Lifeway in Nashville Feb 10, Chapel at DTS (Revised Feb 22)
I am heading out to Nashville to present my book (out in the fall) to Lifeway’s sales staff at their invitation. This book is about the gospel as good news. It is a biblical theology of the gospel and tries to make the point that the gospel is more than death for sin but not equal to social action (though such action is a result of a response to the gospel).
I am heading out to Nashville to present my book (out in the fall) to Lifeway’s sales staff at their invitation. This book is about the gospel as good news. It is a biblical theology of the gospel and tries to make the point that the gospel is more than death for sin but not equal to social action (though such action is a result of a response to the gospel). It highlights how the provision of new life in the Spirit and the ability to know and walk with God is at the core of the gospel. I am looking forward to this book being released. I wrote it last summer while in Jordan. It has always bothered me that by making the gospel equal to death for sin that we turn the gospel into a transaction and take its best ongoing element out of the equation. My hope is that the array of biblical texts assembled to show this emphasis across many writers in Scripture make the point clearly.
A chapel message at DTS on this theme from last Tuesday (Feb 16) is now posted at:
http://www.dts.edu/media/play/?MediaItemID=c180f9ec-7c6a-404d-89d9-b751ab84f19f
5 Comments
Rob Reid
Thrilling
Dr. B.,
Looking forward to the new book. Good luck with LifeWay.
Adam Scheidegger
This book
I’m really excited about this book Dr. Bock. I think many people are writing now about how knowing Jesus Christ actually should change and motivate us toward knowing and serving our brothers and sisters better & our world around us. It seems like the “tide of evangelism” might be changing its focus.
Leslie Jebaraj
Eagerly awaiting …
Dear Dr. Bock: I am very eagerly awaiting the release of your book! I am sure the Church needs this clarification of the Gospel. If Christians cannot agree on the Gospel, in my opinion, then we are simply wasting time and efforts in other endeavours, all the time assuming we are doing something great while we may not, I think. Thank you beforehand for your book!!
Anonymous
The Gospel
Prof. Bock,
I just finished watching your chapel message.I think someone mentioned it on your blog in the past the but what you’re saying about the gospel is similar to what John Piper said in his book ” God is the Gospel “. In it he asks the question ” What makes the gospel good news? or what makes the good news good news?” Is it that we get to go to heaven? Is that we get to escape hell? Is it that our sins are forgiven? Is it that we are declared righteous? Piper says that all these things are gifts and truths of the gospel but they are not what ultimately and finally make the gospel good news. Piper says what makes the gospel good news is that it brings us to God (1 Peter 3:18), to know God, to enjoy God, to walk with God, to treasure Him. In Pipers own words :
” My Point in this book is that all the saving events and all the saving blessings of the gospel are means of getting obstacles out of the way so that we might know and enjoy God most fully. Propitiation, redemption, forgiveness, imputation, sanctification, liberation, healing, heaven – none of these is good news except for one reason: they bring us to God for our everlasting enjoyment of him. If we believe all these things have happened to us, but do not embrace them for the sake of getting to God, they have not happened to us. Christ did not die to forgive sinners who go on treasuring anything above seeing and savoring God. And people who would be happy in heaven if Christ were not there, will not be there. The gospel is not a way to get people to heaven; it is a way to get people to God. It’s a way of overcoming every obstacle to everlasting joy in God. If we don’t want God above all things, we have not been converted by the gospel “.
What are your thoughts on that? Thanks.
bock
Gospel dlb
We agree. I do have a small quibble with him on imputation and whether it has a moral element (I think that is what the gift of the Spirit is about and is a part of sanctification). That detail is not in this quote you give. The other key point I am making is that we do not discuss the Spirit enough in all of this and so that the trinitarian nature of the gospel also is appreciated.