The glory of the gospel is that it is primarily an announcement of what God does, and has done, in the Person of Jesus Christ.
That was the essence of Paul’s gospel…That was the gospel which was preached by all the apostles. They preached Jesus as the Christ. They made a proclamation, an announcement. Primarily, they called upon people to listen to what they called ‘good news’.
They did not in the first instance outline a programme for life and living…They preached, not a programme but a Person. They said that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God come from Heaven to earth. They said that He manifested and demonstrated His unique deity by living a perfect, spotless, sinless life of complete obedience to God, and by performing miracles. His death on the Cross was not merely the end of His life but the result of His rejection by His own countrymen, it had a deeper and more eternal significance…
The glory of the gospel is that it is primarily an announcement of what God does, and has done, in the Person of Jesus Christ.
‘God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself’ and making ‘him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him’ (2 Corinthians 5:21). But that was not all. He had risen from the grave, had manifested Himself unto certain chosen witnesses, and then ascended into Heaven. From Heaven He has sent the gift of the Holy Spirit upon the early Church, and He had brought unto them…new life and power. Their lives had been entirely changed, and they now had life which was life indeed.
They did not in the first instance outline a programme for life and living…They preached, not a programme but a Person.
That was the message. Its entire emphasis was upon what God had done. Its content was God’s way of salvation and of making men righteous. Man had but to accept it and submit to it.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Plight of Man and the Power of God, pp. 82-83
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