What is the Gospel?

Back to theological issues, I've been observing from a distance discussions about the meaning of the Gospel in evangelical circles.  Everybody talks about "the gospel" in evangelical circles, but like a lot of words or phrases that are used again and again, there is an assumption that everybody agrees on what the term means.  So I think the discussion itself is not a bad idea.  (More)

I grew up in an era where the "gospel" was likely associated with the four spiritual laws, a simple pamphlet based approach to witnessing to strangers.  I have asked myself if the four laws present the full picture, if there is some danger in reducing the Biblical story to such a short synopsis, even if the four points are essentially valid.  

Lately, much of the discussion about the gospel is related to atonement theories and a hot topic of whether "penal substitution" is a valid description of what was accomplished on the cross.  

One of the approaches to this question pits the old "Romans road" approach against a particular statement by Paul in 1 Cor 15.  Romans Road follows the outline of much of Paul's epistle and uses a few key verses to try to communicate the message of that epistle in a short burst.

• Romans 3:23  "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
• Romans 6:23a  "...The wages of sin is death..."
• Romans 6:23b  "...But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."
• Romans 5:8,  "God demonstrates His own love for us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us!"
• Romans 10:13  "Whoever will call on the name of the Lord  will be saved!"
• Romans 10:9,10  "...If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, you shall be saved; for with the heart man believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting  in salvation."

Against that backdrop, it is proposed as an alternative by some that the heart of the gospel is a proclamation about who Jesus is.   Seemingly a precursor to the creeds I Corinthians 15:1-8 reads

Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand.  By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

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, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve.  After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

This is a key feature in Scot McKnight's discussion of the topic on his blog.  He objects to a gospel that he describes as "soterian", too focused on individual salvation and not focused enough on Christ as a fulfillment of a promise to Israel.  He does not deny that the gospel includes personal salvation, but strongly feels that aspect has been emphasized to the detriment of a larger picture.

But is 1 Corinthians 15 the Gospel and the epistle to Romans not the gospel?  Is there opposition in the passages themselves?

Here's my take.  Context matters.  1 Cor 15 was written to an established church, not so Romans.  Paul had not been to Rome and seems to have wanted to communicate by letter what he was not able to communicate in person.  Which is more likely to lay out complete picture, a long letter to a church Paul had never visited or a short reminder to a church Paul essentially planted?

In addition, 1 Corinthians 15 is a specific chapter written at a point in a particular train of thought where Paul as arguing for the bodily resurrection of the believer.  I do not think Paul is attempting to explain the full meaning of "gospel" there.  He is instead speaking of the reality of the resurrection and is emphasizing the multiple appearances of the physically resurrected Christ as a vital part of the gospel, an aspect some were questioning and denying.

Back to Romans Road, the particular references used in the Romans Road approach above don't seem to me to do full justice to Paul's argument in Romans either.  Paul makes a very passionate argument in Romans 1 about men seeing God's power in the creation and rebelling, supressing the truth and altering the image of the creator - replacing that image with graven images of created beings.  Later, in Romans 8, Paul dwells on the effects of the fall on all of the created order.  In short, Romans deals with creation, fall, depravity, law, cross, grace, atonement, and ultimately effects on all of creation.

Context matters. In context, Romans is Paul's extended argument explaining the gospel to folks he had never before spoken to.  1 Corinthians 15 is a specific argument about the resurrection to his converts who had questions and problems with the Resurrection.

There may be an ulterior motive for some.  Setting forth 1 Cor 15 as the concise statement of the gospel may be useful to those who discount the Historicity of Adam and a historical fall.  (In Scot McKnight's case, a regular feature of his blog is the postings of a scientist who heralds Evolutionary Creationism.)  If the focus of the Gospel is Christ, His resurrection and kingship then all that troublesome controversy about origins can essentially be sequestered away from "gospel".  Gospel is about Christ, how sin and death originated can be held as a secondary question.

Yet 1 Cor 15 leans heavily on the parallel between Adam and Christ to show a link between the fall and death on one hand, and between the cross and resurrection on the other.   It ends with the hymnic declaration "Where, O death, is your victory?    Where, O death, is your sting?”  So the parallel between Adam and Christ is drawn nearly as strongly in 1 Corinthians 15 as it is in Romans 1-8.  It is an extended argument for physical resurrection that insists sin came from a single man and death through sin.  How, then can the "gospel" be unconnected from the historicity of the fall?

Here is the point.  If 1 Cor 15:1-8 alone is the heart of gospel, then the implication is that while the Cross is maximized, the connection between historical events and the current state of the human condition is somewhat minimized if not obliterated. The cause of the "sting of death" is at best left unaddressed and the purpose of the cross loses at least a bit of clarity.  The fall may be argued as an experiential recognition of "sin" and suffering, but it is not based in actual events.  Ultimately, the meaning of the cross itself is at risk of being spiritualized in the same way the fall has been so that the Cross vaguely represents "hope" or "victory" or "inspiration" but does not speak of atonement for sin as a brute fact of history.

But if Romans is the gospel, then creation, fall, and the human condition are the context in which the cross is offered as an answer.  The meaning of the cross is clarified by the context of the groaning creation, all of which are based in belief that this is a description of reality from the perspective of the Creator.

Personally, I suspect we might better insist that the "gospel" is Genesis through Revelation.   But I am unconvinced that 1 Corinthians 15:1-8 was ever intended to be a short form statement of the gospel.  While it summarizes key Creedal truths, its purpose is to answer a specific question, and if the chapter is read in its entirety it clearly ties the answer to that question to Adam, sin and death.  Truncating the Gospel to the declaration of Christ's victory and kingship without placing it in its full context or placing it opposition to Romans 1-8 seems untenable.  Emphasizing the Kingship of Christ without emphasizing his role as both Paschal Sacrifice and High Priest is not the way to clarify "what is the Gospel".

If we must look for a fulcrum to define the gospel in a sentence, paragraph or phrase, how about this one - "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world", or "But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.