We're having a positive conversation about the gospel, right?
Yes.
All right.
Now whose gospel is it?
God's.
It's God's gospel.
And what are we supposed to do with the gospel?
Preach Jesus.
Yes.
Share Him graciously.
And what is the audience's job?
To listen.
Wow.
So if they're supposed to listen, should we brush our teeth?
Probably.
Yeah.
Should we be, gracious?
Absolutely.
What about humor?
Would that be appropriate?
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Should we pause where necessary?
Yes.
All right.
So one way to present the gospel, of which there are many, right?
Yeah, absolutely.
We've kind of been discussing a variety of ways to give the gospel.
Sometimes we have limited time.
Yeah, for sure.
And I like to, if given the opportunity, and if the Holy Spirit permits,
I like to use the Bible.
Right.
Because I didn't come up with the plan.
Right.
And I did not come up with a better way to say what God wanted to say than how God wrote it the first way.
Right.
Although, I like your point about giving an explanation of the verse.
Yeah.
Because you were saying, what was the verse?
SPEAKER 1
I was talking about Ephesians 2:8 and 9.
So Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, I'm misquoting it, but essentially it's talking about, you know, “ye are saved by grace, and this is a gift of God, not of yourselves, lest any man should boast.”
I think it's something like that.
SPEAKER 2
That's the core essence.
It says, “For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.
It is the gift of God,
not of works, lest any man should boast.”
Now, are there any words that we just spoke that you would like to expound on to help the person gain maximum clarity of what God was trying to communicate in that verse?
Gift.
You like the word gift, so you want to focus on the word gift.
And do you want to contrast it with anything?
What is your strategy for unpacking this word?
SPEAKER 1
You have to look at what is the gift compared to and it's being compared to works.
So gift versus works.
SPEAKER 2
Ah, is the gift of God not of works?
There we go.
That sounds like other verses that talk about gift and works.
I like it.
Um, so now we're going to segue a little bit.
We're going to let the brain simmer.
Is that okay?
You put it on melt mode or I don't know …
Marinate.
We're going to let it marinate.
So I like to define terms.
Do you like to get a good clear definition of words?
Yeah, always.
Okay.
And then should I go into the classroom unprepared with the definition?
SPEAKER 1
Never.
SPEAKER 2
And then if I'm supposed to communicate to people what the word means,
Should I do some digging and find an accurate definition?
SPEAKER 1
Yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER 2
Where do you think I should go to get a definition of words, key terms in the gospel?
The Bible.
I should go to the Bible to define the Bible.
The man is correct.
Did you know that God built and interlaced thesaurus and dictionary into His own Bible?
Yes.
You knew that and that the Bible does help define the Bible?
SPEAKER 1
Yes.
SPEAKER 2
How does it do that?
Because it uses context.
Context.
And context is the structure around which the word is used.
Often there's a synonym nearby or there's a pairing of words or there's a contrast such as gift and works.
It's either A or B.
So if it's by works, then it's not a gift.
And if it's a gift, then it's not of works.
I love it.
So the Bible is the best place to get a definition.
Where else do you think we should go?
We should go to God.
Ask the Holy Spirit to help us understand the Author.
What did the Author mean?
I like that because if God can't give you the definition, you're probably not going to get it anyway.
I like to go to the Blue Letter Bible and tap on the verse:
and then tap Interlinear slash Concordance.
Do you know what interlinear means?
No.
It means in the lines.
Okay.
Interlinear.
Do you hear it now?
Yes.
It's a word by word comparison of the original Greek or Hebrew language and how that word directly connects to English along with a definition of the term
in the Original Language, which we do not worship the original language, neither do we worship English.
We worship God, Who made all languages.
However, we're trying to get a full-spectrum understanding of what this word means.
We should do this, actually.
So I'm going to get a Bible word out.
I'm going to go to a different verse, though.
We're going to just start with “the wages of sin”.
That's a pretty good gospel verse, right?
You're familiar with that?
So if I type in wages of sin,
Romans 6:23 comes up I hit tap read to view in Bible view right so you simply tap the verse just like this up at the top it says interlinear slash concordance. Now it's both so interlinear gives me the complete Hebrew sorry the complete Greek verse which I don't remember exactly how to read Greek from college when we scroll down it gives you the:
Inflected root transliterated word.
So inflected means they put the little accent-a-goo or accent-a-grave on top and then it's also the root word that it comes from and also the transliteration which means to illiterate means to make it come alive in noises.
So how to pronounce it in English, right?
So when I scroll down, and then on the right, it gives you the Strong's number, which that's a concordance, which we'll tap on that in a second.
And it's got the English word.
So the first is the, and then for, and then wages.
Not all the time in each language is the structure of the sentence.
Yep.
There's a word for it.
It's not schematics. [syntax?]
Yeah, there's a word for it.
We'll get it later.
So I want to do the word “wages”.
So I'm going to read the Greek.
Opsonion.
Opsonion.
I can't read it really well.
It's got the word wages so we can tap.
Alright, so when you get into the word, it says Opsonion.
It says from a presumed derivative of the same word as … and gives another link.
It says here we go, definition number one, you're going to love it.
You ready for your brain to expand?
A soldier's pay or allowance.
That part of a soldier's support given in place of pay, as in rations or money which he has paid, it's metaphysically wages, what you're hired to do, your reward or your payment of sin.
It's used four times in Scripture, three times as wages and one time as “charges”.
Here's your charges.
Then it gives a strong definition of the word, uh, rations of a soldier by extension is stipend his pay, his wages, that which a hard-worker earns.
I love it.
Wages.
It's what I deserve.
Right?
So then I like to go to the Webster's 1828.
So number one, we went to God, we went to the Scripture, right?
Yeah.
To get a definition.
Number two, we went to the Holy Spirit and we asked the Author.
So we tried to look for context.
Number three, then we look at the, we look at the Greek. Then English Webster's
1828.
Then we're going to look at the best English.
So if you go to WebstersDictionary1828.com and there's a really good reason why you don't just Google it because words diminish value over time.
Satan hates words because Jesus is the Word.
So now we're going to type in wages into our dictionary in English.
Now are you ready for the next level?
Sure.
Here it is.
So we're helping people understand wages.
It's what I've earned for my trespass.
It's a noun in its first format, singular in signification.
It means hire, reward, that which is paid or stipulated specifically for services, chiefly for services of manual labor or for military and naval services.
So he's really expounding on what we already knew, right?
We speak of servants’ wages, a laborer's wages.
But we never apply the word to the reward given for men in office, which are called fees or salary.
The word is, however, sometimes applied to the compensation given to the representatives in the legislature.
“Tell me, what shall thy wages be?”
He quotes the Bible, Genesis 29:15.
That's a pretty good question.
You worked all this time.
“What shall thy wages be?”
Then definition two, he splits them;
I like multifaceted words.
Right.
Because then you have to look at the context to see what the definition.
Reward, fruit, recompense, that which is given or received in return, “the wages of sin is death.”
That's the verse we're quoting.
I love it.
So we're trying to help the receiver receive the word, including its power and the salvation … meaning.
Words should be unpacked powerfully and certain words need a description, an illustration.
Jesus was a really good storyteller.
He gave illustrations of truth.
He put clothing on the truth.
You know, you were saying that we could just give straight Scripture, 100 Scriptures in a row.
Like I remember when I first went to college,
I went to a public college, state college, and I tried to witness to this guy, and I knew he wanted to get saved, and I didn't know how to, I couldn't remember how to witness.
I'd never been really super formally trained, so what did I do?
I turned to John chapter 3, because I knew that Jesus knew how to witness, and I knew John chapter 3, and did I just read him John 3:16?
No.
I sat down with my friend Jay, and we together read …
John chapter 3, all of it; pausing for questions, absorbing the story.
We read all of it, but at the end of it, Jay didn't get saved.
So I'm like, well, let's read John chapter 4 because in John chapter 4, Jesus witnesses the woman at the well, right?
We read the whole story of John chapter 4, the woman at the well.
Then I remember that it's the book of Romans that tells people that they're sinners.
So I didn't know where to go in Romans.
I had no formal soul winning training.
So I went to Romans chapter 1.
I knew the Bible enough and I read to him all of Romans chapter 1.
Do you know the key thought in Romans chapter 1?
SPEAKER 1
The key thought is the sin of man.
SPEAKER 2
Very sin.
It's a huge long list of sins that we're all disqualified by being sinners.
But you know what happens in Romans chapter 2?
SPEAKER 1
talks about... Wait, let me think about it.
It's been a while since I read Romans chapter 2.
It talks about... But who are you, old man?
SPEAKER 2
The essence of Romans chapter 2 is, “Don't preach to me, preacher, because you're a sinner too.”
So the essence of Romans 2 is that even righteous religious people are still sinners.
Okay, yeah.
And what do you think Romans chapter 3 covers?
SPEAKER 1
We're all sinners.
SPEAKER 2
We're all sinners.
So it's three whole chapters on sin.
What did I do with my friend Jay?
We read all three chapters of Romans chapter 3.
So you said he could go through 100 verses?
We went through 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
So far we've read five chapters of the Bible together.
But Jay's not saved yet.
I didn't know how to witness.
I just knew that the answer was in the Bible.
And I knew that eventually we got to Romans 3:23.
And then I'm like, there's an answer in here somewhere.
In Romans 4, I got a little bogged down.
So I did, I called my friend Erik and I'm like, Erik, you know how to witness to the soul, like the, what'd you call it?
The winning of the soul.
Can you come over here and do that thing?
Cause Jay wants to get saved and we've read through five chapters of the Bible and he doesn't get it yet.
Cause I don't know how to say it to him.
And so Erik came over and said, well, let's go to chapter six of Romans.
And then let's go to chapter 10.
And he picked out certain key verses inside those chapters, but he was methodical, systematic, and definitive.
You know, we do have to let the Scripture speak, and if people are willing to listen, read them the whole Bible.
And if they're willing to listen for a short time, give them a verse and give the sense.
I'm not such a fan of skipping ahead to illustrations about a “gift”.
Now a lot of people can say, I'm going to give you a gift now you have to wash my car.
That's not a gift, right?
That's a great illustration.
However, we did not clearly define the word.
We kind of skipped some steps.
Like this definition thing, it makes you think about the roots, the deepness of the meaning of the word.
So I like a gospel presentation that has clearly defined terms.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah, I agree.
But, you know, I feel like depending on who you are,
“Clearly defined” may be different because it could be subjective because clearly I mean obviously … how clear does it have to be to somebody like do we have to go to the Greek for somebody to get saved or the Hebrew like if that's like there's people I'm sure in the world right that you would need to go to the Hebrew and the Greek for them to get saved because they're just that … you know
But there's other people that they barely even know how to speak English.
And, you know, they don't even know another language exists besides Mexican.
SPEAKER 2
So we're going to do a different episode and we're going to have the core key words of the gospel that cannot be missing.
Like, how do you have a gospel without “God”?
SPEAKER 1
Yeah, you can't have a gospel without God.
SPEAKER 2
So we should define who God is slightly?
Yeah.
Instead of just assume that we're both talking about the same God?
Yeah.
Okay.
Now, can you have a gospel without the word “sin”?
SPEAKER 1
Well, yeah, you can just, well, at least you have to make sure you define it, even if you don't use the word sin, but it has to be some type of definition of sin.
SPEAKER 2
So it's an unavoidable word.
You can use a synonym for it, but you can't give the complete presentation of the gospel without the concept of sin.
Yeah, the concept.
I agree with the concept.
So these are the core concepts, which I don't necessarily... No, I agree.
Okay, so the concept is tied to a word, so there's a God, there's a sin, and then we don't have to use the word “penalty”, we can use the word “wages”, we can use the word “death, consequence, result”, you know, next level logic, but there's got to be a “reward”.
Right.
And number four, there's got to be a payment.
Right, a payment.
And then, you know, the concept really is substitutionary, which that's a big concept, but that's got to be a Lamb of God.
There's got to be a sacrifice, someone who's willing to step in and take my place.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah, I agree.
SPEAKER 2
You know, we can use fancy words.
Soteriology means the study of what it takes to get saved.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah.
SPEAKER 2
Salvation.
Yeah.
Salvation through the Son.
Anyway, but there has to be a “Jesus”.
Right.
Who pays.
Right.
And then I like to emphasize the fullness of the payment.
Yeah.
Because they have to understand the depth of what I deserved and that Jesus paid it all.
And then number four, you've got to take action.
Some sort of belief.
Yeah.
You know, you have to receive, believe & receive the gospel.
Right.
A person believes in their heart.
Yeah.
And they believe with their mouth.
They confess.
Yeah.
and they have to tell God their choice.
Right.
Yeah.
So these are the core essential elements of the gospel that everybody should, if they had maybe just six words that they could do some research on to get a fuller comprehension of what those words mean, so that you feel comfortable and confident in the field, fluidly flowing with these words, understanding their roots, their meanings, their depth, because you are the teacher.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah.
You know, I think …
There's a lot to think about here, but number one, right, we have to understand always who we're talking to.
Because Jesus, I mean, if you look at the way He testified, I mean, he always testified, right, depending on who He was testifying to, differently.
He didn't testify to Nicodemus, a Pharisee of Pharisees, right, you know, someone that was really respected in Israel, that was super hot, you know, knew the law back, like the back of his hand.
He didn't testify to him the same way He testified to the woman at the well.
Why?
Because they're different lives, different experiences, and the way they receive things is different.
With the guy from Nicodemus, He talked about, He said, He tried to use things that Nicodemus didn't know.
He said, well, look, are you born again?
And Nicodemus was like, well, what?
Like He used Spirit, because Nicodemus so used the tradition, he used spiritual approach and said, look,
You're, I mean, he always uses a spiritual approach, but he said, look, have you been born again?
And Nicodemus was like, what is a born again?
Because he's so traditional and so book to the book, right?
And when he went to the woman, right, He asked, do you want, do you want to drink from the Living Water, right?
It's different, right?
If you would have said, do you want to drink from the living water, Nicodemus, Nicodemus probably be like, well, no, like this guy's crazy.
But then we start talking about being born again.
This guy's like, what is born again?
So it's different, right?
It depends on who you're talking to.
Who you talk to is different.
Like when Paul talked to the, I think it was Paul, when he talked to the, um, when he was in, um, I think it was Antioch?
No, it wasn't Antioch.
It was, um, what was it?
Mars Hill.
Mars Hill.
And he started talking to the, what's it called, to the Greeks.
And the Greeks were like listening.
He was using different things.
But once he started talking about the resurrection of Christ, the Greeks like all tuned out.
Why was that?
Because they were so like, oh, it has to be philosophy, this and that, and they just got tuned out.
But he preaches to different people differently.
You have to pick your battles.
SPEAKER 2
So I want to harmonize.
Jesus had two advantages that we don't necessarily get to use those tools when we're witnessing.
Number one, He could see people's hearts.
Yeah.
And number two, He was the Word.
SPEAKER 1
Right.
SPEAKER 2
So He had like the ultimate word selection choice.
There's this fellow named Paul, which a lot of people use him as a pattern for their witnessing.
And Paul had three significantly different audiences, but yet his approach was always the same.
He started with his testimony, which that's awkward.
That's unique.
That is a pattern.
Jesus didn't necessarily have a testimony because He didn't have a salvation story because He is the salvation.
Right.
“Woman, believe me.
I am the Water, right?”
And then Nicodemus, “believe, whosoever believeth on Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.”
And these are very true, very true things.
Paul reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, proving that this was very Christ.
He used words.
He used persuasion.
He used logic.
He used the Holy Spirit.
He used time.
He used illustration.
He used cultural references.
He used all available tools.
He used his own pedigree.
He used his own history, his pattern of life.
“My manner of life from my youth, if they would testify, know all the Jews.”
They know me.
Everybody knew everybody.
How that I lived after the straightest sect of their religion, a Pharisee of the Pharisees.
So then,
There still has to be a core essence of the gospel communicated.
All we're saying is the words need to be clear, the teacher should do some homework, have a good understanding of what words they're saying, and if we had to vote, my prerogative, which you can have your own prerogative, which is perfectly fine, is that if time permits and if the Holy Spirit leads,
A clear definition of terms, specifically we do not want to gloss over the concept of sin and we definitely don't want to gloss over the concept of the eternal consequences of sin, specifically the nature of the condemnation that we deserve, the eternality, the immensity, and the amazingness of the problem makes us run to the Solution and these words need to be …
So well understood by the delivery boy, the delivery mechanism, that the receiver, instead of just hearing a superficial illustration of what are wages, what is a gift, what is sin, who is Jesus, and trust Him, I think we should dig into a good understanding of the meaning of the words and get a holistic, organic,
well-rounded, well-founded terminology definition, and then it puts more weight, I believe, on the word if the word is clearly defined.
I like etymology.
That's the study of the history of the meaning and the roots and where the word came from.
You'll find many of our English words come from other languages or combinations of other words.
and it gives clarity to the mind, meaning and understanding.
SPEAKER 1
That's my point.
Real quick question.
So do you think, in regards to the gospel, right?
Obviously we can talk about other stuff, but in regards to the gospel, do you think there is such a thing as over-explaining?
SPEAKER 2
So the twinkle has to be in the eye.
You know, as a teacher, if the students glaze-over or if they're snoring or if they're done, if there's no,
No questioning.
No curiosity.
The conversation's over.
There's no more communicating.
There's no more teaching happening.
You have to be sensitive.
Right.
SPEAKER 1
Agreed.
Yeah, because, you know, that's one thing I, you know, and that's why I'm so passionate about this subject is because I'm very guilty, because I'm a theological head, right?
Like if you ask me something, I will pull out like 10 Bible verses to show you why this or does not, right?
Because I'm very like about the doctrine, sound doctrine.
But one thing about me is that because I'm so theological oftentimes I forget not everyone's like that and so maybe i might for something need explanation that's super thorough you know like maybe go 10, 20, 30 minutes with me before I even get to even the first like you know breeze of understanding as opposed to somebody else you know they don't have to they don't have to you know … if I go anything over 10 minutes they are sleeping. I just lost them at step 2.
How to keep people interested!
Sometimes I get into way too much detail.
…
There is something written in the law of the teacher. 7 Laws of Teaching by John Milton Gregory
Essentially, one of the ways, one of the keys to teaching is that the teacher must excite the senses of the student by keeping them curious, on-topic, enthusiastic.
There must be a genuine desire to learn and we must foster and promote that enthusiasm, because when the flame goes out in the eyes and the heart and the mouth of the student to where they have no more questions,
They have exhausted their capacity to receive information.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah.
So, I mean, it's kind of like the same idea like this.
Like, I've been, for the last two, three months almost, I've been teaching a junior church, right?
And like, I don't always teach them, but like, usually I'm always the one that gives the invitation at the end.
So like, I'm the one that promotes the decision, right?
I tell them the clear gospel the best I can.
I promote the decision then after whoever gets saved I promote baptism, right?
I tell them about baptism.
So there's a thing as … with kids I could read them like 15 verses and they could all be like spot-on like the best verses to use and they will understand a thing.
But if I use example like this, this is not that this is not salvation is baptism.
So with baptism, I say look baptism instead of reading them a ton of verses.
I say look baptism is two things.
It’s identification … then I say it’s obedience. Baptism is this: I'll put my hand up like this, I'd be look: death, burial, resurrection and I'll do a hand signal. Now everyone put their hands up like this: death, burial, resurrection … This is kids 6 to 11 years old.
When I start getting super duper detail, they won’t get it.
SPEAKER 2
Yeah, I was reading a kid's book called “The Real Jesus” to my grandkids in the car.
Jesus was teaching in the picture. There was a child on His lap. What do you notice about Jesus?
They said, “Well, the kids are close.”
I said, “So the kids are really close.
They're right around Him.
They were the closest in the audience.
There's other people listening.”
I said, “What do you think is interesting about listening to Jesus?”
And the first thing they came up with is, “He uses hand motions.” Because His hand was out.
He uses hand motions to keep the kids entertained.
I'm like, yep, he probably did.
He probably... Good, good catch.
They really like that.
All right, so let's use clear terms.
Let's use good illustrations.
Let's use good cartoons if we need to.
SPEAKER 1
Yeah, like that illustration.
The audience can't see this if anyone listens to this, but the audience can't see this.
But it's a picture that we use.
This is one of the slides that we use in the kids program at the junior church.
And I tell them, look, there's a few things, right?
Because they might understand all the verses.
If I say, wages, sin, and death, they're like all lost.
But then I say, look, there's one bridge, right?
That's heaven.
We're over here where the city is.
Right, there's one bridge, right?
You're like, yeah, there's one bridge.
SPEAKER 2
Where does the bridge go over?
Because they can't see the bridge.
SPEAKER 1
Exactly.
And so I tell them, okay, so I look, so there's a big gap, right, between heaven, which is like one destination.
A chasm, it's like a canyon.
A chasm, a canyon, exactly, like the Grand Canyon, except for there's flames underneath.
So it represents hell.
Exactly, it represents hell.
And so this is how I tell the kids, right?
I'm like, look, you see the picture, right?
They're like, yeah.
And they all like, they all gasp when they see the picture.
and I'm
I'm like, if the bridge is not there and I go any other way but the bridge, do I make it?
No!
What happens?
And they're like, you fall in!
Right!
Jesus... Wait, who is the bridge?
And I tell them, Jesus is that bridge.
SPEAKER 2
So it's a big cross laying across the canyon.
SPEAKER 1
Exactly.
I know you can't see, I know I'm explaining as if you see it, but maybe the thumbnail could be this picture.
So I tell them and I'm like and there's also if you see if you could zoom in a little bit there's arrows right here I'm like you see there's arrows leading off to the side, right?
They're like, yeah, and there's people jumping over.
Yeah one take the bridge.
The bridge is easy to see it's really big, right?
Yeah, you know why because people want to trust themselves and not Jesus, right?
SPEAKER 2
They trusted to themselves that they were righteous and
Anyway, sometimes it's good to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit, especially when you're soul winning, because the Holy Spirit is the ultimate guide and the one who actually wins the person and wins them over to Himself.
The Holy Spirit's always emphasizing the Son and the Son is always pointing to the Father.
So we want people to trust in Jesus.
But they're not going to do that apart from the influence and the sweet whisper of the Holy Ghost, convincing them of truth, persuading them that Christ is worthy of their attention and their faith, their confidence.
And so whatever means you use, it's important to be accurate.
It's important to be sensitive of the Holy Spirit.
If you feel in your spirit and in your soul that a person has not gained clarity,
And it is true that you have to have the essentials, the basic essentials of understanding the gospel before you can take the action of believing in Jesus to receive eternal life.
It is appropriate if this person has lived this many years, it's likely that they'll live a short while longer.
Statistics show that those who are alive tend to stay alive for a little while.
If you want to take time to go through the gospel again or to clarify any parts that were foggy, you do want to achieve maximum clarity, although you're not going to hit 100%.
You still need to strive for excellence in your delivery and let the Holy Spirit be responsible for the reception and their free will.
That's all.
Thanks for listening.
Defining Gospel Clarity