I read the transcript of an interesting interview this week. The religion reporter from a newspaper was asking a person in her town about his faith. But what was interesting was that she didn’t just ask a couple of basic questions. She started off by asking him point blank what he believed. And like most people, he answered that he was a Christian. But she wasn’t satisfied with that. Most people accept that as a true profession of faith. But to this reporter’s credit, she didn’t. She wasn’t looking for a religious label. So she followed up. She followed up by asking him in-depth questions about what he really believed. She asked him about the content of his belief. He responded that he had a deep faith. He said he draws from the Christian faith. He said he’s rooted in the Christian tradition. He said that his grandfather was a Baptist and his grandmother was a Methodist. His mother was a deeply spiritual person. He went on to tell the reporter that he was a member and regular attender at the same local church where he had committed himself to Christ many years before. That sparked another question from the reporter. She asked him, “Did you actually go up for an altar call?” He responded, “Yes, absolutely. It was a daytime service… and it was a powerful moment….” The reporter followed up, “So you got yourself born again?” He responded, “Yeah….” The interview went on and he confessed to regular prayer that he called, “An ongoing conversation with God.” He talked about maintaining his moral compass and doing the right thing and reading the Bible and following the guidance and teaching of his pastor. He even talked about faith and his personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It sounds like a wonderful testimony, doesn’t it? It is filled with good sounding words and Christian language. If that interview went out on TV, you could almost think the Gospel was being preached with that testimony. But I want you to listen to some of the other things that were said. You see, this was a good reporter. She wasn’t satisfied with sound bites or labels. She wanted to know what he really believed. “Who is Jesus to you?” “Jesus is an historical figure to me…. One that I think is powerful precisely because he serves as that means of reaching something higher.” “And he’s also a wonderful teacher.” The prayer that he calls his ongoing conversation with God? He describes it like this: “throughout the day I’m constantly asking myself questions about what I’m doing, why I’m doing it…. Those are the conversations I’m having internally. I’m measuring my actions against that inner voice that for me at least is audible, is active, it tells me where I think I’m on track and where I think I’m off track.” Things got real blurry when he talked about the content of his belief. He said that he is suspicious of dogma. He is uncomfortable with the concept of absolute truth. He doesn’t believe that his faith is transferable to others. Instead, he believes in what he calls tolerance. He said, “religion at it’s best comes with a big dose of doubt. I’m suspicious of too much certainty….” He flat out denies that people will go to hell if they don’t believe in Jesus. He skirts around the interviewer’s question about heaven by saying, “Whether the reward is in the here and now or in the hereafter, the aligning of myself to my faith and my values is a good thing.” He did say that he believed in sin. But his definition of sin was far from biblical. He said that sin is, “being out of alignment with my values.” And the consequence of sin is, “If I’m true to myself and my faith that is its own reward. When I’m not true to it, it’s its own punishment.” Most telling of all was this statement: “I believe that there are many paths to the same place and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people.” I don’t know if you’ve figured out who that interview was with. But it was conducted by a Chicago Sun-Times religion reporter on March 27, 2004 as she sat down in a local coffee shop with then State Senator Barack Obama. Why do I tell you about that? Did I tell you about that interview to get you all riled up against our President-elect? No. You shouldn’t get riled-up against him. You should pray for him. You should pray for him because no matter what label he attaches to himself, if he still believes that way, he’s lost. He might call himself a Christian. He might use words like prayer and Bible and sin. He might even throw in the name of Jesus every now and then. He can even describe how he walked the aisle during an altar call and was born-again. But so can a lot of people. There are very few people you meet who will come right out and tell you that they don’t believe in God. Some statistics report that over 80% of people in America claim to be Christians. But the sad thing is, when you get right down to it, they believe the exact same thing our President-elect believes. They don’t believe in anything and still want to claim Christianity. They don’t believe in anything and can call themselves Christian because they have removed all the content from the words they are using. If you believe that there are many paths to God, then you cannot be a Christian. Because if you believe that there are many paths to God, you are calling Jesus a liar. Because Jesus Himself said in John 14:6, “I am the way the truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father but by me.” There is only one way. There is only one mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus. And if you get that wrong, you are not a Christian. They won’t deny that Jesus existed. That went out of style many years ago because it’s unbelievably silly to say that. They will say He was a great historical figure. They will say He was a great example. He was a great teacher. They might even say He was a great prophet. People throughout the world and throughout history have had those words on their lips as they passed from this world into eternal torment. Because Jesus is more than a historical figure. He is more than a great example to follow. He is more than a prophet or a great teacher. He is more than a path to God. He is THE only path to God. In short, Jesus is the Gospel. The word “Gospel” literally means “good news”. That is what Jesus is. The good news is a person and that person is Jesus Christ. If you remove any content from who He is or what He’s done, then the news is no longer good. But in the fullness of who Jesus is… And in the fullness of what Jesus has done... The news is good indeed. That is the gospel. The gospel is Jesus. Our passage this morning is still part of the conversation that John the Baptist was having with his disciples. You remember that John’s disciples had come to him complaining that Jesus was taking away his ministry. Jesus’ disciples were baptizing people right down the river from where John and his disciples were… and they said that all of John’s crowds were leaving him and going to Jesus. And you remember what John said in verse 30. He said, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” But John didn’t just leave his disciples hanging there. In our passage this morning, he explained why that must be so. He had spent his entire ministry pointing people to Jesus, but they still didn’t get it. So he did the same thing that we have to do. He gave them the gospel again. He told them about Jesus again. He didn’t just give them a label to stick on their lost lives. He gave them the gospel. The true gospel. The gospel with content. The gospel that is embodied in a person. The gospel that is Jesus. He gave them three reasons that Jesus is the gospel. Jesus is the gospel because of His place, because of His proclamation, and because of His position. First, Jesus is the gospel because of His place. Look back at verse 31:
JOHN 3:31
Jesus is the Gospel because of His place. Anything that reduces Jesus to a mere teacher or prophet or even some type of a superhuman is not the gospel. Because Jesus’ place is heaven. But it’s really more than that, isn’t it? Because a lot of times when we think of heaven, we think of a place that’s far away and distant from us. And if we limit Jesus to that place, then we’re limiting Him in a way that isn’t true. Because as John says, Jesus is from above. And because He’s from above, He is above all. John the Apostle said the same thing back in the first chapter. In the first four verses he said, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men.” Jesus is the Gospel because He is from the eternal Godhead. He is from the place where He created you. He is from the place where He sustains you. He is from the place where He breathes life into your lungs. And He is from the place where He will one day take that breath away. Jesus is the Gospel because of His place as your Creator and Sustainer. He is from above and is above all. That’s a far cry from being simply a great teacher, isn’t it? It’s a far cry from simply being a great prophet, isn’t it? Because even the greatest teacher is going to die. Even the greatest prophets who have ever lived—their bodies returned to the earth. Jesus never did. He left His place in heaven and took on flesh. The fullness of God emptied Himself and became a man. He took on a body, but that body didn’t return to the earth. It didn’t see the corruption of the grave. Because in that now glorified body, Jesus rose from the dead. He rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. He ascended into heaven where He continues to sustain His creation. He sustains His creation and intercedes for His children. Any Jesus less than that isn’t the gospel. Jesus is the gospel because of His place. Jesus is also the Gospel because of His proclamation. Look at verse 32-33:
JOHN 3:32-33
Jesus is the Gospel because of His proclamation. There are those today who will tell you that they believe in Jesus but don’t believe in the Bible. Anything that separates Jesus from His Word is not the gospel. Because Jesus chose to reveal Himself to us in His Word. In one of His first public discourses, He told us as much. In Matthew 5:17-18 He said, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” Why did Jesus not come to do away with Moses’ writings of the law and the writings of the Old Testament prophets? Because He’s the One that wrote it. 2 Peter 1:21 says, “For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” That word “moved” literally means “carried along” like the wind carries along a balloon or a sailboat. Jesus, through the Spirit of God carried the writers of the Bible along to write the infallable, inerrant Word of God. But not only is Jesus the One that wrote it, He wrote it about Himself. Hebrews 1:1-2 says, “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son…” Jesus is the One who proclaimed the Word of God to us. He proclaimed it through the fathers and prophets who wrote down perfect errorless words of life as the Spirit inspired them. And He proclaimed it through the perfect revelation of Himself in the flesh. As Peter wrote in 1 Peter 1:25, “The word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.” Any Jesus who hasn’t perfectly and completely proclaimed Himself in His Word and in His flesh is less than the Gospel. And anything less than the Gospel is no Gospel at all. Jesus is the Gospel because of His place and His proclamation. Jesus is also the Gospel because of His power. Look at verses 34-35:
JOHN 3:34-35
Jesus is the Gospel because of His power. Jesus is God. He is one person of the three-in-One person we call the Trinity. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are three persons who eternally exist together as one person. Get it? I didn’t think so. That’s because we can’t fully comprehend it. There is no analogy or illustration we can come up with that can compare. It can’t compare because all our mind can fully grasp are the things that God has created. And truth be told, we can’t even fully grasp those things. So of course there will be no way we can fully comprehend the One who is uncreated. There is no way we can fully understand the One who exists as one God in perfect loving relationship as Father, Son, and Spirit forever. But the second that we make Him anything less than that is the second that we destroy the Gospel. If you begin to see God the Son as less than God the Father, you destroy the Gospel. If you elevate God the Spirit above God the Son, you destroy the Gospel. The only way to describe the relationship of Jesus within the Trinity is the way Scripture does. Look in Colossians 1 with me.
COLOSSIANS 1:15-20
Jesus is the image of the invisible God. That means that He is what Isaiah said He would be. He is Immanuel—God in the flesh. That means that He is what John said He is. He is the eternal Word that became flesh and dwelt among us. It is the role that was determined for Him from before the beginning of time. It was the role that the Father desired for Him. And it was the role that He submitted Himself to. The Father eternally loved the Son. He loved Jesus enough that as He willingly submitted to the eternal plan of the Father… It pleased Father to crush Him. It pleased the Father to subject His Son Jesus to the cruelest inhumanity that the wickedness of His creation could dream up. Why? Why did it please the Father to do that? Why did Jesus the Son willingly submit to that? So that you and I could be reconciled to God. Why? So God could give you the peace with Him that you could never earn on your own. So that you and I and all creation might praise and glorify the Son with holy hands that have been washed with His own blood. So that, as Colossians 1:19 says, in Jesus, all the fullness will dwell. The fullness of what? The fullness of praise and honor and glory, yes. But even more than that—the fullness of God. The fullness of fellowship between the Father, Son and Spirit. As verse 34 says, “for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him.” In other words, because of the willing, submissive obedience of Jesus in going to the cross… the relationship between the Father, Son and Spirit exists in immeasurable fullness together. So where does the Gospel come in? Listen to the prayer of Jesus in John 17:20-26: “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me. And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.” Do you know who that prayer was for? That prayer was for you. Jesus prayed that prayer in the hours before He went to the cross for you. And in those hours, He was praying that you would be one with Him. That by His sacrifice for you… and through your submission to Him… you would exist eternally in immeasurable fullness together with God. Verse 25 of our passage says that the Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand. Because of Jesus willing, humble obedience to the Father, the Father has placed all things into His hand. That includes you. But then comes verse 36. Verse 36 says, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life. And He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.” That’s the Gospel. The Gospel is Jesus. Jesus who is God, willingly stepped down from His place in heaven and lived a perfect life and died for you. He’s given you His Word to show you who He is and what He’s done for you. I’ve given you that Gospel this morning. Your response to that Gospel has eternal consequences. If you believe it, you will have everlasting life. If you reject it, the wrath of God abides on you. Jesus is the Gospel. Who is He to you this morning?
