The Gospel?

I am starting to read a book by Darrell Bock that is entitled, "Recovering the Real Lost Gospel: Reclaiming the Gospel as Good News." I'm excited to read this book because it describes how a lot of churches are have lost what the Gospel truly is....or only present part of what the Gospel entails.

Bock states the Gospel can often times be presented as a therapeutic call where God is there to help us become a better person or more prosperous. Other times the Gospel is only presented as a spiritual transaction--whereby Jesus seems to take our moral debts from us (e.g. sins). There are other presentations of the Gospel that have to deal with politics and liberation from oppression. In other words, Jesus came to deliver mankind from oppression, slavery, etc.

What is the Gospel?

Clearly, Bock believes the cross (e.g. Jesus dying for our sins and raising from the dead) is central to Christianity. In fact, he believes the cross is the hub of the Gospel. But he believes that the Gospels entails much more than just the forgiveness of sins. On what this is...stay tuned.