August 12, 2013
We want to conclude our study in the new birth by sharing what the true Gospel really is.
Easter is the time set aside annually by the world to remember the crucifixion and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. To the genuine Christian, there is no other plan of salvation. In Galatians 6:14, the apostle Paul states, But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ…. Then, in Romans 10:9, he adds …if thou …shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
The subject content found in these two portions of Scripture constitutes the gospel message: Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose again. This truth should be indelibly inscribed upon every believer’s heart. There is no other “good news.” Eternal life is eliminated if Christ went into a coma and then revived. The gospel, meaning “good news,” is “bad news” if Christ did not die by shedding His blood, for then the world has no adequate sacrifice for sin.
If He died and remained in the grave, the dilemma is compounded because He then becomes an imposter by breaking all of His promises and predictions concerning His resurrection. Matthew 16:21: From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. John 2:19: Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Verse 21: But he spake of the temple of his body.
Had Christ not fulfilled these utterances He would have proven himself to be a fraud. However, 1 Corinthians 15:20 states, But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept [or were dead]. He proved His deity through the greatest miracle recorded in the annals of history. Oh, what a wonderful Saviour. Buddha, Mohammed, and Zoroaster never made such claims and are presently skeletal frames lying in the dust of the earth. The Lord Jesus Christ is the only risen Saviour. Were He still lying in a tomb in the Middle East completely decomposed just a skull and bones-He would be disqualified to be the Saviour of the world. But He lives and thereby proves His Godhead and power.
The Gospel of Salvation
In 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, Paul says, 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. What is this gospel or “good news” that saves? 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.
Simplicity, simplicity, thou art a jewel. Could anything be easier to mentally grasp? Little children are able to comprehend God’s marvelous plan of salvation. In verse one of this text the Holy Spirit, through the Apostle, says, I declare unto you the gospel. It is, Christ died for our sins …was buried and that he rose again the third day. This is not symbolic language but means that Christ died literally-in a body, was buried, and rose again literally-in that same body. This is where salvation begins.
If you don’t believe it, you don’t believe God. John 3:16: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Romans 5:8: But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. First John 3:16: Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he [God] laid down his life for us….
Let’s go one step further. Christ’s death had to be by the shedding of blood. Had He died from starvation, strangulation, suffocation, or seizure of the heart, there would have been no eternal salvation possible. Leviticus 17:11: It is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. Hebrews 9:22: …without shedding of blood is no remission [for sin].
The full gospel message is that Christ died for our sins by the shedding of His blood, was buried, and rose again the third day. Be careful that you give the sinner the true presentation of the gospel in your witnessing. Watch out for Bible perversions, organizations, and pamphlets that omit the blood because of the …offence of the cross… (Galatians 5:11).
It is an intellectually humiliating experience to present the picture of a blood sacrifice as far as fainthearted, weak-kneed compromisers are concerned. They don’t mind picturing Christ as a great martyr, willing to die for a cause, because this is a heroic portrayal (but inaccurate).
We, however, must proclaim the truth. We must tell it as it is or forget it. A lopsided, distorted gospel can’t save anyone. It is the blood drawn from the Savior’s veins that produces eternal salvation. Christ himself said so in Hebrews 10:4, 5. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me.
Scores of times the New Testament mentions Christ’s holy blood as the only way of salvation. Acts 20:28: …the church …he hath purchased with his own blood. Romans 3:24, 25: Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood…. Ephesians 1:7: In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace. Hebrews 9:12: …by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. First Peter 1:18: For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold…. But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. First John 1:7: …the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.
The Gospel of Damnation
The one who is behind all opposition to the blessed truth of Christ’s death and resurrection is a sinister agent named Satan. He is the commander-in-chief of the demonic denizens from hell and the god of this present world system. His main purpose in existing is to blind men to the true message of salvation. He doesn’t care if one goes to church and supports a denominational program. Rituals please him because they give man a false security by trusting in that which invigorates the physical senses. Man’s plans to reach heaven through a series of self-righteous efforts delight this arch demon because the program of good works is in complete contradiction to God’s master plan for salvation.
Is Satan really behind this treason against God’s gospel plan? Second Corinthians 4:4 plainly states,… the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. Notice that it is the truth concerning the “glorious gospel” or the glorious good news about Christ-His death, burial, and resurrection-that the satanic hosts from hell are out to blacken and eradicate. If the undercover agents from hell can change the message to eliminate the bloodshed and resurrection of Christ, they have won the battle for the souls of the blinded individuals.
You ask if I really believe that evil spirits pervade the atmosphere? Do I believe these spirits can influence thinking? First Timothy 4:1: … the [Holy] Spirit speaketh expressly [plainly], that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils.
Notice that the human first of all gives heed to a seducing spirit or demon and then accepts his doctrine. Did you know that the demons have theologians among them? The Bible teaches that there is an order of demonic hosts. Among the demons we find a class that pervades human minds with false doctrine. Once the demon has control, it is practically impossible to free the individual from the heretical error preached and practiced. This explains why some of the cults are so successful in binding their victims. Behind their doctrine is an evil spirit.
Satan hates the message of Christ and His blood. I can testify to weird happenings in crusades across the nation when messages on the blood were proclaimed. Satan hates the blood so he plants other theories in men’s minds. These include reincarnation, transcendental meditation, religious experimentation through the use of LSD, emotionalism, and good works.
Man says, “Certainly in this enlightened intellectual age one does not need Christ’s gory sacrifice upon a cross. One only needs to do the best he can in this world-help others, give to charity and follow the Golden Rule, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Ten Commandments. “This all sounds very humanitarian and seems reasonably logical to the mind, but it is “another gospel.”
Every child of God should do good works and help others because of Christ’s presence in his life. He does not work to become saved but rather because he is saved. Ephesians 2:10: For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works…. Notice that a believer works because goodness, morality, righteousness, and service are created in him by Christ Jesus. To change that order and teach men that they must work for salvation is the gospel of damnation planted in minds by the demonic god of this world system. It is wrong because it keeps men from accepting the true gospel of the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
God’s Grace
Romans 4:5 tells us, But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Ephesians 2:8, 9 adds, For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. Again, Titus 3:5: Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.
Grace means “unmerited favor.” God bestows a favor upon a sinner that he does not deserve. All of us deserve eternal damnation because of our sin. God, however, loves us and gives us the gift of eternal life when we put our faith and trust in the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ (obtained through His death, burial, and resurrection). Romans 6:23 states …the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is a gift, dear friend.
A gift ceases to be a gift when one pays for it. If the message of the gospel makes demands upon one through a system of works, the receiver of the so-called gift has been swindled. If salvation comes by following a code of ethics, the Ten Commandments should certainly provide salvation for a sincere heart, because it is the best man can do upon earth. However, God never gave the Law-called “the Decalogue” or “Ten Commandments”-as a methodical plan to produce salvation. Hebrews 7:19: For the law made nothing perfect….
Rather, God’s Law was given to reveal man’s sin. By the Ten Commandments … is the knowledge of sin... (Romans 3:20). In other words, as one hears God’s Law proclaimed or reads it in Exodus 20; he realizes his failure and is driven to Christ for salvation. Romans 3:19 states that the Ten Commandments were given so that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.
Notice that the Commandments were given to produce guilt, not salvation! The thunderings of Sinai produce deep conviction over sin. The conscience becomes disturbed, and the sinner runs to the cross for cleansing. Revelation 1:5: Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood. Do you see it? There is not one human work that has ever been administered upon this earth or one that shall ever transpire in the future that will ever save a soul.
In this chaotic age of apostasy and liberalism, the true message setting forth the plan of salvation is a necessity. Proud humanity would obscure the simplicity of God’s plan with high-sounding phraseology, thus hindering man’s understanding of the gospel or “good news.” Paul said in 2 Corinthians 11:3: But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
Satan loves for a minister to use terminology that is incomprehensible and above the hearer’s I.Q. Why? If the listener finds the message unintelligible because he fails to grasp the eloquent utterances of the speaker-the message is useless and the hungry soul lost. The old slimy, slithering serpent Lucifer wants to blind men to the light of the glorious gospel.
What is the gospel message that Satan so vehemently attacks? It is found in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4.I declare unto you the gospel…. It is, 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. The “good news,” in all of its simplicity, is that Christ died by the shedding of blood for our sins, He was buried, and He literally arose from the grave in bodily form.
Let’s return to the doctrinal dogmas of the Bible and preach Christ crucified, buried, and risen again. This is the true gospel. Anything else has God’s “anathema” and judgment upon it. Galatians 1:8: …though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. Ministers who have detoured the cross calling it a “slaughterhouse religion” have done so because their minds have become alienated from God and darkened through the mind manipulations of demonic spirits. Any person who rejects the true gospel message is under the influence of the spirit world mentally.
Hear God again. Second Corinthians 4:4: … the god of this world [Satan] hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. It is the gospel concerning the death, burial, and resurrection that the hosts of hell are out to discredit and eradicate. Oh, fall on your face before God and change your mind about Christ. Receive the abundant and eternal life Christ longs to give you. Let Him be your Saviour today!
FROM THE HEART OF DR. REXELLA VAN IMPE
Wheres My Eraser?
Ill never forget my first day of kindergarten. I was barely five years old, but I remember it as vividly as if it had happened yesterday.
Making new friends with all my classmates was exciting, the bright and cheery decorations in our homeroom were beautiful, and my teacher seemed very nice.
But the thing that caught my attention and completely fascinated me was…the blackboard.
Watching the teacher take chalk and draw simple pictures and write letters on the board was interesting. But then she took something in her hand, wiped it back and forth across the surface of the blackboard, and instantly every mark she had made disappeared! I watched in wide-eyed astonishment, absolutely intrigued.
Before my kindergarten year was over, I had the opportunity to try it for myself. I made some chalk marks on the board, then used the eraser to make them go away. I never tired of it. The eraser was my favorite discovery.
Although Im normally not a person who dwells on the past a great deal, I do often reflect on the blessings and good things God has sent into my life. My husband, Jack, and I make it a point to recall and give thanks for the ministry opportunities, friends, and victories the Lord has given us-and continues to bestow upon us. Somehow it seems my mind is like a recorder.
Your life, the movie
An article from Smithsonian Magazine written by Dr. Wilbur Penfield, director of the Montreal Neurological Institute, explains why I felt that way. He wrote: “Your brain contains a permanent record of your past that is like a single, continuous strip of movie film, complete with sound track. This film library records your whole waking life from childhood on.”
Do you ever have “home movies” from your past running in your mind? Sometimes thats a good thing, but it can also be painful to be reminded of events and people that have hurt us, or things we have done to injure others.
Perhaps there are incidents in our past that we hope nobody else knows about, and sometimes the devil will replay these hidden shames to torment us.
“Oh, youre such a bad person,” he says. “Just look at what you did. How can you pretend to be so good when youre really so rotten?” Revelation 12:10 exposes the devil as the “accuser of our brethren” who accuses us before God day and night. But the good news is that we dont have to worry about his accusations.
Jack refers to Dr. Penfields article in one of the devotionals in his Soul Food book. His comments there certainly helped me better understand the concept of the “book of remembrance” mentioned in the Bible. Truly God is the great Bookkeeper. He has a record of my life in a heavenly book that has my name on it-Rexella Shelton Van Impe. God has kept a record book on all of humanity-every single person who has ever lived.
But just as He has written everything down, good and bad-every failure, fault, and sin-He also has the ability and divine desire to erase everything bad on my record. Oh, praise God for a heavenly eraser that deletes every wrong word or thought or deed!
That eraser, of course, is the blood of Christ. And it washes us clean! It wipes everything off the blackboard!
Gods heavenly eraser leaves no trace behind. Isaiah 1:18 declares, Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. And Psalm 103:12 says, As far as the east is from the west-and they never meet-so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.
Forgiven and forgotten
When our sins are forgiven, they are forgotten. God promises in Hebrews 10:17-And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. In fact, the prophet Micah rejoiced that God will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea (Micah 7:19). Then, according to D. L. Moody and Billy Sunday (I dont know who said it first), He puts up a great-big sign that says, NO FISHING ALLOWED!
God doesnt want us to go fishing there, looking for and finding the past. He wants us to forget it just as He has. Yet I think that sometimes after God has erased the blackboard of our lives, we keep bringing up events and things that
God doesnt remember any more. Our human nature has a tendency to go back and keep rerunning the old mental home movies of what we were like before God saved us and made us new creatures through Christ Jesus.
We must learn how to forget the past and look to our future in Christ. The apostle Paul, acknowledging that he was not perfect, cried out, But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:13-14).
Of course, the devil will try to remind us of our past. One of his tools of deception is to keep us looking back. He knows if he can make us feel that our past sins make us unworthy to do anything for God, we cannot be effective in the present.
But we can overcome the devil with our testimony of erased sins through the blood of Christ.
Then God can use our life story-our testimony-to reach other people who need to be set free from the shackles of sin. When others see us walking in victory, it gives them hope.
I heard a story about a little girl who said to her pastor, “I want you to know that I am saved.”
“Thats wonderful, honey,” he said. “Can you tell me which one of my sermons brought you to Christ?”
The little girl replied, “It wasnt anybodys preaching-it was my Aunt Marys practicing!”
Living the life of Christ day by day is not always easy, but there is such power in our testimony. In Romans 7:19, Paul talks about the struggle he faced every day in doing what was right. For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Yet, just a few verses later, he declares, There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (8:1).
Whats the secret? Being willing to say, “Wheres my eraser?” Jesus came into the world for a purpose-not only to set the example of a perfect life and to show us God on earth and what we can be though Him, but also to erase the blackboard of our lives again and again! I often find myself saying in my prayer, “Lord, thank You for that eraser.”
Let me make it clear that I certainly am not suggesting that we nonchalantly fail more and sin more, expecting God to erase whatever we do. Thats not what I mean at all. The truth is that even when we do our best to live righteously, there are times when we will not make the right choices. And in those times we can and should say, “Wheres my eraser?”
God is much better at forgiving than we are at sinning!
Eugene Peterson, the pastor who produced The Message a contemporary language version of the Bible, observed that “God is much better at forgiving than we are at sinning.”
Even when we think that we have absolutely gone too far, that weve really done it this time, or that what we have done is totally unforgivable, God stands waiting for us with open arms. No matter how “good” we have been at sinning, He is much better at forgiving. No matter what weve done (or failed to do), its never too bad to be forgiven…and to be erased!
Sin brings shame, but confession brings confidence. The Bible says, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). We can be victorious in the Lord. We can live a life like Aunt Mary that draws others to Jesus. We may have failed yesterday. We may fail today. But we can ask Him to erase our failures and sins.
Then we can begin anew each day.
Theres a beautiful old hymn called, “An Evening Prayer,” that captures the idea of asking God to erase the blackboard of our lives at the end of each day. It says:
If I have wounded any soul today,
If I have caused one foot to go astray,
If I have walked in my own willful way,
Dear Lord, forgive.
Forgive the sins I have confessed to Thee,
Forgive the secret sins I do not see,
O guide me, love me, and my keeper be,
Dear Lord, Amen
Recently I was witnessing to an acquaintance about accepting Gods forgiveness and beginning a new life in Christ. Oh, how this person wanted to do it, but he kept struggling with some really bad sins-truly evil practices-that he feared had ruined his chance for redemption and taken him beyond forgiveness.
God hates sin…but loves sinners
I shared the amazing truth of Romans 5:6-that Christ died for the ungodly. “Its true that God hates sin,” I told this friend, “but that does not diminish His love for sinners. He died for the very sins that He hates.
“There is nothing in your life that cannot be forgiven-no stains that He cannot erase,” I said. “When God erases your sins and you begin a new life, not only is your future clean, but your past is clean also. That means every mention of your past failure is erased in Gods book. It will never again be found in those heavenly pages where the greatest Bookkeeper of all records your deeds. “
So far the person Ive been witnessing to has not given his heart to God and accepted Christ as his Savior. I am praying that the Lord will continue to deal with his troubled heart and love him into His kingdom.
The world we live in today is so troubled and filled with strife, so confused and far from God that many people are filled with fear and anxiety. From a natural standpoint, it would be easy to get our blackboard filled up with worry and dread.
If we as believers study and understand the Word, we see that prophecy is coming true. Every day the news points to the coming of the Lord. But those without the Lord-those who do not know that todays news points to Christs coming-must get dreadfully discouraged. There is no hope outside of Christ.
But we do not have to be sad or fearful because Jesus said, Let not your heart be troubled…I will come again (John 14:1, 3). He also declared, These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world (John 16:33).
If we take our eyes off the Lord and start looking at the world around us, then were going to falter. The Gospels tell how Peter started walking on the water to Jesus, and then was distracted by the stormy seas and began to sink. The same thing can happen to us. When we get that sinking feeling, like Peter, we need to cry out to the Lord for help. We need to ask him to erase the turmoil and lack of faith in our hearts. The only cure is to say, “Lord, I missed the mark again. Please erase it, forgive it, and help me start again.”
No regrets! No fear!
You know, because of Gods heavenly eraser, we dont have to regret the past or fear the future. God has forgiven our past, and He is already in our future. But the only way to get to the future is to live today.
We have absolutely no control over what happened yesterday-and to a large extent, we cant determine what will come tomorrow. The only time we can really use is now, today, where we are living this minute. We wake up every morning to a clean, fresh page God has given us that is labeled TODAY. And, as Im sure youve heard, it is a gift-thats why it is called the present!
I challenge you to start living your life to the fullest. Because we know the Lord, this is the most exciting time to be alive since the dawn of creation. Give your best to the Lord. Do your best to make a difference in your family, your neighborhood…in your world. Who knows if God has brought you to the world for just such a time as this?
Yes, there will be challenges. There will be times when you dont know which way to turn or exactly what you should do. But keep on going with your hand in His. Dont look at the challenges-just keep your eyes and heart on the Lord. The Bible says, Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee (Isaiah 26:3).
Thats where I want to live from now on-how about you?
Remember; dont be afraid to ask for the eraser when you need it!
CHANGED LIVES-one at a time
Dear Mr. Jack and Ms. Rexella,
I wanted to encourage you in the message you bring to the world. I love your show and enjoy watching both of you. You have such a heart for Jesus, it is refreshing to see. Im praying for you and your safety always, as I know it is a dangerous course you are on.
Thank you for what you do. May the Lord bless you and keep you safe.
Your friend,
S. W.
Thank you for being here. You guys are such a blessing to this world and MANY have been awakened to what is actually going on, not fooled by the main stream medias relentless godless propaganda assault.
May God continue to keep watch over the faithful and may His continued blessings be with you and yours as we head towards that great and horrible day, very soon the trumpet will sound.
“Be ye therefore also ready! For in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of man cometh!”
Praise God!
Paul
HIGHLIGHTED PRODUCT OFFERS
New World Order Rising / Dictator of the New World Order
Each amazing component of this special edition set, including New World Order Rising and Dictator of the New World Order is power packed with the clear picture and timeline of the latter days and gives you the answers to crucial questions such as:
- Who are the seven major organizations dedicated to creating a “New World Order”?
- “Europe is looking for a man so powerful that he will hold the allegiance of the people. Be he man or devil, we are ready to receive him” Who said that?
- What shadowy power brokering groups champion the cause of a one world government?
- What does the EU represent in Bible prophecy?
- And much more!
Watch this astounding teaching today, and share it with your church, family, and friends.
New Age deceptions about the faith are being proclaimed even from the pulpits of America’s churches! And these lies promoted as ‘Gospel’ are just one more sign of the great falling away predicted in Bible prophecy. They’re a sign that Jesus is coming soon! In this video, prophecy experts Drs. Jack and Rexella Van Impe expose the most shocking lies promoted in the name of Christianity today!
- How can Christians distinguish the real Christ from false christs?
- What does the Bible really say about sin? How is the New Age Movement, and some evangelical ministers, wrong about it?
- Whom did David Wilkerson predict would become ‘angels of light’ and ‘tools of deception’?
- What is ‘666’, and who is teaching members of his church to tattoo it on their bodies?
- Who are the foremost celebrities and ministers promoting the New Age Movement?
- And More!