The gospel is essentially Jesus Christ, his mission and kingdom. If we focus only on justification by faith and escape from hell we are missing a big part of the gospel. The good news is not about my salvation, it is about the divine messianic King, who became a sacrifice for me to bring me into his kingdom. In this way, the gospel relates to the whole of life, present and future, not only to the past. Paul is ready to preach the gospel to the Roman believers (Rom. 1:15). Did he not believe they were already disciples? I think Paul’s understanding of the gospel is much broader than ours. The gospel is applicable to our daily life: we need forgiveness every day, we need to submit to our Lord and his will every day, we need to pursue his goals in this world every day. Scot McKnight’s book The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited speaks well into this.
Eduard Borysov born in Artyomovsk, Ukraine (in 2018 the town was renamed Bakhmut due to decommunization process in Ukraine), is a professor at Kyiv Theological Seminary, Ukraine. His favorite movie is The Kingdom of Heaven, his favorite smell is coffee and chocolate, his first job was helping his dad in construction, and when not engaged in academic rigor he enjoys visiting friends and watching movies.
