What is the gospel?

What the Bible says

"Gospel" translates the Greek euangelion, "good news." News is different from advice. Advice says, "Do this." News says, "This has happened." When a runner came from the battlefield to announce a victory, he did not tell the city what to do; he told it that the fight was already won. The Bible's gospel is news of that kind. Isaiah sang of it long before Christ.

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, “Your God reigns!”

Isa 52:7

"Your God reigns" is the content of the news. The New Testament announces that this reign has arrived in Jesus. Mark opens his book with the word.

This is the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

Mark 1:1

And the first thing Jesus himself proclaimed was this same news.

After the arrest of John, Jesus went into Galilee and proclaimed the gospel of God. “The time is fulfilled,” He said, “and the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe in the gospel!”

Mark 1:14-15

Here is the first face of the gospel: God's rule has begun among people with the coming of Jesus. In Luke he says that this is why he was sent (Luke 4:43). The news carries an invitation with it, to turn and trust.

But the king of this kingdom came to his throne by way of a cross. Paul gives the Corinthians the shortest summary of the gospel, and he says he is passing on what he himself received.

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,

1 Cor 15:3-4

Christ died, was buried and was raised, and his death was "for our sins." Jesus himself said that he came "to give His life as a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). So the announcement of the kingdom and the announcement of the cross and resurrection are not two gospels. They are one piece of news: the king has come, taken our sin on himself, defeated death, and opened the door of his kingdom.

Paul says of this news:

I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, first to the Jew, then to the Greek.

Rom 1:16

The gospel is itself "the power of God." It is not a method by which we bring about our salvation but the announcement that God has brought it about, and when it is spoken, God moves people. That is why Paul can also call it a proof of love: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Rom 5:8).

The church's witness

From the beginning the church memorised this news in short confessions. The Apostles' Creed, which grew out of the questions put to candidates for baptism, confesses that Christ suffered, died, was buried and rose on the third day The Apostles' Creed. The church called the four books that tell this news "Gospels": one gospel told by four writers.

Matthew Henry comments on Mark 1:15: "By repentance we give glory to our Creator whom we have offended; by faith we give glory to our Redeemer who came to save us from our sins." Christ has joined the two together, he adds, and no one should think to put them asunder Matthew Henry. On Romans 1:16-17 he writes, "Faith is all in all, both in the beginning and progress of Christian life." Matthew Henry The gospel is not something heard once at the door and then left behind; it is the ground on which a believer stands for life.

The Heidelberg Catechism asks in its first question what the Christian's only comfort is, and answers that in life and in death I belong, body and soul, not to myself but to my faithful Saviour, Jesus Christ Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 1. The gospel was comfort before it was doctrine.

Churches still differ over emphasis. Some traditions put forgiveness and justification at the centre; others lead with the proclamation that Jesus is king and God's kingdom has begun. Both accept Mark 1 and 1 Corinthians 15 as quoted above. The difference is which side of the news is spoken first, not which side is denied.

In the original languages

Euangelion (εὐαγγέλιον) originally meant a reward given to the bringer of good news, and then the news itself. In the Roman world the word, often in the plural, was used for news of an emperor's birth, accession or victories; an inscription from Priene, from about 9 BC, hails the birthday of Augustus as the beginning of good news for the world. Many scholars hear in the Christian use a quiet challenge: the true king's good news concerns Jesus. Others stress that its deeper root is Isaiah's "good tidings." The verb euangelizomai (εὐαγγελίζομαι) is tied to the Hebrew basar (בָּשַׂר), "to bear tidings," in Isaiah 52:7.

When Jesus says "repent and believe," "repent" is metanoeo (μετανοέω), to change one's mind and turn around. "Believe" is pisteuo (πιστεύω), which reaches past agreeing that something is true to entrusting oneself to it. The gospel is news to be understood and news to be relied on.

Common objections

"Jesus preached the kingdom and the Father's free forgiveness; the cross as atonement was Paul's invention." At its strongest the objection notes that the first three Gospels speak far more of the kingdom than of Jesus' death, that the father in the parable of the prodigal son forgives without any sacrifice, and that Paul's letters, written before the Gospels, give the cross a weight Jesus' sayings seldom do. The difference of emphasis is real. But Paul says he is handing on what he "received," and many scholars, sceptical ones included, date that summary within a few years of the crucifixion. He adds that the other apostles preach the same: "Whether, then, it was I or they, this is what we preach" (1 Cor 15:11), and he said it while they were alive to contradict him. The ransom saying and the Last Supper words, "This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many" (Mark 14:24), put this meaning on Jesus' own lips, though some hold that Mark was shaped by Paul. The evidence does not compel, but it gives good reason to read the kingdom and the cross as one story.

"Telling people they need saving is pressure, a way to make them feel guilty." The church has sometimes spread this news by threat and force, and that must be admitted. But the gospel is good because it offers forgiveness freely to those who cannot pay. Jesus' first words were not "You are sinners" but "the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near." Sin explains why the news is needed; it is not where the news begins. And trust cannot be forced; it can only be a free answer. The gospel is always an invitation, and the listener is free to decline it.

Going further

It is common to hear the gospel as a method for a better life. The Bible's gospel is not a list of things we must achieve but news of something already done. That matters, because news is true whatever our performance. So it is addressed alike to the person who is trying hard and to the person who has failed and is tired.

You might ask yourself: Have I known Christianity mainly as rules to keep, or as news of an event? What does "the kingdom is near" mean in my own life? What would it change if I trusted the news?

To read further, see Why did Jesus have to die?, What is repentance? and What is grace? Reading the Gospel of Mark through in one sitting is a good place to begin.