Tag Archives: Good News

“Beautifully good news” by Dustin Benge

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“Paul’s introduction to his letter to the church in Rome makes it quite apparent that the entire epistle’s theme is the good news of “the gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1).

Bracketing Romans is the apostle’s reminder to his readers that he was called to be “set apart for the gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1) and a”minister of Christ Jesus… in the priestly service of the gospel of God” (Rom. 15:16).

This good news of the gospel is

  • “the good news of the kingdom of God” (Luke 16:16),
  • “good news… of Jesus Christ” (Acts 8:12),
  • “good news of peace” (Acts 10:36),
  • “the gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24),
  • “the gospel of his Son” (Rom. 1:9),
  • “the gospel of your salvation” (Eph. 1:13),
  • “the gospel of the glory of the blessed God” (1 Tim. 1:11).

Surrounded by bad news at every turn, the church has been entrusted with good news, the good news of the gospel, which finds its foundation in God himself.

The gospel is not an earthly message but a heavenly message. Paul says that this is the “gospel of God‘ (Rom. 1:1).

The gospel is about God– His holiness, love, grace, wrath, and righteousness. But Paul’s main emphasis here is that the gospel is from God.

He is the single author and architect of the gospel. The gospel doesn’t originate in the church.

The church doesn’t devise the gospel. The church hasn’t crafted the gospel.

The gospel is a message given to the bride of Christ announcing his mediatorial triumph over sin, death, and the world.

The word translated “gospel” is a compound in Greek, euangelion. The prefix eu means “good.” The primary root word angelion means “messenger” or “message.”

When those two words are placed together, the word gospel simply means “good news.”

The gospel is the good news of salvation through God’s Son, Jesus Christ. It is the message that sinners can be rescued from God’s wrath against sin through the sacrificial, substitutionary death of Jesus Christ upon the cross and his triumphant resurrection from the dead.

This isn’t only good news; it’s beautifully good news. We will never hear anything more surpassingly beautiful than the truth that Jesus Christ is a willing liberator and Savior of sinners.

What specifically is the message of God’s beautiful gospel?

God sent His Son, the second person of the Trinity, the Lord Jesus Christ, to rescue sinners.

He was born of a virgin and lived a sinlessly perfect and obedient life under the law.

He was crucified on a cross as a substitute to pay the penalty of God’s wrath against the sins of all those who would ever believe.

In His body, He bore on that tree the punishment due to sinners, and His perfect righteousness was imputed to them, making them acceptable in the sight of God.

He was buried in a borrowed tomb and on the third day rose from the dead.

He ascended back to the authority and power of the right hand of his Father to intercede for all believers.

Now, everyone who by faith “calls on the name of the Lord will be saved’ (Rom. 10:13).

No church has the freedom to tamper with, tweak, add to, or subtract from the good news of Jesus Christ– we are just to herald it.

For there is nothing more beautiful and lovely in the sight of God than the extricating of sinners from the kingdom of darkness and delivering them to the kingdom of light.”

–Dustin Benge, The Loveliest Place: The Beauty and Glory of the Church (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2022), 122-124.

“The best part of the best news that the world has ever heard” by J.I. Packer

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“Throughout my sixty-three years as an evangelical believer, the penal substitutionary understanding of the cross of Christ has been a flashpoint of controversy and division among Protestants.

Since one’s belief about the atonement is bound up with one’s belief about the character of God, the terms of the gospel, and the Christian’s inner life, the intensity of the debate is understandable. If one view is right, others are more or less wrong, and the definition of Christianity itself comes to be at stake.

As I grow old I want to tell everyone who will listen: ‘I am so thankful for the penal substitutionary death of Christ. No hope without it.’

That is where I come now as I attempt this brief vindication of the best part of the best news that the world has ever heard.”

–J.I. Packer, “Penal Substitution Revisited,” In My Place Condemned He Stood: Celebrating the Glory of the Atonement (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2007), 21-22.

“He may preach the gospel better than I can, but he cannot preach a better gospel” by Charles Spurgeon

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“Dear friends, do not imagine that God will bless one preacher only, or one denomination only. He does bless some preachers more than others, for He is Sovereign; but He will bless you all in your work, for He is God.

I shall never forget one day, when my dear old grandfather was alive, I was to preach a sermon. There was a great crowd of people, and I did not arrive, for the train was delayed; and therefore the venerable man commenced to preach in my stead.

He was far on in his sermon when I made my appearance at the door. Looking to me, he said: “You have all come to hear my dear grandson, and therefore I will stop that you may hear him. He may preach the gospel better than I can, but he cannot preach a better gospel. Can you, Charles?”

My answer from the aisle was: “I cannot preach the gospel better; but if I could, it would not be a better gospel.”

So it is, brethren: others may break the bread to more people, but they cannot break better bread than the gospel which you teach, for that is bread from our Saviour’s own hand.

Get to work each one of you with your bread-breaking, for this is Christ’s way of feeding the multitude.

Let each one who has himself eaten divide his morsel with another.

Today fill someone’s ear with the good news of Jesus and His love.

Endeavour this day, each one of you who are Christian people, to communicate to one man, woman, or child, somewhat of the spiritual meat which has made your soul glad.

This is my Master’s way.”

–Charles H. Spurgeon, “The Problem of the Age,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons (Vol. 32; London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1886), 32: 96.

“The great fire of the love of God for us” by Martin Luther

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“The chief article and foundation of the gospel is that before you take Christ as an example, you accept and recognize Him as a gift, as a present that God has given you and that is your own.

This means that when you see or hear of Christ doing or suffering something, you do not doubt that Christ Himself, with His deeds and suffering, belongs to you. On this you may depend as surely as if you had done it yourself; indeed as if you were Christ Himself.

See, this is what it means to have a proper grasp of the gospel, that is, of the overwhelming goodness of God, which neither prophet, nor apostle, nor angel was ever able fully to express, and which no heart could adequately fathom or marvel at.

This is the great fire of the love of God for us, whereby the heart and conscience become happy, secure, and content. This is what preaching the Christian faith means.

This is why such preaching is called gospel, which in German means a joyful, good, and comforting ‘message’; and this is why the apostles are called the ‘twelve messengers.’

Concerning this Isaiah 9:6 says, ‘To us a child is born, to us a son is given.’ If He is given to us, then He must be ours; and so we must also receive him as belonging to us.

And Romans 8:32, ‘How should God not give us all things with His Son?’ See, when you lay hold of Christ as a gift which is given you for your very own and have no doubt about it, you are a Christian.

Faith redeems you from sin, death, and hell and enables you to overcome all things. O no one can speak enough about this! It is a pity that this kind of preaching has been silenced in the world.

Now when you have Christ as the foundation and chief blessing of your salvation, then the other part follows: that you take Him as your example, giving yourself in service to your neighbor just as you see that Christ has given Himself for you.

See, there faith and love move forward, God’s commandment is fulfilled, and a person is happy and fearless to do and to suffer all things. Therefore make note of this, that Christ as a gift nourishes your faith and makes you a Christian. But Christ as an example exercises your works.

These do not make you a Christian. Actually they come forth from you because you have already been made a Christian. As widely as a gift differs from an example, so widely does faith differ from works, for faith possesses nothing of its own, only the deeds and life of Christ.

Works have something of your own in them, yet they should not belong to you but to your neighbor. So you see that the gospel is really not a book of laws and commandments which requires deeds of us, but a book of divine promises in which God promises, offers, and gives us all His possessions and benefits in Christ.”

–Martin Luther, “A Brief Instruction on What to Look for and Expect in the Gospels (1521),” in Luther’s Works, Vol. 35: Word and Sacrament I, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 35 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999), 119-120.

“This precious and tender message about Christ” by Martin Luther

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“The New Testament is a book in which are written the gospel and the promises of God, together with the history of those who believe and of those who do not believe them.

For ‘gospel’ [Euangelium] is a Greek word and means in Greek a good message, good tidings, good news, a good report, which one sings and tells with gladness.

For example, when David overcame the great Goliath, there came among the Jewish people the good report and encouraging news that their terrible enemy had been struck down and that they had been rescued and given joy and peace; and they sang and danced and were glad for it [I Sam. 18:6].

Thus this gospel of God or New Testament is a good story and report, sounded forth into all the world by the apostles, telling of a true David who strove with sin, death, and the devil, and overcame them, and thereby rescued all those who were captive in sin, afflicted with death, and overpowered by the devil.

Without any merit of their own He made them righteous, gave them life, and saved them, so that they were given peace and brought back to God. For this they sing, and thank and praise God, and are glad forever, if only they believe firmly and remain steadfast in faith.

This report and encouraging tidings, or evangelical and divine news, is also called a New Testament. For it is a testament when a dying man bequeaths his property, after his death, to his legally defined heirs.

And Christ, before His death, commanded and ordained that His gospel be preached after His death in all the world [Luke 24:44–47]. Thereby He gave to all who believe, as their possession, everything that He had.

This included: His life, in which He swallowed up death; His righteousness, by which He blotted out sin; and His salvation, with which He overcame everlasting damnation.

A poor man, dead in sin and consigned to hell, can hear nothing more comforting than this precious and tender message about Christ. From the bottom of his heart he must laugh and be glad over it, if he believes it true.”

–Martin Luther, “Preface to the New Testament (1522)” in Luther’s Works, Vol. 35: Word and Sacrament I, ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann, vol. 35 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999), 358–359.

“Divine promises” by Thomas Brooks

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“The promises of God are a Christian’s magna charta, his chiefest evidences for heaven. Divine promises are God’s deed of gift; they are the only assurance which the saints have to shew for their right and title to Christ, to His blood, and to all the happiness and blessedness that comes by Him…

The promises are not only the food of faith, but also the very life and soul of faith; they are a mine of rich treasures, a garden full of the choicest and sweetest flowers; in them are wrapt up all celestial contentments and delights.

And this is most certain, that all a Christian’s conclusions of interest in any of those choice and precious privileges which flow from the blood of Jesus Christ ought to be bottomed, grounded, and founded upon the rich and free promises of grace and mercy.”

–Thomas Brooks, “A Cabinet of Jewels,” in The Complete Works of Thomas Brooks, Volume 3, ed. Alexander Balloch Grosart (Edinburgh; London; Dublin: James Nichol; James Nisbet and Co.; G. Herbert, 1866), 254-255.

“Absolutely different” by Timothy Keller

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“A gospel is an announcement of something that has happened in history, something that’s been done for you that changes your status forever. Right there you can see the difference between Christianity and all other religions, including no religion.

The essence of other religions is advice; Christianity is essentially news. Other religions say, ‘This is what you have to do in order to connect to God forever; this is how you have to live in order to earn your way to God.’

But the gospel says, ‘This is what has been done in history. This is how Jesus lived and died to earn the way to God for you.’ Christianity is completely different. It’s joyful news.

How do you feel when you’re given good advice on how to live? Someone says, ‘Here’s the love you ought to have, or the integrity you ought to have,’ and maybe they illustrate high moral standards by telling a story of some great hero.

But when you hear it, how does it make you feel? Inspired, sure. But do you feel the way the listeners who heard those heralds felt when the victory was announced? Do you feel your burdens have fallen off? Do you feel as if something great has been done for you and you’re not a slave anymore?

Of course you don’t. It weighs you down: This is how I have to live. It’s not a gospel. The gospel is that God connects you not on the basis of what you’ve done (or haven’t done) but on the basis of what Jesus has done, in history, for you.

And that makes it absolutely different from every other religion or philosophy.”

–Timothy Keller, King’s Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus (New York: Dutton, 2011), 16-17.

“The diagnosis is very bad news” by C.S. Lewis

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“When the apostles preached, they could assume even in their Pagan hearers a real consciousness of deserving the Divine anger. The Pagan mysteries existed to allay this consciousness, and the Epicurean philosophy claimed to deliver men from the fear of eternal punishment.

It was against this background that the Gospel appeared as good news. It brought good news of possible healing to men who knew that they were mortally ill. But all this has changed. Christianity now has to preach the diagnosis– in itself very bad news– before it can win a hearing for the cure.”

–C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: HarperCollins, 1940/1996), 48.

“Spread it or lose it” by John Piper

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“Where a person or a group is not spreading the gospel, they are losing their grasp on what it actually is.”

–John Piper, “The Gospel: Spread It or Lose It” as cited on http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/1900_the_gospel_spread_it_or_lose_it/ (accessed July 7, 2009).