Following on from my reflections “Gospel: A piece of cake” I want to expand on some of those thoughts. So I had shared about the term gospel and what it has been reduced to by many by using the analogy of a cake (borrowed from Steve Bell). The atonement is the cake and the 9 theories are slices. All 9 are delicious. So it is with the atonement theories, each can bring new life to the gospel. I also shared a bit about Luke 4 and Jesus’ manifesto “the spirit of the Lord is upon me”… and suggested Jesus’ words would suggest the gospel is more than penal substitution.

So now I move on to something slightly different and that is the communication or proclamation of the gospel.

So if the gospel is more than substitution and a guilt orientated message communication is more than preaching sin, hell, wrath and judgment. Jesus’ announcement “the spirit of the Lord is upon me” is an announcement of action, as in Jesus will do the things that follow He announces. Jesus’ proclamation is action-orientated. His life and ministry embody His announcement. And, wow, what a privilege that the same ministry is extended to believers. 

The reason for sharing about communication is that so often when ‘gospel’ is used by evangelicals they usually mean penal substitution which ought to be preached or that every thing else done for the sake of evangelism is done with this bias. Much of the “preachy” methods of evangelism such as open air meetings, door to door visitation and such are what I call the Business or Salesman approach to communicating the gospel. However when I think about communicating the gospel I am most inclined to believe that communicating the gospel effectively involves doing…living…loving…being and so on. The salesman, business type model of persuasion, convincing, preaching is very much a western approach. Many other cultures understand through relationships, that is their way of knowing. Jesus ought not to be sold but experienced and known in a living relationship. What we sell is Christianity, we so work hard at persuading people to believe what we believe by preaching at them our beliefs until they give in. But Jesus did much more than preach, preaching was one slice of the cake for Jesus. Many other ways of communicating were implemented by Jesus in His relationships with others. 

People respond much more to relationships of love and trust than they do some dictator. The felt needs of a society or person are often what they respond to the most. So preaching goes over the head of someone whose felt needs are food. They don’t need a lecture, they need food. Until such felt needs are met then there really is no point in speaking really.

Think of preaching as the bones, put some flesh on the message by being the message. “In the beginning was the Word” and the “Word became flesh”. Dont just give people bones, give them meat. Don’t sell Jesus, but just be like Him, let His life in you communicate “good news” to those around you.