Monday, September 17

To download an audio version of this, click here.

Romans 1:16
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 

You can make an argument that the most powerful force on earth is electricity. I read the other day that one single lightning strike during a storm contains enough energy to power 10 million homes for a month. That’s a lot of power.

Or you could reasonably argue that the most powerful force on earth is a hurricane. Some scientists estimate that an average hurricane releases energy equal to 200 times the world’s daily output of electricity. That’s also a lot power!

But what about a tsunami? Geophysicists estimated that the tsunami that hit Japan last year was up to 100 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima during World War II. That’s almost unimaginable power!

Or, you could look for a completely different kind of power. Take greed for instance. Some would say the human craving for “more” drives everything from national economies to international war.

Or, love. Is there anything as powerful as the love of a mother for child? Is there anything a father would not do to protect his children?

When we talk about the power of love in our human experience, we begin to approach the power of the gospel.

In Romans 1, Paul writes:

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 

We know that the center of the gospel is Christ crucified. The gospel claim is that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and was raised on the third day, according to the scriptures. But the gospel is also the fullest expression of the love of God.

John says it like this:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son … John 3:16

In the passage we look at today from Romans, Paul is saying that the gospel is not only the love of God expressed through Christ, but also the “power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.”

When we use the words “salvation” or “saved” we are assuming that we are both “saved from” something and “saved for” something.

Let me use a rather obvious illustration. Let’s say I’m at the beach and am being swept out to sea in a strong undertow. A lifeguard jumps in the surf and drags me to safety. You could accurately say that I was “saved.” I was saved from drowning in the ocean and saved for the rest of my life.

Now let’s try to imagine what was in Paul’s mind as he wrote these words. We know that before he was Paul the Apostle, Paul was Saul of Tarsus who took delight in persecuting followers of Jesus (see Acts 9:1-2). Saul was an arrogant, hateful, prideful and violent man. So when he says “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation…” he would have been thinking that he had been saved from a life of sin, hatred and violence, and ultimately from the judgment of God himself. He would have been thinking he was saved for a life as an apostle – that is, one set apart for the purpose of bringing God’s good news, the gospel, to the world.

Now, back to our discussion of power. A tsunami might be powerful enough to wreak destruction on an island or a coastal city; a lightning strike might set a building on fire; but what kind of power turns a rage-filled and murderous bully into an apostle of God’s great good news?

Paul answers that question for us by saying, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation…” Only the gospel has the power to turn Saul of Tarsus in to Paul the Apostle.

So, have you experienced the power of the gospel? Do you know what Christ has saved you from? Do you live with the awareness of what he has saved you for? Ask God to allow a “gospel tsunami” to flow through your heart!

Pastor Brian Coffey