The modern gospel
“It fails to make men God-centred in their thoughts and God-fearing in their hearts because this is not primarily what it is trying to do. One way of stating the difference between it and the old gospel is to say that it is too exclusively concerned to be ‘helpful’ to man—to bring peace, comfort, happiness, satisfaction—and too little concerned to glorify God. The old gospel was ‘helpful’, too – more so, indeed, than is the new—but (so to speak) incidentally, for its first concern was always to give glory to God… Its centre of reference was unambiguously God. But in the new gospel the centre of reference is man… Whereas the chief aim of the old was to teach people to worship God, the concern of the new seems limited to making them feel better. The subject of the old gospel was God and his ways with men; the subject of the new is man and the help God gives him. There is a world of difference. The whole perspective and emphasis of gospel preaching has changed.”
–J.I. Packer
