The Role of the Gospel

What does the Gospel do?

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 1.16

The Gospel is the information that results in a person’s salvation. The death of Jesus Christ does not save a person. Clearly Jesus died for all:

For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; 2 Cor 5.14

Just because Jesus died for a person does not mean they are saved. It is the Gospel that has the power to save a person. “Jesus Christ died for you” is not the gospel.

that if you confess with your mouth Jesus {as} Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. Romans 10.9-10

Romans 10.9-10 is not the Gospel. Romans 10.9-10 is what someone who responds to the Gospel looks like! Clearly, if we look at verse 8, we will see this:

But what does it say? “THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART”–that is, the word of faith which we are preaching,

That word of faith - the faith delivered once to all the saints - is the Gospel. That faith of the coming Kingdom of God and King Jesus is the Gospel. This is what we have to be preaching on the streets. And we have to preach it with the same piercing intensity that John the Baptist, Jesus, and the Apostles did. We have to warn people of the coming judgment - that the Kingdom is coming. And they can be saved if they react appropriately to the news by repenting, and believing. When someone responds to the Gospel they are a new creation. They do not look like their old self. They do not talk like their old self. They do not feel like thier old self. They are not concerned with the same things they used to be. If they stole, they return. If they lie, they speak truth. If they curse, they bless. If they hold grudges, they forgive. One cannot claim to have Christ inside you and be the same person. One cannot claim to have an encounter with God, or the risen Christ, and be unchanged. Conversion is supposed to be this tipping point of change, where there is no turning back. A conversion is what we look for out of people that we talk to. The goal is not to bring them to church. The goal is not even to feed the hungry, and clothe the cold. The goal is to convert them, to bring them to God’s Kingdom - so they can go out and convert another.

This Gospel is supposed to be everything. Yet most Christians can’t even answer the question “What is the Gospel”. The Gospel is supposed to be impetus for change for our own lives - both at our conversion and after. The Gospel is the message which we preach to people. If this Gospel isn’t what changes our life - why do we think we are saved (since the Gospel saves)? If this Gospel isn’t what we preach - why do we think we can save anyone (since the Gospel saves)? Since the Gospel saves - what are we as Christians going to do?