Sermon Tone Analysis

THE GOOD NEWS (1): PROVIDED

(I Cor 15:3-4)

March 6, 2016

Read I Cor 1:1-4 – Wives can be tricky.

Gotta watch them.

One day my wife said, “There’s one thing I want to make perfectly clear.”

I said, “What’s that?”

She said, “The lawn,” and handed me a rake!

Clarity is important whether it’s the lawn – or a critical item of information, right?

And there’s nothing God wants us more clear on than the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Sadly, we live in a day when the gospel has been terribly battered, abused and twisted.

I’m sure if we polled this room we’d get nearly as many opinions as there are people as to its content.

It’s been equated with being good, practicing religion, a ticket to heaven, the secret to health and wealth, a means of need fulfillment, and a thousand other aberrations – all of them wrong.

So, what is the gospel?

Can we even know?

One of the most influential voices in the emergent church [McLaren] says, “I don’t think we’ve got the gospel right yet….

I don’t think the liberals have it right.

But I don’t think we have it right either.

None of us has arrived at orthodoxy.”

That’s incredible, coming from a professed evangelical.

Is he right?

No.

He himself denies the heart of the gospel which leaves him afloat on a sea of uncertainty.

It need not be so.

The gospel is not hidden.

And as Easter approaches, I wanted us to see anew the pure, undiluted, clear gospel as Paul gives it in I Cor 15:1-8.

What is the gospel?

The word literally means “good news.”

In simplest terms, the gospel is good news.

Not just any good news, but the good news!

Ultimate good news.

But good news implies “bad news” in the background, right?

Like the boy who arrived at the principal’s office and heard, “That’s 4 times this week.

What do you have to say for yourself?”

The boy answered, “I’m glad it’s Friday.”

Friday was good news against the backdrop of a failed week.

So the backdrop of God’s good news is the “bad news” of a failed world.

Evening news begins, “Good evening,” and then tells you why it isn’t!

The gospel starts with, “Bad news.

You reside in a world where chaos, terror, murder, perversion, pain and suffering reign.

Furthermore, you are lost – pitting your will against the will of your Creator.

You are unworthy of Him, with no hope of changing yourself or your world.”

That’s straight bad news.

But here’s the good news.

Jesus came to fix everything you can’t fix.

If you trust in Him, ultimate victory can be yours.

There is no better news in the whole world.

That is the gospel we want to examine in detail in 3 sermons looking at the good news Provided (3-4), Possessed (1-2) and Proven (5-9).

Note Paul’s intro: 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received.”

“First importance” – Top Priority.

Eternally significant.

This is imperative.

On Christmas Day, 1776, Col. Johann Rall was in charge of British troops at Trenton.

A loyalist spy brought an urgent message that Washington was crossing the Delaware River for a surprise attack.

But Rall was playing poker and had left word that he was not to be disturbed.

The spy finally wrote his message on paper which was delivered to Rall who stuffed it into his pocket – unread.

Rall was still playing poker when Washington’s troops completely surprised the British, gaining a much needed 1st major victory for the colonists.

We wouldn’t be here today but for Rall’s failure to pay attention to a message of first importance!

Well, Paul’s ranks way higher.

And notice he received it.

It’s not his opinion.

It’s a truth he received.

From whom? Almost certainly from the apostles during his first visit to Jerusalem 15 years before.

The form of the message suggests that it was a creed or song developed to communicate vital truth in a brief, easy to remember form – the heart of the gospel in three vital parts – Christ died, Christ was buried, Christ arose – all in accordance with the Scriptures.

The disciples struggled to know the purpose for His existence.

But in the 40 days between his resurrection and ascension, as Jesus taught them, they finally got it.

His life and death had been planned, prophesied and purposeful.

Planned before time began, prophesied hundreds of years in advance and purposed to save a fallen race.

Those facts are the heart of the good news.

So, how is the gospel provided?

3 elements.

I. Christ Died

Death is good news!? Hitler’s, maybe!

But how can death be good news?

John Donne didn’t think it was.

He knew death’s devastation: Each man's death diminishes me, / For I am involved in mankind.

/ Therefore, send not to know / For whom the bell tolls, / It tolls for thee.

So, how can my eternal destiny be impacted positively by any death, let alone one 2,000 years ago?

Paul gives 2 profound answers.

First, Christ died “in accordance with the Scriptures.”

Clue # 1. Christ’s death was part of a premeditated plan of God that He prophesied hundreds of years beforehand.

So it must have a divine purpose.

The assassination of Pres Kennedy was a senseless, tragic accident of history.

The assassination of Julius Caesar, Ghandi, Abraham Lincoln – all surprises to the victims and meaningless intrusions of small, insignificant nobodies into the course of history.

Not the death of Jesus Christ.

His death was planned, prophesied, purposeful and submitted to by Him with full knowledge of what was going on and why.

Because it had been prophesied.

Listen: Psa 22: 14) I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast; 15) my strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death.

16) For dogs encompass me; a company of evildoers encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet— 17) I can count all my bones— they stare and gloat over me; 18) they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.”

Written in 1,000 BC – at least 400 years before crucifixion was invented.

And only divine revelation can explain the precision of David’s description of Jesus’ death – a death planned and prophesied years in advance.

God was in charge of every minute detail.

But that still doesn’t explain why Christ’s death is good news.

How is it good?

Paul’s got that covered as well.

Look again: “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures.”

We’ve seen the plan and the prophecy, but now we see the purpose.

He died “for our sins.”

That’s the phrase that gives His death meaning.

It was a substitutionary death.