THE GOSPEL OF GOD
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God (Romans 1:1, NIV).
During my lifetime, I have witnessed a strange and sad thing happening among those who call themselves ‘evangelicals’. Over recent decades, instead of preaching the gospel,1 evangelicals have increasingly been preaching different messages, which are no gospel at all.2 This is strange because the noun ‘evangelical’ means one who believes in and holds to the Christian gospel. And this is sad, because the world desperately needs to hear the gospel and through the centuries the world has heard this gospel from evangelicals. Evangelicals need to recover the gospel.
‘Gospel’ is a favourite word of Paul. He uses it sixty times in his letters and he uses it in all his letters, except his letter to Titus. In the first seventeen verses of his letter to the Romans, Paul tells us again and again how and why the gospel is important for him: he is ‘set apart for the gospel of God’ (verse 1); he serves God ‘in my spirit in preaching the gospel of his Son’ (verse 9); he is ‘eager to preach the gospel also to you who are in Rome’ (verse 15); he is ‘not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God’ (verse 16); and all this is because ‘in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed’ (verse 17).
Our English word ‘gospel’ derives from an Old English word, gōdspel, which means ‘good story’. It translates the Greek word euangelion, which means ‘good message’ or ‘good news’. (We see the prefix eu-, meaning ‘good’, in several English words, such us ‘eulogy’ = ‘a good word’, and we see the root word angelia, meaning 'message, news' in our English word ‘angel’ = ‘messenger, bringer of news’). It is from the Greek word euangelion, that we get our English word, ‘evangelical’.
The word euangelion would have been a familiar one to both Paul’s Jewish and Gentile readers, for it had both Hebrew and Greek backgrounds. First century Jews would have been familiar with the word from the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. For example, in Isaiah 40:9-10 we read:
You who bring good news to Zion,
go up on a high mountain.
You who bring good news to Jerusalem,
lift up your voice with a shout,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the towns of Judah,
‘Here is your God!’
See, the sovereign LORD comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
Again, in Isaiah 52:7-8, we read:
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!’ …
When the LORD returns to Zion,
they will see it with their own eyes.
In both these passages the word translated ‘good news’ is the Hebrew word basar, which is rendered in the Septuagint by the Greek word euangelion. And in both these passages, the good news that is to be proclaimed is that God is coming to rescue his people from their enemies.
Paul’s first century Gentile readers would also have understood the meaning of euangelion for, in both Greek and Roman cultures, the word was used for the official announcement of the ascension of a new emperor, or of the victory of the emperor over his enemies in battle, heralding a new era of peace. When Paul and the early Christians called their message the euangelion, ‘the gospel’, they were proclaiming to all who were willing to listen that the King of kings had come down from heaven to rescue his people from all his and their enemies and to usher in the long awaited age of peace and justice on earth.
The gospel, then, is not law; it is news. It is not a list of commands that we must obey; it is an announcement of God’s victory over evil. The gospel does not tell us what we must do for God; it tells us what God has done for us. And this news of what God has done is very good news for God has acted in history to rescue humankind from sin and death. I like the definition of the English Reformer, Bible translator, and martyr, William Tyndale (1494-1536), who wrote that the word ‘gospel’ means ‘good, merry, glad and joyful tidings, that make a man’s heart glad, and make him sing, dance and leap for joy.’
Copyright © Ronald Nugent 2021
1 A note to my American friends: I am following the British and Australian convention of using ‘gospel’ (without a capital) for the Christian message, and ‘Gospel’ (with a capital) for each of the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
2 I hope to will look at some of these ‘different gospels’ in coming months on my other blog, A Catholic Protestant.
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