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July 06, 2007

What is the Gospel?

Yesterday I commented on the Thinklings posting that got me blogging again. I left a comment on that post which essentially asked (in a rambling manner) "What is the Gospel?"

After all, when someone says, "We need to get back to preaching the Gospel," how can a Bible-believing Christ follower argue with that? Yet "preach the gospel" seems so simplistic and/or formulaic.

It's been pretty well established that the gospel covers more--much more--than four-point salvation.

I have to admit, there was a time when the commando-style, in-your-face street-evangelism was exciting. But it didn't take long to realize there had to be more to "sharing the Gospel" than that. It provided a great feeling but the feeling never lasted. Eventually it seemed little more than the Christian version of a one-night stand.

So what is the Gospel? Let's check out what Paul says:

Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:1-4 NIV)

Most scholars agree that the book of 1 Corinthians is probably the earliest document in the New Testament. That would make this reference the first recorded explanation of the Gospel. And Paul makes one thing more than plain: Christ's death and resurrection is the primary central issue of the Gospel.

So if we want to know what the Gospel is, we have to understand that the Gospel and the Atonement are completely inseperable. Again to those who are Bible students, the previous statement is bound to elicit an unimpressed, "NO DUH!" But the challenge comes not in realizing the Good News is that Jesus came to be the atonement for our sin, but in how we communicate the fullness of an Atonement Gospel to people who don't even know what the word "atonement" means.

Face it, there are many Christians and hard-core theologians that cannot sufficiently summarize what the atonement is. Open any introductory theology book and you'll learn there are countless theories about the atonement. There's the penal-substitution theory, there's the redemption theory, there's the judicial view, etc. But start talking about these theories and views to the common lay person and their eyes glaze over and before long they are lost.

Can atonement be simplified? I believe it can. No matter what you believe about the atonement, this much is true: Jesus died so we could become everything God originally intended.

Think about that for a second. If we cannot separate the Gospel from the Atonement that means the good news isn't that we can be saved from hell. The good news is that you, me, everybody and anybody can become exactly what God created us to be.

That's good news indeed.

Posted by bubba138 at July 6, 2007 09:58 PM