Sederi Absolutely Essential
Doctrines o f Christianity Sermon P reíicKeci at T*Ke CHurcW of The Open Door, Los Angeles, California BT DR. R. A. TORREY Dean of Bible Institute
imagine for one moment that one Gos pel was as good as another. Further more he had that absolute clearness of thought that comes from being inspired of God, that made it impossible for him to be beguiled into believing that one gospel was as good as another. One gospel was true, the very truth of God; all. other gospels were false, a counter feit and lie of Satan. So one Gospel meant salvation, all other gospels meant damnation. And so Paul cries in our text, “If any man preacheth unto you any Gospel other than that which ye received from me, let him be anathema.” Paul knew that his Gospel was true and that it was the only true Gospel, for he got it right from God. As he himself says, “ The gospel which was preached by me is not after man. For neither did I receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came to me through revelation of Jesus Christ.” Now Paul tells the truth in this claim that he makes here, or else he was a deliberate impostor, or else he was a sadly deceived man. It would be easy enough to prove that he was not a deliberate impostor by proof that is un answerable; the outcome of his teaching proves clearly that he was not a de ceived man, therefore his claim is true, that the gospel -he preached was given to him by direct revelation from Jesus Christ, and is as much the teaching of Jesus Christ as anything that the Lord Jesus Himself taught with His own lips when He was here in the flesh on the earth. What then was the Gospel that Paul preached? The one true gospel, the only saving Gospel, the only gospel that has any right to call itself Christian. If we study Paul’s epistles and Paul’s ser mons carefully, we will find that there are seven essential, cardinal points in the gospel which he taught, seven great truths on which all others turn. If a man holds these seven points, he is all
Text: “But though we, or an angel from Heaven, should preach unto you any gospel other than that which we have preached unto you, let him be Anathema. As we have said be fore, so say I now again: If any man preacheth unto you any gospel other than that which ye received, let him be Anathema. . . . For I make known to you, brethren, as touching the gospel which was preached by me. That it is not after man. For neither did I ^receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came to me through revelation of Jesus Christ.” Gal. 1:8, 9, 11, 12. T HERE is a widely prevailing opin ion today, that what a man be lieves is not of any great import ance, but that how a man lives is the all-important matter. This is a very puerile fallacy, for it ioses sight of the all important and indisputable fact, that how a man lives is determined by what a man believes. As a man thinketh in his heart, as a man really believes, so he is. (Prov. 23:7). .Qur real thoughts, our actual beliefs, determine our con duct, they determine our character, they determine our life and they determine our eternity. To many men one Gospel is as good as another, as long as in any sense it can be called a Gospel. Indeed there is much today that is called a “ Gospel” that is in no rational sense a Gospel at all. For example, we hear much about “ the Gospel of Social Ser vice.” Now beyond a question, social service is important, but it is not a Gos pel, and any one who calls it a “ Gospel” uses words in a very careless and en tirely unwarranted sense. But many of the so-called Gospels, indeed all of, the Gospels except the Gospel that Paul taught, are, as he says in thè verse which immediately precedes our text, not a Gospel at all, but, to use his own words, “ Which is not another gospel: only there are some that trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ.” They are not gospels, though they pre tend to be, they are simply attempts to pervert the one real gospel, “ the gospel of Christ.” Paul did not think one Gospel was as good as another. He was too clear and logical a thinker, to
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