Many people today who profess to be born again Christians are actually not. There is no evidence of God’s saving grace in their lives, and yet they believe themselves to be “believers.” How can this be?

One answer is that they have believed “another gospel,” different from the one Jesus and the Apostles preached.  What was this Gospel that Jesus & His apostles preached?

Jesus explained it clearly in Luke 24:45-46 …“Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations…

Peter preached it in Acts 2:38 And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Paul also reported it in Acts 26:19 “Therefore, [I] declared …that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.

Do you see a common theme in their versions and explanations of the Gospel? Each one makes much more of repentance than most preachers do today. But as Dr. Wayne Grudem has written on page 717 of his Systematic Theology “Preaching the need for faith without repentance is preaching only half of the gospel. It will result in many people being deceived, thinking that they have heard the Christian gospel and tried it, but nothing happened.”

This is why Jesus told His disciples in Matt. 7:13-14 “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

In his continuation of his series The Gospel of the Kingdom, Gregg Harris presents this message entitled The Individual Believer in the Kingdom of God. After you listen to this, be sure to go back and listen to the entire series.