Christians are often encouraged to share “the gospel.” The word “gospel” literally means good news or good announcement. But what is the good announcement? Most of the time, if you ask, you’ll either be told the simple gospel explanation: “Jesus died for your sins so you can go to Heaven.” Or you'll get a 4-point explanation that
1) God created the world for good
2) Humanity sinned and caused a separation from God
3) The Father sent the Son to die for our sins so we can be forgiven
4) Now we follow His way on earth while we wait for Heaven (although #4 has more variations than the others) 

But what did Jesus say when He proclaimed “the gospel”?

Mark 1:14-15

After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

Jesus’s articulation of the gospel is that 1) the time has come and 2) the Kingdom of God has come near. Thus, He calls people to respond by repenting and believing that good announcement. 

“The time has come” insinuates that the people to whom He is speaking have been waiting for this. They have a category for His pronouncement that “the kingdom of God has come near.” So what did it mean to them? 

Israel’s History with Kingship

In the Garden of Eden, when God uses the language of making mankind in “God’s image,” (Genesis 1:27) it doesn’t mean that we look like Him. What it means is that we are earthly representations of God. To make that clearer, the second of the ten commandments says, “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them” (Exodus 20:4-5). We don’t need to make and bow down to an image/human-made representation of God because God already made humans to bear His image and represent Him! How are we supposed to represent Him? We are to do what He does: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (Genesis 1:28). Create and bear the responsibility of caring for creation– just like God whom we image. 

What does all that have to do with kingship? One way of explaining the Genesis narrative, as the Israelites do throughout Scripture, is that God is King over all creation and made humanity to be His co-rulers. (Once you pay attention, you start seeing this language all over the Bible.) But of course, humans don’t like the “co” in “co-ruling” so we rebel, falling into corruption, brutality, and greed. 

In the key moment of Israel’s origin story– the Exodus– God liberates Israel from an evil king, the Egyptian Pharaoh. For some time, they half-heartedly allow God to lead them by communicating through priests and prophets. But then their eyes wander and they demand of the prophet Samuel, “appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have” (1 Samuel 8:5). Samuel is upset with them, but God assures him, “it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights” (1 Samuel 8:7-9). Despite explicit warnings in the verses that follow, they continue to demand a king, resulting in centuries of oppression by their own kings, followed by occupation and slavery in other empires. It’s a sad spiral that leaves Israel desperate once again for liberation by the one, true King. 

The Kingdom of God has come near

While Jesus walked the earth, Israel was under Roman occupation. Like the Egyptian Pharaohs, Roman Caesars explained their kingship as godhood. They communicated that, unlike the rest of humanity, they were the image of a god. Thus, they had total authority to do as they pleased, exercising dominion over all the earth.

Jesus claiming to be the Son of God was clearly a threat to that explanation. And, in fact, the entire biblical ontology of every human innately being an image of God is a threat to that type of empire’s philosophy. Furthermore, all the biblical language of God (the cosmic King) adopting us as heirs is kingdom language dubbing us as princes and princesses (cheesy, but true) with royal value and responsibilities. This is not the kind of self-esteem an occupying nation wants for their colonized subjects.

When Jesus proclaims that the Kingdom of God has come near, He declares that liberation from the dark kingdoms is near. Now, one can understand how the disciples hear this primarily as a liberation from their tangible suffering under Roman occupation. Like God defeating Egypt and leading His people to the Promised Land, the people following Jesus hear these words as a promise to defeat Rome so Israel can thrive in the Promised Land God gave them. But God has a much bigger plan in mind. 

Confusion and Clarity

Frankly, there are a lot of opaque comments Jesus makes about the Kingdom of God. We learn that it is hard to enter the Kingdom of God, especially for rich people (Mark 10:17-29), and the Kingdom of God belongs to those who receive it like a little child (Mark 10:13-16). Some who walked with Jesus would not die before seeing the Kingdom of God come in power (Mark 9:1), while Jesus also says that it’s not something that can be observed because it’s already in their midst (Luke 17:20-21). So how do we make sense of these things? As with all biblical interpretation, one helpful tip is to interpret the murky with the clear.

If you believe the Bible is the true story of God, then you believe that Jesus rose from the dead, defeating death, sin, and the power of Satan over humanity. Yet, Rome remained long after Jesus’s resurrection. So we know it wasn’t simply a physical liberation like Jesus’s disciples expected. In fact, it was something much greater and more comprehensive. 

Ephesians 2:1-3:12 (excerpts)

Notice the language of kingdoms in this passage: citizenship, heirs to the throne, rulers and powers, peace treaties, etc. I’ve bolded some, but see if I missed any.

“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” (which is done in the body by human hands)— remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ...

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone… This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus… His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.”

Co-Heirs with Christ

“The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs– heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory” (Romans 8:16-17).

As you read in the Ephesians passage, repentance and forgiveness certainly are part of “the gospel” but without understanding why Jesus is always talking about the Kingdom of God, we get a dull picture. It’s not just that we were dirty and now we’re clean. Instead it’s that God has a fulfilling life for us to live with Him as part of His royal family and unless we are reconciled to Him through Jesus’s death and resurrection, we are unnecessarily suffering the consequences of our own sin and others’ in this broken, dark world. We’re searching for purpose, joy, rest, and forgiveness, but we can’t find it apart from a relationship with the King of the Universes.

The Kingdom of God that Jesus ushered in is a spiritual reality that is realer than the physical reality we know. That’s why anyone filled with the Holy Spirit can bring healing that supersedes the physical reality of decay that came from the kingdom of darkness. Jesus brought this reality and proclaimed it as the good announcement. Through His death and resurrection, He made it possible for both Jews and Gentiles to become heirs to this Kingdom and help bring it to fulfillment. 

And so, as He encourages His first listeners, so we should encourage others: repent and believe this good announcement! The Kingdom of God has come near, and you can be a part of it!