What is the gospel?

Matt and I have been blessed in joining a wonderful city group at Scarlet City Church.  We have already met some wonderful people and are excited to see the Lord work in and through our lives.  We are currently studying Matt Chandler's "Explicit Gospel" and it is rocking my world.  

The study starts with the question, "What is the gospel?"  Hmmmm...that seemed like such a simple question and yet I was stumped for some reason.  "Well...the gospel is God's word and manuscript for life."  Well that's true, but that's not entirely it.  I was then brought to 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 which reads,

"Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand.  By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you.  Otherwise, you have believed in vain.  For what I received I pass on to you as of first imporance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures."

After reading through that verse I realized that the gospel is quite simple.  Christ died for our sins, he was buried and he was raised from the dead.  That's the gospel.  I think sometimes the gospel is lost and we (Christians) begin to distort the original message.  Many of us believe that once we have accepted Christ, we are slapped with our list of rules in order to stay in God's favor.  Examples are staying sexually pure, not getting drunk, not coveting, not lying, not gossiping, etc.  While abstaining from these things are good, that is not the end-all.  Many believe that if we sin, repent and stumble again and again, we were probably never really saved at all.  Doesn't this defeat the gospel?  Christ died for our sins.  He didn't die for our first couple sins, but rather all of our sins.  Following a list of rules turns us from God-reliance to self-reliance.  I believe this totally defeats Christ's purpose and intent.  If following a list of rules saved us, Christ dying was meaningless.  But if we truly understand the gospel message, we can start to understand how big God's grace really is.  We aren't worthy of anything.  We aren't even worthy of a little bit.  We are sinful.  We are born sinful.  We stink at following rules and we can't do anything to save ourselves.  But luckily Christ took care of it.  He paid the ultimate price and died for our sins.  Bottom line, God's grace is HUGE!!!  He loved us so much that he died for all of our unworthiness.  

Praise the Lord!!