Creation’s Missing Link

Have you ever tried to nail down exactly what the gospel is? Ever been part of a that debate that ended up at square one? I have and I have a few thoughts to add to the discussion. Mind you they are not conclusive. They are much more like evidence that has been added late to a trial in an attempt to give the jurors a clearer picture of what THE gospel actually is.
Technically it is simply the Greek word that means “good news.” But a problem develops when you say something like, “the gospel of Jesus Christ.” It is no long just good news. It is the good news about something, specifically, someone. Now, it is commonly understood that when we (and by we I mean the Christian community) say the Gospel we are referring to the ideas conveyed by the whole phrase the “gospel of Christ.”
So what is THE Gospel exactly. We say it is what someone must believe in order to be saved. But there are major problems with that statement. If you probe that statement carefully you will quickly find that it is not cut and dry. We must all believe to be saved; that is true, but WHAT must we believe? You see, we all come with preconceived ideas, knowledge, and experience that is unique to anyone else. Nowhere is this more clear than in the field of missiology. We find that the Gospel might just be individually tailored.
For example, a native in the heart of the Amazonian jungle might not even know that there is an ocean on the other side of which is an entire continent. And he would most certainly know nothing about the Jewish race that lives on that continent. “What does that have to do with an individually tailored Gospel?” you might ask. Well, some would claim that the Gospel is the simple fact of Jesus death, burial, and resurrection. Simple enough right? Well, try telling that to our native friend. What difference would it make that a random man by the name of Jesus (a name he has never heard before) died, was put in the ground (a concept that might be totally foreign to him), and resurrected three days later? Assuming this man believed your story would he be a new child of God? Would he be a believer? Or must he understand more than just the death burial, and resurrection?
I believe he must. There are too many key elements missing from that simplified version. For example: the fact that Jesus was God, that He was sinless, that God has a standard, that any action counter to his character is sin, that sin has the high price of death, that we are separated from God, that God promised to resolve the separation, and that Christ’s death was the payment needed to resolve that separation. In order to believe the good news he must know why it is good news to begin with.
But what exactly is this good news. Romans makes it clear that we are without excuse for our wickedness because of creation. It says that God is seen from creation and not only is his existence obvious but many of his attributes are as well. For example we can tell that God is very creative, that he is interested in the marco as much as the massive, that he is powerful, and that he is wise. We can even tell that something is a miss, that this world is suffering and hurting and that we do not have access to this God. But there is one piece of information that creation cannot and does not tell us and that is the good news of Jesus Christ. The Gospel is creation’s missing link!
The Gospel then is everything that we need to know that creation has not told us about our alienation from God and the restoration of that broken relationship. The Gospel is the missing piece of information. At the core of the Gospel is the person, Christ. That is why it is called His gospel. But to the native isolated in the Amazon the gospel is much more than the death, burial, and resurrection – it is everything God’s creation could not tell him. It is Creations missing link.