For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth...For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith, ROM 1:16-17.

The gospel of Christ is often referred to as "The Good News of the Gospel." Jesus said, "That repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations," LUK 24:47.

When the gospel is begun with the assurance that, "God loves you, He has a great plan for your life," the ultimate result is complacency, and one becomes secure in a false peace without repentance or remission of sins.

When the Gospel is begun with preaching Christ as the way to heaven to escape the lightning and thundering of Mount Sinai, the ultimate result is seizing upon the death of the Son for the inheritance, without the fruit of repentance, MAT 21:34-38.

Cain, King Saul, Ahithophel, Judas and Esau all showed great pain and regret of their past conduct because it exposed them to punishment, but they did not receive remission of their sins in this mere legal repentance.

Satan is the author of overreaction. He has one desire, and that is to keep us off the strait and narrow way. Whether we overreact to the right or left is not important to him as long as we, "...fall into the ditch," Mat 15:14.

How then must we begin the good news of the gospel? Where is that middle ground which Satan so desperately wants to keep us from preaching, and walking?

Our text teaches us how the Apostle Paul began preaching the gospel. "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ...For therein is the righteousness of God revealed...For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men," ROM 1:16-18. This teaches God's wrath against sin, and that is where the gospel must begin.

To rightly understand the gospel, we must understand that Christ's death on the cross was for the appeasing of God's wrath against sin. This is what we are taught in 1JO 4:10, "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. The message of the gospel must begin with the wrath of God against sin to establish the need of repentance for the remission of sins.

When Jesus cried, "O righteous Father," JOH 17:25, Jesus saw His Father's righteous and just wrath upon sin, but also His tender Fatherly love for His Church in sending His Son to appease that wrath. The Holy Spirit glorifies Christ by revealing God's wrath upon sin, and what Jesus paid to appease that wrath for His Church, JOH 16:8-14, "...that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful," ROM 7:13.

When we begin to realize the sinfulness of sin, then "the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance," ROM 2:4. True evangelical repentance is real penitence; sorrow or deep contrition for sin, as an offense and dishonor to God, a violation of His Holy Law, and the basest ingratitude towards such a loving God!

There must be not only a true sorrow for sin, but a hatred for, and a turning from sin. Our text says, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation." When we learn to see that it was our sins that engraved our names in the palms of Christ's hands while He was appeasing the wrath of His Father upon our sins, then the power of that love draws us from under the power of sin unto Him, JOH 12:32. Amen.