In This Edition:
The Good News Is Always At The Center
Resources for Discovering the Gospel Throughout Scripture
Subscribe!
The Good News Is Always At The Center
“Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’” (Galatians 3:8 NIV)
“He promised the good news long ago. He announced it through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.” (Romans 1:2 NIrV)
What Is The Gospel?
What is the gospel? That sounds like a very easy question. It’s the kind of question every Christian should have a ready-made answer for. Something you can fit on a 3-by-5 card, or explain in 2 minutes or less to a co-worker, or a neighbor, or someone sitting next to us on the bus. But for many of us—including myself—the answer we give to that question is usually too much or too little.
Try to imagine “gospel” as our headline. Have you ever seen one of those simple headlines that seems to just “say it all?”
In 1969, with the whole country glued to their television sets, Neil Armstrong made history that signaled the new frontier of space, and that his trip would just be the first of many. So the Evening Standard offered this hopeful headline: “The first footstep.”
After years of hard fighting pain and misery, just one word was needed to signal elation on August 15, 1945, declaring the end of world War II. Sydney’s newspaper The Sun ran this simple headline:
“Peace.”
The Los Angeles Times wanted to supply a second word to show how the peace was won, and what the peace would proclaim. So they chose two words: “Peace! Victory!” Never have such small words packed so big a punch. It just says it all, doesn’t it?
The word “gospel” is not a Christian word. It’s a baptized word, to be sure; it takes on a new dimension when Jesus and his followers start using it, and pretty much everybody now thinks of “gospel” as a Christian word. But it was in Greek and Roman newspapers before Jesus came along. The word means “good news.” Which means two things: (1) it has to be good, and (2) it has to be news.
It is a headline message about rescue. It’s a message intended to bring hope. Just look at Psalm 40:9: “I have told the glad news of [your] deliverance in the great congregation!” You see, “gospel” was a message about a great event that brought deliverance and hope. And a messenger or herald was one who would announce the message to people eagerly anticipating the headline news of the day. Usually, the headline would be about some event that changes your life forever. So much so, that “gospel” served as a lens through which you would now see everything in the world.
When a young soldier named Octavian decided to go to war against tribal leaders, he united what became known as the Roman Empire behind him. There was nothing like it in the history of the world. So they named him Augustus (meaning “the great one”). So great was this empire—its power, the scope of its plans, the borderless nature of its ambitions—that the announcement that Rome was coming to your village, that Caesar was coming to make your city part of his kingdom was called “gospel.” In 9 BC, years before Jesus was even born, a young Ephesian etched into stone a celebration tribute in honor of Caesar’s birthday. The inscription, which could be read by anyone entering the city, said that the same Providence that orders the whole of life picked this moment—the pinnacle of human existence, to send a savior for us and our posterity. His job: to end all wars, to establish peace throughout the land. So important was his coming, that his birthday could be considered the “beginning of everything” because it reframed how we saw the world: the world was bleak and headed downhill until Caesar appeared, and gave us a new look to the whole universe, becoming a blessing to all people.
Can you guess what the headline was? Here it is:
“The birthday of the god—Augustus—signaled the beginning of the good news (gospel) for the world because of him.”
Let me say that a little differently: “The beginning of the gospel is about Caesar, the god sent by Providence.” And when Mark wrote his gospel, meant to be read out loud (by a herald) to a mostly illiterate society, the very first verse could get you killed: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”
The gospel is a headline—in fact it is THE headline. It shapes my identity.
So what is the gospel? No two Bible writers say it the exact same way. And the gospel has depth and nuance, so any summary could be explored even further. But here is a helpful shorthand showing three essential aspects of the gospel:
First of all, the gospel is an announcement, a declaration (Psalm 40:9; Rom 1:2-3). It’s not a list of rules or fatherly advice or helpful suggestions. It’s a statement about an event, meant to be plastered on every door in your house, meant to guide and direct every thought in your heart.
Second, it brings tremendous joy to the entire world. What did the angel tell the Shepherds in the field that night when the majestic host swirled around them, announcing the birth of the Messiah? “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people” (Luke 2:10). The good news is just that—good news—for the entire world!
Third, it’s about what God has done in Jesus Christ to fix what was broken and to rescue, restore, and reconcile all things through His Spirit. Sin did more than cut the phone line between me and God. Sin ripped a hole in the fabric of the universe. Sin’s curse is seen in every man, in every woman, and even in creation itself. We are alienated from each other because we are alienated from God. And our sin invokes the wrath of God. But thanks be unto God that we have a headline. It’s right there at the end of the first chapter of 1 Thessalonians. After rejoicing that the Thessalonian Christians “turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven,” Paul gives us this headline: “Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath” (1 Thess 1:10). Paul talks about what they did; but the headline—the gospel—is what Jesus did—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.
And he doesn’t just keep us from a wrath-filled future. He also restores our broken relationships with each other by repairing the breach between us and God. Once that relationship is fixed, the love that flows from God to us can flow from us to others. And not only that, God is at work breaking down every wall of partition, righting every wrong, reversing the curse, and reconciling all things through His Spirit because of the rescue mission of Jesus Christ.
And how did he accomplish this? What great event is this rescue mission? Listen to Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:
“Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you have 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, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve…and last of all he appeared to me also…Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.” (1 Corinthians 15:1-5, 8, 11 ESV)
Do you see what Paul does here? By emphasizing “he” at least 5 times, Paul says the gospel you believed and received is what Christ did for us. “This is what we preach,” says Paul, “and this is what you believed.” There are all sorts of deep connections you can make with that. Paul brings lots of these elements together—the love of God, the demonstration of the death of Christ, rescue from the coming wrath, reconciliation of the world, and boasting only in Christ—and states the gospel profoundly in Romans 5:6-11:
“At just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Now only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation” (Romans 5:6-11 NIV).
We were powerless. We were still sinners. We were God’s enemies! By ourselves, without God, we are worse than we care to admit. But God demonstrates his own love in this: that he would die for even me. For us. For a broken world. To rescue, to redeem, to reconcile. To bring Jew and Gentile together into one everlasting kingdom. To bind up the wounds and reverse the fortunes. To right every wrong and to fill his house with unworthy yet adopted sons and daughters. To fill his people with His spirit to engage in kingdom living and to ultimately bring about a new creation in which peace and righteousness will dwell forever. God did what we could never do, for a people who never could have earned it, and never would have deserved it.
Every religion teaches about man chasing after God. The gospel says that God came chasing after us. The gospel is radically different, in that it’s about someone, not something. And that someone is not me. I am not the primary agent; God is the primary agent. I am the problem. God is the solution. The gospel highlights not my worthiness, but my unworthiness. It highlights Christ’s worthiness, and then it talks about how in Christ, through His Spirit, by His power, the most amazing thing begin to happen.
This is the gospel! I can’t stress this enough. Get this right, and everything else will fall into place.
The Gospel In All of Scripture
But is this just a New Testament story? It can’t be. We know that the gospel can be found in the Old Testament. For one thing, Paul says so in several places:
“I, Paul…have been appointed to be an apostle. God set me apart to tell others his good news. He promised the good news long ago. He announced it through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures.” (Romans 1:1-3 NIrV)
“Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’” (Galatians 3:8 NIV)
Since the gospel is about what God did in the long-awaited Messiah (Jesus Christ) through his suffering, death and resurrection to bring about salvation and reconciliation, other New Testament passages confirm that all of scripture can and should be seen as a mighty river with the gospel as the undercurrent:
“[F]rom infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:15-17 NIV)
“Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ.” (Acts 17: 1-3 NIV)
“Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ.” (Romans 10:17 NIV)
And, finally, Jesus himself proclaims that Hebrew scripture should be seen as pointing toward the gospel story:
If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. (John 5:46 NIV)
And he said to them, ‘O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?’ And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself…He said to them, ‘This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.’ Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.” (Luke 24:25-27, 44-45 NIV)
If we take these texts seriously, notice how New Testament writers repurpose Old Testament passages in the light of the gospel story, and also glean from the wisdom and practice of the early church fathers, we can find 4 useful approaches to reading the Old Testament through a gospel lens.
First, look for explicit teaching that the first readers, or the New Testament writers, saw as referring to the Messiah and God’s rescue mission through Him. That through Abraham’s seed all nations would be blessed. That God would raise up a prophet like Moses. That a son of David would rule God’s kingdom. That the suffering servant would bear the iniquity of us all. That Christ would stay 3 days in the heart of the earth, just as Jonah spent 3 days in the heart of the fish. Note the explicit references.
Second, revisit major storylines or themes in scripture that show up repeatedly, and examine how that storyline or theme reveals the gospel. Creation. Covenant. Exile. Kingdom. We see these themes played out over and over again in both testaments. In each theme, we find a loving God creating and calling a people for his purpose. In each theme, we see how sinful, powerless humanity falls short and joins the side of God’s enemy. But in each theme, the relentless love of God breaks through the barriers erected by pride and idolatry, remaining faithful, providing a way of rescue to bring His people back, and offering participation in the way of life under the rule of God.
Third, revisit characters and stories in the text that we often read as no more than moralistic tales about how to be better people. Re-imagine them as stories that display the gospel. We see God’s relentless rescue mission encompassing gentiles and God’s enemies in the story of Jonah. In David, we find God raising up a chosen, promised child of Israel to show power in weakness as he slays the giant that stands in the way.
Finally, borrow insights from imaginative early Christian writers, as well as the church through the centuries, to help us see layers in the text which might offer us even more language for talking about God in Christ creating, then suffering for and finally reconciling a powerless and sinful world.
You’ll come away with four new insights.
(1) You’ll see that God purposed before the foundations of the world to give us the gospel, and it serves as the backdrop and the ultimate story behind every story.
(2) You’ll begin to notice the Trinity—God the sender, God the sent, and God the enabler—in story after story, showing that God is the hero in all of scripture.
(3) You’ll find that what you thought were bedtime stories for kids about why they should obey mom and dad are actually the gospel in miniature, and opportunities to go directly to Jesus and the cross even in the bedtime retelling.
(4) You’ll be inspired to use the gospel as a “lens” which allows you to move from treating the Bible as a rulebook or a constitution that is primarily about us doing better to a story about God at work.
Asking New Questions of Each Book With Gospel Lenses
In 2023, West Side will examine one book of the Bible each week, seeking to uncover the gospel that lies therein. We are certainly not the only ones doing this; Tim Keller is offering the same study throughout the year, and I am certain his videos will be highly insightful and deeply informative. But we would love to have you join us each week, live or livestream, on Sunday nights at 5pm.
The first part of this article is taken from a sermon preached at the West Side Church of Christ titled “The Definition of the Gospel: Finding Our One Thing.” The second part is from a sermon set to be given this Sunday evening at West Side entitled “The Gospel in Every Story: An Introduction.” These lessons do or will appear on the Life on the West Side podcast. Available on all podcast platforms.
Resources For Discovering the Gospel Throughout Scripture
Popular Resources
Keller, Dr. Timothy. Discovering the Gospel in Every Book of the Bible Video Series (2023).
Williams, Michael. Reading the Bible through the Jesus Lens: A Guide to Christ-Focused Reading of Scripture (Zondervan Academic, 2012).
Academic Books
Beale, G. K. and D. A. Carson. Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament (Baker Academic, 2007)
Beale, G. K. Handbook on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament: Exegesis and Interpretation (Baker Academic, 2012)
Hays, Richard B. Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul (Yale, 1993).
Hays, Richard B. Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels (Baylor, [repr.] 2017).
Hays, Richard B. Reading Backwards: Figural Christology and the Fourfold Gospel Witness (Baylor, 2016).
Wright, Christopher J. H. Salvation Belongs to our God: Celebrating the Bible’s Central Story (Langham Global Library, 2013)
Wright, Christopher J. H. Knowing Jesus through the Old Testament (IVP Academic, 2014)
Wright, Christopher J. H. Knowing God through the Old Testament (3 books in 1) (IVP Academic, 2019)
Wright, N. T. The New Testament and the People of God (Fortress, 1992).
Wright, N. T. Jesus and the Victory of God (Fortress, 1997).
Wright, N. T. Paul and the Faithfulness of God (Fortress, 2013).
For Kids
Machowski, Marty. The Gospel Story Bible: Discovering Jesus in the Old and New Testaments (New Growth Press, 2011).
Subscribe to Life on the West Side
My name is Nathan Guy, and I serve as the preaching minister for the West Side Church of Christ in Searcy, Arkansas. I am happily married to Katie and am the proud father of little Grace. You can find more resources on my website over at nathanguy.com. Follow me: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.