As we have seen, Jesus is the Son of God (fully God) and the Son of Man (fully man). Some call Him the God-Man.  By itself this would (or should) make Jesus the most important person in all of history. But, that’s not all….

It’s not just who Jesus is that makes Him so important, it’s also what He did for His creation. As we learned previously, all of us were born into a fallen world, and we are fallen. Sin has corrupted the entire human race–and all of creation is fallen because of the curse (see Romans 8:19-22). The penalty for sin is death (according to Romans 6:23). No matter how hard we try, no matter how “good” we try to be, we could never escape the curse of the law, because we are not only fallen, we have all sinned. Jesus did three primary things for His people to rescue them from the curse of death:

First, Jesus lived a perfectly righteous, perfectly sinless life. This is attested many times in the New Testament. 1 John 3:5 tells us, “In him there is no sin.” Jesus Himself declared, “I always do what pleases [the Father]” (John 8:29, the emphasis being on “always”). His life of complete obedience to the Father is supremely important in understanding His mission to the world.

Second, Jesus paid the penalty for sin by dying on the cross. There are many references in the Bible of Jesus paying the penalty for our sins. Though too numerous to list them all, we learn from the Bible that “God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us . . . . For as by the one man’s [Adam’s] disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s [Christ’s] obedience the many will be made righteous” (Romans 5:8 and 19); “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28).  It’s like this:  Suppose I had a lot of money, and further suppose you and many others were in jail, having been duly convicted of breaking the law. I tell the jailer, “I have enough money to pay for their freedom. If any wish to be released, put it on my account and release them.”  Now, if you or anyone else takes the offer, you are free and clear, as your penalty has been paid.

Third, Jesus rose from the dead, securing our salvation. Despite what you might have heard, the Resurrection is a rather well-attested fact of history (claims of the pseudo-historians notwithstanding). Why is the resurrection so important? Because it proved that Jesus is who He claimed to be and that He accomplished the mission He came to do.

That’s it. That’s the essence of the Gospel. We have a Rescuer. He came to set us free from death and sin. Yet…  there’s so much more.