Explaining The Gospel In Five Minutes?

Dr D A Carson, a noted New Testament scholar, is asked: 

'How would you explain the gospel in five minutes to someone who has no understanding of God, Jesus or sin?'

Carson clearly recognises that for many people in present, Western society the terms of the Christian gospel as used 30 years ago are no longer familiar. People typically don't know the Bible has two Testaments, the Old and the New. That the Old is primarily about the Messiah's people, Israel; the New Testament is about the Messiah and his New people, the Church made up of Jew and Gentile.


Words like God, creation, sin, judgement, sacrifices, prophecy, leading up to Jesus's death and resurrection, the coming of the Holy Spirit and the founding of the Church are far from the thoughts of many today.

If people had the background they had 80 years ago gained through religious instruction in school and Sunday School the one could say something like this:

There is but one God who made us, who is sovereign over all and is our final judge. This God finds our rebellion against him entirely unacceptable and hence, stands over against us in judgement. Consequently we ought to fear him. But mercifully, he is also a God of love who is prepared to reconcile us to himself by sending his Son to bear our sins in his body on the cross and to rise from the dead.

But says Carson, most of these words are going to go over the top of people's heads. We cannot begin as Paul did in Antioch when he spoke in the synagogue to hearers who had the background of the Old Testament (Acts 13.16-41). 

We may have to take Paul's address at the Areopagus in Athens (Acts 17.16-34) as a better pattern for speaking to those without any Christian background says Carson. Paul starts with their altar to the UNKNOWN GOD and proclaims his nature and actions to his hearers. He is the creator who has made the world and everything in it. As he is Lord of heaven and earth he doesn't live in man-made temples as though he needs anything for he is the One who gives to all things, life, breath and all things.

He made men determining their 'times' and the 'places where they should live' (NIV). He did this so that men would seek him, reach out for him though he is not far from any of us. Paul then quotes from pagan writings to reinforce the point that we live in him (v. 28a) and are God's offspring (v. 28b).

Being God's offspring, says Paul, should make us aware that God is not man-made in an image of gold, silver or stone. Although God has overlooked this ignorance [among the Gentiles] he now commands all everywhere to repent. A day is appointed for judgement which will come through the appointed man authenticated by God's raising him from the dead.

I'm not suggesting that this outline should be followed word-for-word. What Paul shows us, I think, is the importance of adapting what we say to others' thought-world or world-view starting with what we appear to share in common. However, his message becomes confrontative in various ways and ends with the need for repentance in the face of God's coming judgement.    

What I think is good about Carson's short response above is his pastoral suggestion of inviting interested folk as well as new Christians to view DVDs similar to what he has produced where he goes through the Bible in 14 one-hour weeks. He uses simple headings for the sections of the Bible and covers it from Genesis to Revelation.

The series is entitled, The God Who Is There and it's available free so check it out.

Preaching the Word of the Gospel

I want to pause from outlining the Anglican Service of Holy Communion and examine the question of the preaching the Gospel in this service. Sometimes it can be too easy for preachers to re-tell a bible story and with that re-telling intersperse a number of moral exhortations.

However entertaining this action may be, it is not preaching the gospel.

It is presenting a moralistic discourse with lots of ethical crumbs which don't add up to the solid food of the whole Word of God. Ethical urgings are just a form of law after all.

Nor by that comment am I disparaging the law. 'The law is holy and the commandment is holy, righteous and good' (Rom 7.12). To be opposed to the Law is to fall into the error of antinomianism (anti-, nomos [law]). But keeping the law cannot save us. The law simply arouses our sinful desires (Rom 7.5).

Hence, although the law is part of the Word of God unless the gospel of free grace (Eph 2.8, 9) is also preached the congregation will go away believing that it should rely on its own strength to remedy its shortcomings. When that happens, a tragedy has occurred. In other cases, more humble hearts come to believe that there is no hope for them because they simply can't fulfil what the law demands.

And these souls are not far from seeing the kingdom of God's grace because it only remains for them to hear the gospel of grace. The preaching of the gospel of grace is sweet nectar to fallen sinners because what we cannot do Christ has already done (Gal 2.13) in his death and resurrection. But then we have to ask,  
                                                                  so what is the gospel?
      Different Gospel Definitions?
One gospel issue that makes things difficult given that when one reads the first three gospel accounts and then the Pauline letters it's not hard to see that the former speak more about 'the gospel of the Kingdom' (e.g., Mk 1.14-15) of Heaven/God and the latter about gospel of salvation (Eph 1.13) understood as justification (e.g., Rom 3.21-26; 4.25) of the ungodly (Rom 4.5).

More variety than even the above can be found in the New Testament. For example, the fourth gospel account only mentions the Kingdom 5 times but more especially highlights 'eternal life' (e.g., Jn 3.16). Hence, even among the gospel accounts differences occur. And we could go on to talk about other NT books that raise issues about the writer's view of the gospel (e.g., James).

     The Gospel Message and Its Redemptive Effects
One evangelical error about the gospel that they are accused of making according to some writers is that what evangelicals define as the gospel is not really the gospel at all but the plan of salvation! As one blogger puts it: 'the gospel and personal salvation are not the same thing.  And that the gospel isn’t a “plan” as much as it is a Person'.

Now in one respect this blogger is correct. The gospel is embodied in the person of Jesus but to stop there is not to fully resolve the issue between the message and its salvific effects.

     An Attempt at Resolution
First, I think a resolution of some of the confusions about the different approaches by the NT writers is to remember that all the presentations are focussed on the Person of Jesus the Christ and Saviour as has been said. When we speak of the Gospel we are talking about the Gospel concerning Jesus Christ for the Gospel doesn't have any content unless one realises that it's good news about Jesus the One born in Bethlehem.

But in addition to that focus, Jesus' coming was/is good news because His incarnation was the climax of all the Old Testament hopes for salvation. Luke in particular emphasises this salvation theme through the songs of Mary (Lu 1.46-55), Zechariah (Lu 1.67-79), and Simeon (Lu 2.29-32). Also the angels' words to the shepherds (Lu 2.10-11) and the words of John the Baptist (Lu 3.4-6) mention this salvation theme. This salvation show the faithfulness of the God of Israel.

In Luke (4.18f) Jesus preaches in the synagogue that the hope-filled words of Isaiah's prophecy (Isa 61.1) are now fulfilled in his arrival! This focus on Jesus the Saviour continues throughout Luke's gospel account. And of course, Jesus' very name means 'God saves'.

All this says that we shouldn't become hung up on exaggerating the distinction between the gospel and its effects (salvation) because the gospel as salvation is embodied in Christ as the 'saviour of the world' (Jn 4.42); the two go together like love and marriage once did.

[2] The Ministry of The Word

The next major section in the Anglican Holy Communion service is titled, The Ministry of the Word. For evangelicals in particular, this section is the highlight of the service because the Church in this section hears the Word of God read.

On a personal note, in the first Anglican service I attended it was this section of the service that amazed and delighted me. Before that service, I had honestly believed that Anglicans could not be classed as biblical Christians at all but as Romanists (Roman Catholics) who rarely if ever opened their bibles. However, I was confronted with four Scripture readings done with such reverence and solemnity that I hadn't heard delivered in such a way before. And this was in a high Anglican service with crossing and genuflecting!

Of course, I had heard the Scriptures read in former churches but usually just one passage and often that would be truncated. (Nevertheless, I now know that my background furnished me with a knowledge and appreciation for the Scriptures for which I am very grateful. Unfortunately, many Anglicans don't know their Scripture very well but that also applies to non-Conformist worshippers too.)

In services that adhere closely to the Prayer Books, the four readings are set out in a Lectionary which is a booklet produced each year detailing readings laid down for every day of the respective year.

Mark the Evangelist

Anglicans along with Roman Catholics and others, use a 3-year cycle of readings based on allocating a year to one of the synoptic gospels: so that year A is Matthew, year B is Mark, year C is Luke. The present year (2012) is year B so the gospel readings primarily come from Mark. Using the lectionary it is possible to become thoroughly immersed in the scripture as week after week, month after month and year after year the readings are given.

After three years, the whole process starts again with slight variations.

And John? John's account is so highly esteemed in the episcopal traditions that it is included every year.

The Ministry of the Word section has 7 subsections:

§12. Old Testament Reading
         A reader from the congregation will go to the front and read a passage from the Old Testament as it is set down for the day. The particular church's newsletter or 'pew sheet' will usually give the readings. Bibles are usually provided for parishioners to follow the reading should they wish.

In reading from the Old Testament the Christian Church is confessing its dependence upon the Scriptures that Jesus used and said 'testified of me'. We often quote 2 Tim 3.16 but forget perhaps that the Scripture mentioned in that verse is primarily the Old Testament Scriptures.
      
The foundations for the New Testament Scriptures are found in the Old Testament.

After each reading of scripture excluding psalm and gospel, the reader says:

Hear the Word of the Lord or (This is the Word of the Lord)*

Thanks be to God

§13. A Psalm (may also be sung; or a hymn or anthem may be sung)
         The psalms have always been described as the hymn book of the Church.
In one of the churches I attended the congregation would sing the Psalm using standard tunes that have been handed down over centuries. It's quite tricky learning how to sing them because the psalms in English are not written in a way that they can be sung easily. However, the psalms are all found in the Prayer Book of 1978 (AAPB) with markings to allow them to be sung. This style of singing, I understand, is unique to Anglicanism.

However, in many churches today, the psalm is usually said responsively with the leader or with two sides of the congregation. Hebrew poetry which is what the psalms are, lend themselves to this treatment.

§14. A New Testament Reading (other than the gospels)
       Often called the 'Epistle' because excluding the gospel account, the Acts and Revelation, only letters (epistles) remain.

§15. A Hymn is sung
        The lay reader will often say, 'We will sing hymn number ### to welcome the gospel'. This expression of 'welcome' marks the fact that gospel is the centre of Anglican worship.
      
Much emphasis is placed on the reading of the gospel account in Anglican services. For example, for the other readings, the congregation sits but for the gospel reading, unless the church is very 'low', the congregation stands. The standing up is to mark the fact that the gospel is important because it tells us directly about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus our Lord.
      
Moreover, the gospel is often 'processed' meaning that the reading is not done in the pulpit or at the reading lectern but down in the body of the congregation. The procession will involve the crucifer (one carrying the cross), acolytes (two parishioners holding candles), lay reader and priest. However, other combinations are also used.

§16. The Gospel is read

To begin the reader says, The Lord be with you
[people respond] And also with you.

The reader says, The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to . . . [ch . . verse.] 
Glory to you Lord Jesus Christ

          Gospel passage is then read carefully with due reverence.

Reader finishes with, This is the Gospel of the Lord,

[people respond] praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

§17. The Sermon is preached

         Sermon is often based directly on the gospel reading just given. But it may also be on the Old Testament or epistle reading as well. Some preachers try to draw together elements from the other readings. Some will preach on something unrelated to the readings. Sermons vary in length with the evangelical preachers tending to go longer (20-25 mins) than others. This practice is in line with their beliefs. They believe the preaching of the Word converts the soul and is needed in the church as much as outside of it.

After the sermon, silence may follow. At one time, Anglican services were known for their silences. Once one came into the church proper, one learned to treat the space as a place for silence. Unfortunately, not so much today I fear. Silence after the ministry of the Word allows us to catch our breath and meditate even if only for a few minutes on what the Lord might be saying to us.

Click here to read one of the reputedly greatest sermons ever preached. You'll be surprised how long again it was preached and how short it is (and the preacher wasn't even an Anglican!).

§18. Nicene Creed (or Apostles' Creed)

Lay Reader says: Let us together affirm the faith of the Church

and then follows the congregational saying of one of the creeds, usually the Nicene but on other occasions the Apostles' Creed.

Note: You may be considering that this layout up to now would make for a long service but I timed the service to this point this morning and found it was just 35 minutes. However, this time would vary depending on the length of the sermon.

*Choices among different 'calls' to the congregation at this point can probably be related to churchmanship. Liberals would be happier with the more ambiguous 'hear the Word of the Lord' than with the forthright 'This is the Word of the Lord' which would suit evangelicals and conservatives more especially.

What is the Gospel (3)

Of course, I'm wondering with all this whether Scott McKnight has got it right. Certainly a few others think the same way. See here and here for examples. 

Not to say that McKnight isn't a writer to be read and listened to. I think he says some valuable things which the evangelical churches and mainline churches need to hear.

But just a few points that I noticed that I would need more detail about are:

• His distinction between gospel and salvation

I'm not sure that this distinction can be so easily sustained. I appreciate what McKnight is wanting to say: the message of the gospel is not the same as its effects (salvation); gospel doesn't equal salvation because God is more concerned about gospel than salvation it seems. For a theologian who is a theoretician by training distinctions are always important. However, when one gets into church ministry settings I wonder whether such issues have much moment.

Why did Jesus come? Jesus at his coming, 'abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel' (2Tim 1.10, emphasis mine).

In Ephesians, the gospel is called, 'the gospel of your salvation' (Eph1.13) which at least suggests that the link between the two is very close. 

Or further, it might suggest that the gospel is the message of salvation through Jesus the Messiah! Jesus we remember was called 'Jesus' because he was to save the people from their sins (Matt1.21)! Jesus came to seek and to save those who are lost (Luk19.10).

I also wonder whether all the preachers and teachers beginning with the Reformation have been failing to preach the gospel simply because they are concerned about the salvation of their hearers. I don't think so. Rather I believe that when preachers focus on the salvation of the unsaved, they will also preach Jesus as the Messiah, the Saviour of the world.

• Is Jesus always to be preached as the fulfiller of the story of Israel?

We know that Paul didn't always do this type of preaching because of his ministries at Lystra and at the Areopagus. Paul adapts his message [the gospel] to his audience. These two audiences were mainly pagan. However, McKnight still wants to see Israel's story implied in Acts 13. Well I think that's a stretch! And I think it's a stretch to find this suggestion of Israel's history in the Acts 17 passage as well. Paul appeals to Genesis 1 and 2 and to the idolatry subsequent to the Fall but any direct reference to Israel's story is absent. 

It can't be argued that because Paul preached Jesus and the resurrection (Acts 17) that this means he preached about the Story of Israel: that line of argument is clearly begging the question! That's the point McKnight is trying to establish so he can't assume it proven as part of his argument in Acts 17.

I think it better to say that the gospel is adapted to the audience. When hearers know nothing about Israel's story one can then appeal to the God of creation who is also the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Would the preaching of Jesus as the completion of Israel's story be of benefit to those outside the church today? I hardly think that too many within the church would understand the point much less those outside.

• The relevance of the ecumenical creeds

McKnight, it appears, has discovered the Ecumenical Creeds: the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene believing them to support his case. However, even a cursory look at these two creeds shows that McKnight is battling to argue that the creeds solely confess the gospel--as he understands it.

The Nicene says, 'For us and for our salvation/ he came down from heaven'. The creed is saying--just as the scriptures do--that Christ's coming was about sinful humanity; it was for our salvation, our rescue from the power and penalty of sin. And the Apostles' Creed (perhaps formulated originally to be used at baptism hence the use of the first person pronoun) finshes with 'I believe in the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. AMEN'. These are distinctly present and future salvific terms. The Trinity and their work of salvation are confessed as an integral whole.

• 'Story'

This point is more a quibble than anything else but we do have to keep in mind that in talking about 'story' and narrative, we are leaving out the majority of the bible! When we talk about the Bible's story we are talking about a humanly created storyline that theologians have developed about the Bible's content.  Nothing wrong with that in itself. We are all in the same boat. Most of us wish to have some over-reaching theme that covers the Bible's content.

The Bible's text is made up of many different genres: saga, genaealogy, law and ordinance, prophecy, parable, psalm, narrative, epistle, and apocalyptic. Without doubt, a movement from beginning(s) to final consummation exists from Genesis to Revelation. Interestingly, this sweep of history used to be known as 'salvation history', 'covenant history' or 'redemptive history' and all of these terms do give insight into the nature of this history.

It's all right to call it a story or a drama but then we are left with the question as to what is the subject of the dramatic history. What is it about?

As you would expect various answers are given. Redemption, Jesus Christ and covenant are often mentioned. Another favourite is the Kingdom of God.

My point is that just talking about the drama or story of the bible is inadequate because it doesn't furnish us with a theme for the dramatic story.

Let me finish with a summary quote from the last link above proposing the Kingdom of God as the unifying theme/story of the Bible:

Like redemption, the covenant is definitely a unifying theme of the Bible, but it also seems to be inadequate to bring together the full range of Biblical revelation. By itself, the notion of covenant tends to be abstract and difficult to define. What we need is a theme that is broad enough to embrace every major Biblical idea, a theme that includes redemption, gives proper honor to Christ as the Creator and Savior, and also does justice to the centrality of the covenant.

Such a theme is the kingdom of God. In the kingdom of God, all of the other suggested major themes are included and given proper place. In addition, the kingdom of God includes other themes important for our understanding of the Bible, such as creation, the Biblical teaching about angels and demons, the doctrine of final judgment and everlasting punishment. Christ Himself remains a central theme of the Bible because as the King, He is the center of the kingdom, its very essence. Redemption as a central theme is the unfolding drama of God’s restoring the kingdom to its original purpose (p. 5).

What is the Gospel? (1)

Scot McKnight believes that the question, What is the gospel?, is a crucial question for the church. He also believes the church to be confused about the 'real' answer to the question, the biblical answer.

I've not long finished a stimulating book by McKnight, The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited (2011).

Provocatively he argues that Evangelicals (those supposedly concerned about the evangel, the gospel, good news) today are not really evangelical at all! They are more accurately called soterians! (He's coined this word to denote those who are primarily concerned with salvation at the expense of the gospel.)

He believes that evangelicals--and included in this description would be many charismatic and Pentecostal churches as well--have built 'salvation cultures' (p. 29) rather than 'gospel cultures'. The two he affirms are not the same thing even though the former is part of the latter. Once might say that the gospel is the big picture whereas salvation is one of the smaller pictures within that.

So we might ask, So what is the gospel?


He's not quick to answer that until he mentions some of his concerns about modern-day evangelicalism and also the traditional, mainline denominations (one of which I attend).

Starting with the latter first, he says that to baptise babies or young children and then onto confirmation is leading to big problems. In many cases, the baptised are never brought back to church. Their parents don't ever bring them back and hence they never get the instruction preceding confirmation. The mainline, traditional churches generally as we know are slowly dying of old age. They often have 'members' of the church who have never personally believed on Jesus Christ as the Son of God.

But what is happening in the evangelical world is sometimes not much better! Although some sort of personal response is called for and made, those decision-makers don't always go on to become disciples. They come to church perhaps and worship but during the week their discipleship of Christ is lacking. For example, from personal experience I am been shocked by what some 'Christian' converts claiming to be 'born-again' imagine is acceptable moral behaviour.

McKnight does not believe that people should not be challenged to make 'decisions for Christ' and elect to believe on him as the Saviour of the world--what he calls 'the decided' group. But it should not stop there. The 'decided' need to be discipled, to be disciples of Christ.

And yes I know, we still haven't got to the answer to the question of what is the gospel. To do that, McKnight says, we have to distinguish (but not separate) four elements: the Story of Israel/the Bible; the Story of Jesus; the Plan of Salvation; the Method of Persuasion. McKnight states that Evangelicalism, and even Catholicism and Orthodoxy would align the gospel with the Plan of Salvation. Under that understanding, the Plan and the Method are often merged (but that is another issue).

He believes the Story of Jesus as it is embedded in the Story of Israel is essentially the gospel (particularly as we find it in 1 Cor 15.1-8) and in the historic creeds of the church (Apostles' and Nicene Creeds).

Next time I will give an outline of how he arrives at that idea and whether it is sustainable.