Paul’s gospel is the complete gospel, including all the aspects of the four gospels

The first four books of the New Testament are called, The Gospels – the gospel of Matthew, the gospel of Mark, the gospel of Luke, and the gospel of John. But there is yet another gospel – the gospel of Paul – which is the book of Romans (and all Paul’s Epistles).

This gospel is the complete gospel – it includes all the aspects of the gospel in the four gospels and speaks further of the gospel of God, even the gospel of Christ (Gal. 1:7). Paul even called it, my gospel (Rom. 16:25).

Paul’s gospel is the complete gospel

Paul’s ministry is to complete the word of God, and his gospel is the basic gospel and the complete gospel, including all the aspects in the four Gospels. Paul’s gospel speaks of Christ in the heavens and as the Spirit, while the other gospels speak of Christ on the earth and in the flesh. The four gospels speak a lot about outward things (like the miracles, signs, Christ’s birth, living, death, resurrection) while Paul’s gospel speaks of the inward experience of Christ as the Spirit for the Body of Christ.

Praise the Lord, the gospel is not about an outward historical Christ but it concerns the Triune God being processed and consummated through Christ’s incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, to become the life-giving, all-inclusive, compounded, indwelling Spirit who mingles Himself with our spirit to accomplish in us God’s purpose in creating man.

This is what Paul’s gospel reveals, and his Epistles form the heart of the divine revelation in the New Testament, the centre of the New Testament.

Paul’s gospel and the Four Gospels

Paul’s gospel includes all the aspects of the four gospels. This morning I was encouraged to briefly see how Paul completed the Word of God by including in his writings all the main points in the four gospels and then going further to expound God’s economy, God’s purpose, His heart’s desire, to have the church as the Body of Christ to express Him in many localities on the earth. Here are some specific points concerning this:

1. The Gospel of Matthew, the gospel of the kingdom, presents the Lord Jesus as the King-Savior who has been given all authority on the earth (Matt. 28:19) for the establishment of the kingdom of the heavens. In Matthew the goal of the gospel of the kingdom is to bring people into the Triune God in order to make them citizens of the kingdom of the heavens (see Matt. 28:19 and 24:14) – this is also seen in Paul’s gospel in Rom. 14:17 and Gal. 5:21.
2. The Gospel of Mark introduces Christ as the Slave-Savior charging His disciples to go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to all the creation in order to redeem and save God’s lost creation from the slavery of corruption back to Him to enjoy the freedom of His glory in His new creation (see Mark. 16:14-16). This is also seen in Paul’s writings in Rom. 8:20-21 and Gal. 6:15.
3. The Gospel of Luke speaks about Christ as the Man-Savior charging His disciples to proclaim repentance for the forgiveness of sins in His name to all the nations so that the fallen men may be redeemed back to the way of peace that leads them into the blessing prepared by God for them according to His eternal economy (see this in Luke 24:46-48; 1:77-79; 2:30-32). In Paul’s gospel, this is seen in Eph. 1:3, 7 and Gal. 3:14.
4. The Gospel of John, the gospel of life, introduces the Lord as the God-Savior with the eternal life; here we see the mingling of the Triune God with the believers to produce the Body of Christ, the vine tree, of which all the believers are members, and which consummates in the New Jerusalem for God’s eternal enlargement and expression. John speaks about it in John 20:31 and 15:16, and Paul speaks even more about this in Rom. 8:10, 6, 11; 12:4-5; Gal. 3:28; 4:19; 6:10, 16.

[sharing inspired from the Crystallization-study of the Epistle to the Romans, msg. 26 (by brother Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Four Great Pillars in the Lord’s Recovery. ]

Lord, open our eyes and open our mind to see the complete gospel of Paul. Save us from having a low appreciation of the gospel in the New Testament. Lord, uplift our view from seeing Christ on the earth in the flesh to seeing Christ in the heavens as the Spirit dispensing all He is and has accomplish into us for the building up of the Body! O, Lord, may Paul’s gospel be our constitution until it becomes “our gospel”