a word from my dead mentor

"[Christ] still remains the only hope of individual man, and the only hope for the whole world. Is the Gospel still relevant? Is its ancient message still adequate? The answer is that it alone is relevant. It alone can deal with, and solve, the problems of mankind."

"The Gospel of Jesus Christ confronts and challenges the modern world with the statement that it alone has the answer to all man's questions and the solution to all his problems. In a world seeking a way out of its tragedy and its troubles, the Gospel announces that the solution is already available. In a world feverishly looking to the future, and talking about plans for the future, the Gospel proclaims that the search is not only mistaken in direction, but is also quite unnecessary. It denounces the fatal habit of pinning our hopes to something that is going to happen. It announces that all that people, individually and collectively, need has been at the disposal of mankind for two thousand years. For the central message of the Gospel is to tell people that everything necessary for their salvation is to be found in the person of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, the only begotten Son of God. It is in Him, His life and His teaching, that we see what we are meant to be and the kind of life we are meant to live. It is in His death upon the cross that we see the sin of the world finally exposed and condemned. It is through His death that we see the only way whereby man can be reconciled to God. It is from Him alone that we can derive new life and obtain a new beginning. It is only as we receive power from Him that we can begin to live the life God intended us to live...The Gospel proclaims that the time is coming when at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, 'of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.' (Php 2:10). Thus, the Gospel of Jesus Christ confronts man and urges him to turn back to this unique Person who was here on earth two thousand years ago, in whom alone salvation is to found."

-Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, from "Truth Unchanged, Unchanging", 105-06.