The Good News

by Bill Lambert

We get so used to some things that their significance becomes lost to us.

St Paul refers often to the “Good News” he proclaims. It was good news indeed – a doctrine of love… of a spirit-filled life and of hope in the next life.

Good News indeed! The Old Testament was all about this life here on earth. The ruling class of priests, the Saducees, held that there was no after-life. God rewarded or punished you here and now. If you were rich and privileged, God favoured you. If you suffered from blindness or leprosy, you were being punished for sin. The Pharisees believed in an after-life with its rewards or punishments, but they kept pretty much to themselves.

You loved your friends and hated your enemies. Your whole time was taken up with obeying the hundreds of refinements that had been added to the Ten Commandments.

Enter Christ with the Good News … a new God of love with a new commandment of a life powered by love! The confident hope of a new and eternal life with God in heaven! Christ – God in human form – sharing our daily walk of life! Our souls filled and guided by the Holy Spirit!

Saint Paul Writing, c.1520,
Pier Francesco Sacchi

St Paul – inspired by the Holy Spirit – is bursting to give us this Good News. His letters are a torrent of words. To read St Paul is to imagine a short figure* striding back and forth, the words pouring from his lips with his scribe wishing shorthand had been invented.

Just listen to St Paul breathlessly proclaiming the Good News … and realise: God is love, love, love! Banner headline, front page Good News!

* Tradition has it that St Paul was a small, balding man.