Answers Bible Curriculum: Lesson 3 - The Gospel Truth

Father, you are, are so good to us. I just, thank you for the opportunity we have to be together this morning and to look into your word and, and see how it teaches us and how it functions for us and how your Holy Spirit uses it to work in us and may our minds be open to what you have for us today in Jesus' name. Amen. So can you hear me OK?

Loud and clear. All right. Well, we'll go ahead and go and that's gonna get adjusted as we go. We're gonna be looking at, today, the, the gospels in particular, in the New Testament.

Last week, Mike got us into the inspiration of the scriptures and so on, but today we're gonna be moving into the Gospels and, and why there are differences in the Gospels. I'll be looking at the gospel truth, And next week, just to see how this fits in context, what we will not be covering today is the, the different ways the gospels present Jesus. So, that'll be next week. I'm sure most of you are familiar with, with that, that topic, but that's not our, our, study today.

But to get us started, just bring us up to speed, was there anything from last week's lesson that That stood out to you that Maybe you, you, can remember and bring up for us to get our minds going, for context. If you're gonna say something, you have to speak up cause I'm half deaf. Especially in here. So is there anything OK.

There is coffee in the back in case you you get your mind going. That's what I have to do. well, I wrote some, some things down. we talked about inspiration.

That it is God breathed, and that God spoke through men. to, to write the scriptures. And in the, the New Testament, we have, at least 8 different writers. It could be 9 because we're not sure who wrote the book, Hebrews.

but there's at least 8 different writers. And, and as Mike talked about last week, when you read the, the, the Greek texts, you, you can tell that, That it's written by different people. That, that they have their own personality, they have their own style of writing. And so he talked about the difference between Luke, who is, is more educated and is likely a Greek himself or a Roman citizen.

He's probably not Jewish. but he's also educated because he's a physician. And so, You have the way he writes, compared to Peter or John who are, are much less educated and they actually are not Greek is not their first language either. And so, There, there's those differences, and yet the Holy Spirit's, speaks through them or breathes through them the words that they write, and God uses them.

And it's, it's such an amazing demonstration of the power of God, that, that God uses human instruments to do His will, to accomplish his, his task. And we, we also talked about how that the inspiration of the scriptures, the way, the reason we believe it, that it's inspired is because it's, it claims it for itself. It's not a, we, we don't say that the Bible is inspired because there was a panel of, of people somewhere that examined and said, and declared it to be, oh, this book is inspired.

No, the Bible declares that for itself.

And the references that we have here in 2 Timothy 3:16, all scripture is given by inspiration of God. 2 Peter 1:21. Peter also, makes that same declaration. So, it, it is internally claimed.

The Bible declares that for itself, that it is inspired. And that is how we see it. And that is how the writers of the New Testament also viewed the scriptures. They viewed them as being inspired by God, that they are of God.

And, as I said already, the authors had different personalities and gifts and, and that does come out in the writing, so we talked about that last week. Now before I get to that, Today, we're going into The, the differences in the gospels. Why do we have four gospels and how they all fit together? What, what is their, and then next week we're looking at their purpose.

We, we will not really be getting into that today. One of the questions that comes up in, like if you're talking to a non-believer, a skeptic, let's say, or, or maybe even somebody who's just brand new and is trying to figure everything out, and they're trying to understand is you have 4 gospels and how do they fit together? Why are there 44 different renditions of the life of Christ? And so that is an, an issue that kinda we're gonna, what we are really is our purpose for our lesson today is dealing with, If you get a, like a New Testament survey, Which is a book you can get at a Christian bookstore, you can order online, but they're actually a very valuable tool for gathering information about New Testament books.

And, and what you will do, you will find as you get into this, this survey is, is, a good one will, will actually give you a lot of background information. what scholars discover as they, as they actually study these things, cause there are people, who do a lot of hard work for the rest of us in, in, uncovering information, studying it. They study the original text, they find out, how all this stuff fits together. And, the, the, the survey that I have is, is, Gro Mackie.

And so he has this chart in there that he got from Westco, who is a, is a, a biblical scholar who if you do any reading at all, you'll see his name pop up quite frequently. He's, he's a very well-known Bible scholar, but he did, he put together this chart. Of how the, the, The the four Gospels actually fit together, where they mesh and, and, and where they don't, where they tell different stories. So, Matthew and Luke, you will see, are in the 40s to 50s on what they have in common and what they, what the, and the differences, the different parts of the, of the gospel message they tell.

Mark has by far the most. It's 93% in common with the other gospels. And, and what that means is what you find in Mark, there's only 7% that's only found in Mark. the 93% of what Mark wrote can also be found in, in the other Gospels.

It's a very high percentage. And conversely, John is 92% of his gospel is only found in his gospel. It's only 8% of his gospel that is also recorded in the other gospels. And so, what we, what we see here is, is there's common, common, stories and you can see how it's broken down and then there's different, stories or teachings that are brought out in these gospels.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke are considered to be the synoptic gospels. And what that means is those three gospels carry the most common information. And so, they are considered to be in both in style and in content to be grouped together. John is unique and you get the uniqueness in John right away.

In the very first verse, what's the first verse of John? In the beginning. And, and, and so John has a very unique style, a very unique purpose in his writing and so his is, is very different. And next week we're getting into, as I said, more the, the, The purposes that, that each one has in relationship to Jesus, but that is how they are laid out.

But you can also get a, what's called a harmony of the gospels. And those are a great tool too. And so you can find those where they actually, people have, have done a lot of hard work in, in putting together the events. to, and, and put them side by side or together.

And so you can actually, if you want to, you can read them in a, in a, in a way where you read all four gospels together in, in a, a linear timeline. And so you can, and you can get those like most study Bibles, I know the MacArthur study Bible has it, has a, a harmony of the gospels where all the scriptures, the references where you can follow along. That way, you can, other study Bibles, I'm sure have it. You can, get it online.

There's online resources for that if you wanted to, to read the Gospels that way. you can also get it just in a book form. I have an old book by AT Robertson, Harmony of the Gospels, and, and it has 4 columns, and, when they're all, together, so in that 8% of the time for John, there's 4 columns. And, but it has the events all side by side and you can read them together.

It's a great way to read through the, the, the gospels. but That's not the primary way we should read it because that's not the way the Holy Spirit inspired it. The Holy Spirit inspired it to be read differently, separately, and that each one has its own purpose. Each gospel, has its own presentation and as we read it and study it, we should study it within its own context and its own purpose.

And, so, but those, that's the deal in the four Gospels. and we're gonna be looking at Some examples of Of how, of, of, we're gonna look at an example of, of two gospels that have the same story and how they differ. And then we're gonna be looking at, first of all, though, the, the two separate purposes of the, of two different gospels and, and what they were for. So, if you have your Bible turned to Luke chapter one.

Luke chapter one. Hm And the 1st 4 verses, Luke. describes or, or gives, his purpose for writing. Now, in the Gospel of Luke, we don't find his name.

He, he, he doesn't take credit for writing it. So we, we really, can't determine by itself that, that Luke is the writer. We really, get more sure of that in the book of Acts where, he also Excuse me. He, he wrote the Book of Acts as well.

And he wrote to Theophilus. You see the beginning of it is exact same as it is in the book of Luke. But in Luke, in the book of Acts, he identifies himself as, as being part of, of, Paul's traveling group as they go to different cities in Asia. And so Luke is, is seen as a, as a co-laborer and, and he uses the, the pronouns we and us.

so we, we know that we can, we can from that determine he wrote Acts, therefore, he wrote Luke. But in Luke chapter one, it says, in as much as we have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished or in some versions it says fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning. To write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.

So, we see here it's written to whom?

Theophilus, right? And so Theophilus is an unknown character. He's, has a Greek name, so we are guessing he's Greek. There are different views as to, to who this person is or if it's actually just one person or, or it's, it's a term meaning to a group of people.

it's comes, it's the, the name itself is actually comes from two Greek words with theos and phleo. It would be God lover or lover of God. and so, and that, and that could mean It could have been a pagan name that, that someone gave their, their child and because that is, is another word for a a Greek god as well. but, the most likely idea here is, is that this is a, a man, a man who, Luke is writing to, who is, is an a Christian, a believer, and, And, and so he is writing to him to explain things more thoroughly.

So, and, and that is Is how probably the best way to read that. He's there to, he writes it. To encourage the faith of Theophilus. he, he's, he's writing this gospel to, to encourage his faith, and it's not merely to satisfy intellectual curiosity.

He says to give the exact truth about the things you have been taught. So what Luke is writing here is, is to explain in a thorough way, the things that they have now, they have up to this time only been told orally. But Luke wants to, to codify it, put it down in writing, and, and have it there so that it's written for, not just for Theophilus but for generations to come. That is what the Holy Spirit is designing for him there.

Luke, Keep I not remembering to press my buttons here. Luke is the physician, co-laborer, and as, as I said before, he, he's this, this man of science, but he's also apparently a person who has a knack for history. Cause as he writes, he's, he's, as we read Luke, he's writing things as a historian would, would write them. and what he's done is he, he explains He, he takes, information from eyewitnesses and from servants of the word.

So he's interviewing people, he's hearing what they say. He's compiling this information, putting it together in a, in a way that, that, tells the story. So it's in Luke that, we, we get this story actually, from the birth of Christ, right? It's this Luke chapter 2 that actually gives us that account, but before that, gives us, the, the accounts that, that come before, Jesus, is born and really builds up to who Jesus is and it's, Luke that, that draws us through then, to all the way to his, his death and resurrection.

So Luke does, in a more historical fashion, almost, I wouldn't say biographical because none of these are biographical, as we'll talk about in a little bit. But He is writing things down more like a historian would write them. The other one I wanna compare with is John chapter 20. John also gives a, a declaration of his purpose.

So if you look over to John chapter 20, in verse 30 to 31. He writes down why he has written his gospel. He says, therefore, many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book. But these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.

What we see from that is that, that John doesn't write down everything. It's not his purpose to write down everything that he ever saw Jesus do. that, that, or write down all the information that he knows about Jesus. Only the relevant details are recorded.

The ones that are relevant. for believing that Jesus is the Christ. That was what he wants the readers to get out of that, that Jesus is the Christ. And when you think about, John's writing, it, it becomes a very powerful presentation.

That is what John is doing. He's presenting almost an argument for Jesus being the Christ, from, from the, in the beginning as, as he starts. And in believing that Jesus is the Christ, that they would have life in his name. And that is the ultimate goal of this gospel is to take people to faith that in seeing who Jesus is, they would be drawn into faith.

He says In verse 31, he uses this word, it's in the new, new American Standard at least, but these have been written. What are the these? If you take your Bible and turn to John chapter one. And we just go through flipping pages, but I'd like your responses.

What are the these that John has recorded that would demonstrate that Jesus is the Christ? Beginning in John in chapter one, what are the theses? These things. So what are these things?

What are they? His miracles. What does John present in chapter one that would demonstrate that he is the Christ? He's a light shining in the darkness.

OK. The word became flesh and dwelt among us, and that tells us something about the beginning of the chapter, right? In the beginning was the word. And the Word was with God and the Word was God.

That's a, one of the most profound statements in the whole Bible. And so it begins, John begins with that. John begins with a statement of fact that Jesus is God. That's what, that's what he's declaring right from the beginning.

And then from there, he moves through his gospel to show the actions that Jesus demonstrated while on earth in the form of a man. When he took flesh How he continually demonstrated that he was the Christ. So, we move to chapter two, and what does he do? He turns water into wine, right?

Chapter 3, he tells the, the religious man that he has to be born again. He challenges the conventional thinking. Of the time. he cleanses the temple.

He in chapter 4, he tells the woman that, he is the living water and that if he would drink of her, she would never thirst again. He heals on the Sabbath. He feeds 5000. So we keep moving on through the Gospel of John.

He walks on the water. He declares he's bread from heaven. He is the light of the world. These are the These are all these things that, that John is recording for us that we could know that he is the Christ.

Here's a big one. He's, he's talking with the, the, the Pharisees at the temple, and he gets this big discussion with them, and it all boils down to before Abraham was, I am. That's a thunderous statement, of Jesus declaring himself to be the Christ. He heals the blind man.

He raises Lazarus from the dead. He prepares his disciples, you read in, in, in John 14 through 17, preparing his disciples for what's coming and even though they struggle for a few days, he, that preparation takes them through, to his appearing to them at the resurrection and, he tells them, let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. So John is writing all those things for the readers to read it and believe that he is the Christ.

Jesus in chapter 17 submits to the will of the Father. He submits himself to the will of the Father. He dies for us. He raises again.

All of that is to demonstrate. That Jesus is the Christ. And so that's what John in his gospel is that, that's his, his purpose. One of the things also that we need to, to see in this is that the gospels were not meant to be biographical in nature.

These are not bio when you read a biography, a biography will usually go, into the, where they were born, which we do know that about Jesus, where they're born, who their parents were, the environment they grew up in, their early childhood years, their, their teen years, the cars they wrecked when they were teenagers and And you get into their education and their adult years and, and, it's, it's how they become the person that they are. with Jesus, We know very little about his childhood.

In fact, we know very little about his early manhood. we don't really start getting the picture of Jesus until he's 30 and he's, he's coming out in ministry.

He's beginning his ministry. The, the rest of the information is very little. We know a little bit about his birth. We know about when he was 12 years old, and they went to, to Jerusalem.

His family did. We know a little bit about that, that incident. And that's pretty much it. We don't know the furniture he built in the car carpenter shop or whether it was even furniture at all.

Maybe it was something else they were building. maybe it was, yoke, yokes for the ox and maybe it was other woodworking things that they did, but we don't really know anything about that. We don't know. How, how much money they made, we don't know how, how well they, their business actually went.

We don't, we don't know any of that. We only can imagine, speculate. And, it, it's cool to think that you would have a man who is perfect. And who has designed the universe.

And has spoken everything into existence, being the guy that you call to your house, come fix this thing. that he's a carpenter that actually knows what he's doing and he's not gonna overcharge you. He's gonna, give you a fair price. yeah, that we, we can think about it in that way, but that's all, just things we think about.

The, the scriptures don't tell us any of that. The gospels were not meant to be biographical. What they were meant to do is give an account of the heritage, and the ministry and the purpose of Jesus that the Holy Spirit would use to draw people to salvation. And it's important for us to remember, even though we know it, but to remember that, that when the Holy Spirit inspired writers to write their, what they wrote, That it's, it's the Holy Spirit's purpose.

It's not the writer's purpose. The Holy Spirit is directing them. And the Holy Spirit is, is, directing them to write what we are gonna need to know. And so there, there's a whole lot of information that we don't need to know.

but what we do need to know is written there for us. And so, we need to, accept it that way. And the reason why I bring that up is because Skeptics have a, have a problem with this. This is one of their objections.

They, they have objections to the fact that there are, are differences in the stories that we're gonna look at in, in the, in these, these two passages. but there are also that it's, that it's sketchy and it's biographical information. See, they, they want a man-made document. At least that's what they say.

Usually though, the problem with skeptics is they just don't want to accept it, period. And so they're looking for reasons not to accept it. And I happen to be very close to a former skeptic whose objections were like this. And in fact, His skepticism became extreme to the point where, anything that I can't just touch and, and, and understand logically, I can't accept.

And it wasn't until God changed his heart, that he's actually able to see the light. And so, trying to win an argument with a skeptic. It's not really what's gonna bear fruit. We do need to try to give the best answers we can get, give them, but what changes their heart is the Holy Spirit.

And what changed, this young man's heart. Was God working in him and opening his eyes to understand. And so he came to faith, not because I had good arguments or good answers or any of that. there were times in our conversations where I was just stymied and I just like, I'd be praying, God help me., because there's, there's just nowhere to go in this conversation.

But God changed his heart and, and, and opened up his mind to understand and he came to faith in Christ. but these are things that skeptics will bring up and have problems with. Matthew 14. Versus 22 to 33.

Give us the account. Of Jesus walking on the water. So let's read it together there. It says immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead of him to the other side.

This is, this is after the feeding of the 5000, by the way. that's the context. While he sent the crowds away, and after he had sent the crowds away, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. And when it was evening, he was there alone.

But the boat was already a long distance from the land, battered by the waves, for the wind was contrary. And in the 4th watch of the night, he came to them walking on the sea. When the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified and said, it is a ghost. And they cried out in fear.

But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, Take courage, it is I, do not be afraid. Peter said to him, Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you in the water. And he said, come, and Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But seeing the wind, he became frightened and beginning to sink.

He cried out, Lord, save me. Immediately, Jesus stretched out his hand and took hold of him and said to him, you have little faith, why did you doubt? When they got into the boat, the wind stopped, and those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, you are certainly God's son. Now, aside from the awe and wonder of, reading a passage like this and trying to put ourselves in the, in the disciples position of what that must have been like to see something so amazing as Jesus doing this demonstration of power over nature.

what we see here is, the, the, an experience that, the disciples had with Jesus. But if you turn to John chapter 6, 16 to 21, you have, The, the, the same story told by another eyewitness. See, Matthew is one of the 12 disciples. John is one of the 12 disciples.

They're both there. They're both eyewitnesses of, of this Happening that takes place. So John describes it like this in Less verses, he says now when evening came, his disciples came down to the sea. And after getting into a boat, they started to cross the sea to Copernum.

It had already become dark and Jesus had not yet come to them. The sea began to be stirred because a strong wind was blowing. Then, when they had rowed about 3 or 4 miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea. And drawing near to the boat, and they were frightened, but he said to them, It is I.

Do not be afraid. So they were willing to receive him into the boat and immediately the boat was at the land to which they were going. All right. So John tells a story one way and Matthew tells the story with a few other details.

And for some people, this seems like contradictions. And so, a lot of times skeptics who, who read the new, the, gospel accounts and they see these, similar passages will point to something like this and say, see it, it contradicts. It's not the same story. But is it really a contradiction?

Has John written something that really contradicts with Matthew? Is there a contradiction? No, there's not. There's nothing that John writes, John just doesn't give all the detail the same details, that, that Matthew does.

Now, John had written that Jesus was coming across the water on a jet ski. That would be a different, a different, set of circumstances, right? That would be a contradiction. But he doesn't.

and so we, there's really not a contradiction there. It's just a different, description. It's like when you have witnesses to something that happens, an accident or, or whatever it is, some an event. If you have three different witnesses, You're gonna get 3 variations to the story.

And so, like say it's a car that's being described, one might call it a blue 4-door sedan. OK. Another person might call it a, a dark, a dark car. Another person might call it a, a shiny dark car.

And so they, they give different descriptions. One of them might be color blind and not able to tell any colors, right? but it, but they don't contradict. They, they all could be true, because they, they give, at least they're all a car.

so So they don't contradict. And so just because you have 3 witnesses to an event doesn't mean that, that they contradict. They actually, in, in, when, when police take reports from what I am told, I'm not a policeman, but I've been told this, that they get suspicious if the testimony all matches perfectly. Because what they begin to think is that the, the witnesses got together and colluded to get their story the same and then they give their, they give their stories.

But if there's differences in the story, Not contradictory, then it actually corroborates. rather than contradicts. It actually fills in some of the gaps and, and, and so on. And there's also, The sense that, that, the, the, the witnesses support each other even in their differences.

So, that is the, the the idea in having this and Mark, Mark also, gives The same story. He has actually. in the very end, he has a closing comment to the story and Mark probably was not an eyewitness. Mark would have gotten this story from the disciples.

He would have heard about it and so he, from the Holy Spirit speaking, speaking through him, he writes it down. But his closing comment is, he says, then he got out of the boat with them and the wind stopped and they were utterly astonished, for they had not gained any insight from the incident of the loaves, but their heart was hardened. In other words, they were so afraid out there in the ocean. They were so afraid.

And they shouldn't have been afraid because they should have gained insight from the feeding of the 5000. But Mark's closing comment to this incident is They hadn't learned it yet. And, and so it's interesting how Mark actually gives us a, a, another clue as to how things, how actually the disciples when they looked back on this, how they viewed it, how they actually saw this whole thing play out. All right.

So why Fo Gospels? As I was pondering this question, I was thinking, it's because God is generous. God could have just given us one. But he, he, he just blew that all up and, and gave us 4.

But, Arthur Pink, he, he actually wrote a, a small book on this called Why Four Gospels. In, in his introduction, he, he writes this, just as a, a course in architecture, Enables the student to discern the subtle distinctions between the Ionic and the Gothic and the Corinthian styles. Distinctions which are lost upon the uninstructed or just as a musical training fits one to appreciate the grandeur of a master production, the loftiness of its theme. The beauty of its chords, the variety of its parts or its rendition, all lost upon the uninitiated.

So the exquisite perfections of the four gospels are unnoticed and unknown by those who see in them nothing more than four biographies of Christ. And so, God gave us 4, to give us 4 different points of view, 4 different angles, and 4, different purposes, really, that, fit who Jesus was when he was here on earth, and what he was doing and help us to have a, a greater and multifaceted understanding. Of the coming of Christ. Pink also is the one who, who actually goes into, he, he does labor the point quite a bit.

That, the, that there shouldn't be more that we expect, that the Holy Spirit in his inspiration of these writers inspired exactly what we needed to know and that we shouldn't, live in frustration that there's not more biographical information that, that's not important for us to know. The Holy Spirit knows what we need and he gives us what we need. And so we need to trust, trust God. We need to trust God, the Holy Spirit, as to what we have here and not try to make more out of it.

And that comes up because there have been false gospels that have been written. In the 1st 100 years after Christ, there were some that were written that, had different information. there was the Gospel of Mary. That was Mary Magdalene, the Gospel of Barnabas, and the Gospel of Thomas.

And so, What about those? And you probably heard at least of one of those. there was that actually was part of the formation of the, of the early Gnosticism. Which was a higher knowledge, a heresy that arose in the early church.

And these gospels were part of that mystical, of religion that came out and and part of the heresy that the early church fathers had to deal with. and in reading these gospels, It's, it's like the rest of, of what we do accept as being part of the canon of scripture. they have to pass certain tests. And so, do they have agreement with the Bible, with the rest of, of what we know is, is, God's word?

do they, have historical reliability? Remember last week, Pastor Mike was talking about, the Book of Mormon and how it, it doesn't have historical or even archae archaeological reliability. And, so, so there is, there is, are these tests that things have to pass and And these do not pass those tests. They're, they're, largely spurious and so on.

I have a quote from The Gospel of Thomas. Where it says, Simon Peter said to them, Make Mary leave us, for females don't deserve life. Jesus said, look, I will guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven.

You didn't know that was in the gospel, did you? That, that, that's how you become a believer and, and get to heaven. Yeah, it's pretty crazy. And, I, I saw one, a, a, a recording of a, a person just out on the street witnessing and talked to a, an individual and this individual was bringing up the Gospel of Thomas is, having other information and, and so this guy witnessing says, well, have you ever read the Gospel of Thomas?

Well, no, but I've heard that it, and People who actually haven't read it are, are, would prefer to depend upon that than on what the, the actual Bible says. now, the, the gospels actually present A, a Christ, a Jesus, who is holy and who is God. And who, who, who has a very A high view and a, a great love of, of mankind. Both male and female.

and Jesus demonstrated that over and over again in his life. We, we, we read about that in the Gospels, the way he, he treated, the women and the men, he treated them, in, in a very appropriate and loving way and accepting way, and, did not discriminate, based upon their, their gender, but he accepted them as they were because he's the one who created them, male and female. On purpose. and so, he's, he's not making those kinds of changes.

All right. Let's just wrap this up. what is the difference between contradiction and corroboration? And that's something I've alluded to already, but The, the passages where people, skeptics have, have issues and problems with.

If someone says, well, there are, there are contradictions between the gospels, then what we should do is, we'll ask them to show it to us and, and go through it and what we will be able to show them is that it's not a contradiction. It's just different details of the same story. It's really corroboration. it's actually building the story and they support each other.

And just because one writer has a different detail than the other writer, doesn't mean that they contradict each other. And so we shouldn't be afraid of that. Different purposes and vantage points support the reliability and the impact. for one thing, we see that there's, there is no collusion.

When we, when we read the diff different gospel accounts, and we see the different details in each one. What we, what we realize is these guys just didn't get together in a room and, get their story straight and then write it out. No, the Holy Spirit led them at different times. To write for different purposes, to even different audiences.

And that supports the idea that there's no collusion that, that was, was committed here, but it was the work of the Holy Spirit. And then an impact, what does it do for us?, the, the, the power that these gospels have for us is it impacts our life. It makes our faith alive. It quickens that, that, that faith in us and makes it alive.

And out of that, our lives are transformed. it changes us. So as we read the gospels, we read what, what Jesus did, and we, we see the impact of it, we, it also impacts us as well. It, transforms us.

OK. Any thoughts or questions? As long as they're easy questions. Right Perspective.

Do Yeah But is. OK. So Brian says it's that, that God gave us 4 perspectives. They all agree and that it was a, it's a gift from God.

God gave that to us. OK, good. Any other thoughts or questions? Y'all wanna get out early, don't you?

All right. OK, let's, let's close then, closing prayer. Thank you, Lord, for the revelation you've given to us and, and the clarity that it has for us. And thank you for the gospel and what it means to us.

And for all of, all of that you've given to us, you've been very generous in the information you've given to us, and we have what we need. And thank you for your, your Holy Spirit that works in us. It opens up our minds to understand. And draws us to the truth.

And, and Lord, may we, live in, in that light and, and then be a blessing to others. Help help us to bring that light to those around us that don't have it yet. Lord, that we may be a blessing to them as well. And we just give ourselves to you for the rest of this day in Jesus' name.

Amen.