The Only Solution: The Gospel

” The real purpose behind the giving of the Law was to reveal the holiness of God, His hatred of sin, His determination to punish sin. The Law was not meant to provide a way of salvation; it was given, according to Paul, to show “the exceeding sinfulness of sin,”to reveal what God thought of sin, and what God would do about sin in the case of all who refused to accept ills grace. The Law “shut us up to Christ”; it makes us see our desperate need of Him in the light of the condemnation of sin.

We have sinned against God. We are in the wrong relationship to Him. His wrath is upon us. We have made it impossible for Him to bless us.  His Holy nature demands that He must punish us and our transgressions. What can we do about it? Nothing! Our tears, our sorrow, our works and strivings, can avail nothing.  We cannot atone for our past or undo our misdeeds, or make recompense. None can keep the law. “There is none righteous, no, not one.”"Every mouth has been stopped.” The whole world is guilty before God. Is there no hope? Can nothing be done? God be thanked, the gospel of Christ provides the answer, as we have already seen. God has dealt with our sins in Christ. The demands of holiness and justice have been satisfied–Christ has been “delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification” (Chapter 4.  25). God in Christ is prepared to receive us.  In him, who has “been made a curse for us” (Galatians 3:13), the curse pronounced against sin is removed and there is hope for all. The law of God which decrees travail and sorrow and misery as the result of sin has been satisfied. God in Christ offers us pardon and forgiveness, and instead of cursing, blessing. Without God we cannot be happy, “for there is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”Try as we will, and as mankind has, we cannot succeed. The first step is to have the favour of God, and in Christ it is gloriously possible–indeed, it is offered us.

Man’s very nature is fallen.  Man is wrong at the centre of his being, and therefore everything is wrong.  He cannot be improved, for, finally, nothing will suffice but a radical change, a new nature.  Man loves the darkness and hates the light.  What can be clone for him?  Can he change himself?  Can he renew his nature?  “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots?”  Can man change the whole bias of his life? Give him new clothing, provide him with a new house in new surroundings, entertain him with all that is best and most elevating, educate him and train his mind, enrich his soul with frequent doses of the finest culture ever known, do all and more, but still he will remain the same essential man, and his desires and innermost life will be unchanged. Were that not true, the world and individual man would long since have reached perfection. Think of all the work of the philosophers and thinkers. Consider especially the titanic changes and social enactments of the past hundred years, with all the efforts at solving the problems of mankind. All these things are good and right in their way within their circumscribed limits.

But the great problem is still left. Man needs a new nature. Whence can he obtain it? Again, there is but one answer, in Jesus Christ the Son of God. He came from Heaven and took upon Him human nature perfect and whole. He is God and man. In Him alone are the divine and the human united. And He offers to give us His own nature. He desires to make of us new men. He is “the first-born among many brethren.”All who believe on Him, and receive Him, obtain this new nature, and as the result all things become different. Those who hated God now love Him and desire to know more and more about Him.  Their supreme desire now is to please Him and to honour and to glorify Him. The things which formerly delighted them they now hate and detest, and the ways of God are the ways they desire. The self they glorified and which they ever desired to please, they now hate and regard as their greatest enemy.  And this in turn brings them into an entirely new relationship with their fellow men.  Loving the Lord their God first, they find themselves loving their neighbours as themselves. Self, and concern about self, is the great cause of ail quarrelling and strife and war. Pride is the root of all social discord. But in Christ self is crucified and peace becomes truly possible. A new society is only possible when we have new men; and Christ alone can produce new men.

There is but one message that can include the whole world, in spite of all divisions and distinctions. There is but one power that can bring all men together and unite them and bring them to true brotherhood. There is but one solution to the problem of individual man and of the whole world. It is “the gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth.”

All who have ever believed it, and have proved its truth and power, have joined Paul in saying and singing: “God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.“ The chorus is already loud, but it will be louder. For John tells us in his vision that: “I beheld and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; saying with a loud voice, worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.” God grant that we may find ourselves among the blessed throng.  We have but to believe on Him, to yield ourselves to Him, and begin to make of Him our only boast here and now, and it is assured.”

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Plight of Man and the Power Of God