City to City DNA: What Is the Gospel?
The following is an excerpt from Chapter 1 of City to City’s collection of papers, Gospel-Centered City Ministry: The City to City DNA, in which Redeemer City to City’s co-founder and former chairman, Timothy Keller, details the organization’s core values.
The full video version of Chapter 1: The Gospel can be found below. The entire series of papers and videos is available here.
WHAT IS THE GOSPEL?
First, the bad news is that we are separated from God. This is evidenced by the fact that we are all (even non-religious people) trying to save ourselves by looking to an assortment of things for salvation instead of looking to God. We do this both corporately (as classes, races, and families) and individually. We look for salvation psychologically (such as placing our hope in our talent or intelligence), socially (such as placing our hope in a group of friends or a spouse), politically (such as placing our hope in a particular party’s agenda), and in many other ways. But the real evidence of our separation from God is that we are unsuccessful in saving ourselves. While basing our self-worth on our finances, race, or talents may bring us a sense of temporary gratification, they will never be enough to make us truly feel we are saved. No matter who we are or where we are on the social ladder, we will always feel a longing for salvation if we are separated from God.
Why are we separated from God in the first place? After creation, mankind allowed sin into the world, which led to its sense of brokenness that we still feel today. Sin continues to operate at the individual level (for example, a greedy person who can never have enough money) and the societal level (such as unjust systems that exploit one group to enrich another). The barrier between us and God is both subjective and objective. It is subjective because our hearts are enslaved to false saviors, which alienates our affections from him. It is objective because we owe God a debt for our sin that we cannot repay, and his judicious acknowledgment of sin’s consequences separate us from him. This means we can only be saved by grace alone.
Because we were created by God to know and love him supremely, our failure to do this not only alienates us from him but also ruins the way all of our other relationships were intended to work. How we relate to ourselves, to others, and to the world is flawed and in deep need of restoration—something we all feel as we live out each day. The gospel identifies the bad news that sin ruins the world, and we cannot save ourselves in the slightest, despite our constant efforts to find salvation.
But the gospel is also good news. Namely, it professes that through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God has done everything necessary for us to be wholly saved by him and his free grace. We receive absolution (and much more) when we trust in Christ as savior. To grasp this, we must first grasp the dynamic of “substitution.” Out of all of the humans who have ever lived throughout history, Jesus Christ alone lived the perfect life we should have lived. He alone earned the divine blessing that such a life would merit—and then he died the death we should have died, taking the curse and punishment we deserve. He did all of these things in our place. Because he was treated as we deserve, we can be treated by God as Jesus deserves. This is a salvation by sheer grace and gift.
Scripture describes this exchange in many places. Below are a few examples:
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.
—1 Peter 3:18
“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
—Mark 10:45
Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.” He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.
—Galatians 3:13–14
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
—2 Corinthians 5:21
As New Testament theologian Murray Harris says, “As a result of God’s imputing to Christ something that was extrinsic to him, namely sin, believers have something imputed to them that was extrinsic to them, namely righteousness.” God can now see us as he would if we were already perfect, resurrected, and seated with Christ in heaven. Notice how Ephesians 2:6 uses past tense when it says, “And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.” It staggers the imagination!
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By sacrificing himself on the cross for our sins, Jesus took the curse and punishment that our lives deserve. We get the blessings and honor that his life deserved. Through this selfless exchange, God can be both just and the justifier of those who believe. We are not just forgiven for our brokenness, but accepted unconditionally in light of Christ’s efforts to redeem us. The gospel is good news because our salvation is accomplished completely by Jesus, not us—good news, indeed, since we are incapable of accomplishing it on our own! And so, in addition to our need to be saved by grace alone, we must be saved by Christ alone.
Last, there is the great news: if we repent and believe—if we transfer our trust from our alternate ways of salvation to Christ—all the reconciliation Jesus made available through his sacrifice can be obtained by us. When we dedicate ourselves to Christ, and the Father now regards us as having “the righteousness of God” because of the cross, he sends the Holy Spirit into our lives. The Spirit remakes our hearts, character, and eventually the whole heavens and earth, creating a place with no suffering, evil, injustice, and death.
The resurrection of Jesus brings the future power of God and his kingdom to renew us now. This means not just a new individual life, but also incorporation into a new community—the church—that reflects this future new creation. The gospel is great news because of what will happen in us and what will happen through us in the world after we embrace it.
About the Author
Timothy Keller was the Chairman of Redeemer City to City and the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, which he started in 1989 with his wife, Kathy, and three young sons. For over twenty-five years, he led a diverse congregation of urban professionals that grew to a weekly attendance of over 5,000.