Hold Fast to the Gospel

Many of us have had friends who at one time professed to be Christians but later drifted away. It seems that more and more people today speak of the deconstruction of their faith as they begin to question things that they had previously believed and taken for granted. Some notable public examples have been men like Joshua Harris, who is a popular Christian author But then just in 2019, he announced that he was leaving his wife and then that he was leaving the faith. And then earlier this year, Paul Maxwell, a former contributor for Desiring God and a professor at Moody Bible Institute, announced that he is not a Christian anymore. There have also been those that have continued to hold on to the Christian label, but have diverged significantly from Orthodox Christian theology. One example that came to mind was Clark Pinnock, who was actually a strong voice for biblical inerrancy in the 1960s. He probably did a lot to steer the SBC back in a more conservative direction. And yet in the ensuing decades, he himself became a denier of inerrancy. He came to embrace open theism, which is the idea that God doesn't know the future, and inclusivism, the idea that people from other religions can be saved. And so clearly this is something that no amount of education or learning can make us immune to. And then still others, Ravi Zacharias comes to mind, are those who have continued to profess gospel orthodoxy, but they've settled into living lives that are in flagrant contradiction to it. And as depressing as this introduction is, the point is that all of these are examples of men who failed to hold fast to the gospel, that they've heard, They received and they understood the truth about Christ, but something pulled them away from him. And if this could happen to them, it would be foolish for us to think it could never happen to us. So we need to hear Paul's charge here this morning, which is to hold fast to the gospel. Now, for those who are new, I've actually been preaching through First Corinthians for some time. It's been a while, but previously we've worked through the first 14 chapters. We've seen that the Apostle Paul is writing to the church in Corinth. This is a church that he previously planted. You can read about that in Acts chapter 18. And Paul is now writing to the church from Ephesus. And he's writing this letter in response both to reports he's heard from some visitors of Chloe's people that have come to Ephesus. And then he's also writing in response to a letter he's received from the Corinthians. And generally speaking, the first half of the book, chapters 1 through 6, is in response to reports. And then the second half, chapters 7 through 16, is in response to the Corinthians letter. And throughout the book, Paul's just been dealing with one pastoral issue after another. He's dealt with the issue of disunity in the church over preferences in preachers. He's dealt with multiple issues of sexual immorality in the church, issue of lawsuits where members are suing one another. He's dealt with confusion about marriage, divorce, singleness, and abstinence. Also, conflict over the eating of food sacrificed to idols. And then there were issues about head coverings, the Lord's Supper, and the exercise of spiritual gifts. So he has dealt with a lot of different issues in this church, and yet, starting here in chapter 15, Paul turns to what is possibly the most significant issue of them all. And it's that some in the Corinthian church are denying the future bodily resurrection of believers. And you can see that if you look ahead to verse 12, where Paul says, now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? Some Corinthians are saying there is no future bodily resurrection. Probably they've imbibed the Greek idea that the body is bad and the spirit is good, so salvation is just a spiritual thing, and death frees us from our body. Well, in chapter 15 of this letter, Paul is gonna argue that that idea is rank heresy. In fact, if you persist in denying our physical resurrection, Paul's gonna argue you have denied the gospel and you're not a Christian. That is how strong he's gonna argue this point. In fact, the picture that comes to mind would be this. Imagine the Corinthians are up in a tree cutting branches. And now they have begun to cut the branch on which they are standing. Paul is crying out to them here, no. Do you realize that if you say there's no resurrection, then you are denying the very foundation of the gospel itself. you're undercutting your whole foundation. So in these first 11 verses, Paul is gonna remind them what the gospel is, why it's true, and that only those who hold fast to the gospel are saved by it. Okay, so the main idea is very simple. Hold fast to the gospel. And as we meditate on that this morning, we're gonna look at three things. Number one, what the gospel is. Number two, how we know it's true. And then number three, who the gospel saves. So first, let's consider what the gospel is. You'll notice in verses 1 and 2 that Paul introduces this subject of the gospel. He says, Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preach to you. Now the word gospel or evangel comes from the Greek euangelion, which means good news. That word occurs 76 times in the New Testament, and then the verb form of that word which would be preaching good news, occurs another 54 times. So this is all over the pages of our Bibles. It's something that every Christian should be able to define because it's the central message of Christianity. It's the gospel that makes Christian preaching Christian. That's why in verse three, Paul says that this gospel is of first importance. Of everything he preached, this is the most important thing. And notice he describes it as something he received and then delivered. Paul is not a contributor to this. He's not an originator of it. He's just a faithful servant and conveyor of this message from God to man. So what is it? What is the gospel? Well, I've heard people say things like, the gospel is that Jesus loves you. Or the gospel is that God is making all things new. Or the gospel is that we should love our neighbor as ourself. But notice here that Paul himself gives us a definition in verses three through five. He says, for I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas then to the twelfth. And if you're gonna sum this up, I think we could say this, the gospel is that Christ died for our sins and rose on the third day. I think he mentions the burial because that's further confirmation of Jesus's death. And then he mentions the appearances because those are further confirmations of his resurrection. But the two fundamental truths, the two things that Paul says here are in accordance with the scriptures, are that Christ died for our sins and he rose on the third day. That is the irreducible core of the gospel. Now we could certainly say more true things about the gospel. In fact, obviously as we think of Christmas, the incarnation is a very essential part of the gospel. Now I think the incarnation is implied by what Paul says there, but we could flesh this out and explicitly mention that. But we can never say less about the gospel. then that Christ died for our sins and he rose the third day. That's the irreducible core. In order for the gospel to be the gospel, we have to tell people about Jesus and him dying for our sins and rising from the dead. Now it's true that in Galatians chapter three, verse nine, it says that God preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham when he said, in you shall all the nations be blessed. It's also true that at the beginning of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, they all say that from the beginning of Jesus' ministry, he was preaching the gospel of the kingdom, saying, repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. So prior to the coming of Christ and prior to his death and resurrection, we could speak of the gospel being proclaimed without explicit reference to Jesus and his cross and his resurrection. And that's because there is this wonderful continuity throughout scripture of God's great plan of salvation through the seed of Abraham and the kingdom he would bring. But now that Jesus has come and his cross and resurrection have happened and God has revealed who that seed of Abraham is and how his kingdom has come through what Christ has done. We can no longer preach the gospel without mentioning the name of Jesus and telling people what he's done. Of first importance, Paul says, is that Christ died for our sins and rose the third day. And in fact, of all the many places where scripture mentions the word gospel, I think that this is the clearest, the most concise, and the great climactic definition of what it is. that Christ died for our sins and rose the third day. Now let's take a moment just to consider each of these two great declarations. First, Christ died for our sins. This means that he became the substitute who suffered the condemnation our sins deserved. We deserve death for our sins. The wages of sin is death, and without the shedding of blood, there can be no forgiveness. But Christ died as the true Passover lamb, the true scapegoat and sacrificial goat from the day of atonement, shedding his blood so that we might be forgiven. Further, we deserve to be cursed for our sin. It is written, cursed is everyone who does not abide by everything written in the book of the law to do them. but Christ died for our sins, bearing our curse instead. It is written, cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. Also, we deserve to be the ones who heard the guilty verdict thundered down from heaven. But once again, Christ took our place instead. Just consider the significance of the fact that Jesus died as a convicted criminal. He wasn't assassinated, he wasn't murdered in a back alley. He was legally condemned. And as unjust and as much of a sham as his trial was, there is still profound spiritual significance in the fact that he died being labeled guilty, a sinner. He died for our sins. And you see behind it all, there was a very real justice taking place. He bore the punishment that you and I deserve so that God's justice might be upheld, even as He justifies sinners like you and me. So the first pillar of the gospel is that Christ died for our sins. But then secondly, and of equal necessity, is the fact that Christ rose on the third day. As Paul will go on to argue in verse 17 of this chapter, If Christ is not risen, then your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Right? So if there's no resurrection, there is no gospel. There's no justification. There's no forgiveness. There's no eternal life. And that's first of all, because the resurrection demonstrates whether or not the cross was effective. You see, if the wages of sin is death and Christ died for our sins, Well, then the evidence that the wage has been paid is life and resurrection, right? If he stayed dead, it would mean we still owed a debt. But then further, the resurrection is absolutely necessary because Jesus not only died as our substitute, but he is our representative, right? You see, he's not only the lamb who is slain for us, he's also the new Adam, our covenant head who goes before us. That's why Paul is gonna say in verses 20 through 22, that Christ has been raised as the first fruits of those who've fallen asleep. He says, for as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. You see, Christ's resurrection is ours. So the irreducible core of the gospel is this, Christ died for our sins and he rose the third day. We can say more about the gospel, but we cannot say less. And that means, first of all, that when you and I go to share the gospel, it's not enough just to tell people that Jesus loves them. We wanna tell them how Jesus has demonstrated his love for them by dying for our sins and rising from the dead. It also means that sharing your personal testimony of how God saved you is not the gospel. That's a wonderful thing to share in addition to the gospel. But we need to actually share the gospel itself. I mean, just think about it. The Apostle Paul had a more amazing testimony than any of us. And yet even he says here, I deliver to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins and rose the third day. That took priority over his personal testimony. This also means that doing good deeds and caring for the poor and trying to make the world a better place is not the gospel. Some people say preach the gospel always and when necessary use words. But the fact is it is always necessary to use words. It's a message, it's news, right? Our good deeds can and should adorn the gospel, but only words can proclaim it. And then finally, as we think about what the gospel is, I think this should remind us to beware of diluting the gospel. It seems increasingly popular today to define the gospel in terms of the kingdom of God coming to earth, or God making all things new, And these are, of course, both very precious, very important biblical truths that are closely connected to the gospel. But my concern is that if we try to define the gospel that way, it easily becomes so broad and nebulous that it lacks any specificity or teeth. I mean, even a lot of non-Christians can get on board with the kingdom of God coming to earth, or God making all things new. But it's the cross and the resurrection. That's the real lightning rods of the Christian faith. That is the heart of what makes Christian preaching Christian. And so we need to make sure that nothing dilutes our focus from that. That is the very heart and center of the gospel. So, that's what the gospel is. Well, let's consider, secondly, how we know it's true. Time restrains us from attempting a full-blown apologetic here, but I do think Paul reminds the Corinthians and us of at least three reasons why we can and should be confident that the gospel is true. And the first of these is eyewitness testimony. And this is implied when he mentions Jesus' death and burial. Those were certainly witnessed, and everybody at the time would have acknowledged that. There's no question that Jesus died. But then in verses five through eight, Paul emphasizes the eyewitness testimony of the resurrection. He records six different post-resurrection appearances. He says first that Jesus appeared to Cephas, which is another name for Peter. We know from Luke chapter 24 that this happened sometime on the day of the resurrection itself. Because after the two men on the road to Emmaus get back to the disciples, those disciples immediately tell them that Jesus had appeared to Cephas. Then Paul says that Jesus appeared to the 12. Now this could have been what happened moments later because Jesus suddenly comes into the room with the locked doors and he appears to them. And this would have been when the original disciples were gathered together. So it may be that, or it could refer to the following week when Thomas was also with them. But either way, the 12 is probably a reference to the group of original disciples and not necessarily to the exact number, because Judas was no longer with them. But it would be awkward to say the 10 or the 11. Well, then Paul says that Jesus appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. And this is remarkable. I mean, over 500 people saw Jesus resurrected at the same time. And when Paul is writing this, it's been about 20 years. So it makes sense he would say most of them are still alive, though some have passed away. And he's implying if you have any question about this, you can go ask them. Now, I think this is likely a reference to the appearance recorded at the end of Matthew. where Jesus gives the Great Commission. We know that that took place on a mountain in Galilee. So not near Jerusalem, but back near sort of where Jesus began his ministry. And presumably, Jesus wanted his disciples to meet him all the way over there so that other believers from his Galilean ministry could come see him as well. I think that's the most likely place where more than 500 people would be to see him at one time. Well then, Paul says that Jesus appeared to James. And this is an appearance that isn't recorded elsewhere. But evidently, Jesus appeared to his own half-brother, James, who we know that during Jesus' earthly ministry was not a believer. And yet later, he becomes the leader of the church in Jerusalem and an apostle. And so presumably, it was this appearance, this personal appearance of the resurrected Jesus to his own half-brother that caused him to believe. And then Paul says that Jesus appeared to all the apostles. Now, of course, most of the apostles would have been included in the 12, but we know of at least a few others who became apostles as well. I mentioned James, there was also Matthias, and possibly Barnabas. And one of the qualifications for being an apostle was having seen the risen Christ. So Jesus made some appearance to all of them, probably together, and I think this more likely refers to the appearance that's recorded at the end of Luke and the beginning of Acts, which takes place on the Mount of Olives just outside Jerusalem. And this is where the ascension itself occurs. And then finally, last of all, Paul says, Jesus appeared to him as to one untimely born. And of course, this is when Paul is on his way to Damascus, going to imprison and persecute Christians. And Jesus suddenly appears to him in blinding light saying, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And Saul is radically converted and called to be an apostle. And whereas all the other apostles had seen Jesus prior to his ascension, Paul, last of all, sees Jesus and is called into apostolic ministry as one untimely born. Now, the point of all this is that with all these appearances, with this many eyewitnesses, with so many of these people who actually demonstrated the authenticity of their faith to the point that they died for this, how do you explain it? Other than that the resurrection is true. Listen to what the non-Christian historian and scholar Paula Fredrickson said. She writes, I know in their own terms what they saw was the raised Jesus. That's what they say. And then all the historic evidence we have afterwards attest to their conviction that that's what they saw. I'm not saying that they really did see the raised Jesus. I wasn't there. I don't know what they saw. But I do know that as a historian, that they must have seen something. Or listen to the British professor Anthony Flew. He refused to believe in Christianity or the resurrection himself. And yet even he said, the evidence for the resurrection is better than for claimed miracles in any other religion. It's outstandingly different in quality and quantity. So the historical case for the resurrection is incredibly strong. This is why Lee Strobel, who set out to try to disprove it, he ultimately becomes a believer. And strikingly, the historians that really study this and wind up rejecting it, tend to do so not because they have some other more plausible alternative to offer instead. They tend to say, basically, we don't know what happened. But they resist the conclusion that normal historical analysis would lead to because it contradicts their assumptions about reality and their view of the world. And the point is, whether we doubt the resurrection because we have naturalistic presuppositions, or because, like the Corinthians, we have embraced some philosophy that says, well, the spiritual is good and the bodily is bad, so therefore, resurrections must not happen, Well, Paul's telling us that the resurrection is a historical fact. He saw it. They saw it. And therefore, we should believe it. But Paul also gives a second reason why we can know the gospel's true. And that is because it fulfills scripture. Notice verses three and four. Paul says that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. and he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. In other words, Christ's death and resurrection were in accordance with what God had said all along would happen. It wasn't just this random surprising event. It was predicted and prophesied beforehand, not only through specific verses, but also through the whole message and trajectory of the Old Testament. The whole Old Testament is about how God would send a Messiah, a seed of the woman who would reverse the curse and crush the serpent's head. One who would overthrow the reign of death and establish his righteous kingdom of life in its place. And then the whole history of Israel and the priesthood and the sacrificial system are all showing how sin must be dealt with. and pointing forward to what the Messiah must do so that a holy God can be reconciled and live with sinful people. And while time would restrain us from going through all the individual verses that promise Christ's death and resurrection, let me just direct your attention to one passage. In Isaiah 53, which the children recited earlier, this was written over 700 years before Jesus was even born, We read of a faithful servant of Yahweh who will come but be despised and rejected by men. It says, we'll esteem him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But then Isaiah says, but he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace and with his wounds we are healed. All we have gone astray like sheep. but the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. What it's saying is that he will die for our sins. And then you keep reading and Isaiah continues that even after he dies, he will see his offspring and the Lord will prolong his days. It says that he will divide the spoil with the strong because he poured out his soul to death. Right, so even after death, he will experience prolonged days and sharing in the spoils of victory. It's saying he will be resurrected. And while the Old Testament doesn't explicitly predict the day on which Jesus would be raised, there is this pattern of third day deliverance, such that you could really expect it. I'll just mention a couple examples. It's the third day after God commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac that God stops him and Abraham figuratively receives his son back again from the dead. Also when Jonah gets swallowed by the great fish and he's in this figurative grave, once again it's the third day when he's spit out on dry land. So for all these reasons, Paul can say Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and he rose the third day in accordance with the scriptures. And this is so important because as compelling as eyewitness testimony is, our faith doesn't ultimately rest on the testimony of men, but on the word of God. And this is also why we can be so sure, not only of the facts of the death and resurrection themselves, but of their significance. You see, imagine for a moment that my grandfather were to miraculously rise from the dead tomorrow, right? And all of us see him. And the doctors and the scientists, they confirm, yes, he was dead, and now he's alive. The newspapers report it, and everybody acknowledges that this great miracle has happened. Well, that would be amazing. That would spark a lot of questions and fascinating theories. But at the end of the day, after the sheer wonder of it all wore off, how many people's lives would actually be changed? And who's to say what it means? Who's to say what it proves? Does it prove Christianity? Or does it prove some other religion? Or does it just prove that, you know what, it must be scientifically possible to reverse death? You see, a miracle that happens in a vacuum doesn't really mean much. But Jesus's death and resurrection are not like that. They're not just eyewitnessed and factually proven. They're also explained and interpreted by the word of God. He died and rose in accordance with the scriptures. That's why the gospel isn't just a fascinating fact of history, but something that must totally transform our lives. As Paul said to the Athenians, God now commands all men everywhere to repent. because he has fixed the day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed. And of this, he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." You see, the scriptures confirm that that is what the resurrection means. So, we should believe the gospel because it's confirmed by eyewitness testimony, we should believe the gospel because it's in accordance with the scriptures, and then thirdly and finally, we should believe the gospel because of Paul's own apostolic ministry. Look next at verses eight through 11, where right after mentioning that Jesus appeared to him, Paul goes on to say, for I am the least of the apostles, unworthy 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 was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believed. Now at the end there, Paul stresses that he and all the other apostles preached the same gospel. That's what the Corinthians originally came to believe, and so if anyone's changed, it's them. But before that, in verses nine and 10, he has this little aside about his own apostolic ministry. And he stresses there this great irony, that though he's the last and the least and the most unworthy of all the apostles, yet by the grace of God, He's the hardest working and most fruitful of them all. And he brings this up not to boast and not to seem humble. He brings it up because he wants to stress the greatness and the power of the grace of God. There's three times he mentions God's grace. And you see, in a strange way, God's grace manifests through Paul and his ministry. is a third reason why we should believe the gospel. You know, I call it strange because on one hand, it's so counterintuitive. I mean, who would have ever thought that Paul, the most strident persecutor of the church, the most narrow-minded, zealous Jew, who would have ever thought that he could possibly be an apostle to the Gentiles? And yet in the wisdom of God, What better testimony is there to the power of the gospel to take a man like that and totally transform and redirect his life that he would be the hardest working and the most passionate, committed apostle of them all. And in the wisdom of God, what better person to be a spokesman for this gospel of grace than one who is the very chief of sinners himself. The one who called himself a perfect pattern for all who would believe. You see, Paul's own weakness, his past sin, all the things that make him seem so unworthy and so unfit, what displays the wisdom and the power of God. You know, his conversion and ministry is one of the most compelling examples of the mysterious and yet beautiful way God works. So if you're here this morning as an unbeliever, how do you explain this transformation that took place on the Damascus Road in Paul's life? How do you explain how a man like that becomes the apostle that he is? How do you explain all the other resurrection appearances? What happened in James' life, Jesus' own half-brother, and the 500 plus people that all saw it? How do you explain the fact that many of these apostles literally died a martyr's death because they were so convinced by what they saw? And then how do you explain the remarkable fulfillment of passages like Isaiah 53? Passages that scholars would claim, oh, this was written after Jesus came. It must have been a lie because it's just so clear. And then they discover the Dead Sea Scrolls and prove, no, this was written before. How do you explain that? And how do you explain the rest of the Old Testament scriptures that so clearly anticipate and look forward to the coming of Christ? I think far too many people say things like, I just don't know. I don't really have an alternative explanation, but I'm just not convinced. I don't think we can really know one way or the other. Maybe you're kind of like Bertrand Russell, and you think, well, I would justify my unbelief before God on the last day by saying, sir, why did you take such pains to hide yourself? God, why have you left us all in doubt? But what I hope you see today is that according to the Bible, God has quite clearly taken great pains to do the opposite, to take our every excuse for unbelief away, Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. He was buried, he rose the third day according to the scriptures and he appeared publicly and repeatedly so that all men everywhere might know with certainty that he is the man whom God has appointed to judge the living and the dead. And you and I are accountable for whether we acknowledge that truth and submit to it or just blindly go on clinging to our own preconceived philosophies instead. So we've seen here what the gospel is, how we know it's true. And then thirdly and finally, who's actually saved by this gospel? Number three, who the gospel saves. And I want you to look back at the first two verses, where Paul writes, now I would remind you brothers of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved if, you hold fast to the word I preached to you unless you believed in vain. Notice the conditional there. The Corinthians are being saved by the gospel if they hold fast to the gospel. Now this idea of holding fast is a metaphor for faith. It's the idea of clinging to and trusting in Jesus and the gospel like you would a parachute as you fall out of an airplane. And the point is, the parachute will only save you so long as you are holding fast to it. Now, we could debate Calvinism and Arminianism and whether or not a Christian can lose his salvation. I happen to be a Calvinist, I think the answer to that is no. But we need to be clear that this verse is saying something Calvinists and Arminians agree on. Arminians say if you don't hold fast to the gospel, you'll lose your salvation. Calvinists say if you don't hold fast to the gospel, it proves you never had salvation. But both agree the gospel only saves those who hold fast to it. Scripture is crystal clear. The idea of once saved, always saved, as if praying a prayer or walking the aisle one time in your life guarantees your salvation, that is a Baptist lie. The only kind of faith that saves is a living, abiding faith. like clinging to a parachute. Otherwise, as Paul says here, we believed in vain. And as I said at the beginning, Paul's fear for the Corinthians is that they are unwittingly sawing through the limb of the gospel on which they stand. Worldly philosophy is taking over their thoughts and leading them away from Christ. And Paul is saying here, remember what the gospel is, remember why it's true, and hold fast to it, because that's the only way you'll be saved And so as we prepare to close today, the great challenge and application for us is this, are we holding fast to the gospel? Or are there worldly philosophies and thinking that are creeping in and pulling us away? The movies and the music and the news and the reports and everything in our culture around us. It's all encouraging us to think about gender and sexuality and justice and identity in ways that are based on totally different philosophies and worldviews than the Bible and the gospel. You know, it seems that people used to, more people used to leave Christianity because they didn't think it was true. You know, but then they would still want to hold on to the Christian ethic. But now, more and more people are abandoning Christianity because they don't think it's moral. They think the Bible's out of date in its views of gender and sexuality. They think it's just too exclusive, too Judeo-centric. But friends, the gospel is what shows us what true justice is all about. The gospel is what shows us what true mercy and grace look like. The gospel is what shows us what true love really is. Oh, friends, as we look to the gospel, it's how we see the goodness and the beauty and the wonder of God. All right, so if we're gonna avoid being tossed to and fro by the shifting philosophies of our age that will change in the next hundred years, we need to hold fast to the truth of the gospel in Scripture. Now, on the other side, Maybe some of us, we are conservative to the bone and we have no problem standing firm against these worldly ideas. But there's other ways we can be taken away from the gospel. We need to beware of pride and legalism as well. We need to beware of taking pride in what we know and our doctrine. We need to beware of thinking that we are better than others because we don't sin in the ways they do. and forgetting that gossip and envy and faithlessness and self-righteousness are every bit as evil in God's sight as homosexuality or transgenderism? You see, if we fall into that, we're every bit as much in danger of not holding fast to the gospel as anybody else. I mean, if there's anything that stands in contradiction to a gospel of grace, it's pride. It's forgetting that we are sinners who deserve hell. And if we have been changed in any way, we need to constantly say with Paul, by the grace of God, I am what I am. And then further, you know, we need to beware of being pulled away from the gospel by this diluted view where we can so easily be pulled into many other good things and studying lots of other interesting aspects of theology or focusing on good activism or good works in our community or helping important needs and all of those things have their place. But we need to be very careful that it doesn't pull away or distract our focus on what's most important. How easily in the midst of trying to do lots of good, we can sort of slide into that more subtle form of pride that doesn't compare ourselves to others and think I'm better, but begins to think that my acceptance before God is based on what I do in my performance. And how quickly that begins to sap our assurance, our joy, our spiritual vigor. You know, how quickly that just causes us to lose all the power of the gospel that motivates the kind of living we're really called to. Or then finally, we need to beware of being pulled away from the gospel by sinful temptations. You know, those secret sins and idols of the heart that gradually grow up and choke the word. You know, how many people don't hold fast to the gospel because like Demas, They love this present world. They believe the lie that they can play with fire and not get burned, that they can flirt with temptation, but it'll never overcome them. Well, friends, we need to realize how dangerous sin is, and when we feel tempted, we need to return to the cross and remember that that is what our sin deserves, and think about the love of God in Christ, that He died for you and for me. He died so that that sin can be forgiven. And let his love cause us to realize how empty and vain every sinful temptation is. And then we need to look at the resurrection and remember that he rose so that we might walk in newness of life. And oh friends, may that stir us up to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus has taken hold of us. You see, as I said at the beginning, we must not be complacent in thinking we can never drift away from the gospel. We need to hold fast to it. But we do so with the hope and confidence that Christ Jesus has first taken hold of us. And even when we fear our faith will fail, He holds us fast. So hold fast to Christ, trusting that He is holding fast to you. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we praise you for the gospel. We praise you that Christ has died for our sins and he has risen on the third day. We praise you that you, by grace, have taken hold of us. We pray that by your grace, we would hold fast to this good news of the gospel. Lord, we pray that you would strengthen us to live lives that bring you great glory. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. And now please stand and we'll sing our song of response, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.