Gospel: Not what you think it means (Part 3)

(Read Part 1 and Part 2 [here] and [here].)

A conversation I haven’t been able to shake

About 10–15 years ago, I had a conversation that has stayed with me.

They said, “I shared the gospel with a co-worker the other day.”

I responded, “That’s great. What exactly did you share?”

They said, “You know… the Roman Road.”

So, I asked, “Isn’t Jesus’ crucifixion central to the Roman Road?”

“Well, yes.”

Then I asked one more question:

“What was the gospel Jesus proclaimed in Mark 1:14–15?”

Pause.

“Hmmm…”

That moment wasn’t about catching someone off guard. It revealed something deeper.

We use the word gospel all the time.
But when pressed – What is it, exactly? – the answers start to drift.

That’s what we began to see in Part 1.
That’s what we pressed into in Part 2.

Now it’s time to attempt to “bring it home.”

When the gospel became something else

Somewhere along the way, the word gospel got reduced.

Not denied.
Not rejected.
Just…shrunk.

Instead of an announcement, it became a formula.
Instead of news, it became a transaction.
Instead of a King and His kingdom, it became a plan for my afterlife.

This didn’t happen overnight. But in the mid-20th century, tools like the Roman Road and the Four Spiritual Laws began to dominate how the gospel was communicated (See the addendum).  These tools weren’t the problem. They were trying to help. They highlighted something essential: that Jesus’ death and resurrection matter for our salvation.

But over time, something subtle happened.  The gospel itself became equated with these presentations.  As Scot McKnight has argued, the gospel was reshaped around helping people make decisions about personal salvation.

And when that happens, the message inevitably narrows.

From gospel to “plan of salvation”

Think about the common thread in most gospel presentations:

  • You are a sinner
  • Sin separates you from God
  • Jesus died for your sins
  • If you believe, you go to heaven

None of that is false.  But is that the gospel?  The good news Jesus proclaimed?

Here’s the tension we can’t ignore: Jesus proclaimed the gospel before He went to the cross.

In Mark 1:14–15, Jesus announced good news.  Not, “I am about to die so you can go to heaven.”  But “The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news.”

The gospel Jesus proclaimed was not first about how to get saved.  It was about what God was doing – right then, right there.

What gets lost when we shrink the gospel

When we reduce the gospel to a plan of salvation, the consequences are real – even if unintended.  The focus shifts almost entirely to me – my sin, my decision, my destination.

The story shrinks – from God’s reign breaking into the world to a private spiritual transaction.

And the resurrection? It fades.

I’ve seen this firsthand. I once asked a group of college students what Jesus did at Easter.  They answered, “He died on the cross for our sins.”  I followed up: “And then what?”

“We get to go to heaven.”

They skipped right past the resurrection – the very thing that makes the gospel good news.

This is what Dallas Willard called the gospel of “sin management” – a version of Christianity focused almost entirely on dealing with sin, while leaving transformation and kingdom life largely untouched.

A gospel that fits too easily

There’s another layer to this.

Sociologists Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton described the default belief system of many as Moralistic Therapeutic Deism[1]:

  • God wants you to be a good person
  • God wants you to be happy
  • God helps when needed
  • Good people go to heaven

When the gospel is reduced to “how to go to heaven,” it fits almost seamlessly into that framework. But that is not the gospel Jesus proclaimed.  

Not even close.

The response I held back

In Part 1, I mentioned a Facebook “survey” asking people to define the gospel.

There was one response I held back.

My friend Crystal Kirgiss[2] wrote: 

1. King Jesus reigns.  2. His death and resurrection provide a way for me to be part of his kingdom. (King – and all its implications.  Kingdom – and all its implications.)

Simple.  Clear.  And loaded with meaning.

What’s there – and what’s not

Notice what’s present:

  • A King
  • A Kingdom
  • A present reign
  • A death and resurrection that accomplish something
  • An invitation to participate

Now notice what’s not central:

  • A formula
  • A scripted prayer
  • A primary focus on going to heaven

Again, those ideas aren’t necessarily wrong.  They’re just not the starting point.

The gospel that the early church proclaimed

The earliest Christian message was not primarily advice about life after death. It was an announcement.  Something had happened.

Jesus is the Messiah.
Jesus was crucified.
Jesus was raised.
Jesus is Lord.

Not someday. Now.

This is why the resurrection is a big deal!

Without it, there is no reigning King.
Without it, there is no kingdom breaking in.
Without it, there is no gospel.

As N. T. Wright has emphasized, the gospel is about what God has done in and through Jesus to become King – and to set the world right.

Why this changes everything

If the gospel is primarily about how I get to heaven, then the Christian life becomes:

  • Make a decision
  • Manage sin
  • Wait for heaven

But if the gospel is the announcement that Jesus is King, then everything shifts. Now:

  • Salvation is how we enter the story
  • Discipleship is not optional
  • The present matters – not just the afterlife
  • Transformation is expected – not just forgiveness

A reduced gospel produces a reduced Christianity. It always has. It always will.

So let’s say it clearly

What is the gospel?

Not a formula.
Not a technique.
Not a sales pitch.

The gospel is an announcement. A declaration:

Jesus Christ is the risen, reigning, rescuing King.[3]

Sit with that for a moment.

Not just Savior.
King.

Not just forgiving.
Reigning.

Not just future hope.
Present reality.

[1] Smith, C., & Denton, M. L. (2005). Soul searching: The religious and spiritual lives of american teenagers. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.

[2] Director of Discipleship Content and Partnerships, Young Life

[3] Interestingly, this statement was also provided by Crystal Kirgiss.  In arrived in my inbox via her monthly “Discipleship Postcard” to Young Life staff on April 7, 2026, while I was developing this “Not what you think it means” series.  (See “postcard” above.) 

ADDENDUM. If you are not familiar with the “Roman Road” or the Four Spiritual Laws, here they are…

The Roman Road is an oft-used plan of salvation – getting its name from the fact that it follows a journey through the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Roman Church.  The five core verses typically outline this plan of salvation:

  1. Romans 3:23 – Everyone is a sinner: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”.
  2. Romans 6:23a – The consequence of sin is spiritual death: “For the wages of sin is death”.
  3. Romans 6:23b – God offers a free gift: “But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord”.
  4. Romans 5:8 – Jesus died for us while we were still sinners: “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us”.
  5. Romans 10:9-10, 13 – Confess and believe to be saved: “That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”

Another well-known plan of salvation is Campus Crusade’s Four Spiritual Laws, developed by founder Bill Bright.  The Laws:

  1. God loves you and offers a wonderful plan for your life (John 3:16; 10:10).
  2. Man is sinful and separated from God.  Therefore, he cannot know and experience God’s love and plan for his life (Rom. 3:23; 6:23).
  3. Jesus Christ is God’s only provision for man’s sin.  Through him, you can know and experience God’s love and plan for your life (Rom. 5:8; 1 Cor. 15:3 – 6; John 14:6).
  4. We must individually receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; then we can know and experience God’s love and plan for our lives (John 1:12; 3:1 – 8; Eph. 2:8 – 9; Rev. 3:20).

Compared to the Roman Road, a major difference in the Four Spiritual Laws is the addition of language about a wonderful plan for our lives.  McKnight spoke to this addition: “regarding God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life, in 1957 a salesman, Bob Ringer, told Bill Bright that he had to learn to evangelize by beginning on a positive note — sales, he was told, begins with something positive”. (McKnight, S. (2016). The king jesus gospel: the original good news revisited. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.)

Gospel: Not what you think it means (Part 2)

In [Part 1], we began to peel back what we mean when we use the word gospel. We noticed how easily familiarity can mask misunderstanding. We also anchored ourselves in Mark 1:14–15, where Jesus came announcing something – not merely offering a teaching, but proclaiming news – good news, gospel.

Now it’s time to go a layer deeper.  Let’s look at the word itself.

Euangelion: More than a religious word

The Greek word translated “gospel” is euangelion (εὐαγγέλιον). Quite simply, it means “good news.” The term evangelism is derived from euangelion.

But here’s the part many of us miss: This was not originally a religious word.

In the first-century world – both Greek and Roman – euangelion had a very specific kind of meaning. It was used to announce public, world-shaping events. Not private spirituality. Not inner feelings. Not abstract theology.

News.  Important news.  Decisive news.

The kind of news that changes everything

If you lived in that world, you would have heard euangelion used in contexts like these:

  • A great military victory had been won
  • A new king had taken the throne
  • An empire had expanded its rule
  • Peace had been secured after conflict

This was the kind of news that reshaped reality for people.  

There’s a well-known story that captures this: After the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, a Greek messenger, Pheidippides, ran roughly 25 miles from Marathon to Athens to deliver the euangelion: the Athenians had won. The enemy had been defeated. He arrived, delivered the message, and then collapsed and died.

Why tell that story?  Because it helps us feel the weight of the word.

This wasn’t casual information.
This wasn’t “something to consider.”

This was urgent, history-altering news that demanded to be announced.  After the Greeks defeated the Persians, soldiers feared the Persians would sail to Athens to claim a fake victory. Pheidippides was tasked with running the distance to announce the success. History-altering news, indeed!

Heralds and proclamations

In the ancient world, news like this didn’t spread through social media or even casual conversation. It was formally announced.  Heralds were sent.  They would enter a city and proclaim the euangelion:

“The king has won.”
“The battle is over.”
“A new ruler reigns.”

And the people hearing it weren’t asked for their opinion.  They were being told what had already happened – and what it now meant for them.

Back to Mark

With that in mind, listen again to how Mark opens his account: “This is the Good News about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.” (Mark 1:1, NLT)

Mark chose that word – euangelion – on purpose.

And then, just a few verses later, he showed Jesus Himself stepping into Galilee proclaiming: “The time has come… The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the euangelion!” (Mark 1:14–15)

This wasn’t random wording.  This was loaded language! Jesus wasn’t simply offering spiritual insight.  He was announcing something had happened.  Something had begun.

So what was the “good news”?

If we hear “gospel” through modern ears, we often reduce it to a formula:

  • You are a sinner
  • Jesus died for your sins
  • Believe this, so you can go to heaven

There is truth there. But if that’s all we hear, we are missing the larger announcement. In the first-century context, the euangelion wasn’t primarily about how to go somewhere after you die.  It was about what had happened here and now.

A new reality had broken in.  A new King was on the scene.  A new kingdom was being established. That’s why Jesus connected euangelion directly to the kingdom of God.

The good news was not just about personal forgiveness – though it certainly includes that.  The good news was that God was becoming King in a new and decisive way, right in their midst. Good news, indeed – especially to those marginalized by the religious system. Systemic marginalization?

If You’ve Been Tracking With Us…

If you’ve been tracking with the earlier posts in this series on the kingdom of God, this should all sound familiar. We noted that when Jesus spoke of the kingdom, He wasn’t pointing to a distant place but announcing a present reality – God’s reign breaking into the here and now.

The gospel, then, is the announcement that this kingdom had arrived in and through Him. In other words, the good news was not separate from the kingdom – it was the proclamation that the long-awaited reign of God had drawn near, just as Jesus said in Mark 1:14–15.

Hearing it as they did

So, try to imagine hearing Jesus for the first time with first-century ears.

You’re used to hearing euangelion when Rome announces victory.
You’re used to hearing it when Caesar’s rule expands.

And now this rabbi from Galilee shows up saying: “The kingdom of God has come near… believe the euangelion.” That would have landed very differently than it does for us.  It would have sounded like a royal announcement.  A claim.

A declaration that something had shifted in the fabric of reality.

So… what do we mean when we say “gospel”?

That’s where I want to leave us.  Not with a neat definition – but with a question.

When you hear the word gospel, what comes to mind?

Has it been reduced to a concept?
A formula?
A set of beliefs?

Or are you beginning to hear it again as news?

Good news!

An announcement that something has already happened – something that changes everything.

And maybe the deeper question:

What might those first hearers have understood that’s lost on us?

Gospel: Not What You Think It Means (Part 1)

We’ve been on a journey since the fall of 2024 – a journey to discover/rediscover the kingdom of God that stood at the very center of Jesus’ message. (See Almost Getting It… and On Earth as in Heaven….)

For me, that journey began nearly 35 years ago, when I first realized that the kingdom of God wasn’t peripheral to Jesus’ teaching – it was the thing. And yet, that realization came with a tension: though Jesus spoke primarily about the kingdom, I struggled to remember hearing much teaching that reflected His focus.

We’ve been lingering – intentionally – on Jesus’ opening proclamation in Mark’s account, slowing down to consider the meaning of the words He chose.

“Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, ‘The time has come, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the gospel.’” (Mark 1:14–15)

We’ve spent time with the kingdom of God, repent and believe. Now it’s time to turn to another word in that sentence – one we use often, perhaps too casually:

Gospel.

And here’s my working hypothesis: “Gospel” may be one of those terms we use regularly without fully understanding what it means – especially as Jesus used it, and as first-century Israelites would have heard it.

If that’s true, then it matters more than we might think. Because if we misunderstand “gospel,” we may also misunderstand:

  • what Jesus was announcing,
  • what He was inviting people into,
  • and how the kingdom of God actually breaks into the present.

A Simple Question

Several years ago, I posted a simple prompt on Facebook:

“In a sentence or two, what is the gospel?“

The responses were thoughtful, sincere, and – perhaps most interestingly – quite diverse.

Here’s a sampling:

  • “God showing eternal, grace-filled, unconditional love in human form through Jesus on earth.”
  • “Jesus is God with us… to show us God’s love, save us from sin, set up God’s kingdom…”
  • “It’s the New Testament telling of Jesus’ life… so that our sins are forgiven.”
  • “The truth.”
  • “The BEST news… that God loves us and has made it possible for us to live a forever life with Him, starting now.”
  • “Jesus died to pay for our sins so that we can be forgiven and go to Heaven…”
  • “A love story.”
  • “My only hope… Jesus living a perfect life, dying in my place…”
  • “Four gospels telling their version of the same story.”
  • “Hope for all!”
  • “Christ’s death and His resurrection.”
  • “The invitation to eternal life.”

Take a moment and sit with these.

What resonates with you?
What feels incomplete?
What makes you pause?

What We Tend to Mean by “Gospel”

As I’ve reflected on these responses, a few general themes begin to emerge.

1. The Gospel as a Message About Personal Salvation
Many responses focused on sin, forgiveness, and eternal life – especially life after death. This framing emphasizes what Jesus has done for me so that I can be saved and go to heaven.

2. The Gospel as an Expression of God’s Love
Others highlighted God’s love story – grace, compassion, and relational restoration. This centers on who God is and how He has acted toward humanity.

3. The Gospel as the Story of Jesus’ Life and Work
Some described the gospel as the narrative itself – the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

4. The Gospel as Good News (in a General Sense)
A few answers stayed closer to the literal meaning – “good news,” “hope,” “truth” – but without always defining what the news is.

All True… But Is That All?

Here’s what’s striking: There is truth in every one of these responses. And yet, if we placed ourselves in Galilee in the first century, standing in the crowd as Jesus spoke these words…

“The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe in the gospel.”

…would the people listening have understood “gospel” primarily in these ways?

Would they have heard:

  • “a plan of personal salvation,”
  • or “a summary of theological truths,”
  • or “a set of writings not yet written”?

Or would something else have come to mind? Something more immediate… more public… more world-shifting?

Before We Define It…

Before we rush to define “gospel,” it may be worth lingering in the tension. Because sometimes the problem isn’t that what we believe is wrong – It’s that it might be too small.

So before moving forward, consider:

  • Which of the responses do you instinctively agree with?
  • Which ones feel incomplete or lacking?
  • Which ones stretch your current understanding?
  • And perhaps most importantly…

What might be missing altogether?

We’ll begin to explore how “gospel” was used in everyday first-century life – and what Jesus’ audience likely heard. Next time.

For now, just sit with the question.

Because what we think the gospel is…
will shape how we hear everything Jesus said.

Believe: Not What You Think It Means

When many people hear the word believe, they think of agreeing that something is true.

Do you believe in gravity?
Do you believe George Washington was the first president?
Do you believe the Earth orbits the sun?

In everyday English, belief usually means accepting a fact or holding an opinion.

But when Jesus announced, “The time has come… The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the gospel.”(Mark 1:15), he was not inviting people merely to accept information about God.

The Greek word translated believe is pisteuō (πιστεύω). And it carries a much richer meaning than simple mental agreement.  It means to trust, rely upon, entrust oneself to, and align one’s life with someone.

In other words, pisteuō is closer to commitment than opinion.

More Than Agreement

The Greek language had ways to describe simple acknowledgment of facts. But pisteuō describes something deeper: placing confidence in someone in a way that shapes one’s actions.

At its heart, the word involves three intertwined ideas:

Trust – placing confidence in someone’s reliability
Reliance – depending on that person
Adherence – orienting one’s life around them

When Jesus called people to “believe the gospel (good news),” he was not asking them merely to agree that the kingdom existed. He was inviting them to trust the king and begin living under his reign.

Belief That Moves Your Feet

One way to understand pisteuō is to notice how belief naturally leads to action.

Imagine standing on the edge of a frozen lake in winter. You might say, “I believe the ice is thick enough.” But if you never step onto the ice, your belief is really just a theory.  Real belief happens when you step out and put your weight on it.  That step – that act of trust – is much closer to the meaning of pisteuō.

Biblical belief is trust that moves your feet.

What Belief Looked Like for Israel

The people who first heard Jesus say “believe the good news” already had a long history of learning what trust in God looked like.  For Israel, belief was never merely intellectual. It was lived out through covenant trust and obedience.

When Abraham left his homeland because God called him to go somewhere he had never seen, that was belief. When Israel stepped into the waters of the Jordan, trusting God to lead them into the land, that was belief. When the prophets called the nation to return to the Lord and trust him rather than political alliances or military strength, they were calling the people back to belief.

In other words, belief meant placing their confidence in God and ordering their lives around his covenant rule.

This helps explain why the Hebrew Scriptures often speak of trusting the Lord rather than simply believing certain truths about him. Faith showed itself in dependence and obedience.

So, when Jesus announced that the kingdom of God had drawn near, he was not introducing a completely new idea. He was calling Israel to renew the very kind of trust God had always sought from his people.

Belief in the First-Century World

There is another dimension to this word that we modern readers sometimes miss.

In the first-century world, belief often carried the sense of loyalty or allegiance. People lived under kings and emperors, and public life involved recognizing and aligning oneself with a ruler’s authority.

To trust a king meant more than believing he existed. It meant acknowledging his rule, relying on his protection, and ordering your life under his authority.

Against that backdrop, the early Christian confession “Jesus is Lord” was profound. It signaled a shift in ultimate loyalty.

Seen in that light, believing in Jesus meant transferring allegiance – entrusting oneself to the king whose kingdom had drawn near.

The Pattern in the New Testament

Throughout the New Testament, belief consistently looks like trustful reliance rather than mere agreement.

In John 5:24, Jesus said that whoever hears his word and believes the one who sent him “has crossed over from death to life.” Belief here describes entrusting oneself to God in a way that results in a change of realm.

In Mark 5:36, when Jairus learned his daughter had died, Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” In that moment, belief clearly means trusting Jesus enough to rely on him in the middle of fear.

And in Romans 10:9, belief is paired with the confession “Jesus is Lord,” language that points toward recognizing and entrusting oneself to the authority of the risen king.

Again and again, belief is not merely agreement – it is entrusting oneself to a person.

Hearing Jesus’ Words Again

Now listen again to Jesus’ announcement in Mark 1:15:

“The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the gospel (good news).”

Notice the movement…

First, repent – turn around, reorient your life.
Then believe – place your trust in the good news of God’s reign.

Repentance turns us away from the old order.
Belief entrusts us to the new king.

Jesus was not asking people simply to agree with a message.

He was inviting them to step into a kingdom.

The Question Jesus Still Asks

Over time, the English word believe has become thinner than the biblical idea behind it. Today, someone might say, “I believe in Jesus,” and mean little more than agreeing with certain ideas about him.  Or that he existed.

But in the language of the New Testament, belief carried relational weight.

It meant trusting Jesus.
Relying on him.
Aligning one’s life with his reign.

Not just thinking differently but living differently.  Which means the question Jesus asked in Galilee still echoes today.

Not simply:

“Do you agree with this information about me?”

But rather:

“Will you trust me enough to live as if God’s kingdom is truly here?”

Because in the New Testament, belief is not just something that happens in your head…

It is something that eventually shows up in your life.

Addendum 4/21/2026. It might be important to note that the opposite of pisteuō is not simply unbelief. The opposite, apisteō, implies a refusal to believe, to be incredulous (cf. Mark 16:16, NLT).

A Sweet Aroma

A few years ago, my friend, Crystal Kirgiss, wrote this article for Young Life‘s weekly communique to staff and stakeholders worldwide. It is a perfect reflection as we prepare to celebrate Resurrection Sunday. With her permission, I want to share it with you…

Sometime during what we now call Holy Week, Jesus was eating with His disciples and other friends when a woman approached with an expensive jar filled with expensive perfume. Rather than giving the jar and perfume to Jesus as a gift, like the Magi had 30-some years earlier, the woman shockingly broke the jar open and poured the perfume on Jesus’ head and feet, releasing a sweet aroma.

Essential oils are big business right now. But dousing someone with it during a dinner party is not the norm. We might lightly dab to clear our sinuses or calm our mood. But we do not pour plentifully, no matter what the occasion. This woman, though, poured until there was nothing left to pour.

Jesus’ disciples were neither amused nor impressed.

“What a waste! What nonsense! You could have sold that for good money! You could have made a measurable impact!” Leave it to Jesus’ disciples to deliver a thorough scolding for someone’s act of absolute allegiance and utter worship.

Jesus, though, set the record straight. He called her act beautiful. He praised her — not for something impressive like converting an entire village, or investing and making a profit, or planning and pulling off a large event, or increasing her ministry output. Instead, He praised her for humbly and faithfully anointing Him for burial.

For months, Jesus had been telling His friends He would soon die. Just days earlier, as He’d entered Jerusalem, He’d told them that now was that time. Maybe He’d even talked about it during this very meal.

But this woman seems to be the only one who truly believed what He said, in which case her strange, extravagant act makes great sense — for how else could she possibly respond but to pour onto Jesus the most valuable thing she had, knowing He would soon pour out for all of humanity the most valuable thing He had.

Both Matthew and Mark note that Jesus said to everyone in the room: “I tell you the truth; wherever the good news is preached throughout the world, this woman’s deed will be remembered and discussed.”

But that’s not usually the case. It’s a weird story, after all. And it lacks a neat and tidy takeaway. If we’re always in search of neat and tidy takeaways, Scripture will often disappoint us. But if we’re willing to read it for what it is, and consider the larger story of the Bible, Scripture will always feed us.

At face value, this story is mostly about something a real woman did, in a real place, during a real moment in time, when it was exactly the right thing for her to do in response to Jesus. Are we as aware of things we’re called to do, in this place and at this moment, in response to Jesus? And if that thing is costly, would we be as willing as this woman was to actually do it, knowing others might misunderstand and call us foolish?

As we read the bigger message of God’s Word beyond this story, it becomes clear why this narrative should be remembered and discussed. This woman’s actions are a reminder that in response to Jesus’ death, resurrection, and Lordship, we’re called to break open and pour out the costliest thing we have — our very lives — as we die to ourselves daily, surrender to our Lord, and honor our King. Hopefully, our acts of sacrificial obedience and worship will release a sweet aroma into the world just like the woman’s perfume did thousands of years ago — but now it will be the sweet aroma of Christ Himself.

By Crystal Kirgiss, Director of Discipleship Content and Partnerships, Young Life

Repent: Not What You Think It Means

In the previous post in this series, Not What You Think It Means: The Words That Framed Jesus’ Message, we began looking at several words that sit at the very center of Jesus’ proclamation:

“The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the gospel!” (Mark 1:15)

For many modern readers, words like kingdom, repent, and gospel have become overly familiar. We hear them so often that we assume we know exactly what they mean.

But familiarity can sometimes mask misunderstanding.

In particular, the word repent often carries baggage that may not reflect what Jesus’ original listeners heard. For many people today, the word repent sounds like a stern religious command: feel guilty, confess your sins, and promise to do better.

While repentance certainly involves moral change, that understanding may miss the larger picture of what Jesus was announcing. To see this more clearly, we need to step back and ask a simple question:

What did the word “repent” mean in the world of Jesus?

Seeing Differently

The New Testament word translated repent is the Greek verb metanoeō, with the related noun metanoia. The word comes from two Greek roots:

meta – after, beyond, or change
nous – mind, perception, understanding

At its most basic level, metanoia meant a change of mind. But in Greek thought, the “mind” was not merely intellectual. It referred to the center of perception – how a person understood reality, made judgments, and oriented their life.

Repentance, therefore, described a shift in how someone saw things: a reconsideration of one’s assumptions and a recognition that one’s previous understanding may have been mistaken.

Classical Greek writers used the word this way long before the New Testament. A general might rethink a military strategy, a statesman might reverse a policy after realizing it was misguided, or a person might reconsider a decision after gaining new insight. In those settings, repentance was not primarily religious. It simply meant reconsidering and changing course.

Another Greek word, metamelomai, described emotional regret or remorse. But metanoia focused more on a change in perspective that led to a change in direction.

That distinction matters. Repentance was not primarily about feeling bad. It was about seeing differently.

The Prophets’ Call: Return to the Lord

When Jewish scholars translated the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek (in what we call the Septuagint), they sometimes used metanoeō to translate the Hebrew word shuv, which meant to turn or to return.

In the Old Testament, repentance meant turning back to God – abandoning idols, injustice, and self-reliance and returning to covenant faithfulness. The prophets called Israel to repent not merely by feeling remorse but by reorienting their lives toward Yahweh (cf. Joel 2:12–13; Hosea 14:1–2; Isaiah 55:6–7; Jeremiah 3:12–14; Ezekiel 18:30–32).

“Return to me,” God said through the prophets.

This Hebrew background added an important dimension to the Greek word. Repentance became not only a change of thinking but a relational turning toward God.

What Repentance Meant in Jesus’ World

Now place yourself among the people who first heard Jesus’ words.

John the Baptist had already appeared in the wilderness calling Israel to repentance and warning that God was about to act decisively in history. Then Jesus arrived in Galilee announcing:

“The time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the gospel.”

Notice the order.

Jesus did not simply say, “Repent.” He said repent because something had happened. “The time has come.”  In other words, the long-awaited moment in God’s story with Israel had arrived.

“The kingdom of God has come near.”  God’s reign – the reality Israel had prayed for, longed for, and sung about in the Psalms – was now breaking into history in a new way.

In light of that announcement, Jesus called people to repent. Seen in this context, repentance sounded less like a rebuke and more like an invitation.

It meant something like this: Rethink everything.

The way you understood God’s work in the world.
The way you imagined the kingdom would come.
The way you expected power, victory, and salvation to look.

God was acting – but not in the ways many expected. The kingdom was arriving not through political revolt or military power but through the surprising ministry of Jesus himself. Tax collectors, fishermen, and ordinary villagers began to follow him. The sick were healed. Sinners were welcomed. Outsiders were brought near.

If people wanted to recognize what God was doing, they had to see differently.

They had to repent.

Rethinking Life Under God’s Reign

When Jesus called people to repent, he was not simply telling them to feel sorry for their sins. He was inviting them to adopt a new vision of reality.

Repentance meant allowing one’s assumptions about God, power, righteousness, and identity to be reshaped by the arrival of the kingdom. It meant recognizing that the story many people thought they were living in was not the whole story.

God was doing something new – yet something deeply rooted in the promises of Israel’s Scriptures. To repent was to step into that story. And once someone began to see the world through the lens of God’s kingdom, life inevitably began to change.

Because when we see differently, we live differently.

Part of the challenge for modern readers is that we often hear repentance through the lens of what sociologists call Moralistic Therapeutic Deism1 – the idea that God mainly wants people to be nice, happy, and feel good about themselves. In that framework, repentance shrinks into little more than moral self-improvement. But Jesus’ call to repent was far more disruptive than that – it was an invitation to rethink everything in light of the arriving kingdom.

Repentance as Good News

For many of us, the word repent still carries echoes of accusation or pressure.

But in the mouth of Jesus, repentance was part of the gospel itself. It was an invitation to wake up – to recognize that God’s kingdom had drawn near and that a new way of seeing and living had become possible.

Repentance was not merely about looking backward at past mistakes. It was about turning toward the reality of what God was doing right now.

In other words:

The kingdom was near.  So rethink everything.

1Smith, C., & Denton, M. L. (2005). Soul searching: The religious and spiritual lives of american teenagers. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.

Not What You Think It Means: The Words That Framed Jesus’ Message

In several recent posts here at Practical Theology Today, we have lingered over a phrase that stood at the heart of Jesus’ proclamation: “the kingdom of God has come near.” We explored what it meant for God’s reign to draw near – how the kingdom was not merely a distant heaven waiting for us someday, but God’s active rule breaking into the ordinary world.

That announcement formed the center of Jesus’ message. But it was not the only thing He said. Mark preserved Jesus’ earliest summary of His preaching in a remarkably compact form:

Now, after John was taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time has come, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the gospel.” (Mark 1:14–15)

In two short verses, Mark gave us the core vocabulary of Jesus’ ministry: kingdom, repent, believe, and gospel.

These words are familiar to most Christians. Perhaps too familiar. Over time, they have accumulated layers of assumption, tradition, and misunderstanding. We often hear them through modern religious filters rather than through the world in which Jesus first spoke them.

In the posts ahead, we will slow down a bit and take a closer look at the words Jesus used when announcing the kingdom.  So, we begin a short series called…

Not What You Think It Means.

The Beginning of the Good News

Before Mark recorded Jesus’ proclamation in Galilee, two important events had already unfolded.

First, John the Baptist had appeared in the wilderness, calling Israel to repentance and preparing the way for the coming One (Mark 1:1–8). John’s ministry created a sense of anticipation. Something was about to happen. God was stirring again among His people.

Then Jesus came to the Jordan and was baptized. As He came up out of the water, the heavens were torn open, the Spirit descended upon Him, and the Father’s voice declared, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11).

Immediately afterward, the Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness, where He faced temptation for forty days (Mark 1:12–13). There, in solitude and testing, Jesus confronted the rival voices that would attempt to define His mission.

Only after these events did Jesus step into public ministry.

And Mark noted one more detail: John had been arrested.  The prophetic voice that prepared the way had been silenced by political power. Yet the message did not stop.  Jesus began proclaiming the same kingdom John had announced – but now with a new authority.

The Words that Framed the Message

Mark summarized Jesus’ preaching in a single sentence:

“The time has come… the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the gospel.”

Every word in that sentence mattered.

Jesus was announcing that history had reached a decisive moment – “the time has come.” The long story of Israel’s hope was reaching its fulfillment.

And the reason was clear: the kingdom of God had come near.

In previous posts, we explored what that meant. The kingdom was not simply a future destination. It was the reality of God’s reign drawing near, in and through Jesus Himself. Wherever Jesus went, the rule of God came close enough to be encountered.

But notice what followed the announcement. Jesus did not simply declare the kingdom’s nearness. He invited a response:

  • Repent.
  • Believe.
  • Receive the gospel.

Those three words – repent, believe, gospel – have shaped Christian vocabulary for centuries. Yet the meanings we often attach to them are not always the meanings Jesus intended. Which raises an important question: 

What did Jesus actually mean when He said, “Repent and believe in the gospel”?

Luke’s Window into Jesus’ Mission

As you may recall, Luke recorded what many consider to have been Jesus’ mission statement – The Spirit of the Lord is upon me… (Luke 4:16-20).  Jesus described the kind of kingdom He was bringing: one that liberated, restored, healed, and welcomed the marginalized.

Mark’s summary in 1:14–15 functioned differently. Instead of describing the mission, it captured the core announcement and invitation that accompanied it. Put the two together, and we begin to see the shape of Jesus’ message:

  • Luke 4 showed us what the kingdom looked like when it arrived
  • Mark 1 showed us how people were invited to respond when they heard about it

Both passages pointed to the same reality: God’s reign had drawn near in Jesus.

Words We Think We Know

Here’s where our problem begins. When modern readers hear the words repent, believe, and gospel, we often import meanings that developed much later in Christian history.

For example:

  • Repent is frequently heard as feeling sorry for personal sins.
  • Believe is often reduced to mentally agreeing with certain doctrines.
  • Gospel is sometimes understood as a formula for how individuals go to heaven when they die.

But when Jesus first spoke those words in Galilee, His listeners heard them within the larger story of Israel and the announcement that God’s kingdom was arriving.

Those words carried layers of meaning connected to that announcement. They were not isolated religious commands; they were responses to the nearness of God’s reign.

To hear them rightly, we need to step back into that moment in Mark’s Gospel – when Jesus walked into Galilee and declared that something new had begun.

Where This Series Is Going

In the coming posts in this series, we will slow down and revisit these familiar words one by one.

  • What did Jesus mean when He said, “repent”?
  • What did it mean to “believe” in the context of the kingdom?
  • And what exactly was the “gospel” Jesus proclaimed?

Each of these words has often been simplified, reduced, or misunderstood in modern Christian vocabulary. Yet when we recover their original context, their meaning begins to come to life.

And when they do, something remarkable happens.  We start to hear Jesus’ invitation the way His first listeners did – not merely as religious terminology, but as a call to reorient our lives around the nearness of God’s kingdom.

So this short series will explore some of the most familiar words in the Christian faith.

Words we think we know.

Words that may not mean quite what we think they mean.

And words that, once rediscovered, may help us hear the message of Jesus with new ears.

When the Good News Took to the Streets

Mission statements are easy to admire. They sound clear and purposeful, especially when they remain safely on paper. The real test comes after the words are spoken – when life presses in and those words must be lived. Luke’s Gospel placed Jesus squarely in that tension.

When Jesus stood in the Nazareth synagogue and read from Isaiah – “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…” – He was not offering a reflection or a general hope for the future. He was naming what He had been sent to do. Luke 4:18–19 functioned like a mission statement, a public declaration that the kingdom of God had arrived and that its arrival would be experienced as good news by the poor, the captive, the blind, and the oppressed.

Luke refused to let that declaration remain abstract. Almost immediately, the narrative moved from announcement to action. The meaning of Jesus’ words was not explained – it was embodied.  The good news hit the streets.

The Kingdom Left the Synagogue 

Luke’s storytelling was deliberate. Jesus’ reading in the synagogue named the purpose of His ministry. What followed showed how that purpose took shape in the world. Rather than unpacking Isaiah line by line, Jesus walked straight into the kinds of lives Isaiah described.

He went to places religious leaders avoided and spent time with people respectable rabbis ignored. He lingered with those whose presence threatened ritual cleanliness and social standing. In doing so, Jesus made something unmistakably clear: the kingdom He announced would not be guarded by distance. That’s why it was such good news.

In Jesus’ world, proximity carried meaning. Rabbis were careful about where they went, whom they touched, and with whom they were seen. Attention was a limited resource, reserved for those deemed worthy of instruction and investment. The margins were not places of formation; they were places of caution.

Jesus inverted that logic – a great reversal, as Eugene Peterson describes it.

Nearness as Good News

Again and again in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus’ presence became the first experience of good news for those Isaiah had named. Before anyone was healed, forgiven, or restored, they were noticed.

Jesus touched a leper.
He addressed paralytics directly.
He allowed sinful women to draw near.
He welcomed tax collectors into relationship.
He stopped for beggars that others tried to silence.

For these people, the good news was not initially that their circumstances might change. It was that God had drawn near to them at all. No contemporary rabbi would have given them sustained attention (or any attention), let alone shared table fellowship or physical touch. Their lives had trained them to expect avoidance, not engagement.

Jesus shattered that expectation.

It was the nearness of the kingdom made visible.

The Scandal of Proximity

Jesus’ nearness was not accidental, nor was it neutral. It exposed a religious imagination that had learned how to speak about God while remaining distant from the people God seemed most concerned about. Without issuing formal condemnations, Jesus’ actions challenged the assumption that holiness required separation.

He did not lower the bar of faithfulness. He revealed its true direction.

Holiness looked like proximity to suffering rather than insulation from it. Faithfulness looked like interruption rather than efficiency. Righteousness was expressed not through avoidance, but through mercy.

The kingdom did not advance by protecting boundaries, but by restoring people.

Why the Incarnation Matters Here

John’s Gospel deepened what Luke displayed. Where Luke showed us what Jesus did, John named who Jesus was. “In the beginning was the Word… and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

Jesus’ presence among the marginalized was not merely compassionate; it was incarnational – God in the flesh.

God did not redeem the world from a safe distance; He entered it fully – taking on flesh, vulnerability, hunger, fatigue, and rejection. The incarnation declared that divine holiness was not threatened by human brokenness. It moved toward it.

So when Jesus touched the unclean, God was revealing His own heart. When Jesus lingered with the overlooked, God was making Himself known. The margins were not on the edge of God’s mission; they were central to it.

The Geography of God

Luke and John converged on a startling truth: the people others avoided became the very places where God revealed Himself. The poor, the captive, the blind, and the oppressed were not afterthoughts in the kingdom of God. They were its earliest witnesses.

Jesus did not simply bring good news to the margins. His very presence declared that God had always been oriented toward them.

Mission, then, was not merely something Jesus talked about. It was something He practiced with His body, His time, and His attention. The mission statement found its truest expression in His presence.

If We Bear His Name…

If Luke 4 named Jesus’ mission and His life embodied it, the question facing His followers is unavoidable. The issue is not whether we can articulate the mission clearly. The issue is whether our presence communicates it faithfully.

Who experiences good news simply because we showed up?
Who feels seen before they are fixed?
Who encounters the reality of God not through our explanations, but through our nearness?

Jesus did not rush past the people Isaiah named. He lingered. And in that lingering, heaven brushed against earth.

The kingdom had arrived – in person.

And it still does – whenever and wherever His people choose to show up.

Full of Grace and Truth

When God moved in, He did not arrive empty-handed. He arrived with all of His fullness. 1

John wrote that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and then added a phrase that can slip past us if we’re not careful: full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

Not inclined toward one.
Not balancing the two.
Full — brimming, complete — of both.

Those words weren’t accidental. John wasn’t improvising. He was reaching back deep into Israel’s memory, pulling forward language that had always described the very heart of God.

Grace and Truth Have a History

The Greek words John used — charis (grace) and alētheia (truth) — carried weight in their own right. But they carried even more when read through the Scriptures Jesus had grown up hearing.

Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, God’s character was described with a paired phrase: ḥesed and ʾemet — steadfast love and faithfulness. Covenant loyalty and reliability. Mercy that holds fast and truth that does not shift. 2

After Israel’s rebellion with the golden calf, when Moses asked to see God’s glory, the Lord proclaimed His own name:

“The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love (ḥesed) and faithfulness (ʾemet).” (Exodus 34:6) 3

This was not a passing description. It was God explaining God.

The Psalms returned to it again and again:

  • “Steadfast love and faithfulness go before You” (Psalm 89:14).
  • “Steadfast love and faithfulness meet; righteousness and peace kiss each other” (Psalm 85:10).

This was relational language: ḥesed named God’s refusal to walk away. ʾemet named His utter trustworthiness.

So when John described Jesus as full of grace and truth, he was making a staggering claim: what Israel had known about God had now taken on flesh.

Grace and Truth Took on a Face

Jesus did not merely speak about grace; He embodied it.

He welcomed the unclean, shared tables with the compromised, and refused to reduce people to their worst decisions. That was ḥesed embodied — covenant love moving toward the undeserving.

But He also spoke with piercing clarity.

He named hypocrisy. He confronted self-righteousness. He exposed illusions of power and wealth. That was ʾemet — truth anchored in reality, not sentiment.

And in Him, these were never at odds.

Grace never diluted truth.
Truth never canceled grace.

When Jesus encountered the woman caught in adultery, He did not pretend sin didn’t matter — but He also refused to let condemnation have the final word. When He met Zacchaeus, grace came first — and truth followed close behind, reshaping his life from the inside out.

Jesus did not oscillate between grace and truth. He lived at the intersection of both.

Why We Pull Them Apart

We tend to pull grace and truth apart.

Some of us lean toward grace — valuing kindness, empathy, welcome — but hesitate to name what is broken or distorted. Others lean toward truth — certainty, conviction, moral seriousness — but struggle to extend mercy without conditions.

Jesus refused that split. Scripture refuses that split. God never asked Israel to choose between love and faithfulness. He revealed Himself as abounding in both.

Grace is not permissive.
Truth is not harsh.
Together, they restore.

Grace and Truth Dwelling Among Us

John said the Word dwelt among us — literally, tabernacled. The same glory that once filled the wilderness tent now walked the roads of Galilee. That meant…

To encounter Jesus was to meet steadfast love.
To listen to Jesus was to hear faithful truth.

Living Full of Grace and Truth

John was not composing a theological treatise; he wrote so we would recognize the character of God.

If Jesus was full of grace and truth, then those who follow Him were invited into that same way of being.

Not graceless truth that wounds.
Not truthless grace that avoids reality.
But love that remains steady and truth that leads to life.

Perhaps the question this text presses upon us is not Do you believe this? But where might you be resisting half of God’s character?

Where do you long for grace but avoid truth?
Where do you cling to truth but withhold grace?

When God moved in, He brought both — and entrusted that way of life to those who would bear His name.

And maybe the world, weary of distortion and suspicion, still longs to see what ḥesed and ʾemet looks like with skin on.

1 See Colossians 2

2 When Hebrew scholars translated their scriptures into Greek, ḥesed and ʾemet were translated as charis and alētheia.

3 Keep in mind that when we read LORD (all caps.), it is translated as Yahweh in the Hebrew scriptures. It’s the name God revealed to Moses when he wondered what to say once the Israelites questioned who had sent him. Yahweh effectively describes God as the one who was, who is, and who forever will be. See Exodus 3.

The Visible Expression of the Invisible God

Paul wrote with breathtaking clarity: “Christ is the visible expression of the invisible God.” (Col. 1:15, JB Phillips). Not a sketch. Not a shadow. Not a partial rendering. Jesus was the visible expression of the God no one had ever seen.

That claim did not emerge in a vacuum. It rested within Israel’s long, layered story of a God who had always made Himself known through visible expressions of His presence. The incarnation did not interrupt that story. It fulfilled it.

John began his Gospel by reaching all the way back before Genesis. “In the beginning was the Word.” The Greek word John used was logos – a term thick with meaning. Logos carried the sense of speech, reason, and self-expression. God was not merely silent power behind the cosmos; God had always been expressive. He had always spoken.

And then John stunned his readers: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

We might say it this way: Jesus was God’s Logos made legible.

In our modern world, the word logo functions in a strikingly similar way. A company’s logo is not the company itself, but it is the visible expression of its identity, mission, and purpose. A well-designed logo makes values concrete. It takes something invisible – vision, intent, character – and renders it visible.

John suggested that Jesus did for God what a logo does for a company – except infinitely more. Jesus did not merely point toward God. He embodied Him.

God Had Always Made Himself Visible

Long before Bethlehem, God had been revealing Himself in visible ways.

When Israel emerged from slavery, God went before them as a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night. His presence was not abstract. It was luminous, directional, and protective. He guided them not by theory, but through His presence.

At Sinai, the mountain trembled. Smoke ascended. Thunder rolled. Fire crowned the summit. God’s holiness overwhelmed the senses. The people did not merely hear about God; they encountered Him as glory, sound, heat, and fear. Theophany – the visible manifestation of God – marked Israel’s story from its earliest chapters.

Later, God instructed Moses to build the tabernacle. The tabernacle became a portable sign that the God of heaven chose to dwell among His people. Glory filled the space. God localized His presence, not to limit Himself, but to make Himself known.

The same pattern continued with the temple. When Solomon dedicated the first temple, the glory of the Lord filled it so fully that the priests could not stand to minister (2 Chronicles 6:12-42). Though no walls of stone or beams of cedar could hold Him, He made His presence known within them. The temple functioned as a visible expression of divine nearness.

Yet each of these expressions carried limitations. The cloud and fire guided but did not speak. Sinai revealed holiness but created distance. The tabernacle and temple mediated presence, but only through layers – curtains, sacrifices, priesthoods.

They were real revelations, but they were not the final word.

The Logos Took on a Face

John wrote that the Word “dwelt” among us – literally, “tabernacled.” In Jesus, God did not merely revisit the tabernacle; He redefined it. The presence of God was no longer housed in fabric or stone, but in a human life.

Jesus healed with touch. He taught with stories. He revealed mercy through meals, forgiveness through proximity, authority through self-giving love. When people encountered Jesus, they encountered what God was like.

– If someone wanted to know how God treated sinners, they watched Jesus eat with them.
– If they wanted to know God’s posture toward the marginalized, they watched Jesus stop, listen, and restore.
– If they wondered what divine power looked like, they saw it kneel and wash feet.

Jesus did not merely talk about God. He showed Him.

This is why the incarnation matters so deeply. God did not finally reveal Himself through a book alone, or a building, or a system. He revealed Himself through a life. In Jesus, everything God had shown before finally came into focus. The cloud, the fire, the mountain, the tent, the temple – all pointed forward. Jesus gave them a face.

Gospel Immersion and the Discovery of God

If Jesus was the visible expression of the invisible God, then knowing God is inseparable from knowing Jesus.

This is why gospel immersion matters. Not as an academic exercise. Not as religious obligation. But as the discovery of the centrality of our faith…

The reality, the core, the import, is found in the Anointed One (Colossians 2:17b, VOICE).

We do not come to the Gospels primarily to extract principles. We come to behold a person. As we linger in the stories – watching how Jesus moved, listened, responded, withdrew, confronted, healed, and forgave – we are learning what God is like.

Gospel immersion trains our imagination. It reshapes our instincts. It reorients our assumptions about power, holiness, love, and faithfulness. Over time, Jesus becomes the lens through which we interpret God – and ourselves.

In a world still tempted to reduce God to abstraction, ideology, or utility, the Gospels insist on something better: God made Himself visible. God allowed Himself to be seen, touched, understood, misunderstood, rejected, and crucified.

And in doing so, God showed us Himself.

The invisible became visible.
The seemingly unknowable became near.
The Logos took on flesh.

And we behold His Glory.