just what is the good news?

what did Paul really say?

this is indeed just another example of how susceptible the Biblical Gospel is to modification. new to me is this so-called "new perspective on Paul," or NPP. I guess it has been around for quite awhile, which is a good thing for me because there have been great essays and even books now written in response to the NPP. It basically asserts that BOTH Catholics and Protestants have the Gospel wrong. How? Basically there has been a gross misunderstanding of the context in which Paul was writing, which has simply led to years and years--centuries really--of a Gospel that is not the one Paul so passionately presented in Scripture. Mostly though, it critiques the Gospel that Luther uncovered 500 years ago. Paul wasn't presenting a grace vs. merit gospel at all--that was a medieval church dilemma not a first century issue, or so they say. You may be writhing this off as faddish liberal scholarship--but that isn't the case. Very prominent evangelical scholars are espousing this new perspective. Yes, it is no surprise that the Gospel is, and always will be, under fire. But that is no excuse for us to be uninformed of the attacks so that we can better understand the true good news of Christ and what it means to us. Here is a great article that does a great job of summarizing the NPP, and then offers a pretty good refutation.