What is a Gospel Church?

The word gospel means good news, but different passages have different aspects of the good news in mind from place to place.

1. There is the good news that "Jesus is Lord."
It is the gospel concerning God's Son, of the seed of King David (Rom. 1:3).

2. There is the good news of his coming kingdom.
Jesus preached that the kingdom was near, to repent and believe in this good news. (Mark 1:14-15)

3. There is the good news of Jesus' death and resurrection. (1 Cor. 15:1-8)
On the basis of this good news, we can be saved.

4. There is Jesus' good news to the poor, to captives, to the blind and oppressed. (Luke 4:18-19)

So there you have it. A gospel church is one that preaches that Jesus is Lord, that he died for our sins and rose victoriously from the grave. A gospel church preaches good news to the poor and marginalized now, and looks forward to the restoration of all things in the coming kingdom. A gospel church looks forward to the salvation that will take place when his kingdom fully comes.

Good News for a Lifetime

Just wrote this:

"What does this fact mean for us [the meaning of the gospel]? In his book, King Jesus Gospel, Scot McKnight argues that it means we not focus narrowly on just trying to “get people saved.” That is to say, some parts of American Christianity focus quite heavily on getting people to “pray the sinner’s prayer” or get baptized. Preaching the gospel comes to be preaching people to cross an initial threshold into Christianity, getting them converted.

"But if the gospel centers on the good news that Jesus is king, then Jesus is not just king for a day. He is king for the rest of eternity. Believing in the good news cannot thus be something you do for a moment and then walk away. Accepting someone as a Lord is never a matter of a true/false test. A Lord is a master. Someone is not your master unless you do whatever they tell you to do.

"So the person who receives the gospel is someone who becomes a lifelong servant and follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. It may begin in a moment, but it never ends. Any narrow focus on the gospel as just salvation—let alone just how to get “saved”—deeply impoverishes it."

The Gospel in Acts

The Noun: "Gospel"
1. The actual word "gospel" (euangelion) is only used twice in the book of Acts. In Acts 15:7, Peter tells the Jerusalem meeting that God first chose to bring the gospel to the Gentiles through him. This good news was something that they believed. To get a better idea of what this good news was, therefore, we would look at the sermon of Acts 10.

2. The second instance is in Acts 20:24, where Paul says that his ministry is to testify to the "gospel of the grace of God." In this instance, it would be natural to take "grace of God" as the content of the good news. Paul's ministry involved testifying to the good news about the grace of God. Whatever the gospel is, it exemplifies the grace of God in specific ways.

The noun does not occur at all in Luke.

The Verb: "To Preach the Gospel"
The verb form, "to proclaim the good news" (euangelizomai) is probably more helpful in honing in on just want this good news is. The verb appears 15 times in Acts and 10 times in Luke.

1. In one translation of Acts 5:42, Peter and others preach the good news that Jesus is the Christ. This type of good news would fit with the Hellenistic use of the word to announce the birth of a future emperor or a military victory.  "Jesus is the Christ" is the announcement that the king has arrived.

2. Acts 8:4 seems to have a similar sense. Philip and others who are scattered preach good news of "the word." What is the word? The next verse suggests the word was as in 5:42.  Philip was "preaching the Christ" to the Samaritans. We can presume that the word means the same later in the chapter (8:25).

In 8:35 Philip shares the good news with the Ethiopian eunuch. It is also the good news about Jesus. Then Philip continues to share it in the towns of that area (8:40).

3. In Acts 10:36, the message of good news is "peace through Jesus Christ," who is "Lord of all things." Again, we remember Augustus and the good news of his kingship when he ushered in the pax Romana ("Roman peace").

What is nice about Acts 10 here is that Peter goes on to give the details of what this good news of the Christ is (and remember that 15:7 pointed us back to this passage in reference to what the gospel was). The gospel was the word that was proclaimed throughout Judea.  It involved a story that started with John the Baptist.

The story involved casting out demons. But the preaching about him was that he was ordained to be the judge of the living and the dead (10:42). In other words, the good news centers on his kingship. However, it also involves the possibility of forgiveness for sins (10:43).

4. Acts 11:40 - They preached the Lord Jesus (Jesus is Lord, Jesus is king again).

• Acts 13:32 - The good news promised is that Jesus is God's Son (13:33), his king.
• Acts 14:7 - Doesn't give contextual clues about what they're preaching but presumably the same.

5. Acts 14:15 - The good news here may be the same, but Paul approaches it much more broadly in terms of the right God rather than the right king.

• Acts 14:21 - No specifics mentioned, but the message elicits disciples or followers, which we would expect of a king.
• Acts 15:35 - Paul and Barnabas continue to preach the good news at Antioch. The good news is the "word of the Lord" (cf. 8:25). Since Lord relates to Jesus as king, it fits again that the center of the good news is the enthronement of Jesus as king.
• Acts 16:10 - no specific content given

6. The final instance of preaching the gospel is in Acts 17:18. Here, the Athenians connect the good news with the announcement of Jesus' resurrection. From elsewhere in Acts, we know that the resurrection for Luke represented Jesus' enthronement as Messiah, Lord, and Son of God... that is, as king.

7. As far as the Gospel of Luke is concerned. Luke 1:19 indicates that the coming ministry of John the Baptist can be good news. The birth of Jesus the Savior is good news in 2:10 (cf. Augustus). John the Baptist preaches the good news of Jesus' arrival in 3:18.

Jesus preaches the good news of the arrival of the kingdom of God (4:43; cf. 8:1; 9:6; 16:16; 20:1) and predicts its demonstrating in his healing ministry (4:18; cf. 7:22).

Summary
The good news in Acts centers on the inauguration of Jesus' kingship, with all that it entails. There is continuity between the good news of Jesus reign and the good news in Luke of the arrival of the kingdom of God, for Jesus is the king God is installing. Entailed in that kingship is of course the peace of his reign, forgiveness of sins, the judgment of God's enemies.

Grudem: Necessity of Scripture 2

...continued from yesterday
_____________
Not-necessary
Grudem does not consider the Bible necessary 1) for a person to believe God exists or 2) to have a moral conscience. He simply doesn't believe this level of knowledge is sufficient to save a person. By contrast, Hebrews 11:6 came to mind: "Without faith it is impossible to please him, for the one who comes to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who diligently seek him." Can a person who, to the best of their understanding, loves God and loves neighbor be saved through Christ, despite not knowing about him?

I personally, coming from the Wesleyan-pietist tradition, find it hard to see God consigning to hell those who never had a chance, those who do not have the privilege of having the Bible or its message. It is an extension, on the one hand, of the fact that I don't believe in deterministic predestination.  On the other hand, it is an extension of my belief in prevenient grace, that God gives some light to everyone in the world. Christianity otherwise seems incoherent.

So my sympathies here are the logical conclusion of my own Christian tradition's core values, although my own tradition has not necessarily been consistent on the topic.  It is a hope based on big principles in Scripture like the fact that God looks on the heart and wants everyone to be saved. In other words, it comes from an understanding of God's fundamental nature as love. If God consigns the vast majority of humanity to hell for an ignorance that is no fault of their own, it is hard to imagine how he can be considered loving in any normal sense of the word. Similarly, if God consigns people to heaven primarily on the basis of cognitive knowledge, he seems rather shallow.

That is not to say that there are not difficulties with this position. What then am I to do with Romans 10 and the evangelistic enterprise of the early church--or of my own church? It at least helps to realize that words like "gospel" and "evangelism" have been skewed somewhat in their meaning. Once again we see partially why those in Grudem's circles have been scrambling in the face of books like Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel and to fight N. T. Wright's version of the new perspective on Paul. It's easy for them simply to decry those like Wesleyan-Arminians with a different theology.  It's another to find some of their own supposed biblical foundations pulled out from under them.

The gospel in Paul is the good news that Jesus has been enthroned king (Rom. 1:1-3) after God raised him victoriously from the dead (1 Cor. 15:1-4).  The gospel in the Gospels has a slightly different focus but it is compatible.  The gospel in the Gospels is the good news that God's kingdom is returning to the earth (Mark 1:14-15), with the resultant good news for the oppressed (Luke 4:18).  Surely the good news includes the whole story, including Jesus' death and the implications in salvation, but the focus is on the reign of God and Christ.

When the early Christians preached the good news (euangelion), they were primarily preaching the lordship of Jesus and the kingdom of God. True, Jesus' atoning death was part of that message (1 Cor. 2:2).  If God's reign is soon coming to the earth and if my sin stands in the way, then Christ's death for my sins is a major concern, and Christ's death is part of the good news.

There is a connection between the rise of modern evangelism and dispensationalism.  In the late 1800s many Christians became convinced that Christ was about to return. At the same time, 2000 years of intervening history was ignored and they saw themselves as the early church of Acts.  Pentecostalism recovered speaking in tongues, as in Acts. While the early church saw the mission to get the good news to the ends of the earth as already accomplished (Col. 1:23), the world had gotten bigger and the reset button was hit on the idea that Christ would return after everyone had heard. Thus the rise of modern missions.

In the early church, the setting was similar but slightly different.  They also, including Paul, thought the Lord would return to earth very soon.  They were preparing the way for this Day of salvation and wrath by preparing everyone for the Lordship of Jesus. They were following the ideal course.  Certainly it's good to be ready for the king's arrival, to have your house in order before he arrives. It thus makes absolute sense to spread the good news of Christ's kingship and the good news of potential salvation.

I won't pretend that this broader understanding of evangelism resolves all the tensions with Romans 10. I'll only point out that the tensions are with other Scriptural principles, not least that God is love and wants everyone to be saved. Paul gives the most normal path in Romans 10, the one built off the fundamental metaphor of the messenger who brings good news from afar that a new king has been enthroned. In this metaphor there is a messenger (like Paul) who brings the good news that Jesus is king.

Is there another option he uses before the messenger arrives?  The path of the patriarchs?  The path of Job?  The path of the Old Testament heroes of faith?  The path of the child or mentally challenged person who does not understand?  I sure hope so.  It's hard to see how Christianity's fundamental claims about God's nature don't disintegrate otherwise.

I end with a final note on the idea of conscience. I do not think that Romans 2:14-15 is about some universal conscience we all have.  Like N. T. Wright and others, I believe the Gentiles in this passage who have the "Law written on their hearts" are Gentile believers who have received the Holy Spirit (cf. Hebrews 10:14-18).  Good thing too, because cultural anthropology has observed that there is very little in the way of a universal conscience around the world.

Most parents protect their children. Most cultures think it wrong to randomly kill someone in your own group. That's about it and there are some "deviant" cultures even on these. The idea of there being a specific moral law built within us doesn't seem to pan out very well in reality. It's a Christian tradition that I'm not sure has much biblical support.

The conscience in the New Testament is one's awareness of sin (Hebrews 10:2-3), which depends on one's understanding and thus one's training. A Jew should be aware of what sin is because they have been taught revelation in the Scriptures. However, a person's "sin knower" can also malfunction (Tit 1:15).

A Robust Sense of Evangelism

Scot McKnight, in King Jesus Gospel has, along with N. T. Wright, refocused us on what the gospel actually is in the New Testament.  Despite the embarrassment of the Gospel Coalition, whose key players for some time have been trying their hardest to plug the leaks in their sinking ship.

Sorry, the truth doesn't care. The gospel is the good news that 1) our God reigns (Gospels) and that 2) Jesus is king (Paul), 3) along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts).  It's not about how to get saved and, although our salvation is part of the good news, it is a minor part.  It is more an implication of the gospel than the focus of the gospel. In Luke, the gospel is primarily good news to the poor and the disempowered (thus the GC conference this year where they will apply all their intellect to argue that the earth is flat).

Here's the next step.  Since the gospel is God and Jesus focused--not me focused, not my salvation focused--this has implications for what it means to "evangelize" and what "evangelism" is (since it is the verb, "to proclaim the good news") and what an "evangelist" is ("someone who proclaims the good news").

An evangelist is someone who proclaims the good news that our God reigns (Gospels) and that Jesus is king (Paul), along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts).  To evangelize is to proclaim to others the good news that our God reigns, that his kingdom made its Normandy landing in the ministry of Jesus (Gospels), that Jesus is God's king over the cosmos (Paul).  That proclamation is evangelism.

True, going would seem to be part of this evangelism and, yes, such preaching aims at a response.  What response?  Confession of the lordship of Jesus, of course, since he is king (Romans 10).  Repentance and submission to the rule of God, of course (Gospels).  Such a response of course means you will be saved, but that is a consequence.  The focus is on the reign of God and his Christ, not on me.

A final word on the Great Commission.  The Great Commission is about making disciples.  Nothing is mentioned about evangelism, although evangelism certainly fits with the Great Commission.  But evangelism is not mentioned.  You make disciples by 1) baptizing them and 2) teaching them.  Baptizing does get them in, but involved a confession of Jesus as Lord and thus submission to his kingship.  Becoming a follower was thus not a matter of praying a sinner's prayer or a moment of justification.

Once we have a more accurate understanding of the gospel, then we'll have to have a more robust sense of evangelism too.

Paul the Christ-Follower 1

Trying to summarize Paul under three headings: Paul the Jew, Paul the Christ-Follower, and Paul the Apostle.  This is the first of "Paul the Christ-Follower."
________
Paul the Christ-Follower
Paul speaks of a time when God was pleased "to reveal his Son in me" (Gal. 1:16).  In Acts 9 we get a fuller version of this event.  On his way to Damascus, the risen Christ appeared to Paul and changed the trajectory of his life from someone zealous for the ethnic distinctives of the Jewish Law to someone who zealously proclaimed that Christ is king.

Like many Jews of his day, Paul may have already been looking for a messiah, a king, to come eventually to rule over a renewed nation of Israel.  As a Pharisee, Paul would already have believed in a future resurrection at least for those killed because of their faithfulness to God.  But initially, the idea that Jesus might be this king did not compute for Paul.  Messiahs were not supposed to die, and the resurrection was supposed to happen all at once, not just to one individual.

Not only that, but this Jesus was not zealous for the Law the way he thought the messiah surely would be.  Jesus ate with tax collectors and sinners.  He did not seem to pay much attention to the rules about the sabbath or matters of purity.  He included people who were unclean in his fellowship.

All of that changed when Christ appeared to him, and Paul had to rethink his entire way of understanding.  Jesus was the Messiah, the "anointed one," the "Christ" in Greek.  He now confessed that "Jesus is Lord," perhaps the earliest Christian confession of faith.  To say Jesus was Lord was to say that God raised him from the dead and enthroned him as king of the universe (Ps. 110:1).  This is the heart of the gospel, the "good news," for Paul: Jesus has arrived as God's king to set up God's kingdom.  He is the one Lord who goes with the one God (1 Cor. 8:6).  He will come again to earth soon to finish what he started, to judge the earth while rescuing those who confess him as Lord.

However, Paul tells us that the focus of his preaching was the cross (e.g., 1 Cor. 1:23).  In the cross, like the believers before him, Paul saw Christ's death as a sacrifice for sins.  Through the "faith of Jesus," God showed his people his continuing faithfulness to them. But unlike most believers before him, Paul argued that this sacrifice could apply both to Jews and Gentiles.  He believed that God graciously would accept Gentiles because of Christ's death, as well as Jews.

In fact, Paul came to believe that God accepted Jews on exactly the same basis, that no amount of keeping of the Jewish Law could establish a right relationship between a Jew and God.  After all, he had been blameless at keeping the Law and still needed Christ.  God must obviously be looking for something other than Law keeping, and it turned out to be the cross of Christ.

Paul follows through with the new revelation.  The Jewish Law put the Jews under a curse.  It only showed their inability to keep it.  The death of Christ redeemed them from that curse. God in his grace had decided to reconcile the entire world to himself through Christ, apart from things like circumcision, the purity and food laws, or sabbath observance.  These are things Paul primarily had in mind when he said a person could not be made right with God or "justified" by "works of Law" (e.g., 3:28), the things that most separated Jew from Gentile.  God was both the God of the Jews and the Gentiles (Rom. 3:29).  He was the God of all who had faith in him (4:16), those who have trusted in what he has done through Christ (9:33).  All who call on the name of the Lord Jesus will be saved from God's coming judgment (10:13).

Key for Paul was that a person participate and "get inside" of Christ's death and resurrection.  We are baptized into Christ.  We are buried with him in baptism (Rom. 6:4), and we rise with him to live a new life in his resurrection (6:8; 8:11).  The life that we now live, we live "in the faithfulness of the Son of God" (Gal. 2:20, my translation).  God accomplishes this transformation through the Holy Spirit, whom God has given us as both a guarantee and down payment of our inheritance that is to come (2 Cor. 5:5).

The result is that we now live a life "according to the Spirit" rather than "according to the flesh," which is how we used to live (Gal. 5:16; Rom. 8:8), a life of love toward our neighbor.  Paul's ethic for his Gentile converts is basically the Jewish Law stripped of its ethnic particulars.  External matters like circumcision and purity rules, even sabbath observance are not part of God's expectation for Gentile believers.  However, they remain under Christ's law (e.g., 1 Cor. 9:21).  They remain, for example, under the sexual prohibition of the Jewish Scriptures, which Christians later came to call the "Old" Testament.

Epilog: Good News versus Soterian

It seemed appropriate to sit back and reflect a little after finishing Scot McKnight's book, King Jesus Gospel.  I had a sense of where I thought Scot would go with the book and in my mind he went half there.  I suppose it has a lot to do with the question he was posing.  What would a fuller sense of the gospel look like in contrast to what happens in an awful lot of American churches?

His answer is that the meaning of "gospel" is something much bigger than what he calls a "soterian" approach.  Since he has invented the word, it is completely appropriate.  A "soterian," as he defines it, is someone whose overwhelming focus is on getting people "saved."  He has made it clear elsewhere that he doesn't actually think the word "salvation" is this narrow in the NT.  What he is targeting is practices associated with a very narrow way of thinking about salvation.

To put it in my own way (which is much the same as Scot's), the gospel is, in the first instance, the good news about the inaugurated kingship of Jesus and the kingdom of God that he inaugurates.  I'm not too sure why this is so controversial in some circles.  People like Scot and Wright might debate some of the details, but it really isn't debatable.  End of story.

This original sense of the gospel is not "me" focused.  It doesn't center on me getting saved.  It is much bigger, much more important than me and my individual salvation.  I think what's really bugging McKnight (and Tom Wright before him) is the all-too-typical, shallow, self-centered focus of so much American Christianity, as if the center of the good news is me and what's in it for me.

Further, Scot is rightly concerned that so many Christians act like the whole deal is done once they "say the magic words."  There are many who believe in eternal security and go on to take very seriously the lordship of Jesus for the rest of their lives.  And there are some who act like once they've read the words on the card, they're done.  Eternal oops there.

Here are two further thoughts upon reflection:
1. God's creational good news
Scot says in the early chapters that the gospel relates to the "Story of Jesus" part of the overall Christian story.  I've hinted before that he is doing a dance between wanting to define words the way the NT does and doing theology, which almost always has to move beyond the specific words of specific biblical authors to formulate an integrated perspective.

The word "missional" does some of that.  I wonder what this book would have looked like if Scot had posed the question "missional versus soterian."  Then it would have more easily looked at a bigger version of the story.  It would have allowed us to talk not only of good news for humanity but about good news for the creation as well.  The NT doesn't actually use the word "gospel" in this way, but it is a valid theological broadening of the implications of the way the NT uses the word "gospel."

Missional has been somewhat of a buzz word, but it still seems to narrow God's purposes for the world to the area of saving.  I personally believe that beauty remains in the world, even after the Fall.  I find it hard to believe that every last bit of goodness flew out of the creation with Adam's sin, and the Bible certainly does not require us to believe that.

God thus has intentions for the creation that do not involve human beings and that are in addition to saving it.  The biggest story we can comprehend is the "creational" story.  I knew a student who pretty much lost his faith traveling the world after college (I've lost track of him).  It seems to me there is a faith crisis waiting to happen if we must limit God's walk with the world to the incredibly narrow story of Israel and story of the church.

I don't think most people have a sense of how few people God must care about if this is it.  We are so surrounded by Christianity that it is easy to assume that most people should know better.  Take a few months and travel through Asia.  Look at a map and compare the size of Judah to the rest of the ancient world.  Then read the book of Jonah. There is at least a potential difference between what Christ has done for the world and what the world knows about Christ.

2. A full switch to what God has done
I came to an ironic realization this morning.  In his chapter on salvation taking over the gospel, Scot pinpoints the Reformation as the point where salvation started on a trajectory to become more important than the gospel.  He says there that it did not happen at once--not with Luther and Calvin--but that it took a while.  It occurred to me where it most took place--with the Anabaptists!

It is the Anabaptist tradition that has been most influential on American Christianity and it is the Anabaptist tradition that has most focused on an event of faith once a person has reached an age of understanding.  With deep respect, I believe this is why I ended the book feeling like it had only gone half way.  As long as we are so focused on this event as the be-all-and-end-all of salvation, we will still ultimately be soterians.

Wesley was of course influenced by the Anabaptist tradition.  But we are not hindered as Wesleyans from recognizing that for Paul, the most important moment of justification and salvation is the final one.  Paul rarely--if even once--uses the word "salvation" in relation to anything but the final escape from God's judgment.  Ephesians 2:8 is the only possible exception I can think of, and even it may speak proleptically (poetically speaking of something that is still to happen but is so certain to happen that we can speak of it as already happened).

It is true that Paul predominantly speaks of justification in the past tense.  We can be justified now and this is incredibly important.  BUT the most important thing is that we are justified when we stand in the judgment.  "It is not the hearers of the law who are righteous in God's sight, but the doers of the law will be justified" (Rom. 2:13).  More important is the "day of wrath, when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.  For he will repay according to each one's deeds" (Rom. 2:5-6).  And this includes believers: "the work of each builder will become visible, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each has done" (1 Cor. 3:13).

Paul's theology was not focused on a justification event in mid-life.  I personally don't think justification was the centerpiece of his theology overall--it was an issue that stood at the center of his debates with Judaizing believers and thus it comes up in Galatians and Romans.  I believe the central focus of Paul's preaching was the cross and what Christ had done.

But even when Paul argued over justification, his concern was with ultimate justification before God, not with a mid-life crisis event.  Certainly we should by all means seek God's justification ASAP.  We can and should be justified now.  But Paul was not arguing over the timing.  He was arguing over the basis.

The role of Acts in our thinking is significant here.  Scot takes the pattern "repent, believe, be baptized" as normative.  An important question is the context of Acts.  For example, these conversions are "first wave."  They refer to places where the tsunami of the gospel is reaching for the first time.  How might the process look different in a place where the wave is retreating?  It is an unexamined assumption that it would look exactly the same.

Even more crucial is the most important element of Acts' equation and one I find that an awful lot of people miss, namely, the Holy Spirit.  Repentance is incredibly important.  Faith is incredibly important.  Baptism is very significant.  But the sine qua non, the most crucial ingredient of all, is the Holy Spirit.  And here we have the precedent of John the Baptist to know that a child can have the Spirit long before they understand the gospel.  These are at least things worth some reflection.

I'll end with a reflection my colleague Keith Drury once made.  "There is no point in my life," he concluded, "at which I would have gone to hell."  His reasoning was thus, put in my own words.

"When I was a child, I did not know what it meant to have faith in God or confess Jesus as Lord.  If I had died at that point or if Christ had returned, God would have accepted me.  The first time I half way understood my need for Christ, I accepted his death for me.  I affirmed him as my king.  If I had died then or Christ had returned, God would have accepted me.  Although I have sinned since then, I have also confessed my sins without undue delay and asked God for forgiveness.  I do not believe there has ever been a time since I confessed Jesus as Lord that God would not have received me if I had died or if Christ had returned."

I could muse more, but I'll stop there (I'll put in a shameless plug for my life reflections on Romans book if you want more ;-). Let me only say that we, and Wesleyans in particular, should do some significant reflection before we conclude the "soterian" path within broader evangelicalism is the right one for us.

Finishing King Jesus Gospel

For all the preceding, check here.

The final chapter is called, "Creating a Gospel Culture."  It has two basic parts.  In the first part, Scot sketches the gospel story from creation to Jesus' return.  The second is his take-away from the study, what would a "Gospel Culture" look like.  Here are his points:

1. We become people of the story.  We read Scripture.  We become people of the Book.

2. We immerse ourselves in the story of Jesus.  Here he interestingly suggests we follow a church calendar because "the church calendar is a gospeling event too" (154).  The church calendar is all about the story of Jesus.

3. We learn from the model of how the apostle's took the story of Israel and the story of Jesus into the next generation and into a different culture... all the way to our generation.

4. We need to counter the stories that crowd out and re-frame the gospel story.  Here he gives a list:

• individualism
• consumerism
• nationalism
• moral relativism
• scientific naturalism
• new age
• postmodern tribalism
• salvation by therapy

Ways to do this--emphasize baptism and communion.

5. We need to embrace the story so that we are saved and can be transformed by the story.  To embrace the story involves a life of communication with God (prayer).  It involves serving others in love and compassion.

Here endeth the reading.

McKnight 10: Gospeling Today

Next is chapter 9 of Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel

Intro: Evangelism Explosion
Chap. 1: The Big Question: What is the Gospel?
Chap. 2:Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture
Chap. 3:From Salvation to Story
Chap. 4: The Gospel of Paul
Chap. 5: Salvation Takes Over the Gospel
Chap. 6: The Gospel in the Gospels
Chap. 7: Jesus and the Gospel
Chap. 8 The Gospel of Peter

Now the second to last chapter: "Gospeling Today."

This chapter is really what the entire book is headed toward. If Scot is right about the gospel--and in my mind he is far more correct than the popular sense of gospel as "how to get saved"--what is the right way for us to look at the gospel today?

First, what is the gospel?  Here is a summary of the book thus far:

• It is framed by Israel's story.
• It centers on the Lordship of Jesus.
• It summons people to respond.
• It saves and redeems.

What does it summon to?  It summons others to confess Jesus as Lord and Messiah.  "Anyone who can preach the gospel and not make Jesus' exalted lordship the focal point simply isn't preaching the apostolic gospel" (134).

It is driven by the story of Israel.  "Acts has only hints of an atonement theology" (134).  "Neither Peter nor Paul focuses on God's wrath" (135).  "If kingdom is the solution, the problem was the absence of God's kingdom on earth" (137), not my individual sinfulness.

Bottom line: "There's not enough Jesus in our gospel" (145).  "We need to talk more about Jesus."

McKnight 9: "The Gospel of Peter"

Next is chapter 8 of Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel

Intro: Evangelism Explosion
Chap. 1: The Big Question: What is the Gospel?
Chap. 2:Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture
Chap. 3:From Salvation to Story
Chap. 4: The Gospel of Paul
Chap. 5: Salvation Takes Over the Gospel
Chap. 6: The Gospel in the Gospels
Chap. 7: Jesus and the Gospel

Chapter 8 is called, "The Gospel of Peter."  What Scot means by “The Gospel of Peter” is basically the gospel in Acts.  From my perspective, it is the gospel in Acts that actually fits almost exactly with what he has been saying the gospel is continuously in the whole New Testament.

For the record, I personally would break it down more precisely like this:

• John the Baptist—gospel is the good news of God’s approaching kingdom (our God reigns from Isaiah 52:7), including the restoration of Israel, its “return from captivity” 
• Jesus—very similar to John the Baptist, but with a restoration focus on restoring the “lost sheep” of Israel, and with Jesus seeing himself as messiah within that kingdom
• Paul—gospel is especially announcement of the inaugurated kingship of Jesus (Rom. 1:2-3), which commenced with the resurrection... of course the death is good news too because he died for our sins
• In Acts, the story of salvation culminating in the resurrection and exaltation of Jesus is the good news

So I agree with Scot more than anywhere else in the book that he has the right sense of what gospel means in Acts.  "The sermons in Acts put muscle and fat on that very 'according to the Scriptures' bone in the apostolic gospel tradition" (117).  "In those early apostolic sermons, we see the whole life of Jesus... if they gave an emphasis to one dimension of the life of Jesus, it was the resurrection" (120). Scot makes a point of the fact that the sermons of Peter and Paul in Acts have very similar content, namely, that their gospel was the same.

He makes a point further that "there is no such thing as gospeling that does not include the summons to respond in faith, repentance, and baptism" (127).  He ventures to say what these are: "faith is the big idea with repentance and baptism as manifestations of that faith" (129).

Very much looking forward to see what he does with all this plowing.  I sense much of the book thus far has been lead up.  What is the pay off?  The next two chapters, I suspect, will tell us.
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Two notes if we were to take the discussion of the chapter to the next level.  The first is the question of Acts as a theological perspective in dialog with Acts as a presentation of history.  Scot mentions James Dunn's claim that Paul preaches the same basic message as Peter in Acts.  He does not mention one way of interpreting that fact, namely, that the sermons of Acts are as much a presentation of Luke's theology as they are precise historical memories of apostolic sermons.

The second is the question of the degree to which Acts--or the methods of the early church for that matter--presents us with a model to imitate.  If Acts models how people in a pagan world (and who have never heard of Jesus) come to Christ, how do people who have heard about Jesus all their life embrace him?  The model of embracing affirmation might not be as event oriented.  I think different models might sometimes play out.

McKnight 8: Jesus and the Gospel

Next is chapter 7 of Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel

Intro: Evangelism Explosion
Chap. 1: The Big Question: What is the Gospel?
Chap. 2:Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture
Chap. 3:From Salvation to Story
Chap. 4: The Gospel of Paul
Chap. 5: Salvation Takes Over the Gospel
Chap. 6 The Gospel in the Gospels

Now Chap. 7, "Jesus and the Gospel."

If the gospel is the story of Jesus' death, burial, resurrection as the fulfillment of the story of the OT, did Jesus himself preach it?  Scot's answer is yes.  Did Jesus preach that he was the completion of Israel's story?  Scot argues that he did.

He starts with pre-Jesus stuff, Mary and Zechariah in Luke.  Yes, they see in Jesus the completion of the entire sweep of God's covenant with Israel.  In Jesus the awaited kingdom comes, involving a new kingdom society and a new citizenship.  Jesus is at the center of this kingdom.

In his dialog with John the Baptist, Jesus implies that he in fact is the messiah, the culmination of expectations.  In three "look at me" passages, Jesus says that his moral vision is the culmination of the OT. He appoints 12 disciples, which implies the restoration of Israel. He foresees his death and sees his role in terms of the Son of Man of Daniel 7.

The conclusion--Jesus preached the same gospel.
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I agree with a great deal here, although I wouldn't put it together quite this way.  I do believe Jesus saw himself as the messiah.  I believe he foresaw his death.  I believe that his appointment of 12 did indeed indicate the restoration of Israel.

I actually start my understanding of gospel with Isaiah 52:7 and the ministry of John the Baptist as the anticipation of God's impending restoration of Israel.  It is the good news that God's kingdom is coming.  So, yes, I do believe Jesus preached the good news of the kingdom's arrival and that he saw himself as an intimate part of it. But I don't think that the word was yet used in reference to Jesus as king until after Jesus' resurrection, and I don't think Jesus' preaching of the gospel initially included any teaching about his death or resurrection.

To me, Scot gives the word "gospel" too continuous a meaning and runs a lot of nuances and historical developments together.  From a scholarly perspective, there are also a lot of assumptions here about these being exactly the words spoken on various occasions.

McKnight 7: "Gospel in the Gospels"

Next is chapter 6 of Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel

Intro: Evangelism Explosion
Chap. 1: The Big Question: What is the Gospel?
Chap. 2:Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture
Chap. 3:From Salvation to Story
Chap. 4: The Gospel of Paul
Chap. 5: Salvation Takes Over the Gospel

Now "The Gospel in the Gospels."

In this chapter, McKnight argues that "the Four Gospels and the gospel are one" (81).  These books are called "the Gospels" because they are the gospel (80).  This, he argues, is why the early Christians called them each a Gospel because they are the gospel, the story of Jesus including his death, burial, and resurrection.  This statement is striking: "they didn't call the first four books of the New Testament the 'Gospels.'  Instead, they called each one of them the 'Gospel'" (81).

The Gospels are often said to be "a Passion story with an extended introduction" (83).  So, "The Gospels are called 'The Gospel according to...' because they declare the Story of Jesus according to the apostolic script: the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus--and this all according to the Scriptures" (85).  "One could say the four Gospels are extensive commentaries on 1 Corinthians 15 or the apostolic gospel tradition" (90).
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I've written a bit about how I see the use of the word gospel developing recently--here's a suggestive summary.  I would have started with Jesus and watched the use of the term grow over the course of the New Testament.  I see it having related but nevertheless developing nuances.  So at some point it takes on the imperial connotations of Luke.  It originally did have connotations of the restoration of Israel, I think.

I do think that Mark 1:1 is an important moment in the development of the word, where the good news about the arrival of Jesus, messiah gets attached to a book.  I suspect that the use of it thereafter in reference to Matthew, Luke, and John followed naturally.

McKnight 5: Gospel of Paul

Moving on to chapter 4 now of Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel.  Previous chapter reviews include:

Intro: Evangelism Explosion
Chap 1: The Big Question: What is the Gospel?
Chap 2: Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture
Chap 3: From Salvation to Story

Now, Chap. 4: "The Apostolic Gospel of Paul"  In this chapter we hit pay dirt, in my opinion.  First my summary then my thoughts.

Although it is not the only reason McKnight starts with 1 Corinthians 15, I think it was good strategy to start here.  Why?  Because Paul is exactly where those who equate "gospel" with "how to get saved" think they have their strongest evidence.  But as Scot indicates, this is not the heart of what Paul had in the bubble over his head when he used the word "gospel."

In 1 Corinthians 15:1-5, Paul reminds the Corinthians of the good news that, not only he announced but that he was passing on as something he received from believers before him (i.e., the first apostles).  What Paul goes on to present is the story of Jesus' death and resurrection.  Scot argues that this story is what Paul means when he mentions the gospel, the good news.  The story consists of four parts: 1) the death of Jesus, 2) the burial of Jesus, 3) the resurrection of Jesus, and 4) the appearances of Jesus.

He then makes 8 points.  I won't mention them all but some of the most important include the fact that Paul didn't come up with this himself (49) and that the gospel is the resolution and fulfillment of Israel's story and promises (51).  He draws this latter point from the recurring mention that these things happened "according to the Scriptures."  Salvation flows from the gospel as a result, but is not what the gospel itself is.

An important quote for Scot from Tom Wright appears here: "I am perfectly comfortable with what people normally mean when they say 'the gospel.'  I just don't think it is what Paul means" (What Saint Paul Really Said, a great place to begin studying Paul, by the way, although you might also like one of mine off to the right ;-)

So, Scot summarizes: "Every time Paul mentions 'gospel' in his letters... he is referring to this four-line gospel."  His main warning, and here I completely agree, is that the other focus has inevitably led evangelicalism to make the gospel be about "me and my own personal salvation" (62).  This tendency does indeed have New Testament theology completely out of focus.

The gospel is the good news about Jesus and the kingdom of God.  That's good news for me too, but I'm an incredibly minor character in the story.
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My additional thoughts:
First, I very much agree with what Scot says at the beginning of the chapter about where you begin such discussions being very important.  Hermeneutically, I would put it this way: because the biblical texts are texts of particularity, texts written in differing, specific contexts, we have to map them to each other.  One thing I insist on is that we must allow that not only may different books have a different nuance or even meaning to the word "gospel," but Paul himself cannot be assumed to mean the same thing every time he uses a word.

To map particular texts and passages to each other, especially when we find diversity of nuance or meaning, we must choose an "Archimedian point" from which to integrate them.  This means either 1) choosing one of the passages as the controlling passage and mapping the others to it or 2) choosing an ideological point "beside" the text from which we integrate the particular texts.  Scot is writing a popular book, so I suppose these musings of mine have more to do with my own hermeneutical pet peeves about flattening out the nuances of particular texts in the name of an overall biblical theology.

Secondly, with the phrase, "according to the scriptures" I come back to what I was saying in the last post about the difference between grands récits and petits récits.  Does this phrase in Paul here mean to evoke some entire story of Israel or does it more function along the lines of a proof text?  In my opinion, the NT authors used OT Scripture much more along the lines of proof texts than in terms of the kinds of grand story we as Christians see there.

Again, I am not hereby rejecting the "grand Christian narrative" reading of the OT.  I'm just saying I'm not sure that Paul conceptualized the story bits in such a grand, unified fashion.  It is appropriate theologizing beside the text, drawn from pieces and hints in the text, but never quite done so holistically in the text, in my opinion.

Finally, I tip my hat to Scot's completely accurate observation that when Paul says Christ died "for our sins," Paul does not say how Jesus' death did something for our sins (51).  It is a reminder that to see some systematic "penal substitution" here is to overread the text, to be unaware of the dictionary you are bringing to the words.

McKnight 3: Gospel Culture/Salvation Culture

I’ve had sporadic internet these last couple days. Rome is not for the faint of heart.  May post my reflections on the trip when I’m back in Germany.

The previous summaries of McKnight’s King Jesus Gospel are:
Evangelism Explosion and
The Big Question: What is the Gospel?

Today, chapter 2: Gospel Culture vs Salvation Culture

Scot begins the chapter by showing his evangelical credentials: “Personal faith is both necessary and nonnegotiable” (28).  He adds, “The sacramental process isn’t enough; there must be a call to personal faith” (29).

I would reword these comments as these statements still have a very cultural feel to me.  Crucial for me as a Wesleyan is the point at which the Spirit makes personal faith possible.  At that point, personal faith is both necessary and nonnegotiable.  Nevertheless, I agree with Scot’s basic point, which is to address people who might think that their lives and attitudes are irrelevant to their status with God because they were baptized as a child or because they participate in Mass every once and a while.  The sacraments do not work in the heart of the Devil.

He then gives the thesis of the book: “We evangelicals (as a whole) are not really ‘evangelical’ in the sense of the apostolic gospel, but instead we are soterians” (29).  The distinction he is making between the two is that a gospel culture will move a person beyond entrance into the church (where the sacramentalists sometimes stop), beyond bringing people to a salvation decision (where the “soterians” stop) to discipleship and maturity (where a true “evangelical,” gospel culture would lead).

A “salvation culture” is thus one that “focuses on and measures people on the basis of whether they can witness to an experience of personal salvation” (30).  This sort of approach, he is saying, is “soterian” rather than truly evangelical.

I think most of us, especially Wesleyans, would agree with his basic point.  We have overemphasized a moment of decision and neglected discipleship.  I will be interested to see how he develops it.  It still seems to me to miss out on the fact that some people’s decision for Christ may not happen as consciously as he is still discussing it.  It must happen when the Spirit presents the light of Christ, but it may not be a dramatic decision point of which a person is fully conscious.  This orientation neglects the fact that most of who we are is a function of our subconscious mind.

His use of the word gospel and salvation still don’t seem changed radically enough.  We’ll have to wait to see what he does with gospel but in this chapter it still seems focused too much on us as individuals rather than on King Jesus—I suspect that will change as we move on.

My main critique would be that his understanding of salvation seems too narrow.  The word salvation is sometimes used for physical healing and rarely if ever used in relation to justification.  Paul’s use of the word is overwhelmingly focused on escaping God’s wrath in the coming judgment.

The question of who will be saved is a whole different can of worms and much bigger than the very narrow way Scot is talking about it in terms of getting a person into the church to the point of decision.  So I think I get his point, but so far I’m finding the way he’s presenting it a little strange to me.

McKnight 2

I don't know how fast I'll be able to work through Scot McKnight's King Jesus Gospel, but here is a second post.  The first one is here.

Chapter 1 presents the "big question" of the book: "What is the gospel?"  He gives three stories in this chapter.  The first was an email wondering what the fact that Jesus is king has to do with the gospel--the assumption being that personal salvation is the center of the gospel.  The second was John Piper demonstrating to a conference that Jesus taught Paul's justification by faith by finding a rare instance in the gospels where the word justified is used (Luke 18).  The third was a casual conversation with a pastor who not only did not think Jesus preached the gospel (of justification by faith) but that he couldn't have because he was on the "before it could happen" side of the cross.

Then we get McKnight's basic point, something those who have read something like Wright's What Saint Paul Really Said will recognize.  This is not what the New Testament means when it talks about the gospel.    Scott F. asked in a comment after the last post what difference it really makes.  I think some possibilities will emerge as we work through McKnight's book.

Since it is still Reformation Day as I prepare this post for Tuesday morning, let me say that one effect is to clarify our emphases.  On the one hand, I am a little more open to using the word gospel in a very general way in relation to these sorts of things.  On the basis of the sermons of Acts, I believe all the consequences of the good news are part of the good news.  So in that sense, I am willing to say that justification by faith is part of the good news just like the resurrection and all that other good stuff is.

This is by extension, however.  It don't think it was in the bubble over any New Testament author's head in a single instance where the word "gospel" is used in the New Testament.  Justification by faith was not even the focus of Paul's preaching (the cross was... no, they're not the same... the cross is about something Jesus did, not something I do), let alone what appeared in the bubble over his head when he used the word gospel.

And it WAY was not the focus of Jesus' preaching, and certainly not what the gospels mean by the word gospel in any instance where they use the word.  This really annoys Scot. "Isn't the more important question about whether Paul preached Jesus' gospel?" he says, gently questioning John Piper's quest to show that Jesus preached Paul's gospel (25).  

So there are at least two reasons to read Wright and McKnight on this topic: 1) just to get it right and 2) to get our emphasis right...

The Gospel Today

I'm trying to finish up today a piece for Catalyst, a Methodist journal for pastors, on the gospel.  I've been delighted to write two dictionary articles on "gospel" for the Global Wesleyan Dictionary and the InterVarsity revised version of the Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels.  So I've written the first half of the article, which gives my sense of how the content of the word "gospel" might have developed from John the Baptist to the second century.  Now comes the most important part for pastors--how do we appropriate this rich history?

I don't think I should write out the whole second half here, but I thought I would use the blog to help me organize my thoughts.  It seems to me that there are at least four key appropriations:

1. Gospel as the good news of God's kingship
The cornerstone of the good news for John the Baptist and for Jesus was ultimately the good news that "our God reigns."  God is in control of things.  Despite how things may look, God wins.

2. Gospel as the good news of Christ's kingship
But Jesus the anointed one stands at the heart of God's reign.  God the Father reigns on earth through Jesus, whom he has enthroned as cosmic king of the universe.  This is good news because Christ is the Savior of the world who brings peace to conflict and the blessings that are usually associated with the good news in the New Testament.  This is good news because it means the defeat of the forces of evil in this world, which are ultimately subject to his authority.  This is good news because it means life from the dead, both ultimately and in our mortal bodies.

3. Gospel as good news for the poor and dis-empowered
In Luke especially, the gospel is a social gospel--it means sight for the blind, liberty for the oppressed, and good news for the poor.  It means that Christ's servants are not only interested in empowering the individuals who are weak, but in changing the structures of society as we are able into good news for all.

4. Gospel as the redemption/reconciliation of the world
The good news means the redemption and reconciliation of the world.  We see this first in the gospel as the reconciliation of Israel in the ministry of John the Baptist to Paul's good news for Gentiles.  It is the entire story of redemption culminating in a coming day when God will set everything right.

Scot McKnight's new book

Joel Willitts, old friend from my last sabbatical in Tübingen, has blogged about Scot McKnight's new book.



I find his description very exciting.  In the past, I've blogged on the idea that God judges us according to the light we have.  This is a venerable Christian idea that has been in the mix of Christian thinking for centuries.  If I remember correctly, Bounds considers it the majority opinion of Christian history.

Frankly, I don't see how Christianity can be coherent if it is not true.  I am a Wesleyan-Arminian.  I do not believe that God picks and chooses who will be saved and who will be damned.  If you have to have heard Jesus' name to be saved, then, in effect, there is geographical predestination.

Rather, as a Wesleyan, it is essential to me that God's "prevenient grace" light everyone who comes into the world and give everyone a chance to be saved, even if they have not heard of Jesus' name.  The idea that God judges everyone according to the light they have is thus a key idea for Wesleyan-Arminian theology, in my opinion.

That is not to say that everyone in the Wesleyan Church or some of our related churches hold this position.  Because we have come to swim in evangelical waters, we often can't tell the difference between what current is what.  Frankly, just seeing McKnight's book has encouraged me because I was wondering whether I needed to back off talking the "God's judges according to the light we have" position.

You see, it changes how you look at evangelism and missions.  I can say--it is God's will for us to take the good news to everyone we can.  I can say--we go because we want everyone to know the truth, because we want to bring everyone we can into our fellowship and into the blessings of God's people.  But these kinds of motivations pale beside the urgency of saving people from hell.

I might be very motivated to go undercover and do mission work in Iran if I saw that mission work as the only thing that stood between the Iranians and hell.  Would I be as motivated if I only believed that those whose heart was right but heads messed up would be blessed so much more to understand the full story and be brought into Christian fellowship?

Of course these are issues of the consequence of ideas more than the truth of ideas themselves.  If God does judge people according to the light they have, then I just have to accept the consequences.  These sorts of things are diversions, logically, from the key question.  If God commands us to go, then God commands us to go, and that's that.

There is an irony in this position because we find ourselves in a similar situation to the Calvinists in the 1700s.  Some argued against missions by saying, "If God had predestined those in India to be saved they would have been born in England or Europe." The response was, "This is the way that God has chosen to reveal who is predestined among those in India."

Now someone says to the Arminian, "What of the biblical language that yearns to see as many saved as possible?"  The response is, "This is language about the how more than about the why."  God has willed the in-gathering of those who yearn for him and missions is the path by which he does it."

I cannot be dogmatic on this issue, only to say that it seems to me Christianity is incoherent if something of this sort isn't true.  If God is love, then he must surely try to save everyone.  And if you have to hear Jesus' name to be saved, then God has failed miserably.  For this reason, I go with God judging everyone according to the light they have.

The implications are, to me, profound and exciting in their own right.  Evangelism ceases to be about getting people to make a decision and be baptized--a focus that seems quite insubstantial.  The goal becomes to see people move toward Christ and his kingdom. It becomes a massive life-long task that isn't reduced to a prayer you read on a card one afternoon.

Now my goal is to share more light with those in unbelieving lands to see them know God far better than they do.  I nurture children on the path to God not because they are out and need to come in but because I want to give them as much light as possible.  And long after a person makes a personal decision for Christ (and I am not in any way denying the importance of an event of Spirit-filling), we have the task of pushing others and ourselves on to Christian maturity.

In short, sharing the good news (evangelism) becomes a whole life-long task, not a blip in a lifetime that has often proved to be most superficial and shallow. I'm looking forward to reading McKnight's book because I have a hunch it is where the church as a whole is headed and should head.

Gospel in the Synoptics

I've been delighted to be given some small writing assignments on the word gospel these last two years.  I finished a second one yesterday.  It's been fun to do a little official work on the gospels since I'm a "Hebrews" person as a scholar and have been a "Paul" person as a teacher.  My most recent assignment was on the gospel as good news in the NT Gospels, a delightful opportunity.

In a nutshell, here is the gist of my conclusions:

• A couple of uses of the word gospel in Greco-Roman culture are significant.  There is of course the announcement of a victory in battle, a "gospel" from the war front, usually at the hands of a messenger.  Even more significant is the Priene inscription, which speaks of the "gospels" relating to the birth of Augustus, the birth of a god and "gospels" concerning the good he would bring.
• The Septuagint uses the word gospels also in relation to relating victory in battle (2 Sam.), but the most significant uses are in the later part of Isaiah (e.g., 52:7; 61:1).
• Mark makes Jesus' good news proclamation of the kingdom the centerpiece of his message (1:14-15).  Mark implies that this message significantly involves Jesus himself (e.g., 1:1), but we get the impression that Jesus himself focused much more on the kingdom as God's reign.
• Matthew does not add much to Mark, but includes proclamation of the good news of the kingdom of heaven as the centerpiece of Jesus' message.
• Luke highlights Isaiah 61:1 in its presentation of the inauguration of Jesus' ministry, making the good news about the reincorporation of the poor and displaced of Israel the centerpiece of the earthly good news.
• John does not use the word gospel, one of many instances of it following its own path.  John is like the Message translation of Jesus--the most directly communicative about who Jesus is, but probably the least literal in its presentation of Jesus. 
• If we then try to look behind the specific emphases of the gospels to what Jesus and John the Baptist might look like on video, I personally think that the language of gospel does indeed go back to Jesus' use of Isaiah 52:7 in his ministry.  I believe with N. T. Wright that the context of John the Baptist is the restoration of Israel and its metaphorical return from exile.  Paul and other Greek-speakers may have started using the noun "gospel," but I suspect their use derived from Jesus' use of the Aramaic of Isaiah 52:7.

I'm interested to see what the editors think of my entry...

Gospel

I'm trying to crank out something due a long time ago.  For whatever reason, things flow out of me better when I at least think someone is listening.  So here goes cranking:
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The word gospel has meant different things in different contexts, most of which relate broadly to the idea of "good news."  The gospels of Matthew and Mark both make the "gospel of the kingdom" the essence of Jesus' earthly teaching (e.g. Matt. 4:23; Mark 1:15).  This fact suggests that Isaiah 52:7 provides key background to how Jesus saw his ministry.  In particular, Jesus likely saw his ministry as part of the restoration of God's reign within Israel and the world, including the defeat of the evil powers that currently rule the earth.

The original context of Isaiah 52:7 was of course the return of Israel from captivity in Babylon around the year 538BC.  The statement in that verse, "our God reigns," seems to connect directly to Jesus' preaching of the kingdom of God, the rule of God returning to earth as it is in heaven.  Early Christians like Paul primarily read this verse in its Greek translation, where they found the verb "to proclaim the good news" (euangelizomai).  It is thus quite possible that the early Christian use of the word gospel started among Greek-speaking Christians who connected Jesus' preaching of the rule of God to the Greek sense of a gospel as the announcement of good news of a momentous sort.  For example, a famous inscription from 9BC about the Roman emperor Augustus of him as a savior whose enthronement was good news (euangelion) for humanity.

A major focus of the gospel in Matthew, Mark, and Luke is Jesus' ministry to the poor.  The verb "to proclaim the good news" also appears in the Greek of Isaiah 61:1, which Luke pictures Jesus quoting as the very inaugural address of his ministry (Luke 4:18): "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor."  Matthew 4:13 also connects Jesus ministry of healing to his proclamation of the good news.  Matthew, Mark, and Luke thus understood the gospel not only in terms of the coming reign of God over the earth but also in terms of the liberating ministry of Jesus to those who were oppressed and disempowered on earth.

In Jesus' ministry, the good news was about God's reign.  When we get to Paul's writings, the gospel is about Jesus Christ himself as king.  Romans 1:3-4 give us a good sense of what Paul means by the word.  The gospel is about Jesus being king.  He is descended from king David in his humanity and enthroned as "Son of God" as part of his resurrection.  It is important to recognize that the title "Son of God" has everything to do with Jesus being king, being the Messiah, the Christ.  The background for this phrase is firmly in Old Testament passages like 2 Samuel 7:14 and Psalm 2, both of which were originally about kings of Judah.  Other New Testament books also picture Jesus' exaltation to God's right hand as a kind of enthronement as Son of God (e.g. Acts 13:33; Hebrews 1:5).

Paul's sense of the gospel of Jesus is thus much like the inscription about Augustus.  The good news is that Jesus has been enthroned as king.  As king he will bring justice and salvation to the earth.  The gospel thus extends beyond the fact that Jesus is king to the benefits and blessings that have come in consequence.

Mark 1:1 probably has a similar sense of the word gospel as Paul.  The beginning of Mark narrates the beginning of the good news that Jesus Christ is king.  Perhaps it is then a coincidence of history that the word gospel came to refer not just to the good news of Jesus as king but to the genre of books like Mark that present the good news about Jesus.  Thus we now refer to books like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John as gospels, whereas originally their audience would have thought of them as biographies (Matthew, Mark, John) and a history (Luke-Acts).

Gospel

I believe my life as a blogger will resume on Saturday. Until then, here's more starter material to help me get stuff going...

Gospel:
1. gospel in Mark/Jesus--good news of the kingdom's arrival, background in Isaiah 52.
2. gospel in Paul--the enthronement of Jesus as cosmic king, background in Roman world (Res gestae divi Augusti)
3. Gospel as genre--begins with Mark, becomes genre in early Christianity, although originally bioi and apologetic history
4. gospel is not "plan of salvation" (cf. Wright)