Saved Through the Gospel

“Through the Gospel you are also being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you...” 1 Corinthians 15:2

St. Paul recaps the Gospel in this chapter: “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures; He was buried; He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures; that He appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, He appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at once...”

Here was a man who as Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee, took great delight in persecuting the Christians. Saul watched while the deacon, Stephen, was dragged out of Jerusalem and stoned to death. Saint Stephen was the first martyr who died for the faith. But there were many other unnamed martyrs as a wave of persecution engulfed the city. Saul went from house to house, dragging the Christians to jail. He was truly an enemy of the early Christians. 

But after a life changing vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus, Saul became Paul. When he trained to be a Pharisee, he had studied the Scriptures extensively. He knew the Law and the Prophets so well. That’s why he was well able to convince the Jews of the New Covenant in Jesus fulfilling the Old Testament. He became a powerful and bold preacher of the gospel. 

As St. Paul proclaimed, we are saved by the message of the Gospel. The more we know it, the more we study it, the more we obey it, the more it will change our lives.