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ACTS 20:24

"THE GOOD NEWS"

Intro: Paul is returning to Jerusalem to an uncertain future. He only knows that bonds and
       imprisonment await him. He has called for the elders from Ephesus to meet him at
       Miletus for this emotional farewell.. Paul declares that the ministry that the Lord
       Jesus gave to him was to testify of the gospel of the grace of God.

I. WHAT IS THE GOSPEL?  (Good news)
        A. That God loves you!
                1. Amanzing how people seek to disqualify themselves from that  statement.
                        a. I can understand Him loving others.
                        b. I can't understand Him loving me.
                                1. I am so weak, I have failed Him. I hate my
                                        weakness.
                                2. I have lived such a sinful  miserable life.
                2. Others challenge that statement.
                        a. If God loves me, then why has he allowed this tragedy in
                                my life?
                                1. Army Captain in Tucson.
                                2. Question usually asked by a non-servant for the
                                        servant knows---
                                        a. He takes orders, not gives then.
                                        b. That his master knows what is best. He is
                                         working from a far greater base of
                                         information.
        B. That God hates sin.
                1. This is necessary if He loves me, for He must hate that which is
                        destroying me.
                2. So God loves the sinner, but He hates the sin.
                        a. He cannot be content while sin masters your.
                                life.
                        b. He must use whatever means necessary to purge
                                sin from your life.
                        c. He sees it as a matter of life or death.
                                1. Through His prophet Ezekiel, He cried to Israel,
                                        "Turn ye, turn ye, for why will ye die?"
                                2. We need no further proof of the spoiling destructive
                                        results of sin than looking at our world.
                                3. The earth may show God's handiwork, but it also
                                        shows what ugliness man can make from beauty.
                3. God's wrath is not directed against man, but the ungodliness
                        and unrighteousness of man.
                        a. We have often a very wrong concept of God.
                                1. Jesus did not die to persuade God to love you.
                                2. God is not fuming with wrath wanting to destroy
                                        you and Jesus saying, "Please Father, for My
                                        sake don't".
                                3. It was God who loved you so much that He sent
                                        His Son to die as your substitute so He could
                                        have a righteous basis to forgive your sins.
        C. It was necessary that men should testify of this gospeI of grace, for it is not
           revealed in nature.
                1. Nature witnesses to law. I see the laws of nature.
                        a. I know that to seek to defy them is courting pain and death.
                        b. I see that they are fixed and non-personal
                2. Nature reveals His love for beauty.
                        a. The colors of the flowers, the trees and skies.
                3. Nature reveals His order. Everything producing after its own kind.
                        a. Imagine confusion if this not so.
                                1. Farmer plants his wheat and up would spring,
                                        tomatoes, corn and oak trees.
                                2. Your wife says, "We're expecting again."
                        b. "Whatsoever a man soweth..."
                4. Nature reveals His wisdom.
                        a. His ability to create life forms amenable to a wide variety of
                           environments.
                                1. Creatures in the sea.
                                2. Some for land.
                                3. Some for sea and land.
                                4. Some to fly, some to fly and swim and walk. The duck.
                b. We do not find the gospel of grace of God in nature.