Gospel Guidebook: Getting and Keeping It Right 
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What is the Gospel and the Nature of Faith?
by Robert P. TerryUpdated May 10, 2026
The Gospel is the proclamation concerning the Lord Jesus, who according to Scripture is the Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of the world and the only name given unto men whereby we must be saved, who is also the resurrection and the life, the One who has the words of eternal life, the only One with whom God is pleased, and the One whom God has set upon His throne to be the Judge of the living and the dead. The Gospel narrative is the historical account of Jesus Christ's vicarious life, death and resurrection: He was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh; lived a perfect and righteous life that fulfilled all of God's will; glorified God's name; performed an all-sufficient work of salvation by dying for sinners in a violent death of atonement on the cross as their penal substitute; and was, thereafter, declared to be the Son-of-God-in-power according to the Spirit of holiness by His victory over death through His resurrection and ascension into heaven with all power and authority as Lord over heaven and earth. The Gospel exposes man's depravity, shows his need of sheer mercy, manifests God's justice against sin, unveils the only way to propitiate His wrath, reveals His righteousness, and displays His love in dealing so graciously with mankind. The Gospel is the good news of a justification accomplished, sanctification to be enjoyed, and glorification to be revealed, which by believing the believer sets to his seal that God is true, and by recognizing the divine righteousness and glory revealed therein, he comes to be assured that God only is his Savior in Jesus Christ, all to the praise of the glory of His grace.
The nature of faith (Gr. pistis, which could also be translated as the word "belief," being the cognate noun of the Greek verb for "believe" and often being used in the exact same context as the verb "believe") should be obvious from the description of the Gospel given above, seeing that Jesus accomplished all things that needed to be accomplished, but because theologians have utterly distorted the meaning of faith and have turned it into various things that only bear the name faith, ranging from an appropriating act to a life of faithfulness, the word faith can mean a 1,001 different things depending on whom you ask. However, what these 1,001 different things have in common is that they turn faith into a scheme of religion that denies the sufficiency of Jesus' finished work and robs Jesus of His glory by moving the focus onto the sinner and what he calls "faith." However, faith, as described in the Bible (excepting its use in figures of speeches), is nothing more than what the rest of the world knows as plain old belief (i.e., the doxastic attitude of being persuaded by the evidence for a proposition), and this will be demonstrated below from the Scripture. Before doing this, however, it is first necessary to demonstrate that the object of faith is indeed a proposition (i.e., the meaning of a declarative statement or something, such as a person, who represents the meaning of the declarative statements advanced by him or her) and can never grammatically be a command to do something. To demonstrate this, it should be sufficient to show the awkwardness that results when we try to make a command the object of faith. For example, it doesn't make sense to say, "I believe 'Repent and believe!'" A command such as "Repent and believe the Gospel" can point us to the Gospel, but the command itself is neither the Gospel, nor can it be used as the object of faith. In contrast, as mentioned above, the object of faith must always be a proposition. The content of the Gospel is a proposition, so it can be the object of faith, as in the sentence "I believe the Gospel." Believing a proposition means to be persuaded that the content of the proposition is true. In the case of the Gospel, it means being persuaded that the content of the Gospel is true, even as Abraham and Sarah were persuaded that the propositions advanced by God were true (Rom. 4:21-22, Heb. 11:11). If you believe the content of the Gospel described above (i.e., you are persuaded that it is true), you have life (John 20:31). In contrast, if you despise the content of the Gospel by thinking it too small of a thing to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and instead attempt to appropriate the benefits of the Gospel to yourself through some act of religious faith, or try to acquire the benefits of it by dedicating your life to Christ, undergoing some ritual such as water baptism, or endeavor to mix anything you believe God is doing in your life with Christ's all-sufficient work at the cross, then you are still seeking to establish your own righteousness in place of the divine righteousness accomplished once and for all by God in Christ.
The Apostles confirm the description of faith given above. For example, the Apostle John described what it means to believe as follows, "If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for the witness of God is this, that He has borne witness concerning His Son. The one who believes in the Son of God has the witness in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the witness that God has borne concerning His Son. And the witness is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, in order that you may know that you have eternal life." (1 John 5:9-13, and see also 1 Thess. 2:13, as well as 2 Thess. 1:7-10 and 2:10-14 where obeying the Gospel is basically equated with believing the Apostles' testimony). Receiving the witness of God (i.e., the propositions that constitute the witness) is exactly the same as receiving the witness of men, except for the fact that the witness of God is more authoritative. But notice how the Apostle equates "receiving witness concerning His Son" with "believing in the Son," where "receiving" corresponds to "believing" and "witness concerning His Son" corresponds to "the Son" (i.e., the propositions represented by Him or advanced by Him). This is evident from John's description that "believing" results in "having the witness in himself," meaning that he received the witness (i.e., the propositions that constitute the witness) as being true (i.e., he was persuaded that the propositions are true). People who don't receive the witness as being true have made God a liar, meaning that they didn't believe the propositions that constituted the witness advanced by Him. Likewise, John the Baptist tells us, "What He has seen and heard, of that He bears witness; and no man receives His witness. He who has received His witness has set his seal to this, that God is true" (John 3:32-33), and then immediately after this says, "He who believes in the Son has eternal life" (John 3:36a). Similarly, Jesus described what it means to believe in John 3:11-12, "Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak that which we know, and bear witness of that which we have seen; and you do not receive our witness. If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how shall you believe if I tell you heavenly things?" What we see here is that the Apostle John, John the Baptist, and Jesus all describe the verb believe as the persuasion of the mind that a proposition is true. In the Gospel of John, to believe in Jesus means to be persuaded that the propositions represented by Him or advanced by Him are true, namely that He is the Christ, the Son of God who is the Savior of the world (John 20:29-31, John 4:42, 1 John 4:14). In confirmation of this, the only passage in the Bible that explicitly describes faith says, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Heb. 11:1). In other words, faith is being assured and convinced that things (described in propositions presented to the mind), although currently unverifiable by the human senses, are true. Applying this understanding of faith to the Gospel of John, none of us saw the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, but when we believe that the eyewitness accounts (i.e., the propositions) concerning Jesus given by the Apostles in the New Testament are true, we fulfill Jesus' words "Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed," by which we come to know that we have "life in His name" (John 20:28-31, 1 John 5:13).
Belief in the objective truth of the Gospel brings with it joy and assurance. Many people can explain important truths of the Gospel, but because they don't have a correct understanding of faith, they never actually believe the Gospel. Many people mistakenly think that they have believed the Gospel because they supposedly trusted in Jesus, established a relationship with Jesus, or appropriated the achievements of Jesus to themselves by saying a prayer, having a conversion experience, practicing religious faith, or undergoing a ritual. Faith is none of these things, but unhappily, what they call faith is nothing more than a garb for self righteousness. The fact is that no one can appropriate anything from God. If Adam, being in a perfect state under perfect conditions, was unable to appropriate life by keeping a positive precept, how much less a sinner in this fallen world? Rather, God is Savior, and He accomplished salvation for sinners according to His own purpose and grace in Jesus Christ. When a sinner believes the Gospel, namely, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, he is recognizing God's righteousness. This recognition of God's righteousness is salvation. Receiving this testimony is receiving life. Therefore, believe the Gospel and let the truth of the Gospel be your confidence and the source of your joy and thankfulness.