Four Portraits, One Jesus Video Lectures, Chapter 1 - What Are the Gospels?

welcome to our study of the four Gospels we've called this study for portraits one Jesus and that sums up in many ways what the Gospels are though all tell the same ultimate story of Jesus they give us four unique portraits angles or perspectives on who he was and is not so long ago I was watching a PBS special on the Roosevelt family and has spent a great deal of time on FDR Franklin Delano Roosevelt our four-term president throughout this special there were many photos of the president given and one of them he was laughing at the antics of his children in another he was delivering a speech on the day after Pearl Harbor his features were a steely resolve in another he's sitting with his dog on his lap a look of serene peace in his eyes and another he was looking with disdain on a lawmaker he simply loathed if we asked which of these pictures captures FDR the answer is of course all of them do he was a multi-faceted person and so we need multiple portraits to understand who he is it's the same with Jesus the Gospels demonstrate both unity and diversity there's one Jesus Christ that's the unity but he's portrayed from four distinct angles or perspectives that's the diversity so what are these four Gospels we'll get into more detail later but let me just briefly summarize the key themes of each of the four Gospels Matthew presents Jesus as the Jewish Messiah the fulfillment of Old Testament hopes and expectations for mark Jesus is especially portrayed as the suffering son of God who offers himself as a sacrifice for sins in Luke Jesus is the savior for all people everywhere Luke is the most inclusive of the Gospels John presents Jesus as the divine son who reveals the father these are not contradictory portraits but complementary ones let's move next to the Gospels genre it's important to ask when you're reading any kind of literature what am i reading we're gonna look at three key characteristics of the genre of the Gospels their history their narrative or story and their Theology we could summarize that the Gospels are historical narrative motivated by theological concerns first let's talk about the Gospels as history Gospels are historical in at least three different ways first of all they have a history of composition Gospels didn't just fall out of the sky from heaven to us they were gradually produced over time and place using a variety of sources understanding the manner in which the Gospels came to us helps us to better understand their nature secondly the Gospels are historical in the sense that they're set in a particular historical time and place that time and place is Palestine during the first century during the period of Roman occupation understanding the various religious parties like the Pharisees and the Sadducees and Judaism will help us to better understand the Gospels themselves third the Gospels are historical in the sense that they're meant to recount accurate history Luke more than the other Gospel writers makes this clear in Luke chapter 1 verses 1 to 4 he says this he says many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word therefore since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you most excellent Theophilus so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught this aspect of what the we mean by the Gospels as historical is critically important unlike most religions Christianity rises or falls on the historicity of the events portrayed most other religions are based on truth claims that are not historically demonstrable such as a claim of the nature of God or a claim related to the means of salvation but the truth of Christianity depends on the reality of events within space and time did Jesus make certain claims about himself historically did Jesus perform miracles did Jesus predict his own death and if so what significance did he give to it most importantly of course did Jesus rise from the dead throughout the New Testament the resurrection is viewed as the vindication of Jesus's claims as the Apostle Paul wrote with reference to Jesus's resurrection if Christ has not been raised our preaching is useless and so is your faith for Paul as for the Gospel writers the historicity of these events confirms the truth or falsity of Christianity so the Gospels are historical secondly the Gospels are narrative or story the Gospels are not just bear history they're history told as story historical narrative stories have various features they have things like plot characters settings so as we read the Gospels we should read them as story too often in the history of study of the Gospels the focus has been not on their overall whole story but rather seeking the sources that were used to write the Gospels to determine their composition history how they were produced others cut and paste the Gospels to bring them together into a single chronological life of Christ but these methods miss the Gospels as story how do you read a novel do you take one paragraph here and there and read it do you try to rearrange it to make it chronological no you read straight through from beginning to end watching for the development of plot seeing how the characters are described and developed immersing yourself in the settings recent research revolves around the methodology of narrative criticism which focuses on the Gospels as story this research has been extremely beneficial to the study of the Gospels in a later session we'll take a whole session to talk about narrative analysis and the details of things like plot character and setting a third feature or characteristic of the Gospels is the Gospels as theology by theology we mean they're written with a specific purpose in mind notice John's explicit statement of intent in John chapter 20 verses 30 and 31 he says Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples which are not recorded in this book 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 the Gospels are not unbiased news reports the Gospel writers passionately believe that these accounts were true that they represented the answer to the world's problems each of the Gospels are written with specific purposes in mind to instruct and encourage believers to convince unbelievers of the truth of their message we call the Gospel writers evangelists from the Greek word you angle leads oh my to announce good news they're proclaiming the good news about Jesus Christ and the coming of the kingdom of God this has important implications for how we read the Gospels each gospel writer has not just a story to tell but particularly illogical themes they want to emphasize and bring out so in summary the Gospels are historical narrative motivated by theological concerns let's turn next to the question of the synoptic Gospels and the Gospel of John we should note from the beginning that three of the four Gospels are more similar very similar to each other we call them the synoptic Gospels Matthew Mark and Luke these three have much common material and many common stories a lot of the language is very similar even to precise verbal parallels just to illustrate the difference 90% of Mark's Gospel material is found in either Matthew or Luke by contrast only 10% of John's material is found in Matthew Mark or Luke there are a number of key differences between the Gospel of John the fourth gospel and the synoptic Gospels there's a difference in the geographical direction of the narrative of the stories geographically the Synoptics emphasize the Galilean setting of the first half of Jesus's ministry Jesus begins in Galilee and teaches and preaches and heals in Galilee he then heads to Jerusalem there's one basic movement from Galilee to Judea in the south by contrast in John there's considerable movement between Galilee and Judea John mentions at least three different Passover Feast that Jesus attended in in Jerusalem so from John we know that Jesus's ministry lasted anywhere from two-and-a-half to three-and-a-half years in the Synoptics you could presumably squeeze his entire ministry into a single year Jesus teaching style is also different in the Synoptics in John and the Synoptics Jesus teaches mostly in parables and short sayings in John Jesus has longer interviews with individuals like Nicodemus in Chapter three and the woman at the well in Chapter four he also conducts these long back-and-forth debates with the religious leaders his opponents these make up a good portion of the first half of the book the content of Jesus's teaching is also different in the Synoptics in John in the Synoptics Jesus speaks about the kingdom of God a great deal his healings and exorcisms demonstrate the power of the kingdom and the dawn of God's endtime salvation in John however Jesus teaching focuses much more on himself himself as the Divine Son of God who reveals the father the signs or miracles in John revealed Jesus's identity more than pointing to the kingdom of God and bring glory to God John has no exorcisms unlike the exorcisms in the Synoptics so why these differences between Matthew Mark and Luke the Synoptics and John we'll talk a lot more about this when we get to each individual gospel but the short answer is that the Gospel of John was written at a different time and place to address different issues and concerns whereas for the Synoptics the pressing question is is Jesus the Messiah and why didn't the kingdom come visibly and physically at his first coming in John's Gospel the emphasis is much more in Jesus's identity in his role as the self revelation of God his gospel was clearly written at a time when the most pressing question was not is Jesus the Messiah but rather is Jesus the Divine Son who reveals the father the question of the relationship between the synoptic Gospels and John raises another question that we've already begun to answer why four Gospels why do we have four Gospels in our New Testament there's both theological reasons and historical reasons theologically we could say the Holy Spirit wanted to give us four unique perspectives on Jesus we get a more full picture of who he was and what he came to a by getting four different perspectives they're not only theological reasons though there's historical reasons the Gospels arose in different Christian communities and were written to address the needs and concerns of particular communities within the church this issue of the different communities to whom the Gospels are written raises a related question of the gospel audiences to whom specifically where the Gospels written almost all scholars agree that the Gospels are written primarily to Christian audiences even though of course the Gospel writers wanted their Gospels to be read by unbelievers they're primarily writing to address the needs and concerns of believers there's been a tendency over the last century to view each of the Gospels is written to a specific Christian community specific church or groups of churches to address their needs for example Mark's Gospels commonly viewed as written to the church at Rome the suffering and persecuted church at Rome to encourage them in that persecution this idea very specific gospel audience has been challenged in recent years by Richard Baulkham and some others these individuals have claimed that the Gospels were not written to isolated Christian communities but rather were intended from the beginning for a much broader Christian audience baulkham points to the evidence of the pauline letters for example to show this the pauline letters show a great deal of communication and travel among the Christian communities this this wonderful network among the believers so baulkham suggests the Gospels like Paul's letters were likely intended from the beginning to be copied and passed on to be used by the broader Christian audience this broader audience is also suggested by the literary interdependence of the Gospels we'll talk about this later but if mark was very early known and the source for Matthew and Luke it must have had a fairly wide distribution almost from the beginning at least soon after it was written so did the Gospel writers have one audience in mind or were they expecting their Gospels to be read by Christians around the world the truth is slightly somewhere between these two extremes the Gospel writers were almost certainly part of individual churches and wrote to address the needs of those communities math he was almost certainly written to a group of Jewish Christians marked to a persecuted body of believers but it's also likely these communities were connected to the larger network of churches and the Gospel writers even as they wrote had their larger this larger audience in mind alright we've asked the question why four Gospels but there's also another related question why only four there are more than four ancient documents that claim to be Gospels you may have heard of the Gospel of Thomas or the gospel of Peter there's a variety of infancy Gospels fanciful accounts of Jesus birth and childhood one got called the protoevangelium of james there's also an infancy Gospel of Thomas are these Lost Gospels that should be included in our New Testament you might have read The Da Vinci Code and The Da Vinci Code a comment is made that there were more than 80 Gospels all vying for inclusion you might also go into a bookstore and see a book called the lost books of the Bible or the Lost Gospels I can tell you these books are not lost I have them in my office you can come see them if you'd like and they're not lost these are the rejected Gospels these were Gospels of the church viewed as inauthentic as not connected to the historical Jesus if they also say the number of 80 Gospels that The Da Vinci Code suggests is wildly exaggerated but we still have to ask the question why were these apocryphal or additional Gospels not included in our New Testament let me quickly give you four reasons first of all is the evidence of late composition none of these Gospels are written in the first century the earliest of the non canonical Gospels was written somewhere in the mid 2nd century possibly or even beyond all four of our New Testament Gospels what we call the canonical Gospels were written in the first century second reason they were rejected is because of what we call pseudepigrapha authorship pseudo P graphic means falsely ascribed authorship none of these non canonical Gospels are written by the authors that claim to that they claim to be written I the gospel of Peter was not written by Peter everyone agrees on that the Gospel of Thomas was not written by Thomas a third argument against these Gospels is that they demonstrate teaching contrary to that of Jesus and the Apostolic Church for example the Gnostic Gospels demonstrate Gnostic teaching which we know was not the nature of Jesus's teaching or his content in first century Judaism most importantly these Gospels were rejected because the church recognized they did not demonstrate the confirmation by the Holy Spirit they did not have the same prophetic power and inspiration that was evident in the four canonical Gospels finally let's deal with the issue of how we should read the gospel so let me just give you some suggestions to begin with we should first of all read the Gospels vertically read the Gospels vertically what does that mean well think of a page and as you read you're moving downward or vertically through it reading the gospel vertically means following the narrative through through following the plot from beginning to end the Holy Spirit inspired four distinct Gospels with their own each unique stories unique themes unique purposes so we should read them beginning to end listen listening to hear what the Holy Spirit wants to teach us through each one so that's reading the Gospels vertically there's also benefit to read the Gospels horizontally by horizontally think of the Gospels standing beside each other and comparing their accounts to one another reading across this way horizontally comparing their accounts to one another what that does it enables the reader to see more clearly what each Gospels individual themes and theology and emphases are so that's what we mean by reading horizontally comparing them to one another what we shouldn't do however is constantly read them Harmonist eclis Harmonist ik Allah means bringing them all together into a single story what that does is it risks distorting each gospel writers unique emphasis and contribution mark has a story to tell if you constantly bring in details from Matthew or Luke you risk missing what mark is trying to say let me give you one example of this Jesus says a number of from the cross in the in the four Gospels for example he says Father forgive them for they don't know what they're doing he he says to Mary his mother dear woman here is your son and to the Beloved Disciple here is your mother he says I tell you the truth today you'll be with me in paradise to the criminal beside him on the cross he cries out I am thirsty he says my God my God why have you forsaken me finally he says father into your hands I commit my spirit and then he says it is finished seven different sayings of Jesus now those sayings are derived by bringing together all four Gospels but if you look at one individual gospel let's say Mark's Gospel in Mark's Gospel Jesus only says one thing from the cross he says my God my God why have you forsaken me now if you bring in these other things father into your hands I commit my spirit and these these these other sayings you risk missing what Mark is trying to do in Mark's Gospel that the crucifixion there it is a very dark scene Jesus were shaken by all his friends he's taunted by his enemies even his the father forsakes him in one sense as the sins of the world are poured out on Jesus mark wants us to get that emphasis if we bring in these other sayings that he said from the cross we risk missing Mark's particular emphasis so we should not harmonize we should listen we should read vertically and listen to each gospel writers individual story now let me just add though I say don't harmonize the Gospels and and for the most part that's true especially when you're teaching or preaching the Gospels are studying them for devotional reasons but harmonizing can be helpful when you're seeking answer historical questions about the life of Jesus for example you've got the trial of Jesus portrayed in all four Gospels and they're somewhat different than each other well if you're trying to determine what happened historically you want to bring them together and see if you can harmonize them or take the resurrection narratives in the four Gospels each of the Gospels present different appearances by Jesus after his resurrection you might ask historically what actually happened who saw Jesus and when and so to bring them together and into a harmony to try to harmonize him to see they actually work historically can be beneficial so harmonization can be helpful for apologetic reasons when you're trying to defend the historicity or even just when you're trying to examine the historicity of these accounts in our next session we'll begin to talk about methods of gospel study how historically have scholars studied these documents

Channel: zondervan

Views: 25,429

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Keywords: Gospel (Quotation Subject), Four Portraits, One Jesus, Mark L. Strauss, Video Lectures, New Testament, Gospels, Bible

Id: QWldx02thzs

Length: 20min 29sec (1229 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 18 2015