This document is for Christians who are interested in the finer points of what the gospel is and is not. For a simpler presentation of what the Gospel is, see the Steps to know God.
Let me
start with a few passages of scripture that most Christians believe is
definitive.
1 Cor 15:1-4
1 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.
2 By this
gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to
you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
3 For what I
received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins
according to the Scriptures,
4 that he was
buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, (NIV)
Many take
verses 3 and 4 as a definition of what the Gospel is, simply because they
immediately follow verse 1 and 2. So the
Gospel is these 3 things:
Would you
agree? Ok, then read what Peter tells
you to do with the Gospel:
1 Pet 4:17-19
17 For it is
time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with us,
what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
18 And,
"If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the
ungodly and the sinner?"
19 So then,
those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their
faithful Creator and continue to do good.
(NIV)
Ok, now try
to obey these 3 things:
How is it
coming? Did you obey them yet? That definition of the Gospel does not make
sense does it? Does God not make
sense? Could it be the way we are
reading it? How can you obey historical
events? What is the Gospel that we must
obey?
I wish we
could look at the passage from the culture in which it was written. Here’s the
next best thing I can offer: Read the
opinion of a Hebrew/Greek bible translator and scholar below.
WHAT IS THE GOSPEL? Do we even know?
Have you ever wondered
what the Gospel really is? When
we mention the Gospel,
many think it is something that
began with the Apostolic
Scriptures, i.e., the
so-called New Testament.
But the Gospel message did
not appear for the first
time in Matthew, nor even in
the Apostolic Writings.
God "preached the Gospel
beforehand to
Abraham" (Gal. 3:8). The generation in
the wilderness "had
the Gospel preached to them just
as we have" (Heb.
4:2). Clearly Moses, David and all
the people of faith in
the Tanakh (i.e., the so-called
Old Testament) possessed
faith unto salvation.
Thus, the Gospel message
must be something older than
we think.
What then is the Gospel?
When we search all four
gospels, we never find
that Yeshua (i.e., Jesus'
Hebrew name) preached a
sermon presenting the Four
Spiritual Laws, nor did
He ever lead anyone in the
'sinner's prayer.' He
never shared a tract with a
single person. He never
asked, "Do you know for sure
that you would go to
heaven if you died?" He never
told anyone, "You
need to have Me in your heart." If
these cliches were not
the message taught by Yeshua
and His disciples, what
was the message?
His message was the
Gospel: "Repent, the Kingdom of
Heaven is at hand!"
(Mat.
John the baptizer said
precisely the same thing). Or
put another way, Yeshua
proclaimed, "The time is
fulfilled, and the
and believe in the
Gospel" (Mar.
does that mean, though?
It means: Turn your life back
from sin because God's
rule and reign have already
begun through His
Messiah!
That's the Good News!
It means that the King
has come, as prophesied in the
Tanakh. It means that even though Yeshua died and was
buried, He rose from the
dead and therefore will
return to complete His
earthly mission as Messianic
Ruler (1 Cor.
15:ff). It means that we must therefore
submit to the authority
of this G-d-installed King
(Psa. 2). Now! (Act. 17:30, 31) And the way to do
that is to respond to
G-d's kindness and turn away
from sin, modeling our
lives from that point on after
Yeshua's.
Salvation truly comes by
G-d's grace bestowed upon
people to help them to
repent; multiplied upon those
who respond to that grace
and actually *do* repent.
But let us be clear: a
Gospel message that neglects to
state the need for repentance
is no Gospel message at
all!
Yeshua was preaching
repentance. His Gospel was not a
sales pitch for people to
feel better about
themselves. We cannot say that His message was
therefore devoid of
grace; just the opposite. But
neither was it an easy
sell. Nevertheless, the
message had a
"pay-off." Yeshua's Gospel
required a
*radical* life change,
however, in order for a person
to "collect"
anything lasting from the G-d of grace.
It required turning away
from sin.
And folks, how do we know
what sin is? We know via
the Torah (i.e., what is
commonly called the Law). In
case we did not know from
the rest of the Bible, G-d
has graciously and
clearly defined sin for us in the
Apostolic
Scriptures. Sin is quite simply any
transgression of the Torah
(1 Joh. 3:4). This
definition was restated
so that we could know what sin
is, so that people could
repent of it.
More likely than not, if
our Master were preaching His
Gospel in much of the
Christian world today, He would
quickly be disregarded as
a legalist. He would
probably be called a
Judaizer. I am certain that He
would be told by someone
to let go of 'the old ways of
the Law' and learn to
walk in the 'new way of the
Spirit.'
We as followers of Yeshua
should be passionate about
restoring the whole
message of the Gospel to the Body
of Messiah. We each must
strive to assist both Jewish
and non-Jewish believers
to return to the feet of the
Master for a fresh
encounter with the One they have
confessed as Lord. It's
time to take off our
gentile-centric
theological goggles, stop pitting Law
against Grace, and to
deal honestly with the real
Messiah and His real
message-the man from
rebuked sin, hypocrisy
and pretense while encouraging
true repentance and
obedience to the commandments of
the God of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob.
--Missionary to Israel
Bryan
made many excellent points about what the gospel is not in his writing above—as well as some fascinating points
about what it is. However, I’d like to
continue the discussion in two veins:
First, I’d like to challenge this idea:
Sin is quite simply any
transgression of the Torah (1 Joh. 3:4).
Then, I’d like to embellish the conditional aspects
of his argument.
1.
Sin is quite simply any
transgression of the Torah (1 Joh. 3:4).
I appreciate the simplicity of this definition of
sin. However, it is confusing to most
people, who do not know which parts of Torah are no longer binding on Gentile
believers. To leave out this
clarification would confuse many. Also,
I think a definition of the Gospel should be simple and broad enough to include
people with disabilities or other disadvantages that keep them from studying
the word like we do. Keeping Torah
leaves them out. That’s my opinion.
John 9:41
41 Jesus
said, "If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you
claim you can see, your guilt remains. (NIV)
I believe that God judges sin according to two
vertices:
b. Intent of the sinner – the ignorant, or accidental sinner is judged differently than the hardened sinner, even
if they happen to commit the same sin.
2.
This passage you mentioned seems like the most
definitive I could find regarding what the gospel is:
1 Cor 15:1-4
1 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.
2 By
this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
3 For
what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for
our sins according to the Scriptures,
4 that
he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,
(NIV)
But if the salvific response is only to "hold
firmly to the word" (in a mental assent way) and not believe in vain, then
other passages don’t make sense:
1 Pet 4:17-19
17 For
it is time for judgment to begin with the family of God; and if it begins with
us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God?
18 And,
"If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the
ungodly and the sinner?"
19 So
then, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to
their faithful Creator and continue to do good.
(NIV)
How do we reconcile these apparently contradictory
scriptures? We take a closer look at the
translation. Check out the other
translations of 1 Cor 15:1-2 below. Notice
how differently they render the NIV’s past tense have taken.
1Co 15:1 And, brothers, I declare to you the gospel
which I preached to you, which also you have received, and in which you stand; (MKJV)
2 by which you also are being kept safe, if you hold
fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. (MKJV)
1Co 15:1 ¶ And I make known to you, brethren, the good
news that I proclaimed to you, which also ye did receive, in which also ye have stood, (YLT)
2 through
which also ye are being saved, in
what words I proclaimed good news to you, if ye hold fast, except ye did
believe in vain, (YLT)
1.
NIV: “have taken your stand” (past tense)
2.
MKJV: “you stand” (present tense)
3.
YLT: “ye have stood” (past continuous tense)
These other translations seem to speak of not only
initially receiving (1 Cor 15:1 “have taken”), but continually standing in the Gospel, in order to continue in a state
of salvation. This sounds more long term
than the NIV. Coupled with Peter’s
warning above to “obey” the gospel, we discover this: The salvific response to the gospel is
continual behavioral obedience to it until death.
Now lets examine the entire passage one last time:
1 Cor 15:1-4
1 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.
2 By
this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have
believed in vain.
3 For
what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for
our sins according to the Scriptures,
4 that
he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,
(NIV)
So then, how can we obey these three items of “first
importance”?
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