We need a more biblical understanding of the gospel. I suspect if I were to ask you what the gospel is, a number of you would say it's forgiveness of sins. Or, if you're in the divinity school, you'd say justification by faith alone. Thank God, forgiveness of sins is one very important part of the gospel. I never want to stand before our holy God on any basis other than the fact that Jesus died on the cross for my sins. But if the gospel is no more than forgiveness of sins, then you and I can accept Jesus Christ, get our one-way ticket to heaven, and go on being exactly the same racist, environmentally unconcerned, unjust people we've always been.
Jesus tells us that the gospel is more than that. Have you ever gone through the Gospels and noticed how Jesus defines the gospel, the good news? Mark 1:14-15 says, and it's a summary of Jesus' whole preaching:
After John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying [in other words, here's the definition of the gospel], "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."
Virtually every time Jesus defines the gospel, he defines it as the good news of the kingdom. What on earth does he mean?
Remember what the prophets had said? They looked ahead to a time in the future, beyond the injustice and disobedience of the people of Israel, and they said, "Some time in the future, the Messiah will come. The messianic order will break in, and God will bring a new right relationship with himself. Our sins will be forgiven and the law will be written on our hearts, and there will be a new right relationship with neighbors. There will be transformation vertically and horizontally, and there will be shalom, justice, and wholeness in society."
Then, Jesus comes along and claims to be the Messiah, and says that the messianic kingdom the prophets had predicted was breaking into the present, in his own person and word. He meant the two things the prophets had talked about. He meant a vertical thing. He meant that we get into his kingdom not by good works, not by any kind of works righteousness. We get into his kingdom by sheer grace, because God loves even sinners, and eagerly wants them to change.
But there's more to this good news of the kingdom than that, because Jesus goes on to call a circle of disciples, a new community. He wasn't an isolated, individualistic prophet. He formed a new society, and this new society began to live differently, to live his kingdom ways. They began to challenge society at all the points that society was wrong, and they cared about the whole person, not just the soul.
So what is the gospel then? It's not just forgiveness of sins, although thank God, it includes that. I am still a sinner, and I want to trust in the cross, but it's more than that. It's the fantastic news that the messianic kingdom has broken into history. Now, in the power of the Holy Spirit, you and I can begin to live differently. And in that new community, all of the brokenness, the social, the economic, the ethnic and the emotional brokenness of this old world is being overcome in Jesus' new community. Matthew 9:35 summarizes this: "Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness."
Teaching, preaching, and healing. That's what Jesus was about. That's what I'm pleading for. He cared about the whole person. Jesus never thought that all you needed was a good life here on earth, and then everything would be fine. In fact, he said that it's better to lose the whole world than lose your relationship with God and Christ. But he never drew the conclusion that we Christians sometimes do. Sometimes Christians today say, "Well, that means that we should spend most of our time on evangelism, and if we've got a little bit of time left over we can care about the poor, and so on." Jesus never drew that conclusion.
Jesus tells us that the gospel is more than that. Have you ever gone through the Gospels and noticed how Jesus defines the gospel, the good news? Mark 1:14-15 says, and it's a summary of Jesus' whole preaching:
After John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying [in other words, here's the definition of the gospel], "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."
Virtually every time Jesus defines the gospel, he defines it as the good news of the kingdom. What on earth does he mean?
Remember what the prophets had said? They looked ahead to a time in the future, beyond the injustice and disobedience of the people of Israel, and they said, "Some time in the future, the Messiah will come. The messianic order will break in, and God will bring a new right relationship with himself. Our sins will be forgiven and the law will be written on our hearts, and there will be a new right relationship with neighbors. There will be transformation vertically and horizontally, and there will be shalom, justice, and wholeness in society."
Then, Jesus comes along and claims to be the Messiah, and says that the messianic kingdom the prophets had predicted was breaking into the present, in his own person and word. He meant the two things the prophets had talked about. He meant a vertical thing. He meant that we get into his kingdom not by good works, not by any kind of works righteousness. We get into his kingdom by sheer grace, because God loves even sinners, and eagerly wants them to change.
But there's more to this good news of the kingdom than that, because Jesus goes on to call a circle of disciples, a new community. He wasn't an isolated, individualistic prophet. He formed a new society, and this new society began to live differently, to live his kingdom ways. They began to challenge society at all the points that society was wrong, and they cared about the whole person, not just the soul.
So what is the gospel then? It's not just forgiveness of sins, although thank God, it includes that. I am still a sinner, and I want to trust in the cross, but it's more than that. It's the fantastic news that the messianic kingdom has broken into history. Now, in the power of the Holy Spirit, you and I can begin to live differently. And in that new community, all of the brokenness, the social, the economic, the ethnic and the emotional brokenness of this old world is being overcome in Jesus' new community. Matthew 9:35 summarizes this: "Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness."
Teaching, preaching, and healing. That's what Jesus was about. That's what I'm pleading for. He cared about the whole person. Jesus never thought that all you needed was a good life here on earth, and then everything would be fine. In fact, he said that it's better to lose the whole world than lose your relationship with God and Christ. But he never drew the conclusion that we Christians sometimes do. Sometimes Christians today say, "Well, that means that we should spend most of our time on evangelism, and if we've got a little bit of time left over we can care about the poor, and so on." Jesus never drew that conclusion.
--- Ronald J. Sider, “The Whole Gospel for The Whole Person”
in A Place for Truth: Leading Thinkers Explore Life's Hardest Questions, 2010.
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