The Gospel: God's Super Power!

        There are all kinds of power in the world. There is nuclear power, electrical power, financial power, mechanical power, muscle power, and brain-power. We have all heard the term "manpower" - but the following story reminds us there are times when "woman-power" prevails.  There were eleven people hanging on to a rope dangling from a helicopter hovering over a mountainside - ten men and one woman. They all decided that one person should get off because if they didn't, the rope would and everyone would all die. No one could decide who should let go. Finally the woman gave a very touching speech on how she would give up her life to save the others, because women were used to giving up things for their husbands and children and giving in to them. Her words were so powerful that all of the men . . . . started clapping (hint - if you don't get that you may need more brain-power!).

 

        Two thousand years ago the apostle Paul penned the immortal words we find in Romans 1:16 - "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek." A few verses earlier (vs 14), he had written, "I am debtor both to Greeks and to barbarians, bot to wise and to unwise." Paul is saying, "Everybody needs Jesus." We all need Jesus because, "As it is written, 'There is none righteous, no not one' " and because, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:10, 23). Bad enough, but even worse, "your iniquities have separated you from your Go; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear" (Isaiah 59:2). The apostle Paul reiterated the same bad news more than 700 years after Isaiah when he wrote in Romans 6:23a - "The wages of sin is death." That's Bible talk for "hell" - the awful eternal destiny awaiting those who don't believe and obey the gospel of Christ (see 2 Thessalonians 1:7-9).

         All this is why all of us need the gospel. The gospel is to our souls what the power grid is to our homes and factories and farms and offices.

The gospel is the means whereby God provides the "power" that saves our souls! "Christ crucified" is the plant that produces the spiritual power needed to forgive our sins. That power is delivered to lost people via the high-voltage lines of preaching (see 1 Corinthians 1:18, 21-24). Americans hear much these days about how powerful we have become. We are often told America is the world's only "super-power." True, but so was ancient Rome when Paul wrote the words of Romans 1:16 quoted above. But there is one thing all the combined powers on earth couldn't do then and still can't do today - that is, they couldn't save a single soul from sin. For that enormous task every human being in every age needs God's super-power - the gospel. It’s that powerful!  Will you think about it.

     by:  Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN