I Declare Unto You The Gospel
(This message is reworked from a sermon preached at Littleby Baptist Church near Mexico, MO on April 28, 2025; but is not an exact transcription.)
Introduction: Good evening and it’s great to worship the Lord together with you this evening! These joint meetings are something we’ve been doing for, what, 15 years now? And it’s always great when we meet some brothers and sisters in the Lord down here. I do believe Heaven will be an even better place because we’ve had a chance to meet together and worship our Lord together while we were down here.
Now let’s get to the message. Last Sunday was Easter Sunday, and that’s when we remember our Lord coming back to life as He was raised from the dead. Even though Paul might never have seen Jesus before the Crucifixion, he did see Jesus while on the “Damascus Road” journey (note to readers: see Acts 9 for that story). I doubt he ever got over it, and we have a glimpse of what he may have thought about as we read these words in the text.
Text: 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, KJV: 1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; 2 By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. 3 For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4 And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures: 5 And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: 6 After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. 7 After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles. 8 And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. 11 Therefore whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed.
We have a teacher of English here with us this evening, and it’s partly in her honor that I’d like to quote a “couplet” or two-line rhyming poem, It’s based on a high school class I took on “Mass Media” and, I have to be honest, I don’t remember much about it except what the teacher called “counting the headlines” of newspaper articles.
This poem, though, is something that I hope my teacher would be glad I remember! Here it goes:
“I have six faithful helping friends, who taught me all I know;
Their names are What and Where and When and How and Why and Who!”
Well—close enough for a rhyme, anyway, no?
For this evening, though, we’re only going to look at maybe a few of these, and we’ll start with the Who of this text. Clearly, the first person is Jesus Himself because He gave His life for us! The greatest day of human history, up to that point, was that Sunday morning, the first day of the week, when ‘up from the grave, He arose!” Just think: if He had been nothing but a philosopher or “great teacher (C. S. Lewis, though, had something to say about that in “Mere Christianity”)”, we would be worse off than most of the rest of the world.
But we don’t worship someone who’s dead! When our Lord died, He—His body—didn’t stay in Joseph’s tomb or anywhere else after Resurrection Day! The flesh of His body didn’t decay or turn into dust, and nobody has found any of His body’s bones, either. I remember a college speech class where a fellow classmate gave a speech on our Lord’s resurrection. He closed by saying that there were three different places where people say the Lord was buried, but they had one thing in common—all three of them were and are empty!
And Jesus proved He was alive to Paul, as I mentioned, on the Damascus Road. Sure, at the time, he was till Saul of Tarsus, a genuine persecutor of believers in Jesus. He mentioned that here, in verse 9, but also (sadly, maybe?) recalled what he had done when he gave his testimony before Agrippa in Acts 26. But even as the Lord Jesus explained in the Parable of the Two Debtors in Luke 7, Saul was forgiven much, and loved much, proving it by doing what he was doing.
This, then, leads us to the last “who” of this text and that “who” are the Corinthian believers themselves. Something to remember is that Corinth was not only one of the five largest cities in the Roman Empire, but also one of the worst cities ever in terms of morality. I’ve heard a few Bible teachers over the years who said one thing in common: Corinth was evil. One of those men even said, that if you told someone “Oh, go to Corinth!” or “Go Corinthian-ize yourself”, you were not giving that person a good greeting. Oh no. That was a directive as to where to go, how to get there and who to take with you: a serious insult, in other words. In a word, they weren’t telling you to go Heaven; rather, the other place.
And they meant it, too.
What’s incredible to me, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if others felt this way, is that Paul came there and preached the Gospel! We’ll never know this side of Heaven how much he accomplished (granted, he did nothing, but the Holy Spirit did everything) while there. Some, it goes without saying, became believers including Crispus and Sosthenes plus the other names mentioned (the household of Chloe; Stephanas, FOrtunatus, and Achaicus, to name a few).
But there were some who were among the worst of the worst, humanly speaking. You don’t believe me? Just take a look at Paul’s description in chapter 6 of who will NOT inherit the Kingdom of God, then lists a number of truly evil sins, some of the dregs of society or scum of the earth as some have stated. We might remember the church or Sunday school photo albums or directories, where a good number of the folks are smiling (well, some are not but not much we can do about that) and looking happy in the Lord. Some of those first generation or pagan-background believers (those won to Christ who had previously worshiped idols) were rough customers but here’s a point of rejoicing: Paul said, “And such WERE some of you!” Before they had met Jesus, they’d most likely have their photos or likenesses in the Corinthian Post Office (remember the wanted posters?) with their names and numbers in an information holder below a facial view and side view!
Yes, they knew what they’d been; and they knew what they’d become. They also knew that the difference between then and now was JESUS!
And you know? The same Jesus Who gave them salvation wants to do the same thing for all of us! There’s a saying, God’s Love reaches everyone except those who run away from Him. We rejoice with and for those in Corinth who left their lives of sin and began living for the Savior. But we grieve over those who heard but never believed.
There are still some like that, even today! Let me tell a story about some people who I saw, just for a moment, way back in 1993. One of my children had something in the skin under his jaw, almost like he had swallowed a marble or something like that. Our local hospital informed us (and I’ve never forgiven them for that!!) that there was nothing they could do but they referred us to a specialty hospital, about 90 minutes away.
To this day, I still don’t know how we made it there! My wife had made some inquiries and received some directions how to get there. These folks knew the area a lot better than we did (I hoped) and, so, off we went on an amazing journey. I say it’s amazing because, 30-plus years after the fact, I still remember a lot of what happened!
We started off heading in the general direction of that hospital. Getting from our house to the main road-check, no problem. But not long after that, we did experience a BIG problem.
You see, either I had missed an exit, or got trapped in a lane that peeled or veered off to another direction and I immediately panicked. Remember, I had no real idea where we were supposed to go and we were getting kind of close to the appointment. I figured, “I’ve got to do something about this” and began looking for a place where I might find directions.
Unlike a good number of men, I don’t hesitate to ask for directions (consider the alternative! Why keep going somewhere when you don’t know where you’re going?). Like a lot of men, even if you do give me directions, there’s no guarantee I’ll get there! But, I saw a place with a good number of cars parked nearby and figured, “Ah! Maybe there’s somebody who can help me out with some good directions!”
Was I ever in for a surprise.
First, I noticed a handrail and, walking closer; found some steps that led down to a landing or something—a place where you open the door. Except, there was no handle on the door! There was a lock, but no door and I don’t even know if there was a peep-hole in the door. Well, that door was solid steel so, maybe, no way to see who’s there.
Except somebody or some thing did see me! The door opened—don’t ask me how—with a serious metal-on-metal squeal like nobody had lubricated or oiled the hinges in years. I can still hear that metallic “squuueeeeeeaaaallllllll” to this day.
As if that wasn’t bizarre enough, the smoke was so strong I thought the place was on fire on the inside. Remember that verse or passage in Revelation where an angel opens the bottomless pit and the smoke darkened the sky (Revelation 9)? I thought this door led to that pit and was just a dress rehearsal for a future event. To this day I wish I had brought two things with me: a flashlight and a battery-powered fan (the one to blow away part of the smoke, and the other to, well, see with).
This establishment must have loved darkness rather than light because it was “flat-out dark” as we’d say back where I’m from originally. Anyway, I began to walk through the smoke and the darkness, watching some of the people inside there scurry away like insects who can’t stand the light! I tried to ask a couple of people for directions but the glances or glares they gave me was proof positive they, well, would not.
I kept walking on through the darkness towards some kind of light (there was an EXIT sign in the distance. My poor knowledge of Latin was such that I thought “EXIT” means “use this way to get out of here’). Eventually I found something that looked like a cash register and, sure enough, there was a cashier standing by. I hoped he or she (at the time, the atmosphere was such that I didn’t know what to expect!) would be able to help me get to the hospital.
Eventually I reached the counter—at least, I think it was a counter—where the cash register and the cashier were located. Now, remember, this took place in 1993 when unusual hair color was, well, unusual, This lady had a “lunch lady” or hairnet like Ruth Buzzi used to wear on "Rowan and Martin’s 'Laugh-In’". I hadn’t seen anyone wear anything like that in years and certainly not with a hair color halfway between light blue and light purple. Yes, that was her hair color!
But she noticed me and, squinting her eyes to a quite narrow slit, asked me, “Can I help you?” in the voice that indicated she’d rather be doing anything besides providing assistance.
I took a deep breath, trying not to swallow too much smoke, and paraphrased Psalm 23:1 as “the LORD is my Shepherd, and information I do want!” My reply was, “Yes, ma’am, I think I made a wrong turn?” using that uptick that shows one may really NOT know where one’s going!
Smile. Eyes widen a little; the mouth forms a wee little smile. “Where are you trying to get to?”
Another gulp and I told her the name of the hospital. All while still thinking of my very (!) free rendering of Psalm 23:1.
No more smile. Eyes as big as saucers. An amazed look on her face. “Oh, honey.”
You know you’re in trouble when you hear this. “Ah, are we anywhere near there now?”
She then told us how to get to the hospital and, don’t ask me how, we made it, even with a minute or two to spare. All I can say is that there must have been some other hands than mine on that steering wheel because I still don’t know how we got there.
But we did, and we made it back to our house without a scratch on us or the car.
Now, the one constant that I remember between then and now is this: there were so many people whom I saw, but couldn’t talk to, most of whom were unbelievers, I’m afraid. And should any of those folks die in their sins, lost without God, they’ll every last one of them burn in Hell forever, unless we or some other believer does something about it.
And Paul _was_ doing something about it! He was declaring or making known to whoever would read, listen or whatever to the Message of the Gospel. He had seen basically good and/or moral people encounter the Gospel and believe. He had also seen many who absolutely rejected the Gospel and wanted to make sure he would never had that opportunity again.
Lest we or anyone forget, Paul laid out as clearly as possible just what Gospel really was (and is): that Christ died for our sins, rose from the dead, and that people—over 500!—saw Him after He was raised from the dead. Paul carried that message of hope and salvation to even a wicked place like Corinth and saw a lot of people believe the message of the Gospel. They were changed forever from sinners to saints, and it was all because of Jesus and the Gospel.
This evening, I’m sure we’ve all heard the Gospel and I hope all of us have believed it. I hope and pray all of us have accepted the incredible gift of salvation. But if not, why not do it this evening? We have no guarantee of anything but right now and an eternity shaped on whether or not we receive and believe the Gospel.
It’s the same good, old, story that Paul shared with others. They heard it and believed. If you haven’t, then do it now while you have the opportunity. Don’t live without Jesus, and more solemnly, please don’t die without Him. Believe the Gospel and be saved today!
Scripture quotations taken from the King James Version of the Bible (KJV)
