Gabe said...
Gabe mentioned "the gospel" which literally means "good news." If you ask 10 Christians was the Gospel is, you are likely to get 10 different answers. Often it's some form of the gospel of sin management like the churches that Gabe mentioned above who are only interested in changing behavior. A friend of mine was driving by a church recently whose sign read "free tickets to heaven, details inside." So apparently there's also the gospel of free tickets to heaven. Is this what the gospel is? Free tickets to heaven? What do we do after we get our tickets?
I'm more interested in what the gospel means to Jesus, then what it means to Christians. To answer this question, we must first understand that Jesus spoke these words to specific people, in a specific place, at a specific time. If you take any one's words out of the context in which they were spoke, you will likely end up with a very different message then the one intended.
Jesus described his own mission as proclaiming the Good news of the Kingdom of God. I mentioned in an earlier post how this is the exact same language that was used as political propaganda to refer to Caesar and the Roman Empire. It was Caesar who first proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God, not Jesus. Jesus intentionally used this same expression to convey that He was the Messiah which Israel longed for to save them from the oppressive empires.
Jesus' titles the Christ or the Messiah both mean anointed one. In Israel's history prophets, priests and kings are all anointed with oil to symbolize their divine calling and empowerment. King David, the most victorious military leader in Israel's history, was commonly referred to as the anointed one. After King David, prophets predicted the coming of another anointed one that would bring salvation to Israel and then the entire world. In the first century the salvation that Israel longed for was not a spiritual salvation, but a political one. The Roman empire occupied Israel, and Israel longed for their Messiah to bring them salvation from their enemies. When Jesus shows up proclaiming the the good news of the Kingdom of God he was intentionally going head-to-head with the power and authority of Rome. He was claiming to be the legitimate agent of God's Kingdom which Caesar pretended to be. Jesus invited all who heard His message to repentance (turn around, receive a new paradigm) in order to participate in the Kingdom of God.
With our American focus on individualism and democracy we need to unpack some of this to get at the heart of Jesus' invitation. In the United States we have set up a system to balance power because we recognize the danger of giving total power and authority to one individual. Balance of power and checks and balances are so ingrained in us that we hear Jesus use a word like kingdom and anything but a kingdom comes to mind. A kingdom is not a democracy. A kingdom is not a blending of it's citizens' desires. A kingdom is an extension of the will of the king. By will I mean intent, desire, plans, purposes, aim, direction, etc. In a strong kingdom, the king give the orders, the orders filter through the ranks, and finally somebody (maybe hundreds of miles away) obeys the order; exercises the will of the king.
Through communication the king makes his will known. The king reveals his will through words. A major theme throughout scripture is the Word of God. The Word of God is the revealed will of God. The Word of God is the Active Voice of God. The Active Voice of God isn't the bible, although God does speak through the bible. Many Christians today are much more comfortable trusting scripture then they are the Active Voice of God. This is very ironic since scripture is a history of people encountering and learning to trust the Active Voice of God. God has given us scripture to help us learn how to tune into and trust His Voice, not to replace our need His Active Voice.
In Genesis, the first book of the bible, we find God speaking creation into being with His Word. He says, "let there be light" and there is light. Creation obeys His Word. Then something very curious happens. God creates humanity in His own image by sharing two gifts: His Life (Breathe, Spirit) and His Word (Active Voice, Revealed Will). God creates humanity with a unique capacity for language, not shared by the rest of creation, out of His desire to relate with us in a special way. God then gave us the option of choosing whether to obey His Voice or not. He explains to the first humans that for them to share His Life, they must obey His Word. They are warned that if they do not obey His Word they will no longer share His Life. In other words, He doesn't force them to remain in Heaven, if gives them the option of creating Hell.
By rejecting God's Voice, humanity rejected sharing God's Life. This created quite a problem: humanity couldn't share in the Life of God again with perfectly obeying the will of God, and we couldn't perfectly obey the will of God without sharing in the Life of God. For thousands of years God pursued us, preparing a people who would once again experience the goodness of His Word and His Life (eternal life).
"The Word of God became flesh, and made His dwelling among us..." (Gospel of John, chapter 1, verse 14)
Jesus entered the world as a seed of the Kingdom of God. Jesus came as a Kingdom of One, perfectly surrendered to the Will of God (He is the will of God) and totally filled with the Power of God. Israel had hoped for salvation from the will of Caesar; God offered them a chance from to be saved from the every will that would oppress them. Scripture promises us that one day Jesus will dethrone every Caesar that enslaves others with their evil wills. However, the first oppressive king He had to dethrone in my life was me. The good news of the kingdom of God is that God's not only willing and able to save us from every single oppressive external king, but that He'll set us free from that internal tyrant too!
The essential Christian creed is, "Jesus is Lord." When we hear "Jesus is Lord" and it finally sounds like good news then we have finally discovered the gospel of Jesus.
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I grew up in a very judgmental and legalistic denomination and my current pastor put it in perspective for me. He said, "It's my job to tell you about the gospel -- not to compel you to behave according to it." Whereas the other church would beat you over the head with the message that you had to be holy or risk going to hell. I can't stand churches whose agenda is to change people's behavior.