How it's framed

The apostles were not like our modern soterians because they did not empty the gospel of its Story, nor did they reduce the gospel to the Plan of Salvation. In fact, the apostles were the original, robust evangelicals. It all has to do with how the gospel is framed. Peter and Paul framed their gospeling through the grid of Israel’s story coming to its destination in the Story of Jesus. Neither did they frame their gospel from the perspective of an atonement theory—whether the ransom theory or the penal substitution theory. Salvation and atonement flow out of the gospel, and Paul can call his gospel the “message of salvation” ([Acts] 13:26), but neither atonement nor salvation was how the apostles framed the gospel.— The King Jesus Gospel, page 117

<idle musing>
It's interesting that what most people consider the "center of the gospel"—atonement theory—doesn't even get mentioned in the early church. They were too busy concentrating on who Jesus is and was. It's telling that the most common manuscripts of the New Testament from the early period are the gospels. We tend to think of Paul first, then Jesus. Who got it right??
</idle musing>