What does the Gospel look like?

It’s not a question we often think to ask ourselves, but it’s a rather important question to ponder. Because how we describe what the Gospel looks like will emerge from our expectations, and that’s what we see in play in Matthew 11:2-6.

John had come proclaiming to people to “Make straight the path of the Lord!” He called people to repentance so they would prepare themselves—both for the coming of the Messiah and the Kingdom the Messiah would usher in. He baptized people to declare their intention to walk in the way of God and crowds of people rushed out to see what God was doing by the Jordan River. John was even bold enough to condemn representatives of political and religious power who came out to see what going on out in the wilderness.

What was John expecting to be the outcome from all his work? I can imagine, looking at the crowds coming out to re-align themselves with the way of the Lord, he imagined that when the Messiah came the power structures of this world would be toppled and a new Kingdom would be established with the Messiah in charge. That’s the way things are supposed to work, right? The people were prepared, the corrupt powers of this world were called out, and the Messiah would move with the power of God. How could it not happen that way?

But after Jesus was baptized, he went around teaching and preaching. The power structures remained in place, and John’s boldness was rewarded with a jail cell when Herod Antipas didn’t like what he was hearing. John’s expectations were not met. So John sent a question to Jesus through two of his disciples, “Are you the one we were expecting or should we look for someone else?”

To his credit, John didn’t just reflexively call out Jesus as being “wishy washy”— or declare him “weak” or “a disappointment.” He had expectations, and they were not met so he was confused. But he also recognized Jesus as someone important when our Savior showed up to be baptized, so he wanted to know if he’d read the situation correctly. Was Jesus the one he was waiting for?

Jesus’ response to John’s question flipped the script.

What does the Gospel look like?

It looks like blind people receiving sight, hindered folks gaining the ability to walk, diseased people becoming clean, deaf people hearing, the dead being raised, and the poor having good news proclaimed to them.

Nowdays, folks who are blind, unable to walk, or deaf will often bristle at the notion they somehow need to be “fixed”—and they aren’t wrong to do so. Our society has changed, for the better, to recognize that folks who are differently abled are not “defective,” they are different. And it’s good that this is an understanding toward which we are growing.

In Jesus’ day that understanding had yet to be recognized. It was a more harsh world, and if you were blind or lame or deaf or diseased, aside from the difficulties you faced in life, you were ritually (not morally) “unclean.” This limited your ability to participate in the community. At the same time folks who were wealthy often, much like it is today, considered the poor to be morally “less” than they were. So poor folks would be given the worst seats in community gatherings, as befit their moral standing in the eyes of the rich. And, of course, one way to describe being “dead” is “the ultimate way to be cut off from a community.” Pretty much by definition.

So even though people today might encounter Jesus’ words and bristle at the implication that the people listed somehow need to be “fixed,” that’s not the point of his statement. Rather, Jesus was telling John that his work was more than John’s expectations would allow him to envision. He wasn’t about simply establishing a new human kingdom, even one based on a new understanding of God’s will. Rather, he had come to overturn every aspect of this world which keeps people apart from God and each other. Jesus was going wherever there were people who experienced being treated as “less than” and saying, “No more.” Even raising people from the dead to demonstrate that his mission was to bring people to God together.

What does the Gospel look like?

It’s a question that churches have had to answer in every generation, and in every culture, in which Jesus’ disciples have lived. And when you look at Church history, both distant and recent, a lot of times we Christians reveal that we’ve got John’s expectations running around in our heads— the assumption that when God’s Kingdom shows up it will come about using both power and strength this world recognizes. In our culture that means packing the courts, passing our laws, crushing our enemies, and taking control so we will be safe. Why? So our expectations will be met. And history shows us that’s not just a “now” problem, it’s present throughout the whole of our story.

But those expectations all arise from a faulty premise about what God wants—and that’s just not how Jesus operated. It’s not what we’re empowered to be or do. It’s not what the Gospel looks like.

The Gospel looks like people being brought to God, together. It looks like the separations, which keep us humans separated one from another, being torn down. It looks like people who, by the logic of this world, are “less” being ennobled. So that there can be no doubt that, they too, are the Image of God. And, yes, as we live out that image of the Gospel we can hope—for people to be drawn to Jesus, for us to repent of our sins, for folks to turn toward Christ and enter into his life and death and resurrection through the waters of Baptism. But never forget, people coming to faith is not about us—our institution, our needs, our desire to be “relevant.” It’s ever and always about Jesus and his call. If we remember that. If we envision Jesus’ description of what the Gospel looks like, then just maybe we’ll have a positive impact on this world—manifesting in ways big and small, Jesus’ Kingdom. Amen.