So, even as days you cannot break enough coffee. So, okay. But we've actually talked about why we're doing this here in Jesus. We're taking these next 50 Sundays from that.
To just look at what Jesus said about himself. We're being honest about what to follow him, being honest about who would Jesus read back to? Where would Jesus go? How would Jesus do these things?
All these sorts of things. If we're honest about that, the best place to find our answers to that is to watch out Jesus said. Let's just simply see how he interacted in the world and just try to model that. If Jesus is the perfect representation of the Father, then the close to the white person, what is God doing?
He just said, why would Jesus do? And so, we're jumping off into this. We might have a little bit different. We might need to just kind of go through some basic stuff really quick just to make things easier for all of us.
So, the days we go to different than normal, we typically talk about one passage. We kind of find that one thing that passes, we believe is appropriate for us that day. Today, we're going to kind of take the fastest lap around all four gospels that are possible. Just for understanding the way that these relate to us, these are different.
I had something rather embarrassing happen to me earlier this year. And, well, I thought the story was true because I experienced it. My friend Kate Reynolds, he's doing the account on the offer now. Kate, look, this whole thing happened to us at the knock-o-ro.
I'll tell you, I can tell you my version of the story. But if you get Kate, tell you can't version the story, it's significant to them. You know, a lot of it is time when you're with your friends and something happens to a group of you, you're trying to get one friend at this set, that one person did not get to be there. They're trying to explain the scenario to them.
And you've got to get the funny person just to tell them the funny stuff. You've got a person here who is typically exaggerates the same way too much. Sometimes you're also the funny person too. But then you've got the person simply knowing true for the person who might not have cared that much.
You kind of have to get the whole story, the whole picture. And that's the best way for us really to think about the gospel. But how that works, because you have four different people who had different experiences with Jesus, who had different reasons that they were passionate about telling a story of Jesus. They're all telling the story that impacted the Zen.
They're telling stories to specific people. They're also telling these stories at specific times. And one of them is not true than the other. But all four of them together give us the best picture of who Jesus is.
Now, it's also, it's also, you talk about these, and what's the honest, and the Bible can be a difficult thing for some people, right? I've been a survey earlier this year. I'm sure you took it, but if you're asking people, why do you struggle? It's really in the Bible.
It's a difficult thing about you. I got 380 responses back to the survey. What most people say is that they can't assist and abuse. You know, sometimes you read the gospel and it gets confusing as well.
That's what it is this. And why does Matthew tell the story like this? And Luke tells the story like this. It's kind of different.
It's different spaces. It's so easy for us to bring out who in the 21st century ideas of truth, and to put them on top of scripture, try to force scripture to conform to the way that we are. But if the gospel, if the whole thing is a little confusing, I'll give you a little bit of background. If you're a reader and you like to read things for yourself, and research and stuff, it's a great book, it's called, The Gospels by John Peter Williams.
It's a quick read, and it's a weekend read. You can not go through it. But one of the things that he spends pages upon pages doing is sharing that in the first century, the gospel, the gospel means good news. It's a proclamation that's typically made from a ruler, for a king, or from a governor.
It was a way of trying to declare, and this is how I'm going to change things with my rule over view. It typically came from their voice set, not from the voice of somebody else. But if we look at just first century historical data, historical figures, the gospels, we have increasingly more information about them. We have more copies of them.
It's the size of these books. To us, like, might not seem to be very big. You can read Mark about it however 30 minutes, probably. That is a gigantic, gigantic, monumental work in the first century, just a way of an aside.
If we look at contemporaries of Jesus, you would soon have the same level of influence, just in a region over a short, first time. We have full copies of the gospel, Matthew Mark, we can join, we have full copies in the second century. So relatively 150 years, we have the full things. To get to full levels of other contemporary historical figures works, you have to get in the 16th and 17th century.
This was not preserved, that there is more information about these. So here on the second level, there's a story that don't believe in the religious aspect of Jesus. But I will say just from what we have of the written record, there's no way we can deny the existence of this person in Jesus. Because there is simply more information out about him in historical records than anyone ever of his particular local geographic influence.
So that's the kind of tough for you. I love talking about that. You can read people whose book it was great. But we're going to jump in and say this is this quick lap across all four gospels.
What we're going to do is we're going to talk about when they wrote it. We're going to have one passive scripture that is kind of the verse that helps us understand why they wrote what they wrote. We've got some particularities about that. So Matthew, the passage is best for us to read to understand Matthew the way he wrote his gospel comes from the start on the mat to be added to the very familiar passive scripture that made us pass.
It's Matthew 5, 3, 3, 10. This says, God bless his oath to the poor and realize their need for him. The king of heaven is there. God bless his oath to the poor and the comfort of the comfort.
God bless his oath to the humble. They will care at the old earth. God bless his oath to the hungry and thirst for justice. They will be satisfied.
God bless his oath to the merciful. For they will be shown mercy. God bless his oath to the archer pure. They will seek God.
God bless his oath to the work for peace. They will call the children of God. God bless his oath to the persecuted for doing right for the kingdom of heaven is there's. But Matthew writes across this whole gospel, really kind of trying to communicate across the board is that Jesus is a Messiah that the Jewish people have been waiting for.
Matthew wrote a very Jewish gospel. Matthew's gospel, solid state was actually probably written in Hebrew or Aramaic first and in translate in degree as the church moved. It was written probably in the 60s to the 80s, 80s, and 30, 40 years after the resurrection of Jesus. Most of the things later closer to the 80s than it was the 60s.
But Matthew is a disciple of Jesus. He was there first hand with him through all this. But Matthew is a tax collector, which meant he was Jewish, but he was participating with the Romans. He was occupying the land.
So Matthew had that job that was necessary that nobody likes. He might have made a lot of money, but he was disregarded as a constricting member of society. He probably wouldn't have put him only existence. In spite of that, Jesus called him to be the same as part of his ministry.
And so it helps us understand what Matthew's writing to talk about the Jewish people. Hey, this is the one we have been waiting for. Matthew has tons of Old Testament quotations, and it was probably originally written in the shibbion in that area around Jerusalem. Mark is very, very, very different.
Mark was written super early, and Mark 10.45 is the passage that we are going to use today to talk about what that book is. Mark 10.45 tells us, the son of man can not be served but to serve others, and to give his life is a ransom for many. Mark's key messages that Jesus came to sacrifice for everyone, sacrificed his life, but also sacrificed in his death. Mark was most likely the first gospel.
He was written in probably the 50s to the 60s, which is relatively quick, 15 to 20 years after the death of Jesus. I think Mark's talking about Mark, though, is who Mark is and what Mark was witness to. So Mark, we find all throughout the book of Acts as well. His name is John Mark.
He was one of Paul's companions on his first missionary journey. He was very young. He was very young. He made Paul mad and Paul pick him out.
Because he wasn't willing to keep up. Barnabas kind of kept him on this. He was traveling throughout his early missionary journeys. Mark was also Peter, the apostle Peter's tribe.
He was an assistant. Mark was one who probably actually wrote first Peter and second Peter as a dictation from John Peter. He wrote his gospel in probably an emphasis when he was staying there with Peter. And it is written to Gentiles.
It's written to people who are not Jewish, who are not living there. Most likely people are in the whole region of Turkey. But Mark, this is what I love and try to understand about this. If he was Peter's tribe, we realize so much of Mark is actually Peter's gospel.
And so stories of Peter was telling Mark that they felt the most important ones that kind of came down. But Mark's mother was intrigued to me. Because Mark's mother was friend was married. And she was one of Mary's that was at the APT, the morning, not Mary Magdalen, not Mary's mother.
She was another very common name. So she was there to see the resurrection, to see this angel came and spoke to these women, she was women. Mark's family also, the church tradition, tells us that the upper room, what kind of costs happened in the book of Acts, toward the disciples were attributed to after the death of Jesus, that kind of first, like Land New Zone, for the whole church, was John Mark's name, Tom. So imagine being a kid as a preteen, seeing all this stuff happen.
And seeing things move out and be part of it. There's some people that think that Peter might be his uncle, that's kind of disputed. But what you have is a kid, that really super instrumental age in life, saw all of this happen and stay alongside of that. Mark's actually a quick-paced gospel, either word immediately shows up just constantly, Mark, you can remark about it out in 40 minutes.
So it's very unique. Luke, on the other hand, is different. Luke's verse that we were gonna use to kind of, to come from that is in chapter 19 verse 10, in this way it says, but some of the man came to seek and save those who are lost. And Luke's primary message that Jesus came to see can save the lost, but also that he is asking us to do the same with him.
Luke was probably written about 70, 80%, Luke was a companion of Paul. And the gospel of Luke is the first part of a larger book. It also includes the book of Acts. The first several years of the church, Luke and Acts were seen as just one book.
And so if you really wanna understand the gospel of Luke, you really need to read the gospel of Acts right alongside of it. Kind of the one big sleep. But Luke was a doctor. So Luke is very exact.
Luke is very specific. Luke is so cabbier, he's very proper informal. If the gospel of Mark was written like a Redneck Hebrew or a Redneck Greek, Luke is the professional language. It was also interesting that there's a lot of kind of questions about who is Luke writing to, why is Luke doing this?
We do know that his part is larger, missionary, germinary, germinary, is being kind of to everyone. But if you look at the name of Luke, you can see him address this person named Theophilus. He specifically talks, this letter is to you, you might print Theophilus. If we look at it, Luke's format actually follows like the legal language or the way that you would provide a witness or provide testimony to a court case.
And that he even uses the word to address Theophilus that is used typically to address the members of the legal community. So some scholars actually think that Luke and Acts were written by Luke to Theophilus, who was Paul's lawyer when he went and had the same up in front of the seat. And it kind of makes the whole suite make a little bit more sense of theory. I think it has a way to do it.
Horse case scenario is an interesting story, but we see specific reasons why people are arriving this. And it makes the formality of Luke then makes a lot more sense in the truthfulness. As Luke talks about Luke, it speaks specifically about how Jesus offers good news for all, especially the poor and especially the oppressed. And this makes even more sense when we look at one of the accusations of the early Christian community is that they were causing the breakdown of civil society.
So to show how the message of Jesus cared for those in a way that actually increased society a better place makes Luke very, very interesting. I have a similar professor also saying though, if you want to find out why Jesus was killed, just relook because Jesus did a little meme. Just the way he just does not play around. It's a straight to the point.
I love Luke for that. He's just an interesting story. So Matthew Mark and Luke, these first three gospels, you might hear me say this, but I thought this is a synopsis. The Latin that means seen together.
Because Matthew Mark and Luke are really, really similar. There's a lot of places where Wayne would just absolutely share together exact same sentences. I'll share a video or it's a Facebook Facebook that I've made in the past about understanding this. And I tell you all this because John is a completely different animal altogether.
John is just a very, very different gospel. So John, the first we're gonna read, kind of understand that is chapter 20, or 31, I was very into the book. This is what John says. The disciples say, Jesus, the disciples saw Jesus do many other miraculous signs and initially the ones recorded this book.
But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. And if by believing in him, you will have life by the power of his name. John, one of the people to know the power of belief. Belief is just this recurring thread all throughout the gospel.
If you're here a couple of summers ago, we went to the seven signs of Jesus. We talked about each one of these signs of a causing belief in a very specific way. John was just fascinated with understanding belief. Many people owned their belief.
John is also one of those, it was written significantly later in the rest of these gospels. Most scholars think it was in an A to A to A they'd be someone kind of pushing into the 90s. And I actually like this 90 day with a lot. John also wrote a revelation.
We talked about this summer. John probably wrote his gospel after he wrote a revelation. So he wrote a weird crazy stuff in Revelation and then John, the gospel's not that weird and crazy. Very great for scenario.
But John is the only disciple to not die a martyr. John is the only disciple to die a natural death. He's a church that tells people to boil and oil and survive that. Does anybody else in that park or enough to boil and oil and survive?
He's pretty serious. But now you've got to imagine what this, I mean, he was young. When he was with Jesus. So you're talking to somebody who's probably late 70s, 80s, maybe even 90 years old.
And at the time, people did not with that. He was ancient. You have to think, what is the story you're going to tell? You realize you're pretty much the last one who left.
You're the disciple of Jesus. And this gospel refers to himself as the disciple of Jesus' love. He's going to tell a story and you're going to commit that Alexander is a church father. He lived about 200 AD.
He's about 100 years after John's gospel. He told us that John called by the Holy Spirit, but also by the church, to not write a source of gospel. To write spiritual gospel. To write gospel, not about the truth and idea of believing in Jesus, but about what happens when belief affects our hearts and belief affects our lives.
And so it kind of makes sense is why John is so different. Because he's not asking what people, who is Jesus He? He's not asking this is somebody's question. What He's asking us is no who is Jesus He?
So if you say you know Him, can you prove it for me? How has Jesus changed you? I mean, all throughout John, you see that the back and forth of Jesus' disciples is the fact that disciples are always misunderstanding through Jesus' and John wants us to not misunderstand the truth of Jesus' to not understand not just the truth, but what he does to our life and how he affects us and is constantly employing us to be able to explain our own individual story that we have about Jesus. John talks about God's sovereignty a lot, but John also equally talks about the human responsibility that if you believe this, that's not enough.
It has to affect you and it has to change you. So now people argue because you're trying to know Jesus' Messiah. Very, very different book, but beautiful. I think John's not fair.
He said not to fit favors. I think John's not fair. I had to, when we were designing his year out, I had to make sure it wasn't like a year of John. He said, he's crazy, I'm pretty, so I like crazy.
But the gospel is a story of good news. The thing that really filters out these, these gospels and the accuracy of those, with all the other writings of the realm and time we've all seen the finishing code and people are going to think about that kind of stuff, is what's the story of Jesus and what is the good news that this has brought to you? Not fun stories, but good news. And this is where we can take a kind of 20 plus minute conversation that was not like a boring lecture, before we can make it become a critical of our lives in the way that we think about Jesus.
Because just as Matthew and Mark and Luke and John had different experiences, had different assumptions, had different environments, had different people, and affected the way that they saw who Jesus was, and people called to communicate that message. Each one of us has different stories and experiences and assumptions. But who Jesus is to us and how do we feel called to share that with others? Now we're not gonna be writing books that get put in the Bible.
But we're causing faith, not just in our lives but in our lives and others. This is good news has affected us. So a couple of questions just to think about, you can keep these on my family, I've got a message yet, so I'll be there all week more. Just to think about this, the first thing is, how would you tell the story of Jesus as good news in your life?
How would you talk about the good news in the fact? The second was this, who's story Jesus has affected your story Jesus? So we've all been affected by it. But other people and their belief and their action has affected us in love.
So who's Jesus' story of good news has affected your Jesus? And how is their good news become your good news? We also see this in private, we put the tell the story. This is public faith, we live that.
We're gonna be affected by their stories as well, so that means we also have to actually walk on it. What is our good news?