Rereading the Synoptics

As part of the Bible School course I'm taking currently, I have now re-read the Gospels According to Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Next will be John, followed by the rest of the New Testament.

The first time I comprehensively read the Gospels (including John) was in the late summer of 1992, long before I became a believer. I had read parts of the Old Testament two summers previously, and now it was time to read the New Testament. I was also attending a mainline United (Methodist-Presbyterian) church, and was generally going through a "spiritual" (for an agnostic) time in my life. I took the Gospels at face value, and my understanding of Christ deepened as a result, but there was stuff in all four Gospels that I just didn't understand, or that went over my head.

Within a couple of years, I had plunged into deep skepticism. I pored over the Synoptic Gospels a lot, though, influenced by the Jesus Seminar and writings in that vein, trying to identify the "authentic" Jesus buried under what I thought at the time were subsequent Christological accretions. As a result, I was so focussed on parts of the Gospels (the individual stories that appear in different versions in the three Synoptic Gospels), that I utterly missed the whole picture.

Fast forward many years, and I came to faith in Jesus Christ as our sole Lord and Saviour. A few months later, I participated in a class to read the Bible in 90 days, which I did. I was so excited to try rereading the Gospels—especially the Synoptic Gospels—now as a believer, but by the time I got to the Gospels, I was reading so fast (determined to finish), that I couldn't really savour the whole breadth and depth of what I was reading. Instead of minutely examining individual verses (as I'd done as a skeptic), now I was focussed on the overall redemptive narrative from Genesis to Revelation, so flew over the Gospels from a bird's-eye perspective, without taking the time to fly down and explore their nooks and crannies.

So now, two years later, I've finally had an opportunity to slowly, comprehensively reread Matthew, Mark, and Luke, taking time to pause, make notes, look up cross references, and so on. And what have I found? A multi-layered depth and richness to all three Gospels that could take a lifetime to really draw out and learn from. All the theology that is more explicitly and systematically set out in the writings of John and Paul is there in the Synoptic Gospels, but scattered about like so many glittering diamonds inlaid into a multi-coloured mosaic.

What strikes me in all three Gospels, above all else, is how delicately and inextricably intertwined are the two aspects of the person and work of Jesus Christ and His Kingdom: the human and divine; the "already" and "not yet"; the temporal and eternal. Focussing exclusively on Jesus Christ as teacher and on the Kingdom here and now, misses the divine, eternal King who existed before the foundation of the world, and who will return to judge the living and the dead. Focussing exclusively on Jesus Christ as the Son of God, Alpha and Omega, Judge and Redeemer, misses His many teachings on how we are to live in the here and now, waiting for His return.

There are other "paradoxes," too. We think of Matthew as focussing on Christ's being the long-promised Davidic King, but we also find the Great Commission. We think of Mark as being short and action-oriented, yet risk missing the teaching on discipleship through suffering and servanthood that lies at the heart of his Gospel. We think of Luke as being the evangelist to the Gentiles and the outcasts of society, yet miss the fact that he—the only Gentile writer of Scripture—was steeped in the Old Testament's teaching on God's grace towards just such people.

And another paradox. As conservative, evangelical Christians, we are all about the Gospel. And yet, we can easily spend time dwelling on Deuteronomy, the Psalms, Isaiah, or Paul's letters—and easily attest that all Scripture points to Christ—while overlooking the one place where the birth, life, ministry, suffering, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour is set out more clearly than anywhere else: the Gospels themselves. Not only that, but there are, of course, clear teachings throughout the Gospels on how we are to live on a day-to-day basis as disicples of Christ, and on how we are to live in anticipation of His return. Are we truly living as He has called us to live? Or do we skip over His teaching for fear of falling into the trap of Kingdom-now liberalism, and losing sight of the Gospel altogether?

May we, as evangelical Christians who are by definition committed to and driven by the Gospel, keep the Gospels themselves front and centre in our minds, and may we never focus on the eternal at the expense of the temporal, nor on the temporal at the expense of the eternal.