They had pure eyes. I mean, I digress. When I think about why we wear clothes, right? In that funny. Everyone everywhere, except for maybe like third world countries and tribes where people walk around naked, or nude beaches. Clothing expresses the bad news that we're sinners, and we can't save ourselves. Did you know that everything about that, like the fact that I put clothes on today? Thank you, by the way for wearing clothes while we're doing podcasts even is expressly saying, I need to cover my shame. And this is what Adam and Eve realized in that moment. They're naked, what do they do? It tells us why you continue. So what fig leaves they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings and man has been attempting to cover himself ever since. Whatever man can make as a form of covering religion, false religion, false gospels, false messages. Every world religion is built on self covering your good works are good enough self covering, say this prayer, and you'll be good with God, Self covering, prescribed to this tradition, self covering, I was raised in a Catholic family, a Christian family, Buddhist family, Muslim family, self covering all of these messages from the world or forms of covering my own shame. And that's why later on in the account after God defines the curse, hey, this is what the consequences are of your sinful actions, Adam, Eve and serpent. But then there's a promise in the midst of the curses that there would be a blessing, and it'd be the seed of Eve, Genesis 315. And a seed would come and redeem it. They had no idea what that meant at the time, but it's a prophecy. And it's the beginning stages of the Good News of the Gospel. And yet, Genesis chapter three, verse 21, God, it tells us ready, and also for Adam and his wife, the Lord God made tunics of skin and clothed them. A lot of Bible scholars might differ. Here, majority and conservative scholars say that verse, the covering that God replaces from their fig leaves, to it says tunics of skin is probably the first animal sacrifice in the Bible. So God Himself likely killed a lamb as a sacrifice. So blood was shed, as a way to make them tunics of clothing to cover them. So with God like no, you don't cover you, I cover you and it's the first prefiguring of the cross of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God that would eventually shed his blood and cover us interesting. That's the gospel. So from there, all the way through the Scriptures, what do you say, man's attempt to fix it themselves? Man's covered state man, man. So I can say yeah, just Cain kills Abel. Within chapter four of the creation story. Cain kills Abel. And off to the races we go. God's chosen people through Abraham and Isaac, and then Jacob, namely Israel, the 12 tribes, off to the races, they go, sinful state, rebelling against God, God chases them down. God does the work. God calls them back to himself, Repent, turn around, come back and believe I got your best interest. I am your Creator, I love you. All the way through the Scriptures, the prophets, the Psalms, the Minor Prophets. Eventually were introduced to the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, where we get we get the person of Jesus, and He is the fulfillment, The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand Repent, and believe. The UN galley on the good news, you have a great sermon jam that we put together a couple years back. That is sort of sort of what you were talking about starts with Genesis three, right old test the Old Testament sermon jam, right? Remember that people like that? Yeah. And it, we'll put it in the show notes. Definitely give it a watch. It's a really cool way to get hyped up on that Mayor, but also the word of God and see the seed of Eve at play from Genesis three. That's right, all the way until the Gospels, right? Yes, every book of the Old Testament, that shows you where Christ shows up. So when people think that Jesus was reduced to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, he's so much bigger than that. And remember, Jesus is not just the know connais Jesus is not the founder of a religion. Jesus is the founder of the world. Yeah, that's a huge difference between the two. He's the founder of the world then he's the author and finisher of our faith. Sra. So he he created That's right. And he finishes the faith. That's right. This whole thing falls on him. Yeah, him alone. And that's why we got to get the pure gospel right. Not only in what we preach, teach, but expressively and what we live. Even if this is true, that Christ took death from me, then what am I fearing in this life? If death is supposed to be the greatest fear, so yeah, there's nothing I shouldn't fear anything. Yeah, I shouldn't fear Coronavirus, Coronavirus, should not have shut down churches and Coronavirus should not have shuttered in Christians who said I believe God is good and he's faithful, and he's a creator. And yet, I don't think God is the one that controls my death. He gave me life, but he doesn't have a say on my death. And I'm going, that's wrong thinking. That's not biblical thinking. In fact, I'm not encouraging anybody to be reckless. I'm just encouraging Christians to be faithful. That's what it means to be recharged. So I live in light of the fact that God controls my birth. God controls my death. And I have to be equipped to share if somebody was to ask you, Hey, what's the good news? What do you believe? The challenge is, can you in X amount of words or less, really, I don't want to put an amount of numbers on that? Can you express or share your faith and explain the pure gospel, that's should be the challenge of each of us? So I think it's worthwhile with all the content, and all the conversation thus far to pause and pivot. And I'm going to walk us through what is called, it's known as the Romans road. And the reason it's called Romans road, because these verses are found in the book of Romans. But I don't want to Christianize it and commercialize it, and desensitize it, as much as I want you to hear the build up right where we begin with the pure gospel, Romans 310. Again, you don't have to use these verses. But just in your mind, this is how it should frame. There's none righteous, no, not one. That's Romans 310. That's the first place. There's no one that's righteous, which means none of our good works are good deeds are righteous in God's sight. So we don't have any hope, in and of ourselves. I then make my way, a few verses ahead in Romans 323. And it simply says, All have sinned, all being every last one of us and we all fall short of the glory of God. So there's the bar for humanity, sinners, who are lost without a savior. We eventually make our way to Romans chapter five. And I like to quote Romans five, eight and it says God demonstrates His own love toward us in that law we're sinners. Remember, we're still sinners. Christ died for us. My Testimony I love sharing it on January 7, where I stood before a judge because I was deserving of the consequences of the crime I committed you guys know my testimony out there if you don't you're joining us for the first time. I'm gonna give it to you in very quick fashion for time sake, but I stood in a rightful place of judgment, I was going to receive the consequences for my decision. And that's when my victim son stood up, a son stood up entered in, interrupted and gave me what I did not deserve. And I literally was set free by a hug that he gave me Ethan, I was set free to spend the next 55 months in prison locked up physically, yet free spiritually and emotionally. And when I think about that picture, that pales, as real as that was, as powerful as that was, that pales in comparison to what Christ did a son stood up, entered in interrupted, intercepted the very judgement I do deserve the death that awaits me. And he gave me forgiveness and he gave me righteousness and He gave me his presence that sets us free beyond any human forgiveness, or human liberty. So where do we go from here? We go to Romans 623. The next stop, it says this, For the wages of sin is death obviously, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now we're making our way we're recognizing there's a gift that has nothing to do with us. And it's in Christ Jesus, our Lord, eventually come to Rome, Romans chapter eight, verse one, and you need to be reminded at this point, that there's no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, therefore, there is no condemnation. And I obviously have to remind myself there's no condemnation. And a lot of people jump over to Romans 10. And they basically end with with verses eight to 10, but I'm just going to read verse nine, that if you confess with your mouth this is the pure gospel the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. When it says raised from the dead, it speaks to the resurrection, right? So Christ Holman across, that's the crucifixion. And three days later, he rose from the grave. That's the resurrection. Basically, the resurrection validates everything that he said and did, and his earthly life and ministry, it validates that he was, and he is who he said he was, and who He said He is, He was God incarnate, He was God made flesh. So our entire faith rests on one, those verses I just talked us and walked us through, while at the same time, the resurrection of Christ that the tomb is empty, sets this message apart from every other religious message in all of the world, every other religious leader is dead, and in their grave, Christ alone, stands as the only one who conquered death. And that's the pure gospel. So anyone from anywhere who's done anything, can receive this good news, the gospel, to be saved from their sin, receive the one and only son, John 316, God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, the only begotten, that whoever believes there's that word again, trust in Him shall not what perish, but have everlasting life. That's the gospel. That is what it literally means to be recharged, coming back to your first love. So we just got done talking about what the gospel is, and you did a really, really good job of going through that and exploring that. I figured, why not go through what believing the Gospel actually gets you. As far as benefits go? That sounds super weird when I say it out loud, of like, it just doesn't seem so selfish, you know, because I have done nothing, we have done nothing to deserve the grace and glory. And every benefit that the Lord gives us. And our heart toward the gospel should not be to get these benefits. Our heart toward the gospel is a realization like we, we saw that Jesus said, some of his first words in his ministry, repent and believe in the good news. And so once that's done now, there are some benefits of believing in the good news, in trusting in Jesus in walking in righteousness, like we talked about. And I have been personally going through Romans eight, in my personal devotions quite a bit. And I've been loving it. I'm not going to read the whole thing. But I encourage you to go through and read Romans eight, I found myself reading it in in chunks and little chunks, because, man, if you really want to wrap your heart and mind around what it's saying, and the beauty and the glory of what is actually happening, this unpacks quite a lot of that in the benefits of it. So some of the benefits I wrote down, were obviously we went through forgiveness and freedom from sin, new life and Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, purpose, position, hope, and vision. And so I'll quickly go through them to just explore some of the points that I've, you know, wrote down in my own thoughts, but forgiveness and freedom from sin. Romans eight says, we're more than conquerors through him who loved us now that's at the end of Romans eight. And at the beginning of Romans eight, you also see that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. So putting those two bookends together, that's crazy. We are more than conquerors. Not through us, but through him who loved us, right? Yeah, your train of thought. Remember, the psychology gospel would stop at we are more than conquerors. We want to conquer, conquer, and leave through Christ out of it, who's obviously the source of our overcoming. Yeah. And you see, Paul, when you're reading this, you'll see a lot of like, run ons, because he's, he's getting all of the placement right, if you will. we're more than conquerors through him who love who us. And he does that several times. It just goes on and on. So that it's extremely clear how things work, and what he's trying to say. But new life in Jesus Christ we are consistently told to put on the new self. The Holy Spirit is another benefit gives life even though our flesh is dead that is found all over the place but It Romans eight, nine through 11, I'm gonna read that real quick. You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh, but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you, and if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death, because of sin, the Spirit gives life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in, you just think about that line, the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead, is living in you. He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of His Spirit, who lives in you. Again, that's another, another punch to the psychology gospel. It's not it's not us, giving ourselves life it is His Spirit, who lives in us. That's a benefit, the Holy Spirit. Purpose, which is another benefit is the call to be holy, as God is holy, and the Great Commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel that is walking in righteousness, and living in obedience. Next benefit position. So even though we were an enemy of God, we were once an enemy of God, He sent His Son to die for us and make a way for us to know him, like Matt has already said many times, and through that way, God not only forgives and freeze, but then also adopts us into His family, which you'll find in Romans eight as well as a son and daughter of God, and gives us a placement which we are all unworthy of which is, we are an heir with Christ, an heir with Christ. That's crazy. So even though we are unworthy of just forgiveness, He gives us all these benefits and puts us as an heir with Christ, it just, that's mind blowing, next benefit his hope, of what of heaven, eternal life, and are coming King Jesus. And in finally, vision, we no longer see the world through our fleshly eyes, but see it through spiritualize, which is a biblical worldview, which is what we believe in researched, so good, Ethan, you nailed it, use scripture, you rightly divided the truth. That's what the Bible says the Christian is supposed to do, rightly dividing the word of truth, you cut it straight. That's the pure gospel, the pure gospel, doesn't have any additives, any ingredients that are not in the Bible, it doesn't have any extra curricular influences, it's pure. And when it becomes contaminated, it loses its power. So the gospel and the implications there in that you receive the good news that God again, God became man, that man became a lamb, that lamb, the Lamb of God, who took away the center of the world, on a cross rose again on the third day, and he ascended into heaven, he sits at the right hand of God the Father, He deposited His Holy Spirit, and anyone who would believe and receive that message of truth that inspires us. That is why we have an appetite, to know His Word, His presence lives inside of me. So his presence equals His providence. His providence means he knew the day I would be born. And he certainly knows the day I will die. And in between my birth and my death, I'm to live a life reflective back to the light of His glory. The mirror, as you said earlier, I reflect Christ, that's what the sunlight does, in relation to the moon, the moon reflects or bounces the sun's light, that's me, I'm dark, unless the light of the sun reflects off of my surface, I m to be, as Paul said it an epistle written by the ink of grace, so the world can read and see, that guy believes what he says he believes. And hopefully, Lord willingly. People ask, Hey, what makes you so happy? In a world that seems so sad? And that's just the way of me saying they're going to ask you what's, why you so different? And you're able to tell them because of Jesus, and you tell them about the good news, that God saved you from the death you deserve. Now, whether or not they receive it or not, that's not up to you. There was a time in my life Ethan, where I was so focused on whether or not somebody is going to receive the message I preached. And then I realized, who do I think I am, I'm not the Holy Spirit. And I cannot allow that pressure to be on my shoulders, um, to live it, speak it, preach it, and leave the outcome to God. And I want to end with what Paul said in Romans chapter one, Romans 116, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Why was Paul saying that? Because there were those that were were ashamed their lives were on the line. People were losing their livelihoods, their lives, their family, they were being taken into custody incarcerated because of their faith. Remember Jesus US also considered to be a renegade is why they pinned him to a cross. So now his followers are now doing the same things that he was doing living as he was living, and there comes persecution. So Paul's like, hey, there are people that are cowering in their faith. There are people that are shuttering. There are people that are silenced. For I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, but is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, this is a summary statement, The just shall live by faith, justified, just if I had never sinned, in the first place because of Jesus, I am justified just if I'd never sinned in the first place, and I live by faith in Christ alone. So that's the pure gospel, we could probably talk about this for the rest of our life. Yeah. Because that's exactly what we should be doing. We hope that you were encouraged by the pure gospel episode really stands in stark contrast to the previous nine episodes. The false gospel obviously comes in various forms, gotta have ears to hear and eyes to see, to be able to identify and discern the lies. There are a lot of them a lot of churches with great followings, prominent leaders, and teachers are all propagating the false gospel and people are following them, because they don't know the pure gospel. The pure gospel ultimately takes over every part of your life, your mind, your heart, how you think. And it does affect how you live. And that's why what you did Ethan to cover the benefits of the Gospel, the opposite of the prosperity gospel, right, is that you don't prosper because of the Gospel is that the gospel prospers inside of you. That's what Ethan meant when he said, We benefit because of the good news. So, goodness gracious, our God is good. And our God is gracious, more to say, hopefully, in the next episode, which is season one review, season one review. So we talked about a little bit of the false gospels in comparison to the pure gospel in this episode, but in that episode, it's gonna be a more short form. Just straight up sticky definitions. Like let's go over all that we talked about. Yep. And just kind of bring it home. I would love to hear that. All right. Let me say this before you close us down either guys, please, please, please take advantage of recharge. podcast.com That is our homepage attached to cc ocean city.com. That is our church. If you are ever in the Ocean City area, we'd love to meet you. If you already attend our church, we appreciate the support and sharing and subscribing and all of those social media. Things we do. But please submit a question. For our queue, and our episode, our question and response episode, you can find the very link to submit any question that you may have at recharge podcast.com Or in the show notes on Spotify, or Apple podcasts. Please take a moment to ask a question. We will be honored to answer it. And this is the last week to submit a question for the q&a episode. So make sure you submit your question no later than March 25. And we will see you guys in the next episode. Season review. That wraps it up. Thanks for joining us. I'm Ethan Hoover. I'm joined by Matt. Thanks guys. See you guys in the next episode. God bless