The Mystery of the Gospel

Stuart Greaves

Session 1: The Gospel is the revelation of Who God is

1. The angels to the shepherds in the field: “Glory to God and on earth
peace, goodwill towards men?”
a. When I think of the Gospel, I think that it is this plan from God that
has all the best intentions in God’s heart in mind for the human
race that there will ultimately be peace, joy, and good will towards
men.
b. Peace and good will in terms of:
i. How we feel emotionally
ii. Our spiritual condition
iii. Society
iv. Politics
v. The environment
vi. The whole universe
2. Thus the Gospel is not merely our personal salvation experience, but the
whole plan God has for the human race.
3. The central issue of the Gospel is the knowledge of God.
a. The reality of knowing God and who He is.
b. Understanding or expounding upon:
i. God’s personality or attributes (i.e. merciful, righteous, holy,
just, powerful, jealous, King, Judge, Bridegroom)
Read: The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer
ii. God’s power: knowing His power (Eph. 1:17-18)
iii. God’s purpose; His plan
4. God as light
a. Genesis 1: God creates light, yet no sun or moon yet. What is the
source of the light? The light of God’s glory
b. Rev. 2:1 – The New Jerusalem is filled with light that is from neither
the sun or the moon. It is the light of God’s glory.
c. Hab. 2:14 – The earth will be filled with the knowledge of God’s
glory.
d. Num. 14:21 – All the earth will be filled with God’s glory
5. Much of the earth is full of darkness, but the good news (the gospel) is
that God has a plan to drive darkness out of the created order and to
permeate creation with the understanding of His personality, power, and
purpose.
6. The most important thing about us is our knowledge of God.
a. We are designed to reflect Who He is, and our reflection is based
on our understanding of Him.
b. A right understanding of Him impacts the way we reflect Him.
c. Therefore it is the #1 thing that the enemy seeks to undermine in
our hearts and minds.
7. We connect to God through His story told in the Word. We challenge
the strongholds against the understanding of Who He is (2 Cor. 10).