The Gospels

I just made a late addition to my presentation for Sunday and will discuss who the authors of the Gospels are, their intended audiences and the different purposes for writing. I'll save for Sunday the dates of their writing and some other items. With any luck, I might even be right.

Matthew was written by Matthew, the disciple. Matthew was writing predominantly to a Greek audience (likely Greek Jews), and his primary theme was proving that Jesus was indeed the promised Messiah. Mark was not a disciple, but certainly a close associate of them, known to Peter and Paul. Mark's audience were Roman gentiles, perhaps even wider than that, and his purpose was to show that they also had a place in Jesus' kingdom and that it was reserved for the Jews only. Luke wrote his book to what was likely his Roman patron, Theophilus, but certainly with the intent that it would be further distributed. Luke, being a physician, was attempting to give a uniform account of Jesus to Gentiles as to avoid confusion as well as establish a baseline of truth for the inclusion of Gentiles into the Christian church.

John did his own thing. John was writing for Greeks, and his purpose was to expand upon and augment the other three Gospels. Whereas the other Gospels have their similarities, a reading of John will show that he described different events. In the end, this is merely informational, since the purpose of all the Gospels, despite their intended audience of the time, is for ALL of us today. The only thing we need to know is that they tell the life and times of Jesus, the Messiah, foretold from of old as the eventual savior of the world. As we progress through the Gospels, we need to keep one extremely simple point in mind:

Up until Christ's time, salvation was obtained through observance of the Law. Jesus' primary message was that his death and resurrection was the ultimate fulfillment of the Law. It was the 180-degree reversal of everything the Jews had been taught, with the addition that GENTILES were able to receive the same thing also. Pretty heady stuff. I know us Germans and Scandinavians will change our minds on a dime, but these were, after all, a stiff-necked people.

Never let that point stray far from your mind as you see the reactions of the people that interact with Jesus, since he's still telling us to do the same exact thing--to reject the world and all it would tell us and follow him. It wasn't easy then, and it's not supposed to be easy now--and no one ever said it would be.

Scott