In the first four verses of this letter
Paul establishes two things; his credentials and the work of Jesus on the
cross. The rest of the letter is spent developing those two themes. Verses 3-5,
(one sentence), give us the Gospel “3
Grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord
Jesus Christ, 4 who gave himself for our
sins to rescue us from this present evil age according to the will of our God
and Father, 5 to
whom be glory forever and ever! Amen.” If we break the sentence down into parts
we first have “Grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus
Christ”, two blessings “grace and peace”
“to you” the reader of this letter. Where does the “grace and peace come
from? Jesus Christ and God the Father both give us grace and peace this shows
us that they are of one accord.
Paul continues, “our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave
himself for our sins”
this short statement is the gospel, the good news! It says it all, what
man could never do Jesus did! He gave himself as propitiation, for our sins! (Propitiation is a word not often used in new
translations or in churches anymore as a part of the dumbing down of Christians
going on currently. However in my opinion this word carries a heaver weight
than those used to describe what Jesus did on the cross. It means to appease but also to fulfill the
wrath and righteous anger of God.) When we understand that, to God, all sin
is sin and that there is no sacrifice mankind can do to absolve himself of sin
we become free to rely on Jesus our Lord and Savior to make us righteous before
God the Father. We, by our works, no matter how great cannot ever hope to
satisfy His righteous anger and wrath toward us. There is no sacrifice; there
are no works we could ever do to pay for even our ti,niest sin. We are, and will always be, deserving of
God’s wrath except that Jesus paid our price for sin and redeemed us from the
kingdom of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of light, (Colossians
Chapter 1). What sin? Every single sin we have ever done and ever will do. Jesus
paid the price for all of them. All we need do to receive God’s grace is to
believe in the work of his one and only son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
It is no wonder that the world hates this! The simplicity of
the gospel makes mankind totally rely on the sacrifice of one man. But more
than a mere man, Jesus is our creator, (Colossians Chapter 1), He is God very
God. He, our creator, became sinless man for the singular purpose of becoming
the only sacrifice worthy to absolve sin. He suffered and died that we may
become pleasing, righteous and acceptable in the eyes God the Father.
The world wants and needs to take part in its own salvation.
Down through history mankind has done unspeakable things in an effort to please
God and or gods. Belief in reincarnation, now in revival, is yet another means
of making one worthy in the eyes of god or gods. These poor people hope, after going through
this veil of tears over and over again, they will get it right eventually. Yet all
these remain in their sins. Today there are several religions that preach a
good works gospel that as Paul says is no gospel at all, but a loss of grace. There is a need in mankind to be able to stand
before God or gods and say “I did my part.” “I lived a good life.” But the law
of Moses and the law written on our hearts condemns us, (Romans chapter one).
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