A Definition of the Gospel

Scott McKnight, a professor at North Park Seminary in Chicago had a post in Christianity Today's blog, Out of Ur. In it he posits that the reason that we have issues in the church is that we preach the wrong gospel (or an incomplete gospel). So churches that emphasize one part of the gospel and ignore another part of the gospel will grow up to have problems based on their lack of a part of the gospel.

He says that the root cause of lack of commmitment to the church, lack of reconcilation within the church and the rampant individualism (and I would say the new focus on I can be the church all by myself) is based on a parody (his word) of the gospel that reduces the gospel to Jesus came to earth to save my sins and get me into heaven.

The best part is his definition of the gospel.

The gospel is the work of the Trinitarian God (a community of persons) to create the community of faith in order to restore humans (made in God’s image) through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ as well as through the empowering gift of the Holy Spirit to union with God and communion with others for the good of the self and the world. And all of this to the glory of God.