INTRODUCING..... THE GOSPELS The Pilgrim's Guide to the Bible No 57

WHAT ARE THE GOSPELS?

Gospel means ‘good news’. The word is derived from the old-English ‘god-spell’, which literally means ‘glad-tidings’. This in turn is a literal translation of the Greek word: euangelion, meaning ‘good message’. This is the derivision of the English words: evangelist and evangelism.

In Christian terms, the Gospel is the good news of the coming of Jesus Christ into the world – an account of his life, death and resurrection. This, of course, is the central message of the Christian faith. In cconsequence, the four Gospels are probably the best known and most widely read section of the Bible.

Matthew, Mark and Luke are generally known as the Synoptic Gospels, because they offer a synopsis, or common outline of the life of Jesus. In these three gospels, we find not only the same incidents from the life of Christ, but often they are described in almost the same words. By contrast, John’s Gospel follows a very different order and pattern, and even a very quick glance will indicate that the purpose of this Gospel is quite different from the other three books.

It is generally accepted that Mark was the first gospel to be written, and is believed to give us the memoires of Peter himself. Peter describes him as ‘my son’ (1 Peter 5:13). Mark himself was a young teenager during the ministry of Jesus, so he was too young to be one of the disciples, but he was an eye-witness of the events of Jesus ministry, (Mark 14:51-52 is taken to be his personal statement) and he did become a close colleague of Peter. So Mark had ample opportunity to listen to Peter’s story, and to make a written record of it. His mother’s name was Mary, and he was the cousin of Barnabas. It is believed that the disciples met in the upper room of his mother’s house in Jerusalem. It is, therefore, an eye witness account of Christ’s ministry.

Even a quick reading of Matthew, Mark and Luke demonstrates that much of the text is almost identical in all three books, with Mark’s writing being the common thread. Today, we would consider it to be wanton plegiarism to take someone else text and simply reproduce it, but the gospel writers, and their first century readers, did not have that mindset. The earliest manuscripts were, of course, all hand-written, and it was considered to be perfectly acceptable for Matthew and Luke to take Mark’s writing, and simply to insert their own, specific teaching into the existing text.

Matthew, of course, was one of the disciples, and in his gospel, we probably have a selection of Matthew’s own writings which either he or one of his close colleages, edited and added to Mark’s gospel. Whilst Mark gives us a fast-moving account of the actions of Jesus ministry, Matthew adds to that account some more reflective passages, with a greater number of parables (stories told by Jesus), and some longer blocks of Jesus’ teaching (most notably the Sermon on the Mount).

Luke was a Gentile convert to Christianity, probably converted under Paul’s ministry, and he became a close friend of Paul. His contribution to the Bible includes not just his gospel, but also the Acts of the Apostles, and on several occasions in the text of Acts, he slips into writing ‘we’: ‘we travelled, we went, we came to’. From this it is safe to infer that Luke was with Paul during his long period of house arrest in both Jerusalem and Caesarea. Luke, therefore, had plenty of opportunity to meet with eye-witnesses of Jesus, including Mary, and to produce what he describes as ‘an orderly account’ (Luke 1:3) of the life of Jesus. Luke gives us greater detail about the beginning and end of Jesus’ life: the Christmas and Easter stories, and also includes a long section which is quite different from Matthew and Mark, set during the period of Jesus journey up to Jerusalem, before the Passion narrative, which gives us some of the best known gospel characters, both actual and in parables, including The Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the lost sheep, Martha and Mary, Zaccheus the tax-collector.

John’s Gospel is completely different. John was one of the twelve disciples. He descibes himself as being ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’ (John 20:2), and he lived to be a very old man, eventually dying in the city of Ephesus. So when John wrote his gospel, as an old man, he must have known the writings of Matthew, Mark and Luke, and rather than simply re-telling the story of Jesus, he set out to offer a profound and reflective commentary upon the purpose of Jesus’ life, seeking to strengthen the faith of a new generation of believers who had not been eye-witnesses of Jesus life. So as he began, his mind went back many decades as he thought about the salient points of Jesus ministry and made his selection of stories to include. Whilst the synoptic gospels demonstrate how Jesus the man proved himself to be God, John’s Gospel reveals how God Himself chose to become human. Jesus is the One sent by God into the world to be its Saviour. As God the Son, he shares his Father’s authority, living in close communion with Him. John goes deep into the things that God has revealed, and brings out the eternal significance of the incarnation. He illustrates his theology by selecting stories from Jesus’ ministry. He depicts the miracles as ‘signs’ of God’s authority.

‘But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.’ (20:31)

For John, the key phrase is ‘eternal life’. 3:16: ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.’

WHY WERE THE GOSPELS WRITTEN?

The Gospels are not biographies of Jesus. They do not give us detailed historic accounts of Christ’s life. They are concerned to present the Christian significance of His life. Their basic purpose is to preach the gospel, in order to convert the unbeliever and to build up the believer in his faith. This does not mean that they were unconcerned about history. Luke lays particular stress upon the fact that he was using authentic, eye-witness testimony.

Mark gives us the key to the gospels in his opening verse. 1:1 ‘An account of the good news about Jesus Christ.’ So although not biographies in the conventional sense of the word, they are our basic source of information about the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. The cross and resurrection are central features of the gospel story. In fact, a third of the narrative in the gospels is centred around the last week of Christ’s earthly life – his the Passion, Cross and Resurrection.

They wrote in order that their readers might believe in Christ, and so have eternal life. They therefore portray Jesus as his followers saw him. The history in the gospels is history as seen by Christians.

Each gospel is written with a slightly different emphasis.

In Mark, we have the gospel in its purest, and earliest form. Since earliest times, Christian tradition has placed St. Mark’s gospel as the earliest. The gospel, as we have it, is the writing of John Mark, one of the group of first Christians. (Acts 12:12,25).

Mark is a Gospel of great candour. It emphasises the servanthood of Jesus. We see him as the humble but perfect servant, come to do his father’s work.

Mark writes in simple sentences. It is easy to read. The narrative moves along quickly. Jesus is always on the go. Such words as: ‘And then’, ‘Again’, ‘Whilst’, ‘Immediately’, frequently punctuate the text. Mark is keen to portray the action, and seems to be asking his reader to react and respond. Jesus is a man of action. As we watch, the things he does convince us that he is the Son of God.

Mark set out to tell us the clear certain facts about Jesus: his deeds more especially than words. His aim is essentially evangelistic. He seeks to prove that Jesus is the Son of God by showing what he accomplished during his ministry. So he begins with Jesus proclaiming the Good News of God’s Kingdom (no time for birth narratives). .

Matthew is a revised and enlarged edition of Mark. Mark contains 661 verses. Matthew reproduces 606 of them. (In fact there are only 24 verses in Mark which are not reproduced in either Matthew or Luke). As a general rule, Matthew and Luke follow the order of Mark. Matthew seeks to improve upon Mark, by improving his grammar, and by modifying some of his statements about Jesus (e.g. Mt. 13:58; 19:17; cf. Mk 3:21)

Central to Matthew’s teaching is the reality of Emmanuel, God with Us (1:23). More than any other Gospel writer, he seeks to depict Jesus as the fulfilment of OT prophecy. Therefore, he stresses the continuity between Old and New Covenants. He is seeking to convince a Jewish readership that Jesus is the long-awaited Messiah, promised by the prophets. A recurring phrase is: ‘All this was done to fulfil that which was spoken of by the prophets.’ (16 occurrences).

Christian universalism is evident within the text. Although he has a wide grasp of the Jewish tradition, Matthew is not a Judaizer. He includes a Trinitarian baptismal formula, and a command to world mission. The wise men represent the coming of Gentiles to worship the Christ. He ends by saying ‘Go and make disciples of all nations....’

Luke sets out to write ‘an orderly account’, not just of the ministry of Christ, but of the early church. The Acts of the Apostles is volume 2 of Luke. He was a companion of St. Paul, and one of the early Greek converts. Col 4:14 refers to Luke as a doctor. Quite possibly he was a slave - it was normal for a slave to be a physician. Undoubtedly, he was a well educated Gentile.

Luke offers us the most comprehensive account of Christ’s life. He is very concerned with historical reliability. He contains the longest birth narrative and gives us the great songs of praise that date from the coming of Jesus into the world: Mary’s song, Zechariah’s song, The angels’ song, Simeon’s song.

Even to the most casual reader, it quickly becomes plain that John’s Gospel is strikingly different from the three synoptic gospels. It is a profound and reflective commentary upon the purpose of Jesus’ life. It reveals Jesus as the One sent by God into the world to be its Saviour. As God the Son, he shares his Father’s authority, living in close communion with Him. John goes deep into the things that God has revealed, and brings out the eternal significance of the incarnation. He illustrates his theology by selecting stories from Jesus’ ministry.

As Christians, we have one Gospel – the good news of Jesus Christ. The four gospels of the New Testament all testify to one truth - Jesus Christ, the Son of God is, in actual fact, God himself assuming human personhood, living dying and overcoming death itself in order that the human race may know for certain that God loves us and is totally committed to humanity, and longs to draw all people into a relationship of love and friendship with Himself in order that we may receive the gift of eternal life. Not only are we challenged to believe this good news but we are also called to commit ouselves to it by ackowledging Jesus as Lord of our lives and living as His disciples.