R.C. Sproul

We carry that over into English and talk about the good news.

Now, the term in the Greek language is used widely and also within the context of the sacred Scriptures, even in the Greek translation of the Old Testament that is in its simplest meaning.

The term gospel or Evangelion refers to any message of good tidings.

For example, you go back to the Old Testament and we read of the account of the confrontation between David and Goliath.

And when David is victorious over the Philistine giant, the report is then spread throughout the land.

And that report of the announcement of this decisive victory over the Philistines is called the gospel.

That is, it's good news, so that any good report could be called gospel in the ancient world.

But of course, when we come to the New Testament, the term gospel takes on a more technical, specialized meaning.

It refers not to any good news in general, but a specific kind of good news with a specific content.

Now in terms of Christian history, I can distinguish at least three ways in which we use the term gospel.

One of the ways, one of the most common ways in which we hear the term being used is from what developed in early church history.

The first four books of the New Testament—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—became known in the early church as the four Gospels because the content of these first four books of the New Testament

focused attention to some degree or another on a biographical summary of the life and the teaching of Jesus.

And since Jesus in his person and in his work becomes the central focal point of what the New Testament calls the gospel,

the books that give us a report of His life and teaching became known as gospel.

So one of the ways in which the term gospel is used in Christian history is to refer to a specific literary form, that literary form that was used in these biographical sketches of the life of Jesus and compiles, as I said, the first four books of the New Testament.

But when we go to the pages of the New Testament itself,

There we find a progressive understanding and usage of this specific term, gospel.

And so what I want to look at first is what I'm going to call the gospel according to Jesus.

That is the way in which the term or concept of gospel functions in the teaching of Jesus.