Monday 27 February: The gospel – why we need it

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Last week, we had a look at the state of our world and of ourselves. We had a look at the brokenness and sin that lead us into anxiety and a place of crying out to God.

This week, Tom Newbold, Head of Supporter Relations at Bible Society, takes us through the Bible’s answer to that sorry situation: the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Focus for the week: the gospel

Bible readings: Romans 3.10; 1 John 1.8

Do you ever feel like you’re not quite good enough? I think most of us probably feel like that from time to time. It’s a bit of a human tendency, isn’t it?

But why is that? Let’s think about our human origins for a minute …

Take Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Things are pretty good for them at first, right? But then sin enters the scene. Adam and Eve’s eyes get opened to good, and to evil, when they eat the fruit.

And then they start to experience these feelings of ‘not good enough’. We read in the book of Genesis that they cover themselves up. They hide from intimacy with God. Shame and sin well and truly gatecrash the party. 

And shame and sin have been gatecrashing humanity ever since:

Paul says to the Romans, ‘There is no one righteous, not even one.’ (NIV)

And John writes in Scripture, ‘If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves.’

You see, the parasite of sin has infected all of human nature. Being honest, none of us love God as we should and none of us love each other as we should. Very often, we just aren’t good enough.

But, there’s good news. God doesn’t leave us in a sin-infested state. Just as the darkness of sin entered the world, the ‘light of the world’ comes right back at it.

And the good news of the gospel is that Jesus Christ came and made our ‘not good enough’ more than enough.

And that’s what we’ll be exploring in the coming days.

This reflection was written by Tom Newbold, Head of Supporter Relations at Bible Society.