16 Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great:The gospel is a declaration of the narrative of Christ's entire life; this gospel is the "mystery of godliness". As we mentioned in the post this week on Ted Campbells' book, the gospel was from the very beginning a narration of God's saving work in the events of Jesus' life and death and resurrection and ascension.He appeared in a body,
was vindicated by the Spirit,
was seen by angels,
was preached among the nations,
was believed on in the world,
was taken up in glory.
My own definition of the gospel, which I articulated first in my book Embracing Grace: A Gospel for All of Us
goes like this and I'd like to know if you think it fits the overall themes of this survey of "gospel" in the New Testament:
The gospel is the work of the (triune) God to form a community of faith in order to restore cracked Eikons through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and the gift of the Pentecostal Spirit to union with God and communion with others for the good of others and the world.
goes like this and I'd like to know if you think it fits the overall themes of this survey of "gospel" in the New Testament:The gospel is the work of the (triune) God to form a community of faith in order to restore cracked Eikons through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and the gift of the Pentecostal Spirit to union with God and communion with others for the good of others and the world.
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Scot,
I have really enjoyed discussions of "gospel" on this blog, and they have shaped my thinking in many ways. However...(oh no)...
I got lost in the details of this word study. It seems that most individual verses using gospel and discussing the gospel actually support the caricature reading: The gospel is the work of the (triune) God to restore cracked Eikons through the death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ to union with God. The other parts of your statement (which I would change only a little) come from reading the whole story - which puts the gospel sound bites in context.
My changes also come from reflecting on the story - not the gospel soundbites.
I need time to think about exactly how I would word it though...
Scot,
Ditto on thanks for this series.
It's funny, though, I had a different take-away than RJS. While there were certainly verses that (rightly) talked about Jesus' death and resurrection, one of the things that struck me from the series was that more often than I anticipated, it was (Jesus as the) "Christ" which was proclaimed--the whole person as the christ-ened king, not just the climax of his victory for God and humanity.
I like your idea that the gospel is essentially everything God is doing towards restoring cracked Eikons (through Jesus, the Spirit, & the people of God). To me, that's the heart of it; that's why all that God does in 'the gospels' and even in Acts is good news. That said, I don't think "forming a community" is, if it was intended to be, enough to incorporate the theme of the kingdom of God in the OT's or NT's "gospels." I tend to think that the scriptures couch 'the work of the (triune) God', especially through Christ, as the work of a government, an administration, of which Jesus is revealed to be the Christened head, and his people as the arms and legs, doing and heralding the work of that government (at the Christ's command and through the power of his Spirit). The theme of the kingdom, seems too central to Jesus (let alone understanding the title of 'Christ') and the rest of the scriptures to not incorporate it more fully.
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