We’ve finally made it to the Gospels, Acts, and Romans, on this journey through the Bible. Join me as we take a quick ride past these first several books of the New Testament.
If you’ve followed this trek you’ll know we just made our way through the Old Testament. On the bike ride this brought us to a trestle high above a creek.
The Gospels
The Gospels – Mathew, Mark, Luke, John – are where Jesus came to earth, walked the land, healed the sick, and taught about the Kingdom of God. This is where we encounter the tangible Jesus, living among the people.
Viewed from above
The creek at this point of the bike ride was viewed from the height of a train trestle far above the water below. Matthew’s Gospel starts with a genealogy which at first glance appears far removed from the story of Jesus. Many people are confused by this list of names, still others skip it entirely, and some like me initially get lost in it until we find some familiarity and discoveries in it.
Matthew Mark Luke John
Matthew gives us Jesus’ lineage and Kingdom teaching. The genealogy in the first chapter of this Gospel links Jesus to King David, whose story we discovered in 1 and 2 Samuel in the Old Testament.
Mark walks out the gospel with Jesus on the move in ministry.
Luke shows us the shepherds and a whole lot of “carefully investigated” details. (Luke 1:3)
And John just confused me the first several times I peeked inside. What was this Word stuff right at the beginning of this Gospel? After reading Genesis I recognized the connection to John’s Gospel and the beginning of the Bible.
As I continue to look into these four books of the New Testament that share details of Jesus’ life and ministry, I start to understand a little more about the Gospels and the love of God.
Look around
Once I grew accustomed to riding on gravel I could look around and see my surroundings instead of just the rocks under my bicycle tires.
When I glanced out past the trestle across the vast forest of trees I recognized parts of the trail I had ridden over. This section folded back around so I could see out over a segment of the path on which I had already traveled.
Bigger picture
Taking a step back gave me a more encompassing view of the bike trail.
I hope that if you’ve followed along on this ride that just rolled through the Old Testament that you, too, have started to grasp a bigger picture of what’s in the Bible.
More tunnels
I relished this moment on the ride because soon we were riding through two more tunnels.
Acts and Romans
Tunnels. That’s what the books of Acts and Romans felt like to me at one time.
When I first read Acts it was a cure for insomnia. I couldn’t get through it. Too many details. Too many storylines. After spending more time with my Bible open I began to recognize the names of people in Acts and connect them to other places in Scripture.
Where Gospels leave off
Acts takes up where the Gospels leave off. In fact, Acts is the move of the people in ministry, the early church, after Jesus heads back to heaven (resurrection and ascension) at the end of the Gospels.
Connections to books around it
If we skim Acts we’ll see names from the Gospels and names mentioned in the books of the Bible that follow. No need to spend much time in it now, just note the connections to the books around it. This basic knowledge will help anchor more of the content of the Bible.
Tunnels
I think just being accustomed to riding through several tunnels on the trail helped me travel through these next two.
Although some of the details in Acts were hard to remember, I was starting to grasp more aspects of Scripture so I knew the feeling of being in the dark wouldn’t last.
This tunnel and the next one were not as long as the first few. I think I was able to see the light shining through as I entered one of them.
Having a glimpse of visible light was helpful at this point in the Bible – for the book of Acts and the one that follows, Romans.
Romans
My first glimpse at Romans was probably similar to my experience with Acts. A lot of information that I couldn’t keep track of. This book was different from the Gospels and Acts. Romans is the first of the letters in the New Testament. This one happens to be a letter to the church in Rome written by Paul whose story can be found in Acts. See how these connections work?
The Book of Romans is Paul’s teaching about Jesus. This is another book that becomes clearer to me each time I return to it.
If you are reading along in your Bible, I encourage you not to get bogged down by Acts or Romans. We’ll keep rolling through the New Testament to glance at the next section of letters. Ready?
In the last post we saw no sign of the manger, but we did
discover the wise men and what Jesus did in ministry. Like the wise men, we are
searching for the Christ Child in the manger. Let’s see what the other two
Gospels contain.
The Gospel of Luke
Birth stories
Let’s look at the Gospel of Luke. The first chapter is filled with baby stories. Here we read early childhood stories of John the Baptist and Jesus, even stories from before they were born.
Mary
In Luke we hear from Mary, the mother of Jesus. In Matthew we heard about Joseph.
Joseph and Mary
Check out chapter two. Do you see Joseph and Mary arriving
in Bethlehem?
We’ve found the manger!
Keep reading. Look who else is arriving.
The shepherds and the angels.
We’ve located the rest of them in Luke.
The manger
So how do we remember that the manger is in Luke’s gospel?
Well, when I was a kid, every year we would watch a Christmas Special. Near the end of the special, a boy with a blanket would walk onto the stage of a Christmas Pageant and tell the story of the birth of Jesus, the nativity story.
You might have seen it too.
The story told by Linus is in Luke.
The Gospel of John
If we’ve found the manger in Luke, do we need to keep looking?
Yes. We’ve come this far. Join me as we glance at the Gospel
of John.
In the beginning was the Word
The first chapter of John starts very differently from the
rest of the Gospels. When I first started reading the Bible, John’s gospel was
confusing to me. I didn’t understand what he meant by the Word. I liked the
words “life” and “light” but the rest didn’t make much sense to me.
John the Baptist
The first name we see is John. John the Baptist, not John, the author of the book or Gospel of John. Jesus doesn’t arrive in chapter one until John’s testimony. Or does He?
Jesus
Did you notice verse 14?
“The Word became
flesh and made his dwelling among us…” John 1:14a NIV
That’s Jesus. Jesus is the Word. Jesus is the light.
We may have located the manger in Luke, but here we see the
gift revealed. Jesus come to earth in the flesh to dwell among us.
John’s gospel reveals
the gift. John reveals Jesus.
Ever wonder where the Christmas story manger scene is in the Bible? You know, the story with the shepherds and the angels. I heard it read so many times as a child, but when I started reading out of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, I couldn’t always find it.
When I read through the Bible with some friends and we
reached the Gospels, those first four books of the New Testament, I made some
observations that have helped me remember how they each start and where to find
the nativity story with Jesus in the manger.
The Gospel of Matthew
Genealogy
Matthew’s gospel starts with a list of names that many
people skip. Just FYI, that’s the genealogy of Jesus. Those names may mean
nothing to you now, but if you stick with it, you might just be surprised at
how many names you do recognize. That’s what happened for us.
Joseph
Just after the list, Joseph arrives on the scene. We hear about the coming Messiah, but we don’t find the Christmas story here. We’ll move on for now, after all, we’re in search of the nativity story. Don’t worry, we’ll come back to Matthew’s gospel in more detail in another post. Although we don’t find the manger here, we do find some treasure besides the gifts that were brought for the Christ Child.
Wise men
Speaking of searching, did you notice the wise men searching for the Christ Child? Some translations refer to them as Magi. Many of us grew up hearing about the three kings mentioned in the hymn, present in the Christmas pageant, and gathered around the nativity set. Although they show up in many places around Christmas time, they are only found in one gospel, the Gospel of Matthew.
My method to memorize utilizes Magi. Matthew’s gospel mentions the Magi.
The Gospel of Mark
Messenger
Moving on to Mark, we first hear about a messenger, John the
Baptist.
Good information, but where’s
the manger?
The first real mention of Jesus is of him in the middle of
ministry.
Where are the wise
men? Where are the shepherds? What about the angels?
Ministry
Mark’s gospel, full of many stories of Jesus, begins with a
messenger, then moves quickly to Jesus in ministry. This is a wonderful gospel
to learn about what Jesus did, but with no manger here, we’ll keep moving.
What to memorize? Mark’s gospel moves from messenger to ministry.
Two more Gospels to go. We’ll take a look at Luke and John
in the next post.
