NEWS SIDEBAR: Excerpts from”The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebration”

c. 1999 Religion News Service UNDATED _ Excerpts from”The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebratiion,”signed by more than 125 evangelical Christian leaders to be released in the June 14 issue of Christianity Today magazine. The 3,400-word document includes a preamble and sections on the gospel, on unity as well as a series of affirmations, […]

c. 1999 Religion News Service

UNDATED _ Excerpts from”The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebratiion,”signed by more than 125 evangelical Christian leaders to be released in the June 14 issue of Christianity Today magazine. The 3,400-word document includes a preamble and sections on the gospel, on unity as well as a series of affirmations, denials and commitments.


PREAMBLE

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is news, good news: the best and most important news that any human being ever hears.

All Christians are called to unity in love and unity in truth. As evangelicals who derive our very name from the Gospel, we celebrate this great good news of God’s saving work in Jesus Christ as the true bond of Christian unity, whether among organized churches and denominations or in the many transdenominational cooperative enterprises of Christians together.

All who are justified experience reconciliation with the Father, full remission of sins, transition from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light, the reality of being a new creature in Christ, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.

THE GOSPEL

This Gospel of Jesus Christ, which God sets forth in the infallible Scriptures, combines Jesus’ own declaration of the present reality of the kingdom of God with the apostles’ account of the person, place and work of Christ, and how sinful humans benefit from it.

The heart of the Gospel is that our holy, loving Creator, confronted with human hostility and rebellion, has chosen in his own freedom and faithfulness to become our holy, loving Redeemer and Restorer. The Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world (1 John 4:14): it is through his one and only Son that God’s one and only plan of salvation is implemented.

God’s justification of those who trust him, according to the Gospel, is a decisive transition, here and now, from a state of condemnation and wrath because of their sins to one of acceptance and favor by virtue of Jesus’ flawless obedience culminating in his voluntary sin-bearing death.

The Gospel calls us to live as obedient servants of Christ and as his emissaries in the world, doing justice, loving mercy, and helping all in need, thus seeking to bear witness to the kingdom of Christ.

UNITY IN THE GOSPEL

Christians are commanded to love each other despite differences of race, gender, privilege, and social, political, and economic background … We know that divisions among Christian hinder our witness in the world, and we desire greater mutual understanding and truth-speaking in love.”


AFFIRMATIONS AND DENIALS

We affirm that the Gospel is the saving power of God in that the Gospel effects salvation to everyone who believes, without distinction … We deny that the power of the Gospel rests in the eloquence of the preacher, the technique of the evangelist, or the persuasion of rational argument.

OUR COMMITMENT

As evangelicals united in the Gospel, we promise to watch over and care for one another, to pray for and forgive one another, and to reach out in love and truth to God’s people everywhere, for we are one family, one in the Holy Spirit, and one in Christ.

DEA END RNS

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