The Gospel of What?

What is the Gospel?  Have you ever asked someone this question?  If not you should try it ans see how they respond.  You should ask yourself that question and see if you can answer.  The word gospel was actually super common word in the first century.  Gospel means good news.  We use this phase all time; “I have good news and bad news”.  Just like today the phrase good news is a common statement of hope. Everyone likes good news.  So then what is the gospel about? It is the good news of Jesus Christ.  The book of Mark starts out “the Gospel of Jesus Christ”.

What is the good news of Jesus then? It is His life, death and resurrection.  Paul says that this Gospel is the power of God to salvation for all who believe for the Jew first and also for the Gentile. This means that the Gospel is not tied to one culture! That is one thing I love about what I do at YMI.  I get to work with churches and missionaries from all different cultures. I get the blessing of seeing the gospel lived out and expressed in different ways but seeing how the message is still the same.  This past week I have had the blessing of working with a Hispanic church plant in Kingsbury, CA; a Brazilian multicultural church in Minneapolis; suburban churches; rural churches; and  predominately white churches.  The single thread that ties all these churches together is the gospel of Jesus. When the rest of the world can’t get along, the church crosses lines and proclaims the Gospel! This always gets me excited.  God is much bigger than American culture or African cultural or European culture.  There isn’t one correct culture because God transcends all cultures and transforms them.

Have you been outside your culture lately to experience the body of Christ? Have you shared the Gospel cross-culturally lately?  If not you should! It will teach you to appreciate the vastness of God more and more. The gospel is static and does not change but the way it is expressed does and it is what makes the church a beautiful bride.