What is the Gospel?

In this episode, Gabe and Riley talk about the Gospel. We often talk about the gospel, but we seldom go through the process of defining it and talking about what the Gospel is and what the gospel means. Today we will do just that, and we hope that after listening, you would be equipped to explain to anyone just what you mean when you say, believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

SHOW NOTES:

Crossway Article: "What is the Gospel?"

R.C. Sproul Video: "What is the Gospel?"

Transcript

Riley Forrest: 0:00

Hey everyone, today we are going to talk about the gospel. I know Shaka, pastors are going to talk about the gospel. That's a very important part of our belief and understanding it is paramount to our knowledge of God and His plans. So we're going to take some time to break down what the gospel is and what it means. You're listening to the church matters podcast and Ministry of Redeemer church.

Gabe Davis: 0:24

Hello, hello. Welcome to church matters a podcast designed to equip and help the church apply and learn a biblical worldview for all Riley is dying because I never get our tagline, right? I don't know. I think it's understanding apply, but I'm gonna get a tattoo. Yeah. I don't know why. Yeah, I wrote it down once upon a time, and that should be good enough.

Riley Forrest: 0:50

If we ever have a dedicated podcast room, we'll just plaster it. Oh, for sure. I could just look, it'll only be for my benefit.

Gabe Davis: 0:58

It's Yeah, well, yeah. Welcome to church matters. And we are, you might hear just FYI, you might hear some ham. We're not in Santa's workshop, you might hear some hammers and some noises like that is actually just the very good sounds of some kind of construction happening at the church, which makes me so happy, where we've been hung up with any kind of remodeling stuff we've been hung up with, permitting, and that sort of thing. It's just amazing how long it took even just to put the sign out front, you know, like on the road, that's like a three to four month process for permanent, just got the temporary sign kind of taped over the old sign. Yeah, I mean, and that's, you know, that doesn't even talk about like design time, or blueprint time, or any of that kind of stuff or, or a structural engineer looking at something or it's like, it feels like every representative of the representative of the city has to come out and be like, we'll take a little bit of money. And we'll take a little bit of money and a little bit for this person and dot this eye and cross this T and anyway, so Ken mills and Hoyt Tonon have been working on expanding the cry room, the nursery room, which we desperately need. Yes. How many infants? Yeah. And they're just they're basically going to double it in size. And so they've been working on rerunning wires and taking down one. So just like hearing hammers, hammering and saws sighing makes me so happy because it's like, something is happening.

Riley Forrest: 2:33

Yeah, so anyway, you might hear that in the background, those guys are working hard. So hear that thanks. Can rain falling outside? You know, that winter has arrived in the Pacific Northwest. When you look at the forecast. It's just there's no sun in sight. It's just rain for the next

Gabe Davis: 2:48

10 days. That's optimistic. I was gonna say like, I mean, it'll warm up. That's all it says. That's all it tells me is the 10 day forecast. It'll go longer. Yeah. Well, we that's that now that all that's out of the way, now we can get to the real meat of what we're going to be talking about today, we're going to talk about the meat, we're going to be talking about something that that every artist would be that every person in our church knows and understands and can articulate. And that is the question, what is the gospel? Not just the question, we don't want them to just be able to give the question. We want them to be able to answer the question, what is the gospel? That is it's going to be on our signage, speaking of signs, it'll say a gospel centered church. And so what does that mean? When we say what it when we say, gospel centered, what does it mean? Or what's what's the answer to the question? What is the gospel? Some of you listening, you've gone through the membership class of Redeemer, and you know that a part of the membership interview is we ask that question, what is the gospel? How would you answer that? We hopefully hear the gospel in every sermon. We believe that our songs are going to be oftentimes reflecting on the gospel, our liturgy, meaning just our order of service as a church is walking through the Gospel story. And so a while back, we actually did a sermon series called The

Riley Forrest: 4:20

I think it was called the Gospel story, the Gospel story.

Gabe Davis: 4:23

And because there's sort of like a very short way you could talk about the gospel. And then there's a full big kind of robust way you can talk about the gospel. There's people that are break it into the gospel proper, and the gospel and community and the Gospels purpose and all these kinds of things also. And so yeah, we did a sermon series A while back, and it was more like that longer unpacking of the context of the gospel, and it cetera, et cetera. But before we go further, let's let's do a little bit of work to explain just what we're talking about when we Say, the Gospel rally. Do you want to start us off?

Riley Forrest: 5:04

Yeah, I mean, we can, we can start off with what that word means is a good place to start. And it just means good news or a good message. So that at the if you wanted, like the shortest possible way to say what is the gospel, you could just say good news. That obviously needs to be unpacked even more, because what is the news? And why is it good?

Gabe Davis: 5:24

Sometimes you'll hear like, people want to get fancy and show that they got a degree in Bible and so they'll say uncle use that right? And but if you kind of break that word down, it's spelled e u A, n g e l i o n, right? And that prefix EU, maybe like a common place here to hear that is in a eulogy. Right? What are we saying when we say a eulogy? It's

Riley Forrest: 5:48

a good thing.

Gabe Davis: 5:49

It's a good thing, right? It's a good word, it's. And then if you think of that word, and gallium, like, what we actually mean with that, that actually has to do with the message. So you think of like, angels angels are messengers, similar, same word. And so that angels are messengers. And so you take this, you EU, and that's the good. And then you talk about the good message, a good word, good message. So sometimes you'll hear glad good tidings. That's the same kind of thing. Good news, gospel, all of that has to do with good, a good word, a good proclamation. I was kind of just some of the history of that a little bit like, back in the the, this idea, this word has a rich background in the Old Testament. So if you were a doctor, and you came to examine a sick person, and then afterward, you said that there was nothing serious, the person was totally fine. Then that was gospel. That was good news. If you in like Greek times, this is the one that a lot of people will use to kind of explain it. But there was a battle going on. And you were the city. There was a little ways away from the battle, but there was a battle raging, and it was going to have an impact on your city, right? And so you're waiting to know, did our boys win? Or do they lose, right? And so then what would happen is as the war was kind of going on, eventually, the commanders would send back a runner, and the runner was meant to bring a report. And it was either going to be a report of bad news, meaning batten down the hatches, we're about to get taken over, get gather up the women and children, let's get out of the city, like we need to flee whatever, or depending on the way they were running back. They might be coming back with a good report. Good news. And so that's what you have the who is that that I'm trying remember, is that the prophet Isaiah, yeah, that says how beautiful upon the mountains or the feet of him who brings good news. And so that kind of idea is, as that person came back with a good report, everybody would go, okay, we can breathe a sigh of relief, like we're gonna be okay. Everything's all right. We're winning the war. It's okay, there was victory. And so that was also considered good news. And so that's kind of the contextual background. And so when we get to the New Testament, then there's kind of different ways that the word gospel is used. And sometimes people get confused, because when you ask a person, what is the gospel? Very common way for people to answer that is by going oh, well, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, right. And that's partially true. Because those are called the Gospels like with an S. And or you might talk about John's gospel, or Luke's Gospel, right? And why are those called the Gospels? Riley?

Riley Forrest: 8:42

Yeah, in a lot of your Bibles, if you go to the beginning of the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, you read at the beginning of it, it says the Gospel according to Matthew, the gospel according to Mark. So it's, it's Mark, Matthew, John Luke, it's their account of the good news of what the gospel is. So it's their accounting of, in their case, what Jesus did, and what they what they were eyewitnesses to, in the ministry and work of Jesus. That's the good news, the gospel that they are giving an account of. So in a sense, they are giving the gospel it is their gospel, so to speak, in a sense that they are the heralds of it, but it's not the that's not the substance of it is not the gospel. They're telling you what it is, right?

Gabe Davis: 9:29

Yeah, exactly. So that's one way that the Bible uses the language of gospel, right is to talk. It's sort of a literary term, and it's referring to the information, the content that's in those particular books. But another way that the the Bible uses the language of gospel is, Well, John the Baptist I wrote down the verse here, John the Baptist says, in Matthew Three, two, he says, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And, and John the Baptist is introduced as, as a guy who's, who's preaching the gospel, who comes to preach the gospel. But that's that's his message, his messages about the kingdom. Or even when we get to Jesus and he begins his ministry, Jesus actually starts and says, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the gospel. Okay, well, a couple of things to think about there. Jesus has not yet died. Jesus has not yet rose again, he has not yet ascended into heaven. And yet he's saying, believe the gospel. And so the question is, then wait a minute, like I thought the gospel had to do with the death and resurrection of Jesus. And so that's kind of another way that the Bible talks about the gospel is, as it relates to the kingdom, and Jesus is talking about the kingdom that the kingdom is at hand, and John the Baptist says, is talking about the kingdom. And so there's this way in which the kingdom is actually connected to this language of the gospel, so much so that Jesus can say, Repent and believe the gospel, and he's talking about the kingdom. He's not saying, Repent and believe that I rose from the dead, because he hasn't risen from the dead, right? And so you want to take a shot at kind of unpacking a little bit, there's obviously a lot can be said about that. But why Jesus could call the by saying, you know, in Mark 115, when he says, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand, so when he says, The kingdom of God is at hand, and he's calling that the gospel, how does the kingdom in a sort of, you know, don't we don't think it's super in depth, but how does the kingdom relate to the gospel?

Riley Forrest: 11:37

Yeah, I, I mean, I've been kind of steeped in this last week, because we just preached on the presence of God, the declaration of the Incarnation, one of those is the presence of God. And when there's a kingdom, the king is there, right? Like, and we look at God's presence throughout the Bible, and we see His presence in Genesis, we see it in Revelation, he's dwelling with his people, the declaration, and in Genesis 21 is Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. And so I think one thing that Jesus is saying here and mark, one is he's saying that God is with you. God has with the man because the King has come, the kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the good news that through this king is the salvation of all centers of all people. Yeah,

Gabe Davis: 12:21

that's right. So there's like a way in which when when Jesus is and John the Baptist is proclaiming the kingdom, there's a way in which this is still kind of cloaked in all of what that's going to mean. Yeah.

Riley Forrest: 12:31

So pointing forward, that's right to the cross. Well, we point back to the cross. Right. So here's what Jesus did. And, and also, here's what he will do a new creation. Before the cross, they're pointing forward and saying, Here's what he will do, He will save us.

Gabe Davis: 12:45

Yeah. And they're tapping into these promises. When Jesus says, The kingdom is at hand. This isn't like, some vague idea. This is the Messianic Kingdom that he's talking about. This is what they would have understood. This is the fulfillment of the promises given to David, that he would have a son who would, from whom the throne would never depart, whose rule would be everlasting. And so Jesus is, is saying, that kingdom that the mess of the Messiah is wrapped up in like, that's at hand. So repent and believe that repent and believe that, that God's promises are breaking in. And this is beginning to unfold right here. And right now. Yeah,

Riley Forrest: 13:24

I mean, from the very first pages of the Bible, we get Gospel we get and we call it the proto un Gillean, the very first gospel in Genesis 315, where God declares that there will be a an offspring of the women to crush the head of the serpent, there will be deliverance for his people, even that far back. That's the first promise we get that God's gonna deliver his people. That's

Gabe Davis: 13:47

right. And so then when we are so Jesus is saying, okay, but I believe that that time has come. Yeah, believe that that time is now believed that those promises that are wrapped up in the Messiah, that that, that God has made, that that time is now that's happening, and, and then we get into Jesus's life, and we see oh, he's not just giving news about some other person. He's not the announcer of the king. He is the king. John the Baptist is the announcer of the king. But Jesus is himself the king. And so then we see through his life and his death and his resurrection. We see how that connects into this gospel of the kingdom because we're seeing how it's possible that the kingdom is going to be established, and we're seeing the king and what he's doing to bring God's people into that kingdom. And so you have then the apostle Paul, who uses the word gospel the most in in the epistles. He now begins just talking about it in terms of particularly in terms of Jesus and His person and his work and what he's accomplished. And it's, it's this announcement of who Jesus is and what he's done. So a couple of things for people to know when we're talking about the gospel. The gospel is not the same thing as your testimony. Right? So like, if if I asked the person, hey, what's the gospel? It's not uncommon for a person to go, Well, when I was a kid, I was raised in church. And, you know, God saved me. And my parents did a good job teaching me about Jesus, and none of that. And they tell you their testimony, which is great, like praise God for that. But that's not the gospel, the gospel is not anything that we've done. The gospel is what Jesus has done. It's an announcement of what he is accomplished, right? So that's one kind of important thing about the gospel is it has to do with Jesus, what he's done, what he's accomplished, who he is, and, and then there's, you know, from there, there's a lot that a different kind of, like, think of it like a diamond, and you're holding it up. And there's lots of different facets and different ways that you could talk about this. But there's some really key elements. So one way to picture this is picture like, I don't know, for me mentally, the thing, the picture that works is like picture a spear. And so you're asking what's the very like tip of the spear? What's the sharpest point of the spear, it's not wrong to call going out a little ways from the point of the spear, the spear, that's still the spear. It's not wrong to like, I don't want to get hit by any of this beer, right? It's all a part of it. But when we talk about sometimes the gospel, it can be really important to just say, okay, so what is the tip of the spear, if you will, and then there are things that flow out from that. But what's kind of the the very point, the very sharpest part of the gospel. And so what you're going to hear us do over the next few minutes is kind of just talked about that, but then also talk about some broader elements of the gospel and some different ways of talking about it. And really, the the hope in this is that anybody who goes to Redeemer would would have practice and understanding of what is the gospel one, because we think that it's believing the gospel that saves us, it's hearing the announcement about who Jesus is and what he's doing, what he's done, and and saying, I believe that I trust him, I believe that I have faith in that, that there's salvation that comes as we believe in the gospel, right. But then also, we don't think it's this thing that then we move past as Christians, we think it's something that we continually return to that believing the Gospel is what impacts our growth in godliness, or holiness. It's what is meant to impact how we relate to one another instrument to impact how we think about the future. It's meant to impact our marriages, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So it's important to understand the gospel. But to think of it as an ever deepening pool, or a just, you know, you can kind of understand that the tip of it, and that's the important thing, the most important thing I should say, but that there's all these other aspects that we don't want to lose, either that all have to do with the gospel. And so I like one pastor says, you know that the gospel is not just the ABCs of Christianity, it's the eighth disease. And I think that's totally right. It encompasses the whole of the Christian life. So let's just talk a little bit about what is that tip of the spear, if you will relate it to the gospel? How would you talk about that rarely.

Riley Forrest: 18:23

I would go to you mentioned the apostle Paul, I would go to the apostle Paul, I'd go to First Corinthians 15 is the passage that jumps out to me. Let me just read that real quick. Yes, starting in verse one, I would remind you brothers of the gospel, I preached to you, which you received in which you stand by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you unless you believed in vain, For I delivered to you as of first importance, what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures that He was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared deceive us then to the 12. So I'd say if we're talking about what's the culminating point, the tip of the spear of the Gospel is that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures. You have to then unpack what Christ is, that's the word for Messiah. MASHIAC. In Hebrew, you have to unpack that a little bit because if Jesus was not God, in the flesh, God incarnate, that it does not matter that he died. But since he was and he lived a perfect sinless life, then he can take the punishment for our sins on himself. He is the propitiation for our senses, as Paul uses elsewhere, and and we can be reconciled to God through the work of Christ. That would be kind of the very tip of the spear to me. Yeah.

Gabe Davis: 19:40

And that Yeah, cuz that's, that's really good. Because I think sometimes another thing that happens is people say, well, the gospel is that God loves you. And that's actually not quite true either. I mean, that's absolute. That's true. That's a good true statement. But that's not the gospel. Because if we if we do that, if we say, well, how does how does the then what We're really asking is, how does the gospel benefit us? And and it's like, Well, God, God loves us. And so then that benefits us in all these different ways, right God, so God saves us. That's not the gospel of God forgives us. That's not the gospel. What we need to understand is when we say, what is the gospel that that is in its most proper form, it's talking about, it's the announcement of who Jesus is and what he's done. Right. So Jesus lived a perfect life. Well, Jesus was, was born. He's truly God, truly man, he lived a perfect life, sinless, live, he went to the cross in our place for our sins, that he died in our place for our sins, and that he rose again. And that that showed that the sacrifice His Atonement, his payment for our sins was received, and that death could not hold Him that He was who He said He was that it vindicated him. And so the gospel is this message of what Christ who Christ is, and, and what he's done, that he ascended to the right hand of the father that he rules and he reigns. So he's the king, He's the Messiah that was promised, and, and now he lives to make intercession for us, and He will return again. And so we go like this is this is who Jesus is, and what he's done that none of that now has to do directly with us. It has to do with what he's done. But very then connected to that, and very important is to go okay, so what is the impact that had on us, because in order for us to receive it as good news, we need to understand then what it was that was actually accomplished, right? And so it's very proper to also then say, well, when when Jesus died in your place for your sins, that means if you trust in Jesus, than you can be forgiven of your sins, you can't you are united to Christ in His death and His resurrection, that you are adopted, that you are reconciled to the Father, that you are given an eternal life like, these are these benefits that come about from who Jesus is and what he's done.

Riley Forrest: 22:07

I mean, you see that in Ephesians, that even though you were dead in your trespasses and sins, God being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved you, even when you were dead. He made you alive together with Christ, you've gone from death to life. And that's the change that the gospel impacts in us.

Gabe Davis: 22:26

Yeah, so that first part of who Jesus is and what he's done, sometimes what will like the fancy theological term for the the sort of tip of the gospel, if you will, it would be justification, that we are justified, meaning there's a way in which we are declared legally righteous legally, that there's not guilt for us. Would would be more proper like that, because of Christ work, then His atoning sacrifice is applied, or rather, our sin was paid, our debt was paid. So like when you when we sing the song that says, Jesus paid it, all right, that's what we're talking about. We're talking about our justification. And so justification is just a word that means Jesus paid for your sin, Jesus paid it all. And so we'd say, okay, like, that's good. But then the gospel is even more and that the gospel is also that he gave us his righteousness, looking at like Second Corinthians 521, when it says, For our sake, he made him to be sin, who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. And so we would say, at the at the tip of that gospel spear is that Jesus didn't just get us to neutral, he didn't just erase our debt and our sin, but that he actually imputed to us his righteousness. So he lived a perfect life. And so one way to think about that is, you know, he didn't just pay our debt, he then credited our account, and with his righteousness, and so that's all wrapped up in that tip of the spear of of the gospel is our justification, our imputed righteousness, that in Christ, we are declared holy before God because we've received that imputed righteousness of Christ that's all kind of wrapped up in the atoning work of Christ and the cross. And that's why, as, as a gospel centered church, we often talk about the cross being central to everything else that we think about and understand is, because that is the very sort of tip of the spear of the gospel, if you will, without it, you don't have a church really? Yeah, without it, we don't have any of the other kind of amazing blessings that result from that. And so what are some what are some of the other kind of aspects of the spear now moving outward to other blessings of the gospel would be some other other things that we might talk about or point to

Riley Forrest: 25:01

I mean it. Well, I think in a way I mentioned one of those already right that we've been raised from death to life. So we didn't no longer under the power of sin. We're now enslaved to righteousness. We've been given the Holy Spirit who indwells us, right?

Gabe Davis: 25:14

Holy Spirit is a part of the Good News of the Gospel Absolutely, because of what Christ has accomplished. But if we say, the holy receiving the Holy Spirit is the gospel, the gospel Well, that's, that's going a little further downstream. That is a benefit of the Gospel is that every person is filled with the Spirit. But when we talk about that kind of very tip of the spear of the gospel, we need to start with Jesus's person and work right, but you're right, anyway. Yeah, absolutely. The Holy Spirit is one of those blessings of the gospel.

Riley Forrest: 25:43

Yeah. Are you talking about something different? No, no, no, exactly. We're talking about blessings of the gods. Yeah. Yeah. So the Holy Spirit's indwelling his his work in our lives, the the gifts that were given through the Holy Spirit, those are all blessings of the gospel. The church is a blessing of the gospel. Yeah, absolutely. You know, that's how we, that's God's means for spreading his His Word and His light and his kingdom in the world in this age. And so that's a definitely a blessing of the Gospels, right? discount that? Yeah.

Gabe Davis: 26:11

Yeah, the, you know, then then there's like a way that you can tell the gospel. Well, I like the way that some people break it down. They have it, I alluded to this, but one way that I was kind of taught to think about this was the gospel proper, which is the announcement. So that's, that's the announcement of Jesus Christ, the Son of God lived a perfect life in our place. Right, those things that we're talking about that is substitutionary death on the cross for our sins, He rose triumphantly from the grave to launch God's new creation and is now exalted as the king of the world. Okay. That's the great gospel, proper announcement. And then that calls for a response, right? Repentance, mourning over our sin, trading our agenda for Jesus's agenda, turning in faith to suffocation to Christ, right, it calls for this response, because Jesus is the King. And so we're meant to now respond to that reality. And then there's sometimes what's called the Gospels context, or the story of Scripture. And that's kind of that, like, when we think about our liturgy, right, that's more that that gospel liturgy, so just walk us through what I mean by that. And that terminal gospel. Yeah, like the Gospel story.

Riley Forrest: 27:22

Yeah. And sometimes you'll hear us refer to this as biblical theology. It's, it's, it's God's story, looking at the Bible as as a whole. And not just focusing on one part, but looking at what God's doing through all of history. And so the the gospel categories that we've used to talk about that as creation, fall, redemption and new creation, so creation, starting with just who God is, and what he has done, looking at creation itself. So God has actually created everything, he owns everything, he's all powerful, a lot of these attributes of God in that way. That would be the category of creation. Fall would be looking at, we've looked at with creation, who God is, then fall we look at who man is, why is the relationship between God and man, broken, we see that in, in the fall of Adam and Eve, and then working out through through all of history until we get to Jesus, and redemption. And this act that we're talking about now. It's just really the pinnacle of the gospel proper, as you say. And then what does that accomplish it accomplishes God being able to dwell with His people in new creation. And so we were promised that all things will be made new and restored, and God's people will be in God's place under God's rule and God's blessing, which is kind of the tagline of that answer. Yeah.

Gabe Davis: 28:37

Yeah. And so like, when you think about the gospel proper, when we talk about, what is it that I must believe, to be saved? That tends to be what we're talking about? Is that like, tip of the spear gospel proper, this announcement of who Jesus is and what he's done. But then some people they they rightly want to say, well, but hold on the gospel actually went beyond just that moment, because like you mentioned earlier, Genesis 315, we have this first kind of declaration of the gospel, and God declares that this this promise and, and so there's another way to talk about the gospel, which is this bigger story. And it's to look at scripture and to say, okay, all of Scripture is telling a story, a true story of, of what God is doing to redeem His people and the whole context of why what Jesus accomplished on the cross is so significant. And so you say, Okay, well, how would you tell that story? Well, you can tell the story and sometimes with kids, this is actually a better way at helping them understand the gospel is you tell the Gospel story. And so you say things like, Well, God created human beings in His image meaning to display him in to represent some of his attributes in the world. God created men and women in his image, and and then we fell we sin we disbelieved God. We were held against God. And so because of that the image of God in us was was marred it was it was twisted and distorted. And now we didn't represent God that we were supposed to. So sin entered the world, but God originally created the world good. And he had purposes for it and intention for it. And we were supposed to be a significant part of that plan. But because of sin, that that got jacked up, our purpose got jacked up. And, and so sin distorts everything, it's a it's like a parasite. It's like mold on bread or rust on pipe, you know, it's, it's this distortion, it's this parasitic thing that's now clinging to us. And so it's distorting what God's agenda and plan was for the world and in our lives. And so there's but there's this hope that eventually, someone is going to come, the Messiah, and he is going to bring about redemption, He is going to restore God's people to fellowshipping with him, and he's going to restore the image of God, being represented through them. And in this original plan and purpose that God had for his people and, and for you and for the world is going to be restored and redeemed because of this person. And so then we get to redemption in the story of Jesus and what he did, and again, who he is and what he's done, and, and how we accomplish that we go yay, okay, like, the Messiah came and the Gospel. And the good news is, we're seeing the pinnacle of that. And then, and then that moves into new creation. And this, this idea that we're not it didn't stop there, it's actually now headed back to this, this new Eden in this, God fellowshipping with man and us living in unbroken relationship with him, and sin being this parasite being forever and completely taken away from us. And even now, through the work of the Spirit and our union with Christ. This, our image of God is by grace, restoring something of our our nature and something of our imaging of God. And so we we live lives that are now have purpose and meaning and are connected to that original purpose and meaning God had for us because we're united to Christ. And so there's this big, overarching way in which we say, this is the big gospel narrative of everything that God intended to do, that he planned to do, how sin messed it up how Jesus came and healed and fixed and restored, redeemed. And because of that, where we're going and what God's plan is for the future, that's that big overarching, here's the Gospel story, of which the tip of the spear is the sort of crux, you know, intended language intended there of the story, and, and is the cross The cross is the pinnacle moment in that story. And so that's where everything kind of the hinge point of the story going forward. So anyway, so you can talk about the gospel proper. You can talk about the gospel context, or the story of Scripture. And then you can talk about the Gospels purpose, like, so what was the gospel? What Jesus what Jesus accomplished? Like, what was it? What was it doing? What was it achieving, to achieve something? And we'd say, well, yeah, it achieved, creating an outpost of God's kingdom, in this world, that the Kingdom broke in, and that the church now serves as this picture of the kingdom of God. And the church is not the kingdom. But it is a picture of God's kingdom. And it's through the church that Jesus is rule is represented on earth, and that there's this way in which God's original agenda is being achieved. And so like the gospel accomplished something, and it continues to accomplish something, yeah,

Riley Forrest: 33:39

Luke wrote the Gospel according to Luke and also acts, yeah, in the beginning of Acts, he gives this little dedication and says, To Theopolis, and in my first book, he's talking about his gospel account, I told you the things that Jesus began to do, right. And the idea there is that it's not done with with the cross, Jesus is still at work in the world through his church, and we get to see how that changed the entire world in the book of Acts, and then in our world today. Yeah, you're exactly right, that it's tiny outposts. And what does it accomplish what it accomplishes, the problem being solved, is God cannot dwell with His with a sinful people, right? And Jesus, with his redemption and his work on the cross, solve that problem by by accomplishing that reconciliation, by triumphing over sin and death so that God's people could well with him as they were meant to. So

Gabe Davis: 34:36

I think those can be three helpful categories in my mind to kind of understand the Gospels think of the gospel proper, which is the announcement of who Jesus is and what he's done. And then think of the Gospel story and that's the storyline of Scripture and kind of the context of, of that gospel proper announcement. And, and then think of that third category which is, so what is the gospel will actually accomplishing what is it doing? What is that announcement? What is the result of that announcement? What's the effect of it on the world? What's the effect of it on individuals? And how are we then? You know, fourthly, How then are we called to respond in light of the gospel. And so when we talk about like, our obedience, obedience is not the same thing as the gospel. Obedience is fruit of the gospel, you know, so when we talk about the importance for a Christian to be baptized, well, that's fruit that results from the gospel, it's not in and of itself, the gospel that is a obedient outworking of the gospel. When we talk about obey the gospel, Peter uses that language that's talking about, act in such a way live in such a way that your obedience is is a response to who Jesus is and what he's done, and all the implications of that. Right. So here's what we're gonna do for the rest of the podcast, I have a couple of, I thought this might be kind of cool, have a couple of some old timey ones, from some folks that have since passed on, and then some more recent folks. And I just want to read to you some definitions of the gospel that these guys give. And, and they took time, you know, they wrote these down, and we're just kind of talking about these things. But I would encourage you to, here's some homework, I would encourage you to write your own, it could be a paragraph, just write your own definition, maybe based off of some of the stuff you're hearing or whatever, but just write a definition of the gospel, what is the gospel, and then bring that to, you could bring that to your community group leader, you could bring that to your community group, you could bring that to your pastors, and allow us to help like, shape that and help you think about that, and, and maybe memorize some scripture that would support that. And I think it'd be awesome if every person in this church had a sort of memorized, you know, one to two minute way that they could talk about what the gospel is. It could be short, it doesn't have to be a big huge page. In fact, I think it's probably better than it not be. But just a paragraph would be great. That helps you kind of think through what is the gospel? What is it that we are declaring and saying all of our hope rests in and so I'm going to read to you a couple of definitions, some some folks give for the gospel, and maybe it'll spark some ideas or some, maybe it'll be a helpful prompt to you as you think about defining the gospel. So the first one I'll give you, I gotta go with scroll. This one's a little bit longer. But let me give you this one, he says there is no greater message to be heard than that which we call the gospel. That is important as that is, it is often given to Matt given two massive distortions or oversimplifications. People think they're preaching the gospel to you. And they tell you, you can have a purpose to your life, or that you can have meaning to your life. Or that you can have a personal relationship with Jesus. All of those things are true, and they're all important, but they don't get to the heart of the gospel. The gospel is called the good news, because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings. And that problem is simply this, God is holy, and he is just, and I am not, at the end of my life, I'm going to stand before it just and holy God, and I'll be judged. And I'll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness, or lack of it, or the righteousness of another. The good news of the Gospel is that Jesus lived a perfect life of righteousness. He lived a life of perfect obedience to God, not for his own well being but for his people. He has done for me what I couldn't possibly do for myself. But not only has he lived that life of perfect obedience, He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God. The great misconception in our day is this, that God isn't concerned to protect his own integrity. He's a kind of wishy washy deity who just waves a wand of forgiveness over everybody. No, for God to forgive you is a very costly matter. It costs the sacrifice of His own Son. So that's the I think I'm got a page out of order here. I'm not sure but that's, uh, that's, that's what Sproul says, Riley, anything you want to add to that?

Riley Forrest: 39:12

How can you add to scroll?

Gabe Davis: 39:17

Okay, I think I found the second part of the page, it says, so valuable was that sacrifice the god pronounced it valuable by raising Him from the dead so that Christ died for us. He was raised for our justification. So the gospel is something objective. It is the message of who Jesus is and what he did. And it also has a subjective dimension. How are the benefits of Jesus subjectively appropriated to us? How do I get it? The Bible makes it clear that we are justified not by our works, not by our efforts, not by our deeds, but by faith and by faith alone. The only way you can receive the benefit of Christ's life and death is by putting your trust in Him and Him alone. You do that you're declared just by God and you're adopted into his family. You're forgiven of all of your sins and you begin, you have begun your pilgrimage toward eternity. So that's that's Sproul. That's a good way to start us off. Yeah, I'm glad you don't have anything to add to that. That's why we'll actually see. But I think part of the benefit of some of these different things I'm going to read to you guys, as I want you to see just some of the different facets and sort of shades of nuance or the different dimensions of this beautiful diamond of the gospel. Craig Bartholomew says, gospel from the Old English Godspell good tale means good news. And this is the best news there can be in Jesus, the kingdom of God has come. Alistair beg, says, here's the gospel in a phrase, because Christ died for us. Those who trust in Him may know that their guilt has been pardoned, once and for all. What will we have to say before the bar of God's judgment? Only one thing Christ died in my place? That's the gospel. Martin Luther says at its briefest, the gospel is a discourse about Christ, that He is the Son of God and became man for us that He died and was raised and that he has been established as Lord over all things. This much St. Paul takes in hand and spies out in his epistles, he bypasses all the miracles and incidents in Christ's ministry, which are set forth in the four gospels. It includes the whole gospel adequately and abundantly. This may be seen clearly and well and his greeting to the Romans, where he says what the gospel is, and then declares, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand, through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures, the Gospel concerning his son, who was descended from David according to the flesh, and designated Son of God and power, according to the spirit of holiness, by His resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ, our Lord. There you have it. The gospel is a story about Christ, God's and David's son, who died and was raised and is and is established as Lord. This is the gospel in a nutshell. That's Luther. Got you want to think just read a couple more?

Riley Forrest: 42:08

Yeah, keep going. We couple more. Yeah. Okay. Got a couple more, I have too little of

Gabe Davis: 42:12

the gospel. I'm going to read to you this is a guy named Jeremiah Burroughs, old Puritan writer. Here's what he says, the gospel of Jesus Christ in general is this is the good tidings that God has revealed concerning Christ. More largely it is this, as all mankind was lost in Adam, and became the children of wrath put under the sentence of death god, though he left his fallen angels, and has reserved them and chains of eternal darkness, yet he has thought upon the child, the children of men, and as provided a way of atonement to reconcile them to himself again, namely, the second person of the Trinity, takes man's nature upon himself, and becomes the head of a second covenant, standing charged with sin, He answers for it by suffering with the law and divine justice required. And by making satisfaction by keeping the law perfectly, which satisfaction and righteousness, He tenders up to the Father as a sweet savour of rest for the souls that are given to him. And now this meditation of Christ is by appointment of the Father preached to the children of men, of whatever nation or rank freely offering this atonement unto centers for atonement, requiring them to believe in him and upon believing him believing, promising not only a discharge of all their former sins, but that they shall not enter into condemnation, that none of their sins or unworthiness shall ever hinder the peace of God with them, but that they shall through him be received into the number of those who shall have the image of God again, to be renewed unto them, and they shall be kept by the power of God, through faith and to salvation. I know some of that language might be a little tough to kind of take in that older language. But again, he's hitting some of those same kinds of themes that we've been talking about. Chris Well, WA Criswell says this, the message from our Lord Himself is that Christ suffered and was raised from the dead, and that remission of sins should be preached in his name to all people. That is the good news. That is the message that is the gospel. Robert Gulick says this, the answer to our dilemma of how the gospel of the kingdom and the gospel of the cross relate is that the gospel of the cross is integral to the gospel of the kingdom, if we understand both to mean expression of the same gospel, namely as a as promised the gospel of God. The Gospel then is the message God acted in and through Jesus Messiah, God's Anointed One to affect God's promise of shalom of salvation, God's reign. That is the gospel. Couple more. Got a couple of recent couple more recent ones give you give you some older folks, here's some some newer ones. Pastor Mark Devere, Capitol Hill Baptist church, he says this, here's what I understand the good news to be the good news is that the one and only God who is wholly made us into His image To know him, but we sinned and cut ourselves off from him. In His great love, God became a man in Jesus, he lived a perfect life and died on the cross, thus fulfilling the law himself and taking on himself the punishment for the sins of all those who would ever turn and trust in Him. He rose again from the dead, showing that God accepted Christ's sacrifice, and that God's wrath against us had been exhausted. He now calls us to repent of our sins and to trust in Christ alone for our forgiveness. If we repent of our sins and trust in Jesus, were born again into a new life and eternal life with God. Now, that is the good news. And then I got to I can't go on without mentioning what da Carson says, da Carson, who's a excellent theologian, if you're not familiar with him, I highly recommend them to you. Da Carson says this, he says, The Gospel is integrally, integrally, I can't say that word very well. Tied to the Bible storyline, indeed, is incomprehensible without understanding that storyline. God is the sovereign, transcendent and personal God who has made the universe including us his image bears, our misery lies in our rebellion, our alienation from God, which despite his forbearance attracts his implacable wrath. But God precisely because love is of the very essence of his character, takes the initiative and prepared for the coming of his own son by raising up a people who by covenantal stipulations, Temple worship, systems of sacrifice and of priesthood by kings and my prophets are top something of what God is planning, and what he expects. In the fullness of time his son comes and takes on human nature, he comes not in the first instance to judge but to save, he dies the death of his people, he rises from the grave, and then returning to his heavenly Father, he bequeaths, the Holy Spirit as the downpayment and guarantee of the ultimate gift he has secured for them, and eternity of bliss in the presence of God himself, and a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. The only alternative is to be shut out from the presence of this God forever in the torments of hell. What men and women must do before it is too late is repent, and trust Christ, the alternative is to disobey the gospel. And then he summarizes First Corinthians 15 says, The Gospel is Christological. That means it's Christ centered. The gospel is theological meaning it's about God. The Gospel is biblical. The gospel is apostolic. The gospel is historical, the gospel is personal, the gospel is universal. And the gospel is eschatological, which means has to do with all of where history is headed, and, and the end of things. That's da Carson. So

Riley Forrest: 47:43

nothing against sprawl, but Carson's knock it out. Yeah, that sounds really good. You can hear through all of those those common themes, especially of tracing the Gospel story, and hearing those themes of creation and fall, redemption and new creation. That's why we structure things that way, because it is a very common way to I mean, it it's not a common way. It's God's story like that. It's that's why it's in there. The other thing that I that I noticed as you're reading those, is there's a good emphasis on not only a lot of times, you'll hear when you have an early conception of the gospel, you'll hear what is the gospel, it's the Jesus Christ came to and died on a cross save me from my sense, right. And one thing that's missing from that is Jesus Christ was God and lived a perfect sinless life. And then you can move on to he died on the cross to save you from your sins. Because if you didn't live a perfect, sinless life, right, there's no it doesn't matter that wouldn't have satisfied the life death, burial resurrection. Exactly. Yeah. So don't just skip over Jesus's life and go to death resurrection. Remember that he did live an entire life on this earth seamlessly.

Gabe Davis: 48:50

Yeah, right. I feel like I left one person out and I feel like I need it. Okay. This will be my concluding one is John Piper, John Piper, who has done a lot to further our understanding of the gospel. He says, the heart of the gospel is the good news that Christ died for our sins and was raised from the dead. What makes us good news is that Christ's death accomplished a perfect righteousness before God, and suffered a perfect condemnation from God, both of which are counted as ours through faith alone, so that we have eternal life with God and the new heavens and the new earth. The Gospel of Christ is the good news that at the cost of his son's life, God has done everything necessary to enthrall us with what will make us eternally and ever increasingly happy, namely himself. The gospel is the news that Jesus Christ, the righteous one died for our sins, and rose again eternally triumphant over all his enemies, so that there is now no condemnation for those who believe, but only everlasting joy. The gospel is the good news of our final and full enjoyment of the glory of God in the face of Christ that hid this enjoyment had to be purchased for sinners at the cost of Christ's life. makes his glory shine all the more brightly. And that this enjoyment is a free and unmerited gift makes it shine more brightly still. But the price Jesus paid for the gift and the unmerited freedom of the gift or not the gift, the gift is Christ Himself as the glorious image of God seen and savored with everlasting joy. I wouldn't even had to say that that was from Piper, there's just some words that you'd be like, oh, yeah, that's Piper. But yeah, I mean, this is this is the gospel that we say is we want our church we want Redeemer to be centered on this is the gospel that we don't believe we ever move past as Christians. It's the Gosh, shit

Riley Forrest: 50:38

here we can week out, yeah, every sermon, every service, you should hear the gospel. That's right.

Gabe Davis: 50:43

And it doesn't mean that it will always hit every single nuance aspect in every single facet of the gospel. Because maybe hopefully, even what you're hearing in those quotes is just the bigness of the gospel. And but we we want to be a church that is centered on the reality of the Good News of who Jesus is and what he's done. And then the benefit that that is to us, we want to talk about that all the time. We want to talk about our community groups, you want to talk about that on Sunday morning, we want to be formed in that Gospel story. And so that's that's really what our our church is aimed at. That's what we mean when we say we're a gospel centered church. Yeah, amen. Yeah. Well, hopefully that's helpful to you. I don't know. Like you said, Riley, I don't think you can get enough gospel. So my encouragement to you would, because it's so easy for us to stray from the gospel. I think it's so easy for us to stray into legalism, or works or all of the things, even good things, things that were meant to do ways of being obedient. But as Christians, we need to continually come back to who is Jesus and what is he done. And otherwise, our obedience very quickly departs from worship, a worship, full response, and it becomes just something we're trying to do, often to try to fill the place of what Jesus has already done. And so our belief is that we need to continue to preach the gospel to ourselves daily. And so I'd encourage you make make that a, a exercise for you to do make that some homework, maybe from the, from the other end of this podcast, do it as a family, ask your your lead your family through this if you're listening to this and, and you help your kids understand the gospel. That those are all important. We'd hope applications from knowing what the gospel is. So thank you. Thanks for listening. Hope it was a blessing to you to consider the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ.