BibleInTongues

The Good News Jesus Announced

Before "gospel" named a book, it was an announcement: God is coming to reign and rescue. Trace that good news from Isaiah's herald on the mountains to the four accounts of Jesus.

By BibleInTongues Editorial TeamPublished June 5, 2026Reviewed by BibleInTongues Review Team on June 5, 2026
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An announcement, not a slogan

The word we translate "good news" started life as a runner's message: a victory or a king's arrival shouted ahead so a town could get ready. Isaiah 52:7 paints exactly that scene, with the feet of the messenger "beautiful on the mountains" because his cry is "Your God reigns!" The content is the point: God is taking the throne and bringing peace.

When Mark opens "The beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God" (Mark 1:1), he is borrowing that herald's vocabulary and pinning it to one person. The four Gospels are not advice columns or moral fables. They report an event and ask what you will do about it.

Reading them this way changes your posture. You are not skimming for tips; you are hearing news that, if true, rearranges everything. Let the text address you as the town the runner is racing toward.

Promised in Isaiah, fulfilled in Jesus

Centuries before Bethlehem, Isaiah 61:1 has a Spirit-anointed figure say he was sent "to preach good news to the humble," to bind up the broken-hearted and proclaim liberty to captives. It reads like a job description waiting for a name.

In the Nazareth synagogue Jesus reads that very passage aloud, rolls up the scroll, and says, "Today, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing" (Luke 4:21). The promise stops being future. The herald Isaiah described is standing in the room.

So the Gospels do not float free of the Old Testament; they are its payoff. When you notice a quotation or echo, slow down. The writers are showing you that the good news was God's plan all along, not a late improvisation.

What the news asks of you

Mark compresses Jesus' first sermon into one line: "The time is fulfilled, and God's Kingdom is at hand! Repent, and believe in the Good News" (Mark 1:15). Two responses are named. Repent means turn around; believe means trust the announcement enough to act on it.

Matthew 4:17 records the same launch with "Repent! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand," tying the call to a kingdom that has drawn near rather than a private feeling. Good news, in the Gospels, is something you step into, not merely admire.

Read with that double question in front of you: where am I being asked to turn, and what would it look like to trust this? The Gospels expect a verdict, not just a reaction.

Why these accounts were written

John states his aim plainly: "these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name" (John 20:31). The selection of stories is deliberate, aimed at a response.

Luke 19:10 sums up the mission the news carries: "the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost." Zacchaeus, up a tree and out of options, is the kind of person the announcement is for. The good news is rescue, not reward for the already-respectable.

This week, read a Gospel chapter slowly and ask what it wants you to believe and how it wants you to live. Then pray it back: thank God for the rescue, name where you need to turn, and ask for trust to match the announcement.

Verses

  1. 7Isaiah 52:7
    Read in context

    How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news, who proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”

  2. 1Isaiah 61:1
    Read in context

    The Lord GOD’s Spirit is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to those who are bound,

  3. 15Mark 1:15
    Read in context

    and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and God’s Kingdom is at hand! Repent, and believe in the Good News.”

  4. 21Luke 4:21
    Read in context

    He began to tell them, “Today, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

  5. 31John 20:31
    Read in context

    but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name.

  6. 16Romans 1:16
    Read in context

    For I am not ashamed of the Good News of Christ, because it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first, and also for the Greek.

  7. 12Acts 8:12
    Read in context

    But when they believed Philip preaching good news concerning God’s Kingdom and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women.

  8. 23Matthew 4:23
    Read in context

    Jesus went about in all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the Good News of the Kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness among the people.

  9. 35Matthew 9:35
    Read in context

    Jesus went about all the cities and the villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the Good News of the Kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness among the people.

  10. 14Matthew 24:14
    Read in context

    This Good News of the Kingdom will be preached in the whole world for a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.

  11. 1Mark 1:1
    Read in context

    The beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

  12. 122 Corinthians 2:12
    Read in context

    Now when I came to Troas for the Good News of Christ, and when a door was opened to me in the Lord,

  13. 13Ephesians 1:13
    Read in context

    In him you also, having heard the word of the truth, the Good News of your salvation—in whom, having also believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,

  14. 27Philippians 1:27
    Read in context

    Only let your way of life be worthy of the Good News of Christ, that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of your state, that you stand firm in one spirit, with one soul striving for the faith of the Good News;

  15. 9Isaiah 40:9
    Read in context

    You who tell good news to Zion, go up on a high mountain. You who tell good news to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with strength! Lift it up! Don’t be afraid! Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold, your God!”

  16. 29Mark 10:29
    Read in context

    Jesus said, “Most certainly I tell you, there is no one who has left house, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or land, for my sake, and for the sake of the Good News,

  17. 10Mark 13:10
    Read in context

    The Good News must first be preached to all the nations.

  18. 18Luke 3:18
    Read in context

    Then with many other exhortations he preached good news to the people,

  19. 43Luke 4:43
    Read in context

    But he said to them, “I must preach the good news of God’s Kingdom to the other cities also. For this reason I have been sent.”

  20. 22Luke 7:22
    Read in context

    Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John the things which you have seen and heard: that the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them.

  21. 32Acts 13:32
    Read in context

    We bring you good news of the promise made to the fathers,

  22. 7Acts 14:7
    Read in context

    There they preached the Good News.

  23. 21Acts 14:21
    Read in context

    When they had preached the Good News to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch,

  24. 28Romans 11:28
    Read in context

    Concerning the Good News, they are enemies for your sake. But concerning the election, they are beloved for the fathers’ sake.

  25. 171 Corinthians 1:17
    Read in context

    For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the Good News—not in wisdom of words, so that the cross of Christ wouldn’t be made void.

  26. 141 Corinthians 9:14
    Read in context

    Even so the Lord ordained that those who proclaim the Good News should live from the Good News.

  27. 161 Corinthians 9:16
    Read in context

    For if I preach the Good News, I have nothing to boast about, for necessity is laid on me; but woe is to me if I don’t preach the Good News.

  28. 231 Corinthians 9:23
    Read in context

    Now I do this for the sake of the Good News, that I may be a joint partaker of it.

  29. 162 Corinthians 10:16
    Read in context

    so as to preach the Good News even to the parts beyond you, not to boast in what someone else has already done.

  30. 7Galatians 1:7
    Read in context

    but there isn’t another “good news.” Only there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the Good News of Christ.

  31. 15Ephesians 6:15
    Read in context

    and having fitted your feet with the preparation of the Good News of peace,

  32. 5Philippians 1:5
    Read in context

    for your partnership in furtherance of the Good News from the first day until now;

  33. 51 Thessalonians 1:5
    Read in context

    and that our Good News came to you not in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit and with much assurance. You know what kind of men we showed ourselves to be among you for your sake.

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