Sometimes, the Gospel—the Christian religion’s “good news”—is summarized using a familiar line from John [3:16]. But that isn’t the gospel that Jesus preached! The SSUC Library contains two books that point up the Nazarene’s good news: there’s Peter Gomes’ The Scandalous Gospel of Jesus, and the more earnest The Gospel of Jesus: In Search of the Original Good News, by James Robinson.
Described as “the preeminent expert on the earliest sources of information about Jesus,” Robinson is the founding director of the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity. According to Goodreads, he, in this 2005 book, “offers one of the most authentic and stirring accounts ever written of the message preached” by Jesus. (Gomes, in his book, calls it, dramatically, “a disturbing and redistributive gospel”.)
Jesus was forever espousing what he labeled “the kingdom of God”. “This utopian vision,” as Robinson dubs it, “was the core of what Jesus had to say, and what he himself put into practice.” He concludes his volume by warranting, “…if you really are committed to Jesus, then you should be committed to the gospel of Jesus,” and living it out here and now: “take an active role in meeting the needs of others.”
