The gospel: A simple message

“Who is it he is trying to teach? To whom is he explaining his message? To children weaned from their milk, to those just taken from the breast? For it is: Do and do, do and do, rule on rule, rule on rule; a little here, a little there.” Isaiah 28:9-10
This verse refers to the ridicule that the prophet Isaiah was receiving from his countrymen concerning the message he had been given from God to tell them. They ridiculed him for it being too simple, and only fit for children. For them, it was only about what to do and keeping rules. (The actual Hebrew here is sav lasav sav lasav, kav lakav kav lakav - mimicking baby talk.)
Similarly, there are people today who ridicule the gospel for it being too simple. They can’t understand how we can be saved by something God has done, without us having to do anything more than believe. They read the Bible and come away thinking, “It’s just a whole bunch of ‘Thou shalt’s and ‘Thou shalt not’s.”
The difference for an unsaved person reading the Bible and a Christian reading the Bible, is that the Christian has the benefit of the Holy Spirit illuminating the word of God to them. The unsaved person does not have this, and so the words on the page are just that - sav lasav sav lasav, kav lakav, kav lakav. I have found that there is very little to be gained from debating with an unsaved person as to the validity and power of the word of God. If they say they don’t believe it, there is little you can say that will make them change their mind. Instead, we need to pray that the Holy Spirit would open their eyes, that they would come to faith in Christ and be able to read the Scriptures in the light of their Author. It is true that the gospel is simple. It has to be, because otherwise there would be an intellectual barrier preventing some people from being able to be saved. If we needed a measure of intellect to understand the gospel, it would give us opportunity to boast because we had figured it out. The gospel is simple enough that a little child can understand it and believe in Jesus. And it is so simple that it confuses the minds of many great intellects of the world. “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things – and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before Him” (1 Cor. 1:27-29).