What is the Gospel? There are many good answers to this question, but lets look at what Paul taught us as “The Gospel”. He clearly defines it in 1 Corinthians 15- 1-4
“Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how 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:”
That is the Gospel. He died according to the scriptures, fulfilling countless prophecies exactly! That he was buried and then rose again, fulfilling prophecies. This is amazing and when I read it as a young person I just kept on going, you could spend hours on this passage alone and try and search for all the scriptures that were fulfilled in his death and resurrection. However, what I want to point you to today is in verse 2- “unless you have believed in vain”, the Greek word used for vain is eikē–
Thayers Defines this word as
- in considerably, without purpose, without just cause
- in vain
- without success or effort
This came to mind to me because of an article I read about pastor Ryan Bell who made a New Years resolution to live without God, and at the end of it he became an atheist. I am not sure why he decided to do this, but I am led to believe that his faith was pretty weak to begin with and this just helps put the icing on the cake for him. He also had a documentary crew follow him around so maybe there were ulterior motives other than just questioning his belief.
I contrast Ryan with the 21 Christians in Libya who were beheaded and didn’t recant their faith in Jesus, or Iraqi Christian children who were told by ISIS militants to convert to Islam or be killed. Their response? “No, We Love Yeshua (Jesus), they were killed as well. I have less pity for Ryan because he had it easy, its easy to be a follower of Christ in the US. There is coming a time when it won’t be, you can see the clouds on the horizon. Our faith should be as strong as the Iraqi Children’s or countless others being persecuted around the world, not the Faith that many have only when times are good.
In the end Ryan believes in vain and an example to us of what that looks like.