North Star: Gospel

If you ask 100 Christians to define the gospel for you, you will probably get a minimum of 78 different answers. Think of the gospel as the sturdy ship which allows us to safely explore God’s invitation into His vision for all creation. This is a ship with a responsive rudder, an anchor, and a large sail to catch all of the wind. Put it another way, the invitation to board the good ship gospel is not about making it home in one piece (which we will), or getting it perfectly right (which we probably won’t); it is about how we will experience the journey there. That is why the more clearly we understand God’s gospel, the greater our experience living His vision will be.

Gospel of the Kingdom

John the Baptist started the show by shouting, “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near” (Matthew 3:2). Once Jesus arrived, He said the exact same thing: “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is near” (Matthew 4:17). The message of the gospel begins with an announcement of God’s Kingdom. However, this announcement was not simply referring to a place — it was also a declaration of authority and association.

These opening words of Jesus made his intentions crystal clear: He was here to establish God’s rule, secure the boundaries of his dominion, and restore the people of God into relationship with himself.

However, to understand the real beauty of this announcement is to know the story of humanity. In the beginning, God decided to fill the universe with the goodness He had within Himself. The crown of this creation was humanity and they were intended to share in the abundance overflowing from God Himself. At some point however, those made to be like God covered themselves with objects from creation, hid in the darkness, and turned to accusations and denials. Perfection was traded for guilt, communion for fear, and approval for shame. They were expelled from the original kingdom, God’s garden in Eden. They were covered in the bloody skins of sacrificed animals. The earth was cursed, their bodies broken, and God’s creation was left in mourning.

Yet, that original intention remained embedded in the souls of humans. A longing for freedom from fear, shame, and guilt — a return to God Himself — marked the human experience from that day forward. They pursued this longing for years as they built kingdoms, set up thrones and conquered enemies. However, all of their kings failed and all of their kingdoms crumbled. Perhaps the centuries of suffering and disappointment were quietly telling God’s people that they were longing for more than high walls and a beautiful castle.

It is into this story that a man from a no-name family in a no-name town left His carpentry job to announce that the kingdom they have longed for has finally come. Jesus announced that castles were coming, a land would be secured and people restored. And yet, he also announced that the kingdom was here right now.

Continuing in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus painted a stunning picture of the Kingdom of God in his Sermon on the Mount followed by signs of what this Kingdom looks like — Jesus healed the sick, restored the broken, and raised the dead. What he was showing was that the Kingdom of God is marked by a transformation from sick to healthy, fractured to whole, death to life. From there, disciples are invited to follow Jesus and live with Him in order to become like Him. Because in this Kingdom, healing doesn’t come merely by edict, but by relationship.

The flourishing of God’s image bearers is not contingent upon a set of circumstances, it is contingent upon a relationship with their true Image. Life in Eden was so good because life in Eden was life with God. And so Jesus came announcing that life with God — a life marked by restoration, healing, and friendship — was once again available.

The gospel begins with the bold declaration that God’s Kingdom has come and our fears are relieved. Life with God under the rule of God is now available to anyone who would turn from their rebellion and trust in King Jesus.

Gospel of the Cross

The Kingdom paints us a picture of what life is and what life will one day soon be like. However, there still remains echoes of our exile. Though our fears may be quieted, the guilt of our rebellion still hangs heavy on many of us. The king dispels our condemnation in the most surprising of ways though: he entered his creation as a baby. He grew and took a blue-collar job. He showed us life in the kingdom by living like a perfectly loyal native son of Eden. He showed us how good a life free from guilt is. And then He allowed Himself to be betrayed, beaten, and executed. In pouring out His justice and wrath on the innocent, God was making way for the guilt of the criminals to be absorbed. If God’s only concern was for the legal ramifications of sin to be dealt with, if He only wanted us to stop feeling guilty, to receive payment for our debt, the story would have ended at the death of Jesus.

Our king is not a loan officer, though.

In His mercy, He had so much more in store for us than a “paid in full” stamp on our heavenly paperwork. After days of silence, the tomb was opened and Jesus woke up. He was restored. He was resurrected. Instead of bringing judgment onto those who handed him over to execution, Jesus reminded them of His love for them (John 20:19). He breathed on them the Holy Spirit (John 20:22). He cooked them breakfast on the side of a lake (John 21:9). Jesus does not simply take away our guilt, He adopts us into his family. He does not simply forgive us our debt, he gives us a place in the family business. And so, having cleansed the souls of people, our great King returned to heaven and, satisfied, sat back down upon His throne.

Whereas the gospel of God’s kingdom is an announcement of a new reality, the gospel of God’s cross is an announcement of a new route. The kingdom is not achieved through consistent behavior and faithful rule following. It is received by faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. He did not say that the kingdom of God would break into the world through acts of kindness and good deeds. He said entrance into His kingdom was available through Him. More specifically, there is no entrance into God’s kingdom apart from Christ and it is Christ’s cross that has lowered the drawbridge. The gospel of the cross announces that Jesus has secured our worthiness to be kingdom citizens. The kingdom tells us there is nothing to fear and the cross tells us we are liberated from our failures.

Gospel of Grace

At some point in our gospel journey into God’s vision, we find ourselves sailing through a hurricane. This is when the right answers and behaviors stop working. Our fears have been quieted by the message of the kingdom and our guilt has been relieved by the message of the cross — yet we find ourselves hunched over the helm with chattering teeth, wondering if we should veer right or left, drop anchor, or anticipating the jagged rocks that are waiting for us just ahead. When our lives reflect barely a glimmer of God’s kingdom and we feel certain that Jesus, after all He went through, looks at our stumbling with disappointment and contempt, we begin wondering if it is not what we’ve done that was the problem, but rather who we are. This is the voice of shame telling us that we simply are not valuable enough for God. When we find ourselves in this place, our only recourse is to fall into the final announcement of the gospel: God’s amazing grace.

This grace is the reliable compass that keeps our heading on those rough seas. It is the warm raincoat that keeps us dry when the rain is pounding. It is the gentle, comforting reminder that God is with us. We cannot enter the kingdom without a cross — and we can only receive it by grace.

Only the gospel of God’s grace has the power to free us from our shame because it first agrees with us —“yes, you are more dead in your sins than you ever thought possible” but then it says “and you are also more loved and accepted in Christ than you ever dared imagine.”

God sets his love upon us and gives us the life of His Son to show us that the earning is over. Everything that can be done has been done. This means that by grace and through the cross we have come home to God’s kingdom.

It gets crazier, still.

God wants you to experience the beauty of being fully alive, living like humans are meant to live, and He wants this for you even more than you do. There will be times when the cold seems more attractive than the heat. There will be times when Egypt sounds better than Sinai. The gospel comes to us, though, as people who thought we liked being dead. God is committed to leading you into the fullness of life with Him. Just as there was nothing you could do to earn His love and acceptance of you, there is nothing you could ever do to make Him change his mind. God has set His love upon you and he will keep His arms wrapped around you forever.

Putting It All Together

God built the kingdom, Jesus endured the cross, and the Spirit covers us in grace. The gospel of God’s kingdom quiets our fears and tells us there is a place where we are safe. The gospel of God’s cross removes our guilt, telling us that Jesus’ perfect scorecard belongs to us now. The gospel of God’s grace covers our shame, telling us that we are more loved than we could ever hope to understand.

Each aspect of the gospel is a staggering announcement on its own.

On their own, though, each aspect of the gospel also carries with it the threat of simplification and reduction. There is no kingdom without the cross and there is no cross without God’s grace. The gospel must be kept whole. As this three-fold gospel fills the earth with the best news we are ever going to get, a new people spring to life. Wherever the gospel takes root, creation watches the human race appear once again. We carry the gospel, we become a new people, the church, and the glory of God fills the world as the waters cover the sea (Habakkuk 2:14).