The Gospel Quotes
I am attempting to distinguish these quotes about the Gospel from quotes about salvation.
My SBI sites get a half million visitors a year, and every tool I use is free.
It is my premise that the Gospel is the proclamation of Jesus of Nazareth as a person—Son of God, Christ, Lord, and Savior—not the proclamation of some facts or details of Jesus' work or ministry, even such important facts as his sacrifice on the cross. There is a theology of salvation, and there is a theology of the atonement, but while both are good and important for the Christian to know, neither constitutes the Gospel.
The strongest evidence I can produce for my premise is that the Book of Acts, the only place where we have actual sermons preached by the apostles to the lost, never mentions that Jesus died for sin. It mentions repeatedly that Jesus forgives sins, but it never mentions what we learn in the letters to the churches (and, thus, to those already saved), which is that forgiveness of sins is accomplished through the cross.
The first quote I put on this page was a 1997 quote from N.T. Wright, a noted and mainstream New Testament scholar, who not only agrees, but emphasizes that very point in his book, What Saint Paul Really Said
You can determine whether you agree by comparing Acts yourself and the quotes on this page and the salvation quotes page.
Clement of Rome, A.D. 96
The apostles have preached the Gospel to us from the Lord Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ [has done so] from God. Christ therefore was sent forth by God, and the apostles by Christ (cf. Rom. 10:15). (First Clement 42)
N.T. Wright, 1997
When Paul says 'the gospel', he does not mean 'justification by faith'; he means the message, the royal announcement, of Jesus Christ as Lord. (What Saint Paul Really SaidBut if we come to Paul with these questions in mind — the questions about how human beings come into a living and saving relationship with the living and saving God — it is not justification that springs to his lips or pen. When he describes how persons, finding themselves confronted with the act of God in Christ, come to appropriate that act for themselves, he has a clear train of thought, repeated at various points. The message about Jesus and his cross and resurrection — 'the gospel', in terms of our previous chapters — is announced to them; through this means, God works by his Spirit upon their hearts; as a result, they come to believe the message; they join the Christian community through baptism, and begin to share in its common life and its common way of life. That is how people come into relationship with the living God. (What Saint Paul Really SaidBritt Mooney, 2011
The Gospel was more than just an individual plan of salvation.1 It was the expression of a meta-narrative that invited the individual to join the story as a disciple and a participant in the story. A simple plan of salvation invites one to make a single decision, to become converts. The Gospel as a meta-narrative makes disciples, which was the commission of Christ to the apostles and the Church.2 The understanding of the Gospel in such a way leads to a creation of a community of disciples, a veritable “gospel culture” in churches. ("The Patristic Rule of Faith as a Guide to Modern Evangelical Unity"; [a term paper shared with me by the author])
History
Departments
Teachings
Miscellaneous
Contact
Subscribe
