Sharing the gospel with someone in China

I am currently in the process of sharing the grace gospel with someone in China. We connected over a social platform and below is a cross-section of a conversation I am in with them. Please pray that my friend will understand the gospel message and will experience the faith to receive it and believe it. Pray also for their safety and protection as we know that China is a country that can persecute Christians and confiscate Bibles.

May God's abundant grace be with my Chinese friend and may they come to know the riches and joys of salvation through the power of the gospel of grace in Christ Jesus.

Below is a transcript of one of our recent chats. In it I present them with the gospel in its simplicity. Please feel free to share this gospel message with others in your circle of influence.

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Hello my friend,

It is wonderful to hear from you again. I have many questions for you and want to learn about you and your interest in the Bible. I know that China is a difficult country to live in and that the Bible and the Christian faith are persecuted, so I hope you are safe and can receive my messages without problem.

I look forward to chatting with you and sharing our faith and testimonies.

Now, let me answer some of your comments below....

—- So, I'm not going to use a translation program, and what do you think of that? Because I am mainland Chinese, I use simplified Chinese.

I admire that willingness to learn and improve. Your replies are much better than what you make it out to be. 😎 Keep it up and you'll be fluent in English in no time.

—- As for Jesus Christ, I have only known he is the son of God and God sent him to save humanity from the consequences of its sins.

This is a true statement and very accurate. The Bible does teach us this. Jesus Christ is God's Son and did come to save humanity from the consequences of their sins. But this is only part of the gospel (God's good news) message. The gospel also tells us HOW Jesus saved us from our sins. This is where His sacrificial death on the cross comes into view.

—- As regards the good news of the cross of Christ, I have never heard of it.

So, let me tell you more about the cross. The key to the gospel is that we must hear and then choose to believe that Jesus Christ gave up His life for us. You see, the way for God to forgive us of our sins is that innocent (sinless) blood had to be shed. God tells us in the Bible that only blood can be used to forgive sins,

Hebrews 9:22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission [forgiveness of sins].

So, someone had to die for the human race. Innocent [pure] blood had to be shed so that it can be used to cleanse us of our guilt and sins. Since no human was innocent and could fulfil this requirement, God had to send His Son. The only innocent [pure] person was the incarnate Son of God who was born into the human race and lived perfectly according to God's laws. Jesus NEVER sinned, so his blood was pure and could be used to cleanse us.

So, Jesus had to die! Jesus willingly paid our sin debt by dying and spilling His blood for us. He was killed in our place. God poured out His wrath and anger on His own Son who willingly stood in our place. He took the beating for us so that we could be freed from sins and become righteous before God. It was a tradeoff. Christ took our sins, and we received His righteousness.

Romans 4:22 And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. 23 Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; 24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; 25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

In the Bible, the gospels tell us how Jesus was beaten and nailed to a cross and left to die. This was done for us! But another important thing to know is that God raised Jesus from the dead (3-days later). Jesus, who was buried in a tomb, was brought back to life after 3-days by the power of God and was taken back into heaven to take his place on the throne. The resurrection is significant because it is the proof that God approved the payment for our sins. We are justified and made righteous BECAUSE Jesus was raised from the dead. His resurrection is the seal of approval from God that our sins have been paid for and the transaction is final and settled!

This is the WHOLE good news of the gospel. You can be saved from your sins by trusting in the death of Jesus on the cross. You are justified and made righteous because of His resurrection. The power of the gospel is simply to believe that you are forgiven and saved because of the cross of Christ and His resurrection.

Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

Here are some scriptures that tell what the gospel is and that it is freely given to us by God for our salvation. All we need to do is believe in the cross-work of Jesus Christ and His resurrection. The work that Jesus did is ALL sufficient for our salvation. We do not need to do ANYTHING else to earn our salvation. We cannot, because we are sinners! If we simply believe in that which Jesus did for us, we are saved by this message. It is the only thing that can save us! The power of the message of the gospel.

The Power and Simplicity of the Gospel

So, what is the gospel message that saves TODAY? Well Paul sums it up perfectly in his letter to the church at Corinth.

1 Corinthians 15:1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; 2 By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. 3 For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4 And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

That is it! There is nothing else to know, there is nothing else to do; you don't need to work for it or earn it. The only thing you do is believe that God made a way through His Son and that what Jesus did fully satisfied the debt of sin. His death "for us" paid our sin-debt liberating us from its burden. His death "as us" liberated us from 'the dominion and power of Sin'. It is a complete work achieved by Christ and offered as a gift from God.

Ephesians 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Titus 3:4 But after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, 5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; 6 Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; 7 That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

I will pray that the Lord will open your heart to the gospel. I will pray that you will have the faith to believe in the message of salvation through Jesus Christ. If you have any more questions, or if you need more details and scripture to prove what I am saying, please let me know.

Once you have chosen to believe in the gospel, we can continue to chat about other Bible content. There is a very important thing to know about studying the Bible that we can deal with in future posts.

God bless you and your family.

May His peace and grace be with you until we chat again. 🙏🙌😎