“For I am not ashamed of the good news.”

(Romans 1:16)

Bad news has a way of making the headlines. Crime, catastrophe, war’s carnage crowd the front pages of our newspapers. The man who comes home drunk, beats up his wife and runs off with another woman is written up as news, while no reporting is made of the thousands of husbands who live in faithful family tranquility.

In an effort to do justice to the good news that is always being bypassed by the more sensational bad news and is either tucked away in an obscure corner of the paper, or left out entirely, a well known periodical compiled a synopsis of the year’s good news, which had not received front page attention and published it under the title, Even Good News is News. Here could be found a formidable list of encouraging and optimistic reportings of human capacity for progress and decency such items as: A report that 1950 was the healthiest year for the nation, with the death rate dropping to the lowest on record, 9.6 per thousand. Figures revealing that Americans are giving more to charity than ever before.

In Des Moines, Iowa, an unemployed man, unable to buy his three-year-old daughter a doll for Christmas on a sudden impulse held up a shoe store, getting $38 from the cash register. Twenty minutes later he was back, his conscience troubling him. He returned the money, gave himself up to the police. But when he told his story the shoe shop owner refused to prosecute him. And when some Des Moines citizens heard about it they not only got his little daughter a doll, but they gave him $200 and offers for three jobs on the spot.

Sixty-nine tubercular displaced persons and their families were brought from Italy to new homes in Sweden. In India, contributions to the Mahatma Ghandi trust fund poured in from rich and poor alike, to set up hospitals, orphanages, craft training schools. Yes, even good news is news, deserving of reporting and attention.

But the good news most frequently missing from the headlines in these days of bleak and bad news emphasis is the good news of the Christian gospel. You know that’s what gospel means — “good news.” It is the old Anglo Saxon word — a contraction of “God” and “Spell” — the “God-story.” The evangelists report: “Jesus came preaching the good news. Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand.” The Apostles hurried from city to city, village to village, with hasty hand, grasping people by the shoulder in the marketplaces and in the shadows of dark prison cells, urgently pleading: “Believe the good news and be saved. St. Paul wrote the Roman Church: “For I am not ashamed of the good news of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”

And the gospel — the good news — is still news, the best news this old world can ever hear, that the Almighty God in highest heaven has made a way through His Son Jesus Christ for sinful men and women to be forgiven and reconciled to God and to their fellowmen with whom they have been at enmity because of their sin. And this good news is still proving to be what St. Paul claimed for it; the power of God for saving all men of every nation from sin and selfishness, and transforming their individual lives and their social structures to conform with the glory and the beauty of God’s everlasting Kingdom.

Hear some of the concrete evidence that the good news of the gospel is still news — even if it didn’t make the headlines. In China, now overrun by Communist armies, while the missionaries are driven out or driven underground — a Chinese Christian says: “We will see that this work goes on. The Communists may destroy our churches, disorganize our religious groups, even kill some of the Christians, but they can never kill Christianity in China. It will live on in our homes and in our hearts until we can build again publicly.”

And in Korea — poor broken, bleeding Korea — our army air force men are told as a part of their routine briefing: “If shot down, search out a native Christian church. The countryside is dotted with them. There you will find your best chance for good treatment.”

Harold E. Fey, editor of the Christian Century, just back from a visit to the Korean battlefronts, reports: “In the great prison camp on Koje Island, Christian and Communists are fighting it out with the weapons of the spirit. Here two conceptions of truth and two ways of life confront each other on the basis of equality. Here Communist prisoners of war are given the chance voluntarily to study, to discuss without fear, to ask questions, to have opinions. This educational program loosens the mental chains of communist enslavement to materialism, but it does not in itself liberate men. Liberation comes through the Christian faith, brought to this place by missionaries and Korean pastors. This also the Communists are free to take or leave alone. The only things they are not free to do are to run away or to kill those who are bringing the Christian message to them. Under those circumstances Communists are being converted by tens of thousands. Here, where the ideological struggle is conducted fairly, truth triumphs as it has always done, as it will always do … The purpose of God is working itself out in that land of incredible suffering and superhuman triumph.”

From Africa, where the whole social order is in ferment and the class and color struggle is exceedingly strenuous, and our dear friends Mr. and Mrs. Shive are working as our missionaries, good news comes pouring in. Dr. Darby Fulton and Dr. James A. Jones just returning from a tour of our Congo missions tell us that our church is embarrassed by the magnitude of its teaching and evangelistic and medical opportunity. We have neither the personnel, nor the facilities, nor the money in sight to take advantage of the opportunity already in our lap. Another on the spot observer in Africa today writes: “There are no curtains here of bamboo, iron, or silk. The doors are open. Africa is the best place in the world to take up our responsibilities for winning men’s minds.”

Last year our denomination, the Presbyterian Church in the United States, sent out 37 new missionaries to distant places to proclaim Christ’s gospel of peace. Not many, you say, 37 compared with the millions now being conscripted to make war. And you are right. There ought to be 37 hundred, or better 37 thousand. But just picture those 37 — young men and women of skill and promise (Jean Lindler was one of them) highly trained — leaving their homeland and the members of their family, giving up the comforts of this fabulous land, renouncing all prospects for security in old age — to go to backward, God-forsaken spots of the world, the cesspools of society, the open sores upon the body of the world, and there in love and compassion lay their lives down in service for the least of mankind — because, because, the love of Christ constrains them. Do you know of any better piece of good news for a world gone mad than this evidence of what the good news — the gospel of Christ — has already done and is doing in the hearts of such people and can do for others?

Dr. Henry Nelson reports this bit of news. You know, by the way, who Dr. Nelson is — one of our church’s physician-surgeons who stayed on in China after the communists took over. You remember his plucky little wife talked to us at a family night supper last year and won all our hearts. She was to be back with us tonight but had to cancel her engagement when last week she got a telephone call from her husband in Hong Kong saying he’d be home this weekend.

Dr. Nelson reports from our Mission Hospital in Taichow that Mr. Deng Chang, a well educated Chinaman who brought his son for treatment, in the long hours of waiting during his son’s recuperation, fell to reading the New Testament. Being a rapid reader, he soon finished the New Testament, and raced on through the Old Testament. He asked a few questions of the hospital attachés about this Christian faith: “How can I know that this book is so?” He remained unconvinced until he began to wander about the Christian hospital and to wonder about how it was run. He remembered some other places where he knew that the first class patients had better care because they paid more. Secretly he made frequent trips to third class wards to observe the nurses and servants there as they cared for the less fortunate patients. To his surprise, there was no difference in the amount of kindness, consideration, and care in the third class wards and in the private rooms. Three nights Deng Chang tossed in his bed, unable to sleep. His doubts and his reason were in struggle. Then, “suddenly I believed,” he said. “I found peace at last. My heart was put at rest. God used my son’s illness, the trip to the hospital, the reading of His word, and the kindness of His servants to lead me to my Savior.”

Yes, the good news of the gospel is news, too, and it was never intended to be kept secret. Isaiah the prophet was commanded to proclaim abroad the good news of God’s bringing salvation to his captive people: “O Zion, that bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountains; O Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength, lift it up, be not afraid, say unto the cities of Judah, behold your God. Behold the Lord God will come with strong hand.”

Jesus, our Lord, commanded His disciples: “Go ye into all the world and preach the good news to all peoples … This good news must be proclaimed in all the world.” James Smart says that “one reason the early church cut into the world with such incisiveness was that each Christian was prepared to be a minister of his faith to others.” They did not believe their Lord intended His good news to be kept secret. It’s still news and ought to be broadcast.

Suppose a research physician discovers a cure for cancer. What does he do with it? Keep the secret formula for himself and his family and let people die for want of making known his saving secret? Would we not say the man was guilty of criminal unconcern, a sinful selfishness?

Suppose a geologist by his scientific observations makes the discovery that a nearby, long inactive volcano is about to erupt and belch molten fire on thousands of people who dwell on the seemingly peaceful mountainside. Does the geologist keep his own counsel, pack up his bundle of belongings and paddle his little canoe away from the doomed island to a peaceful haven and save just his own skin alone? What would you think about such a man?

We are a people who have the good news — which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth — that redeems individual lives from doom and degradation of sin and transforms human society from living by the law of the jungle, on the mountain of atomic fire and brimstone, to the blessedness of God’s kingdom of peace and righteousness and brotherhood. How criminal of us, if we keep the good news for ourselves and have no part in publishing it abroad for the salvation of others!

God has committed unto us this gospel of reconciliation. Here is the good news that a weary, despairing world is waiting eagerly to hear. It was never intended to be kept secret. What if conditions now are a bit bad for delivery? Are we excused if the good news is not published and proclaimed abroad today by us?

We had a little rough weather last week. It was slippery under foot, foggy, cold. The public schools closed. Radio warnings urged motorists not to get their autos out. But the little paperboys that carried the news rolled out of bed just as early and peddled their bikes through the cold darkness over the icy streets to deliver the secular news to every door. You never heard a word over radio or anywhere else saying they were leaving off operations.

You and I through our World Mission program can take part in delivering the good news to the dark doors of saddened homes. Are we going to allow a few disagreeable features in world climatic conditions, a few hardships and obstacles to stop us from carrying to the four corners of the earth the good news that Jesus Christ has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel?

• Scripture Reference: Romans 1:16-0 • Secondary Scripture References: Mark 13:3-10 • Subject : Missions; World Missions; Evangelism; 654 • Special Topic: World Missions • Series: n/a • Occasion: n/a • First Preached: 2/4/1951 • Last Preached: 1/1/1900 • Rating: 3 • Book/Author References: Christian Century, Harold E. Fey