1. The Gospels (Part 1)
Ps Josh Chan

2. The Gospels – literally means ‘good news’
The Gospels – literally means ‘good news’. Each account is written with the purpose of getting across the good news. What is the good news? That Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born, lived, died, and rose again.
All the gospels portray the life of Christ, so there are great similarities, but they’re also very different. That’s why they contain different types of information and different amounts of information. They can be seen as inconsistencies or contradictions, but when we know the purpose of each gospel, we know that it actually all makes sense.
They were written separately and individually. However, there are a great number of similarities present in the gospels, even word for word similarities, so we know that there was some collaboration and discussion when it came to writing things down.
Written 30 – 60 years after Jesus’ death.
Christ = Messiah
The Kingdom of God

3. Matthew Jewish to the Jews Joseph’s perspective of Jesus’ birth
A former tax collector until Jesus called him out to become one of His disciples. His other name – Levi – is used in Mark and Luke. Matthew 9:9; Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27
His goal was to work with the Jews to help them see that Jesus was the Messiah, the One that the prophets spoke about.
He quotes the Old Testament more than any of the other gospels (29 times) and 13 times he writes ‘to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet’.
Matthew doesn’t deal with Jewish culture in great detail because he assumes that his audience already knows and understands the culture and history of the Jews.
We can see later on that Paul has to address these same struggles, that they wouldn’t let go of traditions and things that they held on to, they were settling for the shadow and types that Jesus had already fulfilled.

4. Matthew
Jesus’ first detailed recorded miracle in Matthew 8 is Jesus healing a man with leprosy – this was aimed at the Jewish people. They understood that leprosy was a sign of being unclean, yet Jesus touches the man, which is the wrong thing to do, and instead of Jesus also being made unclean, the opposite happens, and the man is made clean.
This is unheard of, this is abnormal, this goes against everything that the Jews were taught. But it introduces Jesus as the Messiah, the one who could forgive the sins of the Jews, the one who could take the unclean and make it clean.
Jesus’ birth is described with the same important details as the other gospels, but there is a great emphasis on Jesus being celebrated at birth, as divine, as King.
Matthew’s focus is on showing that Jesus truly is the King that the Jews have been waiting for. He presents Jesus as the King and as royalty repeatedly. He also shows how much Jesus loved the Jews and Israel.
Even Jesus’ disciples are listed to show that they were chosen. Not people of noble character, but still called out and people who Jesus trusted with the message of the gospel, people who Jesus chose to represent His kingdom. Matt 10:2-4. In verse 7, we read about their assignment – to tell others that the kingdom is near. The message of the disciples was all about the kingdom.

5. Matthew
Matthew is the only gospel that uses the words “kingdom of heaven” and it uses the word ‘kingdom’ about 55 times because the emphasis is on the King. 12 out of 15 of the parables in Matthew begin with, “The kingdom of heaven is like”.
It’s all about the kingdom because Jesus is king.
Matt 15:21
The emphasis on Jesus’s love for Israel and that His priority is on Israel. Not that He didn’t love or have anything for the Jews, but Matthew wanted to make sure that the Jews understood the love that Jesus has for them so that they would believe that He is the Messiah and Deliverer that they were waiting for.
While Jesus came first for the Jews, and then for the Gentiles, the truth is that the Jews rejected Him as King. They didn’t acknowledge Jesus as King, they missed Him as the Messiah, so we see that there is animosity between Jesus and the religious leaders. Matt 12 – conflict with the Pharisees.
So Matthew shows us that the Kingdom now includes the Gentiles (Matt 21:43)
In other words, the Kingdom of God includes the Jews, but it is bigger than the Jews. God’s kingdom is now for anybody and everybody, as long as they would receive and accept Jesus as the King.

6. Matthew
Matthew answers the question “Who is Jesus” with the emphasis on Jesus being a Jew and the promised King of the Jews.
Matt 16:13
Even when it comes to the crucifixion and the resurrection, we see that Jesus is crucified as the King of the Jews. In Matt 21:1, we see that Jesus is welcomed as the King of the Jews. They all worship Jesus as King, only for Jesus to be then mocked and sentenced to death because He is the Messiah (chapter 26 and 27) and the King of the Jews.
The very thing which they celebrated, they then use it as an accusation and an insult to who He is.
He talks about Jesus’ final words to the disciples but doesn’t mention Jesus ascending. This is to show that the Messiah fulfilled all the prophecies spoken about Him, to show that the King rose again, that the Messiah defeated death, that He had ultimate victory over death.
That was the most important part of Jesus as Messiah – He was the anointed one that could not be defeated even by death.
It’s not that Jesus didn’t ascend or that it wasn’t significant, it was that the emphasis was that Jesus reigned as King, so when He resurrected, that was establishing His kingdom on earth.
It meant that everything He said was true, that His teaching can be believed, that His instructions are dependable. The Jews could then leave what they used to believe, their traditions and laws, and rely on Jesus because He rose again and proved His Kingship, even over death.

7. Mark The emphasis in Mark is on Jesus as the suffering servant.
Throughout all of Mark, we see that Mark is documenting occurrences, times, names, locations, activity. He’s trying to make sure that he’s capturing all the important events in Jesus’ life, especially the significant moments and miracles.
Mark’s name is actually John, but his surname is Mark. We know this from Acts 12:12; 25
We also know that Peter was like a mentor to Mark, so much so that Peter regarded him as a son.
It’s often thought that the book of Mark was the first of the gospels to be written, so most likely around 30 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection.
The book of Mark is written not to try and convince the Jews of anything, but mostly to record the events of Jesus’ life.
One of the biggest emphases is that Jesus was a servant. So whenever we read the book of Mark, we need to keep in mind that it’s more about the character of Jesus than anything else.
There is also an emphasis on the action and the events that happened in Jesus’ life, more than His teachings or His words. It describes Jesus as the Son of God and proves it through His life, His miracles, and everything that He accomplished.

8. Mark Mark’s target audience is to the Romans.
Compared to the Jews, the Romans were almost the opposite. They saw things very logically and were only interested in progress. They didn’t care about the history of a person or prophecies, hence why Mark doesn’t bother recording any of the genealogy of Jesus. That simply didn’t matter to the Romans.
Any fulfilled prophecies were irrelevant, even the title “Messiah” didn’t matter to them because it had no meaning. Mark mentions the term “Messiah” the least out of all the gospels.
The Romans were not familiar with the Old Testament and also had very little interest in the Old Testament, they weren’t bound by any laws or cultures, they simply wanted to live their own lives the best way they could.
In Matthew, we can see that the Old Testament is quoted multiple times to prove the intricacies of Jesus’ validity as the Messiah, but the Romans firstly, didn’t know anything about the Old Testament, and secondly, they didn’t care about discussing the details of the Old Testament. Hence why Mark doesn’t make the connections nearly as much as the book of Matthew.
The Romans wanted to know who Jesus was, what He did, and why His story matters.

9. Mark
Mark only contains nine parables, compared to 20 miracles, and covers all the main points and events in the life of Jesus.
Yet, Mark focuses on the servanthood of Jesus. It speaks about His humility in spite of His perfection and that He came to serve more than anything else.
This is a huge shift for the Roman mindset. Romans were more akin to strong leadership, leadership where authority was respected and where holding a position of authority was more about power and being significant and obeyed, rather than serving those under your authority. But Mark constantly shows that Jesus, who had authority, still came to serve and to love others.
Mark skips Jesus’ childhood and moves straight to His life as an adult because the Romans wanted to know what Jesus did that matters. And ultimately, Mark’s goal is to show the unfamiliar who Jesus is in a nutshell, showing the highlights, the significance, and His character.
It’s like Jesus is portrayed as a Man on a mission, He’s here to accomplish something, to get something done, to serve because that’s what He’s here for. In the book of Mark, we see the Greek word “euthos”, which means “immediately” or “at once”, because Jesus came to serve, to make things happen.

10. Mark
The emphasis on Jesus’ miracles are there to show that He came and did significant acts. He wasn’t lazy or slow in accomplishing His action. It’s like a record of everything Jesus did. “He did this, and then this, and then this, and then this.” Jesus made things happen and accomplished things.
Within Mark 1, we see Jesus accomplishing a lot.
He writes down very quickly everything that Jesus does. Jesus accomplished things without delay.
Jesus didn’t just teach, He also did what He taught. He challenged the status quo and the understanding of what was possible for the Romans.
The book of Mark is also detailed. Mark records Jesus’ subtle actions as well, His emotions, His expressions, the way that He felt before His response. Mark is the only book that tells us that Jesus was a carpenter (Mark 6:3). Matthew tells us that He’s the son of a carpenter, but Mark tells us that Jesus Himself was also a carpenter.
Mark very succinctly writes about Jesus’ death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. We see that Jesus did everything that He was sent to accomplish, that at the end of His mission, He gives us the instruction to go into all the world and preach the gospel.
All of this is written so that someone who knows very little about Jesus and the Old Testament can read Mark, understand the purpose of why Jesus came, understand what Jesus did, and now know what to do with it. It’s written for someone who wants to get straight to the point, who isn’t interested in the history, but needs just enough detail to understand the point.