The Gospel is NOT About YOU

Have you ever noticed that God wired the gospel in such a way that it would be nearly impossible to make the gospel about you?

Throughout scripture, we see this principle of God blessing you to be a blessing, not just to receive a blessing and make it about you, but make it about others. One thing we often forget about is in the Bible times, there were really only two kinds of people, Jews and non-Jews, what we call Gentiles, just as there are two genders, male and female. And since the time of Abraham, God was an exclusive God for the Jewish people, barring very few exceptions. But God’s plan was always to save the whole world. God tells Abraham in Genesis 12, I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing to others. And in you, all families of the earth shall be blessed. So the question, why did God choose the Jewish people is because he wanted to save the whole world.

Now, when Jesus resurrects from the dead, the plan comes to fruition and he made a way for all people to come into the family of God, Jews and Gentiles. But Romans 11 has a very interesting reason for why God brought the Gentiles into the family of God. See, many Jewish people rejected the gospel of Jesus, but Gentiles began believing. And Paul speaks to this in Romans 11, where he says, did God’s people, Jewish people stumble and fall beyond recovery? Of course not. They were disobedient, so God made salvation available to the Gentiles, but he wanted his own people to become jealous and claim it for themselves. It’s supposed to be impossible to make the gospel about you. Paul continues in Romans 11, he says, but you must not brag about being grafted in to replace the branches that were broken off – the Jewish people. You are just a branch, not the root. You may say, those branches were broken off to make room for me. Again, Paul knows we will always try to make the gospel about us, but it should be impossible.

To put it simply, why did God choose the Jewish people? Because he loved the Gentiles and wanted the whole world to be saved. Why did God let the Gentiles into the family of God? Because he wanted the Jewish people to be provoked to jealousy and come back in. So why did he choose the Jewish people? Because he loves the Gentiles. Why did he let the Gentiles come in? Because he loves the Jews. The gospel is not about us. It’s about God’s love for people, and it’s always about someone else.