This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “What is the Gospel?” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, August 9, 1998.
Tonight we are beginning our scripture reading in Matthew’s Gospel, chapter eleven. We are reading, beginning at verse two. This is Matthew eleven, verse two. Give your attention to God’s holy word. While imprisoned, John heard of the works of Christ. He sent word by his disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for someone else?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Go and report to John what you hear and see.
The blind receive sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear. The dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. Blessed is the one who does not take offense at me.” Then turning to 1 Corinthians 15, beginning in verse one.
Now I make known to you, brothers, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, according to the promise of life in Christ Jesus, wrote to Timothy, my beloved son: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God whom I serve with a clear conscience, as my forefathers did, as I constantly remember you in my prayers night and day, longing to see you, even as I recall your tears, so that I might be filled with joy. For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am sure that it is in you as well. For this reason, I remind you to rekindle afresh the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands.
For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and self-discipline. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord or of me, his prisoner. Share with me in suffering for the gospel according to the power of God, who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity, that now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. For this reason, I was appointed a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher.
O God, encourage us in our devotion to you and to your Son. May the things that we read and consider from your Word minister to our souls. O Lord, refresh us, your children. And may we, Lord, being refreshed by your mercy, serve you with diligence.
O God, your word is a delight to us. It is a delight to your people, not only here but around the world. And Father, as your people delight in your word, may it please you, O God, to use that delight, that joy in the word, as a message for the health and benefit of many. We pray, Lord, that we may see the profit and prosperity of your word, and that it would please you to use even us, your servants, as a means for the gospel and its distribution. May our lives, O God, be read as a message from you. May you help us, God, in all of our words and works, that in them Christ Jesus may be manifest. In whose name we pray, amen.
Now, while it is true that we have been considering the gospel and its content from Matthew 11, and Jesus’ words to the disciples of John the Baptist, specifically what he says in verse 5 of that eleventh chapter of Matthew, in relation to the gospel being preached to the poor, it is also true that we have been examining the gospel and its content in light of that passage. It has been the habit of people like ourselves, when discussions about the content of the gospel arise, to turn quickly to Paul. To turn quickly to Paul. This is understandable, given our theological orientation, given the fact that we are Calvinists, and the Apostle Paul is the proclaimer of the gospel of grace in its fullness. Paul is known to us for his devotion to the gospel.
He speaks of himself as one who has been set apart for the defense of the gospel, as stated in Philippians 1:17. And he refers explicitly to that gospel to which he is committed more than seventy times throughout his epistles.
He is rightly famous for his memorable statement in Romans 1:16: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes.” And he is equally famous for his strong warning regarding the presentation of his gospel, as recorded in Galatians 1:8: “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.”
But Paul should be equally famous for his grand and eloquent statement, his grand and eloquent declaration, that is found in 2 Timothy 1:10. God called us with a holy calling, having saved us, which now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior, Jesus Christ, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. Each of these comments from Paul captures the rhapsodic intensity with which the gospel moves his soul. But clearly, we are not drawn to Paul in this matter of the gospel merely because of his servanthood. Our understanding of things sets us, does it not, among those who have looked upon the gospel in its full redemptive sense, in its full salvific sense. As sinners, we have been instructed to look away from ourselves, since our redemption does not lie in us, polluted as we are through our spiritual and moral corruption. Instead, as Paul has constantly encouraged sinners like ourselves to do, we look to Jesus Christ, who redeems us through his death and through his resurrection.
J. Gresham Machen, on many occasions, labored to define the gospel. And in the definition of the gospel to which he was drawn, he was inevitably set squarely before the gospel as Paul presented it.
Machen then, in the final analysis, had no interest in giving comfort to those who believed that the gospel was to be defined by the effects it had in people’s lives. He had no interest in giving comfort to those who believed that the gospel could be defined by that which was essentially an exhortation or even a command. According to Machen, the gospel was not even a way of life when considered along the lines of exhortation or command. And it was certainly not a program to be scheduled and then observed by the Christian Church.
And the worst way to approach the gospel, according to Nation, informed as he was by the Apostle Paul, was to equate that gospel with religious feelings generated by religious stimuli. This is why, in seeking to present the gospel and its definition, Machen turned to the Apostle Paul and the words of Paul found at the opening of 1 Corinthians 15. Here Paul, at the same time he is reminding the Corinthians of the gospel he had made known to them, verse 1, also lets us know the content of that gospel in a remarkably clear formulation expressed for us in verses 3 and 4: how that Christ died according to the Scriptures, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, how he was buried, and how he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. In keeping then with that definition of the Gospel that Nation had set himself to defend, even as he was informed by the Apostle Paul, Machen saw that at the heart of the gospel was an event. Specifically, an event as understood in relationship to the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The gospel was tied up with an event.
The communication of the gospel is the rehearsal of historical facts—those specifically laid down in the Scriptures. This means that the gospel is not the sharing of an idea in the mind. It is not the communication of a feeling from the heart. It is essentially the rehearsal of historical facts as those historical facts are laid out in the Word of God. The gospel, then, is not the sharing even of a so-called eternal truth.
The Greeks were interested in sharing eternal truths. The gospel is not, then, even the sharing of a so-called eternal truth, but the narrating of an event: the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that for sinners. Indeed, Machen was quick to point out that the gospel Paul proclaimed is not the communication of bare facts. The event upon which the gospel turns has meaning, and meaning and event go together, as Paul himself makes plain.
Therefore, that Christ died—the bare historical fact that Christ died—is not the gospel. But that Christ died for our sins is. Likewise with the resurrection. Not the bare historical event of the resurrection—that Christ was raised on the third day from the tomb—is the gospel. But as Paul says here and in another text, based upon what he would say here, Christ was raised for our justification. That is the gospel. Here, then, is the content of the gospel. Here is what is so good about the good news. In the event of Christ’s death and bodily resurrection, our sins have been forgiven, and we have received justification before God the Father.
Now, in hearing again this old story, I trust that you are not disappointed. And my confidence in you here at Grace Church is that you specifically are not disappointed, nor do you tire of being reminded of the crux of the gospel’s meaning. My hope is that you find the essence of the gospel to be liberating, blessing you with freedom from the many misconceptions about what constitutes the gospel.
Along these lines, how many have exhausted themselves in their pursuit of a gospel experience, or how many have praised themselves because, in their own estimation, the gospel meant merely self-satisfied human accomplishment. Such attitudes, I am sure you are aware, have nothing to do with whether one is a liberal or a conservative, whether one is mainline or evangelical. In fact, what is so tragic about the current religious scene is that the evangelical movement as it has developed is virtually indistinguishable from the liberal mainline establishment. You see, it does not matter whether you are the college student being pressured on an evangelical campus until you experience the gospel in a personal crisis, or whether you are the young professional approached by the mainline liberal church as if the gospel were community relations and social work. People in either of these groups are being diverted from the gospel’s proper definition and its proper meaning.
In its true expression, the gospel frees you from such childish religious ideas. In fact, it is precisely from just such childish religious ideas that the gospel is intended to free you. Stop worrying about what you experienced or did not experience, and focus instead on what Christ experienced in his death and resurrection on your behalf. Stop concentrating on how you feel or do not feel, and instead concern yourself with how Jesus felt in his death and resurrection, in the accomplishment of your redemption and the forgiveness of your sins. Stop overemphasizing efforts to improve the world, and begin focusing your affections on Christ and on the gospel as Paul presented it, and on that gospel reality that sets before you a different order of things altogether.
But it is precisely at this point that we are led to what we might call the broader concerns of the gospel. You might object. In what we have described so far, how can there be broader concerns for the gospel? But it is precisely at this point—the point where our focus on gospel reality sets before us a different order of things altogether—that we are led into the broader concerns of the gospel, and even to greater concerns than those that we have specifically focused upon thus far.
To be sure, as I indicated at the beginning of this message, people like us, when it comes to the discussion about the gospel and its content, tend to turn to the Apostle Paul. And I am not complaining about that. Far be it from me to complain about people who turn to the Apostle Paul when it comes to explaining the content and the meaning of the gospel.
But you must know that for the last two hundred years, a number of people in the Church have been objecting to this point and to this approach. It is in the interest of considering the broader concerns with respect to the gospel that we press on from what we have said about this gospel to even greater consideration. These concerns are latent in the Apostle Paul, even if not explicitly expressed by him. I will reiterate: for the last 200 years, a number of people in the Church have been objecting to this approach, whereby we focus upon the Apostle Paul and concentrate upon his approach to the gospel.
They say Paul invented his own gospel. He was the originator of a new and completely different religion. This gospel and religion, they claim, arose from his own view of human inability. It promoted his belief in the idea of a substitute blood sacrifice and a bodily resurrection. According to these people, in Paul’s hands, the gospel became the good news about the removal of human guilt and the cleansing of the human conscience through divine action in the supernatural figure of Jesus, the confessed Son of God. But all of this, they say, is purely and completely mythological.
What we must understand, they claim, is that Paul’s gospel is retrogressive. It is a return to Judaism in its forms and ideas. It is far removed from the advanced universal gospel that Jesus actually taught. Jesus’ gospel, they say, included no notion of himself as Savior. It included no idea of him as Redeemer, whose sacrifice would achieve the mythical goal of appeasing a vengeful God or securing personal salvation for individual believers in a fictional paradise. Jesus’ gospel, they say, was not about what he accomplished for us—about that which we, in our sin, could not achieve by ourselves. It was not about who he was or what he did.
Rather, Jesus’ gospel is about what he himself discovered. It was the good news that God, to the extent that we still wish to speak about God, is a loving Father—not a wrath-filled deity. True religion, they say, is not found in abject prostration before a threatening image of divinity, but in the realization of our own inner potential through self-improvement and service to others. These people, over the course of the last two hundred years, claim that no two things could be more opposite than Jesus’ and Paul’s versions of the gospel. Now, what do you say?
And if you claim that the gospel which Jesus preached to the poor, as mentioned by him in Matthew 11:5, is the same gospel that Paul proclaimed and referred to in Romans 1:16, or in 1 Corinthians 15, or in 2 Timothy 1, how would you prove it? Can you point to Jesus’ statements about the gospel, where he explicitly mentions the gospel, and can you find in those statements an explicit reference to his own death and resurrection? How would you resolve this issue?
You may say to yourself, I will not concern myself with this matter. In fact, I might even attend a state university and take courses in philosophy and religion. Even though this position is presented, I will simply wrap myself in self-satisfied fundamentalism, close my ears, and withdraw from the classroom. I tell you, if there is a self-satisfaction that characterizes the liberal establishment, it does not even compare to the self-satisfaction expressed in your position.
I will not give it any thought. In fact, I believe the church that gives it thought is on the wrong path. I believe the church that attempts to answer such a question is completely misdirected. You see, by and large, this is exactly the attitude that the Church, broadly understood, has taken over the last two hundred years.
We will simply assume our orthodoxy. We will not examine it carefully, and we will not discuss it when we stand in the pulpit or behind the lectern. So when we come to our people, we will feed them on religious ideas, religious experiences, and religious feelings. And with that, they should be content, because that is what we are content with. As we present this immature approach to religion, and as we produce Christians who live at a kindergarten level, we should all be content ourselves, because no one will know more than anyone else. We will all be equally ignorant.
Well, what would you say? Is it important for you to address the issue of the relationship between Jesus’ gospel and Paul’s gospel? Is it important for you to have a response as you consider the challenge presented by this issue? Such is the nature of the problem that it demands a solution, and that problem has been placed there by divine providence. You see, it is by God’s providence that this issue exists. When the church ignores this problem, it becomes spiritually immature. In response, I hope that you know the Gospels well enough to point out that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John present Jesus as one who proclaims a gospel that is thoroughly redemptive and supernatural, just as Paul does. And as you make this assertion, you will be guided by truth and confirmed in the conviction of your confession.
The gospel you see in Jesus’ teachings is connected to the kingdom. It is the gospel of the kingdom. You read this at the conclusion of Matthew 4. He traveled throughout the regions, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom. What kingdom did Jesus proclaim?
The kingdom attached to the gospel is not a new or novel idea, nor a recent mental discovery on Jesus’ part, as if He had a sudden new thought. Rather, the kingdom proclaimed by Jesus is an event.
Sound familiar? It is an event. It is something that has taken place. Yes, specifically in historical facts and transactions. It is an event. The kingdom comes, you see. The presence of the kingdom, Jesus announces in his very person, in his own coming, and in and through his ministry and what he does. In and through him, the kingdom, he says, draws near in its consummate judgment, an event. But also, already, and here’s the key point, already, graciously and marvelously intrudes into this world. It bestows its eternal blessings in and through Christ. This intrusion of blessing is bound up in Jesus in his identity as Savior and Redeemer.
The one who saves his people from their sins, Matthew 1:21.
The one who actually forgives sins, Matthew 9:2.
The one who gives his life as a ransom for many, Matthew 20:28.
The one who sheds his blood as the blood of the new covenant, poured out for the forgiveness of sins, Matthew 26:28. The one whose own sacrifice in death and bodily resurrection means the bodily resurrection of those who do not stumble over him, as Matthew 27:52 and 27:53 prove.
All of this, then, is laid within the gospel, laid within the good news. This good news is the message of which Jesus speaks when John’s disciples in Matthew 11 come to him with John’s question. And it is precisely this gospel that ministers to John in his prison cell. It is this gospel that ministers to John in his prison cell. What do you think is John’s response when word comes back to him through his disciples from Jesus?
Well, what Jesus has said to my disciples means that within a few days or a few months, I am going to get out of this place. I am going to be released. And that is what the gospel means, right? Because the gospel means that God is on the side of the oppressed, right? I am oppressed, I am in jail. I am suffering here. So as Jesus sends word back, John must think, yes, I am one of the poor, I am one of the oppressed, I am in jail. The gospel means I will be released.
Oh no. In fact, it means you stay in. And even though you are in prison, you are a free man, because the gospel has bestowed on you an eternal blessing of freedom that belongs to heaven, which no person or government can take from you, nor even confer upon you. I say then, it is this gospel that ministers to John in his prison cell, and it is precisely this same gospel that ministers to Paul in his chains. What? The promise of release? Perhaps I will be released, perhaps I will not. But whether I am released or not, I am the prisoner of Christ, and as such, I am a free man. Why?
Because of the gospel of the kingdom. Because of what God has done in the events that have manifested the kingdom and brought it into clear view. I say it a third time. It is precisely this gospel that ministers to John in his prison cell, and by extension, to Paul in his chains. A gospel by which, just as much as in Paul’s own gospel, death is abolished and life and immortality are brought to light. No, brought to realization. So that they are even within our grasp now. You see, the gospel is good news because it is about the arrival of eternal blessings, wondrously and graciously bestowed already through the action of God upon undeserving and helpless sinners.
And in this, Jesus and Paul are agreed. And in this, I trust, as your heart is likewise set upon eternal things, set within your grasp by the gospel. In this, I trust, you and I agree. Do you want my personal application? Would that satisfy you? I am presently the patient of Christ Jesus. And as such, I have a health and a wholeness that this world cannot confer, nor can it take from me. And that because of the gospel of the kingdom.
Let’s pray. Our God, we thank you for the gospel, and we pray, Lord, that we would pursue with all our intensity the meaning of that gospel, that we would not be content to leave it at the level of mere forgiveness of sins for the cleansing of conscience, so that we might be able to endure in this life. But that we would see, Lord, the full scope of this gospel, the good news that has been given to us, that through the event of the kingdom and the event of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection, even his ascension into glory, we are now those who are recipients of the blessings of heaven. And these blessings, O God, are bestowed by your grace, in accordance with the gospel, that in the midst of our struggles and difficulties, whatever they may be, we may be confident that we already possess within us the substance of glory. And in this, O God, may we rest. Help us all, our Father. May we see ourselves driven by and inspired by the Spirit of the Apostle who is set for the defense of the Gospel. May we love the Gospel. May it be precious to us. It is our very life.
The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.