The One and Only Gospel

The word "Gospel" means "Good News" and it refers to the message of what God did to save us and how we can receive that salvation. It is supposed to be a simple message that has defined Christianity from the beginning, but it seems that there is some disagreement among Christians about the Gospel that was being preached at the beginning of the Church. Some say that the Apostles led by Peter were preaching that a person is saved through having faith and doing works together, while the Apostle Peter and those who agreed with him were preaching that salvation comes through having faith alone. This theory gives the idea that Paul alone was spreading the Gospel, with the other Apostles only serving as a hindrance to him and his message, leaving a great divide between Jewish and Gentile believers. While it is true that the early Christians, including the Apostles, didn't always agree, it is not true that they were hopelessly divided over God's plan of salvation. When you look into the New Testament, instead of seeing contradicting messages, you see a unified truth, proclaiming that salvation comes by God's grace through personal faith in who He is and what He did to save sinners, whether they be Jew or Gentile.

In clearing this up, we need to begin with the one who is most often accused of preaching salvation by works, the Apostle Peter. In Acts 10:43, Peter has just told a group of Gentiles about the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, when he gives the following invitation, saying, "To Him all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins" (Acts 10:43, NKJV). Now when this first group of Gentiles believed, they received the Holy Spirit in what has been called a Gentile Pentecost, which was evidenced by the speaking of tongues as in Acts 2. This Gentile Pentecost was a unique event to commemorate the first of the Gentiles coming to believe. It was at this point that Peter said, "Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?" Don't miss the sequence of events: Peter gave the invitation to believe for salvation, they believed and received the Holy Spirit, and then they were baptized afterwards. Peter said that this was the same way that the Jewish believers had also received the Holy Spirit and came to be baptized. It was through faith alone, with no works mentioned.

I would also like to point out the events of the next chapter in Acts, when Peter got back to Jerusalem and was surrounded by controversy from the Jewish believers because he had been with Gentiles (Acts 11:1-3). Peter first explained to them how God had sent him to the Gentiles to tell them how to be saved (Acts 11:4-14). Peter told them how they received the Holy Spirit and then said, "If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?" (Acts 11:17, NKJV) Their response is in agreement with Peter: "When they heard these things they became silent; and they glorified God, saying, 'Then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life'" (Acts 11:18, NKJV). Peter's emphasis was on belief for salvation and apparently that was the same message that the Jews had already received.

When Paul was preaching in the synagogue in Antioch of Pisidia, his message was essentially the same as Peter's. Paul told of the coming of the Messiah, the death of Jesus, and the resurrection of Jesus. Paul then said, "Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through this Man is preached to you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him everyone who believes is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13:38-39, NKJV). When most of the Jews in the synagogue (though not all) rejected what Paul had to say, Paul turned to the Gentiles, but it does not say that his message to them was any different. It's interesting that you see this same pattern in every city that Paul went to. If the city had a synagogue, he started preaching there, then when he was inevitably rejected, he would turn to the Gentiles, but his message was always the same to both, namely that salvation comes by God's grace through personal faith.

Now it is clear that not all Jewish Christians believed in the message of salvation by grace through faith alone. In fact, Paul, Barnabas, and other like-minded Christians went to Jerusalem, "to the apostles and elders," over the disagreement, in order to try and resolve it (Acts 15:1-2). The majority of believers were overjoyed at the news of their success in reaching the Gentiles, but a minority of believers were critical (Acts 15:3-5). Not surprisingly, since he was the first to proclaim the Gospel to the Gentiles, Peter stood up to defend Paul and his Gospel. The Bible says, "And when there had been much dispute, Peter rose up and said to them: 'Men and brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they'" (Acts 15:7-11, NKJV). I want to take special note of two things in what Peter said. First of all, Peter called the Law a "yoke" that none of the Jews had been able to bear, or in other words, none of them had been able to save themselves through the keeping of the Law. Secondly, Peter said that it is through "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ" and nothing else that anyone is saved, whether Jew or Gentile.

With these passages in mind, I simply cannot believe that they preached a different Gospel. You see both Peter and Paul preaching salvation by grace through faith to both Jews and Gentiles. There's no reason to believe that the other Apostles were any different. Their's was a unified message of salvation by the grace of One Lord over one people of faith, whether Jew or Gentile, as the Bible says, "For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity" (Ephesians 2:14-16, NKJV).

Today, there are many denominations and varieties of Churches, much more so than it was in the beginning when there was only a Jewish and a Gentile Church. In all our disagreements, whether worthy or unworthy of argument, it is imperative that we have one unified message, just like the early Church did. That message should be that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, our Savior, and our Lord, because He was born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, died in our place, and rose again from the dead to save and change the lives of all who will place their faith in Him. That's the message of salvation by grace through faith. The grace is His part, while the faith is ours, and when both come together, salvation happens! When it comes to life and death, that's the only Good News!