Godly Living by the Grace of God
Godly Living in the World Today: A Study in 1 Corinthians • Sermon • Submitted
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The Gospel that Matters
The Gospel that Matters
Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
Paul has been addressing specific conflicts within the church that have led to divisions. From who do you follow to how we should exercise our personal freedoms to how we should utilize the gifts of the Spirit, Paul has continually reminded the church in Corinth that the intent of the work of Christ is to unite us and not divide.
Paul drives this point home as he brings us back to the means of our salvation, the gospel of Christ. The gospel is the good news of Christ, the report of victory from the battlefield of sin and death. Through the gospel, we are united in the victory of Christ. This is the foundation. We have been united with Christ, united with the Father and united with one another through the same victorious act of Christ to conquer sin and death once and for all.
Apart from Christ, our hope has no position. We are left foundationless, but in Christ’s victory, we have life because we have regained access to the life Himself.
By the Grace of God
By the Grace of God
For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve 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 to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.
When we compare ourselves to the work of Christ, we see that it was because of our sins that Christ had to die. We see simultaneously our burden and our deliverance. When we see fully the gospel of Jesus, pride falls away for we have nothing to stand upon before Him apart from Him.
We have lost sight of the fact that we are the least of these. We have exalted ourselves to a higher moral position instead of recognizing that Christ died for even me.
Our life was saved for Christ that through our continued breaths that He might be proclaimed and our lives might be a testimony to the world that the good news of Christ is true because it can even save a sinner like me.