Luke writes about John the Baptist, “So with many other exhortations he preached the gospel to the people” (Luke 3.18). Arguably it should be translated as “he evangelized the people.”

So what was the content of this message?  We don’t have to guess.  Luke tells us:

He said therefore to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

And the crowds asked him, “What then shall we do?” And he answered them, “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise.” Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, “Teacher, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Collect no more than you are authorized to do.” Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.”

As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ, John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

So there you go.  Does that sound more like this or this?

I’ve already touched on how Horton’s definition of the Gospel as (and only as) “the specific announcement of the forgiveness of sins and declaration of righteousness solely by Christ’s merits,” won’t work if one considers the Bible authoritative and reads what it says, but it might help to go into more detail.

John the Baptist certainly is not where we want to stop in our understanding the Gospel, but he is not compromising it, nor teaching falsehood.  If your idea of the Gospel message excludes moral exhortations like those above, you need to re-engage in Scripture, not pass judgment on others who, whatever their problems, know better than you on this point.

It might be helpful to note the two uses of the word “gospel” or, since it is a verb in these cases, “evangelize”

Luke 2.10:

And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy [or: “I evangelize you about great joy”] that will be for all the people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

Luke 4.18-19 (Jesus reading Isaiah 61.1,2):

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim the Gospel to [or “to evangelize”] the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Luke 2.10 says that a new King is coming, and in Luke 4 Jesus says he is the king (“annointed”) to announce his new kingdom is coming.  And this is precisely John’s point recorded in Luke 3 and quoted above: The King is coming so get ready.

Jesus himself preached exhortations as Jospel just like John did.  As Jeff Meyers has written:

Matthew tells us that Jesus preached the “Gospel of the Kingdom” (Matt. 4:23), then he gives the content of his preaching of the Gospel in the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount. If we don’t like that, then we ought to change our narrow definition of the Gospel.

In fact, this Gospel of the Kingdom is summarized shortly earlier in Matthew 4: “From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.'”  Matthew clearly specifies that Jesus began this preaching after John’s arrest.  Thus, we can be certain that Mark (1.14, 15) is recording the same event:

Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”

So the Sermon on the Mount is not at all some kind of “law” ethic for which the gospel is the needed rescue.  Rather, it is the repentance that the Gospel demands.  It is the proper response to believing the Good News of the Kingdom.

One can easily look at the data (searching for “gospel” or “good news”).  This in not an obscure point or one difficult to prove: “Gospel” is the news or story of the coming kingdom or king.  It thus entails repentance and new obedience in response to this new king.  It can be as wide as t,he entire story of Jesus (Mark 1.1) or it can be a narrower summary.  But it is not reducible to “the specific announcement of the forgiveness of sins and declaration of righteousness solely by Christ’s merits.” In fact, Horton’s definition doesn’t even include the demand for faith which, if one really tries to be sympathetic and get as much of his definition out of what we read in the (let’s point it out again) Gospels, is a a demand that is at least as prominent as the announcement of forgiveness.

But more amazingly is that Horton finds fault with the Manhattan Document for doing exactly what the Gospels do in the preaching of the Gospel they show us.  The ethical standards proclaimed in the document mean that it compromises the Gospel:

They are deliverances of the law that God inscribed on every human conscience, not of the gospel that God announced beforehand through his prophets and fulfilled in his incarnate Son’s life, death, and resurrection.

However, it is just for that reason that I stumbled over a few references to the gospel in this declaration.

Oh, OK.

He said therefore to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

And the crowds asked him, “What then shall we do?” And he answered them, “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise.” Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, “Teacher, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Collect no more than you are authorized to do.” Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages.”

If John can “evangelize” the people by telling people to respect property and deal honestly with others in their power, then a group of Christians can point out that the Gospel demands that babies and others not be killed and that marriage is for man and woman.

The error at this point is not marginal.  It goes to the heart of the more general confusion among Christians of every denominational stripe today, on the left and the right.

Well, yeah. That means these people read the Gospels.

There are real serious and central errors in Roman Catholic soteriology.  Accusing them of faithfully imitating the proclamation of the Gospel is not the reason for those errors and is not likely to prove to them that they are in error.  If Horton can’t sign a document with Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox contributors, he is free to say so.  But this nonsense about mixing creation ordinances with the Gospel is a morass of confusion that does not help the cause of Protestant Orthodoxy nor Biblical fidelity.  And it doesn’t help the Church deal with rampant and horrific abuse, perversion, and murder by unbelieving powers that we are supposed to confront with, yes, the Gospel.

Next Up (I think) The Gospel in Acts and Paul.  Stay tuned.

Here’s my series portal.