by Rolaant L. McKenzie |
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The True Gospel
1 Corinthians 15:1-11 (NASB)
Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you,
which also you received, in which also you stand,
by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I
preached to you, unless you believed in vain.
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received,
that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day
according to the Scriptures,
and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time,
most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep;
then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles;
and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.
For I am the least of the apostles, and not fit 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 toward me did
not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but
the grace of God with me.
Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
The doctrine of the resurrection of the body was specifically denied by the pagan intellectualism of Corinth. By contrast Paul presents Christ's death, burial and resurrection as central in the gospel of salvation. The gospel does not merely bear witness to a historical event, for what it recounts, namely, resurrection and exaltation, is beyond the scope of historical judgment and transcends history. Nor does it consist only of narratives and sayings concerning Jesus which every Christian must know, and it certainly does not consist in a dogmatic formula alien to the world. On the contrary, it is related to human reality and proves itself to be living power. This "for our sins" makes the preaching of the death and resurrection of Jesus into a message of joy and judgment. Of joy, because the gospel brings salvation from sin and its penalty. It justifies the sinner before God. It is the power of God unto salvation (Rom 1:16). It breaks into the life of a man and refashions it, regenerates it, making him into a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). It cannot be generally perceived (2 Corinthians 4:3); it must be divinely revealed (1 Corinthians 2:14). Through the gospel God calls men to salvation. The preacher is the mouthpiece of God (2 Thessalonians 2:14), and since it is God's message to men, it demands a decision and obedience. The gospel is a message of judgment because attitude toward it will be the basis of decision at the last judgment (2 Thessalonians 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17). The gospel is not an empty word; it is effective power that brings to pass what it says because God is its author. Acceptance brings eternal life; rejection brings eternal death.
This gospel message was the same truth that the Apostle Paul
continually and consistently preached (1 Corinthians 2:1-2). The
recipients of this letter could attest to the veracity of this. Truth by
its nature is invariable, unchanging; and the infallible teachers of
divine truth could never contradict themselves or one another. This gospel
was that which the Corinthians had received. They had professed faith in
this message, and stood by it. For if they gave this truth, they left
themselves no ground to stand upon. The doctrine of Christ's death and
resurrection, is the foundation of Christianity. Remove this, and all
hopes for eternity sink at once. And it is by holding this truth firm,
that Christians stand in the day of trial, and are kept faithful to God.
It was by this gospel alone that they could hope for salvation.
The verb katecho means to "hold fast" or to "hold firmly". Paul clearly asserts that they were saved if they faithfully retained or held to the gospel as he delivered it. If the resurrection of Christ did not really take place, then their
faith would have been in vain. The gospel message would have been without
grounds. If their understanding of the gospel did not commit them to
belief in the resurrection, then theirs was no saving faith.
The gospel was among the first doctrines which Paul preached, for it is
the leading and primary doctrine of Christianity. Paul refers to the fact
that he was not the author or originator of this doctrine, but that he had
received it from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself by inspiration (1
Corinthians 11:23; Galatians 1:12). The Messiah, the Lord Jesus, died as
an expiatory offering on account of our sins. This passage is evidence
that He did not die merely as a martyr, but that His death was to make
atonement for sin. That He died as an atoning sacrifice, or as a vicarious
offering, is here declared by Paul to be among the first things that he
taught; and the grand fundamental truth on which the church at Corinth was
founded, and by which it had been established, and by which they would be
saved. It follows that there can be no true church, and no well-founded
hope of salvation, where the doctrine is not held that Christ died for
sin. The "Scriptures" Paul refers to are the writings of the Old
Testament, where it is taught that the Messiah would die for sin. Some Old
Testament passages that attest to this include Psalm 22, Isaiah 53:4-6,
Daniel 9:26-27, Hosea 6:2, and Zechariah 12:10. That Jesus was buried was proof that He actually died. The text goes on
to say that He "has been raised". Paul expresses this in the perfect
tense, signifying Jesus' continued life after the
resurrection. Paul again attests that this occurred "according to the
Scriptures", the Old Testament. Some evidences of this can be found in
Isaiah 53:10-12 and Psalm 16:10. Paul refers to the testimony of many eyewitnesses who saw Christ after
He had risen from the dead, appearing first to Cephas (the Aramaic name of
Peter), then to the Twelve [Matthias had replaced Judas (Acts 1:12-26)]. While this was not recorded in the Gospels, most of the five hundred
believers to whom Jesus appeared were still alive at the time of the
writing of this epistle. The number of eyewitnesses provided
incontrovertible proof of Jesus' resurrection. This is James the half-brother of Jesus, rather than the one called James who was martyred some time before (Acts 12:1). By "all the apostles", it likely refers to the occasion at the Sea of Galilee, recorded in John 21:14. It is also possible that He frequently met the apostles assembled together; and that Paul means to say, that during the forty days after His resurrection He was often seen by them. Some have debunked this Resurrection appearance as simply the pious
vision of believers seeing with the eyes of faith. But Paul could have
cited the testimony of two for whom that was not true, James, the half
brother of Jesus, and himself. Like Paul, James probably came to faith
(John 7:5; Acts 1:14) because of an appearance of the resurrected Christ
(Acts 9:3-6; 22:6-11). The last appearance of the risen Lord was at this point to Paul. The
significant thing is that Paul uses the same verb that he used for the
previous appearances. He thereby claims that he actually saw Jesus in
visible form. It was no hallucination. That is why Paul emphasizes the
resurrection so strongly in his epistles. "One untimely born" comes
from the word ektroma, which means "untimely birth,
miscarriage". Paul's meaning here is that when Christ appeared to him and
called him, he -- as compared to the disciples who had known and followed
Him from the first, and whom he had been persecuting -- was no better than
an unperfected fetus among living men. The comparison emphasizes his
condition at the time of his call. The least, because of the last of them; called latest to the office,
and not worthy to be called an apostle, to have either the office or the
title, because he had persecuted the Church. What kept Paul low in this
manner was the remembrance of his former wickedness, his raging and
destructive zeal against Christ and His members. How easily God can bring
a good out of the greatest evil! When sinners are by divine grace turned
into saints, He makes the remembrance of their former sins very
serviceable, to make them humble, and diligent, and faithful. Paul's unworthiness served only to enhance sovereign grace. This grace
did not "prove vain" (taken from the word kenos), but caused
Paul to work in such a way that he "labored even more", signifying
the character of grace given; a divine endowment of power. It was not the
power of Paul that made his labor possible, but the grace of God working
through him. To Paul, it was immaterial by whom the gospel was preached. The establishment of the truth was of primary importance. What mattered was the fact that the Lord Jesus died, was buried, and rose again. The design of Paul is to affirm that the doctrines to which he here refers were great, undeniable, and fundamental tenets of Christianity. All true Christians believe that Jesus Christ, and Him crucified, and then risen from the dead, is the sum and substance of Christianity. All the apostles agreed in this testimony; by this faith they lived, and in this faith they died.
Galatians 1:6-10 (NASB)
I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by
the grace of Christ, for a different gospel;
which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing
you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.
But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel
contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed!
As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to
you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!
For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to
please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a
bond-servant of Christ.
How can men (sinful by nature) come to God (holy by nature)? Paul's answer is this: There is only one way -- accept the salvation God's grace makes available through Christ's death and resurrection. Forget about merit -- salvation through obedience to the law of Moses. Man is too weak by nature to accomplish self-salvation or self-sanctification. Certain Jewish Christians (the Judaizers) were teaching that works of the law were essential for salvation, that Paul's gospel was not correct, and that he was not a genuine apostle. Paul's answer was to proclaim the doctrine of justification by faith plus nothing, and of sanctification by the Holy Spirit, not through observance of the Mosaic Law. This answer was given in the full apostolic authority he received from Christ. All theologies that teach salvation by faith plus human effort are forcefully negated by this great letter.
Paul was amazed and dismayed by the fact that the Galatian church
foolishly did not hold fast to the gospel as it had been preached to them.
They were removed, not from the apostle who was God's instrument in
calling them into the fellowship of the gospel, but from God Himself, by
whose direction the gospel was preached to them. Therefore, they had been
guilty of a great abuse of His kindness and mercy towards them, because
they had fallen away from the grace into which they had been called. It
took but a little time for the Galatians to fall into the theology of the
Judaizers that taught justification by works of the law. This doctrine of
the Judaizers is called "a different gospel" because it presented a
different way to salvation from that which was revealed in the gospel,
namely, by personal effort rather by faith in Christ alone. Paul declared this gospel of the Judaizers to be not another (ho ouk
estin allo) but a different one (heteron euangelion), a false
one. These false teachers were distorting the gospel. The word used
here, metastrepho, means to "pervert, corrupt". It also can mean
"to transform into something of an opposite character." As an illustration
of its meaning here we might cite Acts 2:20, "the sun will be turned into
darkness ..." That is what the false teachers in Galatia were doing:
turning the glorious sunlight of God's truth into the darkness of error.
They were transforming the gospel of Christ into something that was not a
gospel at all. The Galatian Christians were being duped and deceived by
this erroneous teaching and were deserting Christ and His free gospel of
salvation. Paul refers to himself as well as the apostles. It may be that he also is referring particularly to himself. He alludes here, possibly, to a charge leveled against him by these false teachers that he had changed his views since he came among them, and now preached differently from what he did then. While Paul did on occasion take part in Jewish rites (Acts 21:21-26), he never taught that observance of these rites were part of the gospel or necessary for salvation. The false teachers may have thought so, however, and assumed incorrectly that Paul had changed his position to that of the necessity to observe the law in order to be saved. Paul's use of "or an angel from heaven" was a very strong rhetorical mode of expression. It is not to be supposed that an angel from heaven would preach any other than the true gospel. But Paul wanted to convey to the Galatian Christians in the strongest possible terms that the gospel that was preached to them before was indeed the one and only true gospel. Any gospel that differed from this one was false and brought only eternal condemnation to those who believed it as well as to those who taught it. The word used here for "accursed" is anathema. It is used for
something to be delivered up to divine wrath, dedicated to destruction and
brought under a curse. This is probably the strongest word Paul could have
used to forcefully drive home the point that anyone who preached a gospel
different from the true gospel would be under the condemnation, the curse,
of God Himself. How confident was Paul that the gospel he had preached was the only
true gospel? He was so fully persuaded that he pronounced an
"anathema" upon those who pretended to preach any other gospel. And to let
the Galatian Christians and the false teachers there deceiving them know
that he was not speaking out of rashness or intemperate zeal, he repeated
it. This will not justify our thundering out anathemas against those who
differ from us in minor things. It is only against those who forge a new
gospel, who overturn the foundation of the covenant of grace by setting up
the works of the law in the place of Christ's righteousness, thereby
corrupting Christianity. The message Paul conveys here is this: If you
have any other gospel preached to you by any other person, under the guise
of Biblical truth, or of having it from an angel himself, you must
conclude that you are being imposed upon. For whoever preaches another
gospel lays himself under a curse, and is in danger of laying you under it
as well. Was Paul seeking to please men by toning down his message? He was being accused of preaching a cheap form of admission to God's kingdom. He counters by saying that he is a bond-servant of Christ (lit., slave). How can this cross-centered way be viewed as seeking to please men? Apparently the Judaizers had charged Paul with teaching freedom from the Law in order to curry the Gentiles' favor. But the tone of this letter, specifically the harsh language Paul had just used, was hardly calculated to win the approval of men. Pleasers of men simply do not hurl anathemas against those who proclaim false gospels. Indeed, if the apostle had wanted to please men, would have remained a zealous Pharisee and promoter of the Law rather than becoming a servant of Christ. Elsewhere Paul affirmed his purpose to please God, not men (6:12; 1 Thessalonians 2:4). Since the apostle had spoken so harshly, he felt it that should be clear now that he was not seeking to persuade men in the sense of conciliating them or seeking their favor. He was concerned, rather, to be on good terms with God. Pleasing men by adjusting the message to suit their desires is inconsistent with being a "bond-servant of Christ."
The word resurrection usually points out our existence beyond the grave. Of the apostle's doctrine not a trace of it can be found in all the teachings of philosophers. The doctrine of Christ's death and resurrection is the foundation of Christianity. Remove this, and all our hopes for eternity sink at once. It is by holding to this truth firmly that Christians stand in the day of trial, and are kept faithful to God. We believe in vain, unless we remain in the faith of the gospel. This truth is confirmed by Old Testament prophecies; and many saw Christ after He was risen. The apostle Paul was highly favored, but he always had a low opinion of himself, and expressed it. When sinners are, by Divine grace, turned into saints, God causes the remembrance of former sins to make them humble, diligent, and faithful. He ascribes to Divine grace all that was valuable in him. True believers, though not ignorant of what the Lord has done for, in, and by them, yet when they look at their whole conduct and their obligations, they are led to feel that none are so worthless as they are. All true Christians believe that Jesus Christ, and Him crucified, and then risen from the dead, is the sum and substance of Christianity. All the apostles agreed in this testimony; by this faith they lived, and in this faith they died. Those who would establish any other way to heaven than what the gospel of Christ reveals, will find themselves wretchedly mistaken. The apostle presses upon the Galatians a due sense of their guilt in forsaking the gospel way of justification; yet he reproves with tenderness, and represents them as drawn into it by the arts of some that troubled them. In reproving others, we should be faithful, and yet endeavor to restore them in the spirit of meekness. Some would set up the works of the law in the place of Christ's righteousness, and thus corrupt Christianity. The apostle solemnly denounces, as accursed, every one who attempts to lay so false a foundation. All other gospels than that of the grace of Christ, whether more flattering to self-righteous pride, or more favorable to worldly lusts, are devices of Satan. And while we declare that to reject the moral law as a rule of life, tends to dishonor Christ, and destroy true religion, we must also declare, that all dependence for justification on good works, whether real or supposed, is as fatal to those who persist in it. While we are zealous for good works, let us be careful not to put them in the place of Christ's righteousness, and not to advance any thing which may betray others into so dreadful a delusion. In preaching the gospel, the apostle sought to bring persons to obedience, not to men, but to God. Paul would not attempt to alter the doctrine of Christ, either to gain the favor of men, or to avoid their fury. In so important a matter we must not fear the frowns of men, nor seek their favor, by using words of worldly wisdom. |
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