When was there a time when the Gospel of Christ did not exist? Can you point your finger to ‘a period when the religion of Jesus was an unheard of thing? “Yes,” one replies, “before the days of Christ and his apostles.” But we answer, “Nay, Bethlehem was not the birthplace of the gospel.
Though Jesus was born there, there was a gospel long before the birth of Jesus, and a preached one, too; although not preached in its simplicity and plainness, as we hear it now. There was a gospel in the wilderness of Sinai, although it might be confused with the smoke of the incense, and only to be seen through slaughtered victims; yet there was a gospel there.”
Yea, more, we take them back to the fair trees of Eden, where the fruits perpetually ripened, and summer always rested, and amid these groves we tell them there was a gospel, and we let them hear the voice of God as he spoke to recreant man, and said, “The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head.” Such was the beginning of the gospel— SPURGEON.
