October 15, 2025 • 38 mins
A roadside illusion, four different memories, one shared event—that’s our doorway into the mystery and beauty of the four Gospels. We explore why Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John read differently without pulling the story apart, and how multiple witnesses, audiences, and purposes actually deepen trust rather than erode it. From Deuteronomy’s call for corroboration to modern parallels in journalism and courtroom testimony, we make the case that diverse perspectives clarify the center.
We walk through each Gospel’s heartbeat: Matthew’s tapestry of prophecy for Jewish readers; Mark’s kinetic portrait of authority and miracles for Roman minds; Luke’s physician-level diligence, compassion, and historical reliability for a Greek world; and John’s high Christology, the Word made flesh, inviting belief and wonder. Along the way, we address popular sticking points—like the trilingual inscription above the cross and the “one angel or two?” at the empty tomb—showing how language, translation, and human attention explain variations without touching the core. Think perception tests and eyewitness selectivity; focus can shift details, but the central scene remains.
We also tackle timing, manuscripts, and external sources. The Gospels were written astonishingly early by ancient standards, while thousands of manuscripts and references from Tacitus, Pliny the Younger, and Josephus reinforce their historical weight. If you’ve ever wondered whether the differences signal contradiction or completeness, this conversation offers a steady framework: many witnesses, one Messiah; different angles, the same unshakable claim—Jesus lived, died, and rose. If this story is true, it’s the story that changes all others.
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
David (00:02):
Welcome to the Boundless Bible.
My name is David Shapiro.
Hey, I'm Javi Marquez.
And I'm Jason Holloway.
Welcome back, guys.
I'm really excited for today'sconversation.
I'm going to start off a littlebit different.
I'm going to start with a storythat I'm going to tell you
guys.
Uh, and this actually comes myfamily a few years ago.
I try to pride myself infinding really cool places to go
(00:24):
and to look at.
And I found a place in centralFlorida called Spook Hill.
And Spook Hill is supposed tobe this hill that appears as
though when you're going up,you're actually going down.
And I brought my family here,and it was one of the worst
things I ever chose.
It really didn't, I didn't seewhat other people were seeing.
So what I ended up doing is Ididn't want it to be a waste,
(00:46):
and I ended up stepping on thegas.
So I would go uphill because Ithought you were supposed to
roll uphill.
It was a weird it wasn't reallyclear.
Okay.
Um, but coming back, you know,we've talked about that story
before, and you know, my sonremembers the story by me
stepping on the gas and himlooking at me, going, Hey,
you're stepping on the gas, andme trying telling him to be
quiet.
So his younger sister wouldn'tknow that.
(01:07):
She remembers it just being adisaster and me being
frustrated, you know, my wifewas kind of laughing because
usually I'm really good at thisstuff.
But what I found out is we hadfour very different thoughts of
the same exact day.
And when you ask everybodyabout it, they're gonna give you
four completely differentstories that all have to do with
Spook Hill.
They'll all remember that, butthey're gonna remember it in
(01:29):
their way.
And what it reminds me of isthe four gospels.
This brings me to where a lotof people, a lot of skeptics as
well, kind of go, Hey, why arethere four gospels and why are
they so different?
So I want to kind of open thatup as an intro and say, hey,
let's let's talk about thisbecause it's an interesting
topic.
Jason (01:47):
Yeah, I think it's a great topic.
I mean, I I think it's reallyimportant to like tackle it head
on because this is somethingthat I'll say honestly, a lot of
people don't read the gospelsand they don't know.
They don't realize it and theynever even understand this.
But for those who are digging ahair deeper and they are
reading the Bible, and they readMatthew, then Mark, then Luke,
then John, they they realizethat it's not the same story.
(02:10):
Um, you know, and and thatcauses questions.
And then there are well, I meanlater we'll talk about, I'm
sure, that there are some evendetails that differ.
And, you know, again, that cancause some strife for people.
So I love that we're havingthis conversation today because
I think it's going to help us tokind of assuage some of those
fears or their thosecomplications for people.
Javi (02:31):
Yeah.
I love what you agree speakingto you about this, Jason.
I love what you say.
What is it?
The four, not five.
Jason (02:38):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, I yeah, I think thatwe we said this before.
Why are there four?
Was the question.
And I said, because three wouldbe too little and five would be
too much.
That's the that's that's theeasy answer, right?
It's three, three is notenough.
Five is uh is too much.
So four, perfect number, righton target.
Yeah.
David (02:54):
Yeah.
One of the things I'll sayright off the bat is in
Deuteronomy 1915, part of thelaws is you want witnesses for
when somebody is accused ofsomething, when you're trying to
figure out what the story is.
Deuteronomy actually says youneed more than one witness.
Yeah, and here you have fourwitnesses to the same account.
And I feel like this is alsoGod going by his own law, his
(03:15):
own standard, and saying,Listen, I'm gonna give you four
different accounts of the lifeof Jesus.
And I think so, right off thebat, we're starting off with
something that's necessary, notjust, hey, why did he?
He gave us these because that'spart of his law that he's
following.
Javi (03:29):
Yeah, and Deuteronomy 19, 15, it goes two or three
witnesses, God said, I'm gonnagive you four gospels.
So just he just always, alwaysoutdo himself, you know.
And I think it makes sense.
I think it makes sense when welook at news publications and
like we see the same story butdone in different, you know,
explained in different ways, orjust sharing, you know, you
(03:52):
know, different books ondifferent topics, right?
Even a lot of books on Jesusand stuff like that.
And it's just it's good to hearand see different perspectives,
different angles on it to getthe full story of what happened.
Jason (04:05):
I think it's interesting that you brought up news, right?
Because we we particularly livein a in a society now where you
either live listen to one sideof news or you listen to the
other side of news.
And that's even though you feellike you're well versed, re
realistically you're you'relooking at one side of a
spectrum or the other side of aspectrum.
And the thing about the gospelsis that you have four of them,
(04:25):
right?
And so it clearly is not adichotomy.
It's and and you add to yourpoint, David, you have a third
person involved who's able to,you know, commiserate which one
of the three is right.
And then you have another onestill, just to add nuance to the
story, just to add perspective.
And so if if I really wanted tounderstand, I imagine if I was
a detective, I wouldn't want tohear one person's side of the
(04:46):
story.
I'd want to hear two people'sand three people's.
And by by the fourth person, Ireally feel like I get a I get
an account of it.
And so again, I'm I didn't tiethat back to the political thing
or the news thing, but youknow, right now we're kind of in
this very dichotomous thing,and it's I'm right or you're
right, but there's no there's nomeeting in the middle.
The gospels are a really goodexample of why you shouldn't
listen to one or the other.
You need to listen to two,three, four, even sometimes even
(05:10):
opposing views in order toreally understand where the
middle is.
And I think that's one of themain reasons that there's four
gospels, personally.
Yeah.
David (05:17):
Yeah.
And it also speaks to four verydifferent people.
So when you look at the fourgospels, yes, you know, Matthew
is speaking to the Jewishpopulation.
Uh, you have Mark that'sspeaking to the Roman, you have
Luke that's speaking to theGreek, and then even with John,
he's speaking more to theevangelistic.
So it's it's four completelydifferent people that are
actually being spoken to throughthe gospels.
(05:39):
And and listen, there areMatthew being the one speaking
to Jewish people, that should bethe one that would speak to me
the best, being that I was bornand raised in a Jewish
household, but it doesn't.
Mine's actually John.
Uh mine goes to thattheological, you know, uh
evangelistic theme, and that'swhat speaks more to me.
So it also speaks differentlyto different people.
Javi (05:59):
Yeah, that's cool.
I would say for me, I'm Ididn't grow up Jewish, but
Matthew is probably one of myfavorite ones.
Is it?
Because it speaks on it justthe whole genealogy is amazing
to me and just kind of like thebreakdown of how we got to Jesus
and him being, you know, thatthat that lineage, right?
If I'm saying that right.
And yeah, I think they're allgreat, and I think they all have
(06:21):
they all have a value in theoverall story of Jesus, and it
all points to Jesus being thethe the son of God that was here
on earth that came to be thesavior to a promise of the
world, right?
And he's just he, you know, forfor us as sinners gave us
salvation, but also one thingthey also all mention is the
(06:44):
resurrection.
Yes.
So we can't forget that.
Jason (06:47):
Yeah.
I mean, uh Dave, why don't wewhy don't we talk about how I
mean I don't think people evenknow about the four, you know,
the four audiences they may havebeen speaking to.
Maybe we take talk a little bitabout that.
David (06:57):
I mean, you talked about Matthew being to the Yeah, so
this is, you know, very he talksabout the Old Testament
prophecy quite a bit.
This is speaking to God'schosen people.
It is really focusing on Jesusbeing the Son of God, the one
who came down to suffer.
This is a prophecy from Isaiah.
So he heavily talks about thatthe gospel of Matthew is about
(07:20):
how Jesus came down as theMessiah, as the one that the
Jewish people have been waitingfor.
And that's really where hisfocus is.
It's the fulfillment of thisOld Testament prophecy.
Yeah.
When you look at Mark now, hereally focuses more on the
miracles.
He focuses on the action andwhat's going on.
So it's a very specific and acompletely different crowd.
Not that he doesn't care aboutOld Testament prophecy, but he's
(07:42):
not the person who can speak onit.
Right.
So he takes a step back and hekind of looks at the action.
Jason (07:47):
Well, and if he's speaking and if he's speaking to
the Romans, one of the thingshe's trying to do is show the
importance of this Jesus personbecause he can't set it up as
prophecy and fulfillment becausethey didn't have that prophecy
for them.
So to them, he's trying toexplain the divinity.
He's trying to express thedivinity, he's trying to let
them know the speciality of thishuman and why they should be
(08:08):
paying attention to it.
David (08:10):
Yeah.
Luke, who I happen to think isprobably your favorite, Jason.
Jason (08:13):
This is the well, the book is, yes.
David (08:17):
This is the physician.
This is the one that focuses alot on history, also on
compassion.
He focuses his attention.
Now you're looking at the Greekand Gentile world, who really
focuses on the philosophy andlove, but also kept a really
good history.
And this was the physicianLuke.
So this is what his gospel did,which is why I knew this would
be your favorite, Jason.
Jason (08:38):
Well, yeah, I mean, there's there's there's a couple
reasons it's my favorite.
One is that it expands, it'sprobably the most robust in
terms of historical value.
Um, it's the most robust interms of historicity.
I know I've heard Weshoff talkabout how they use Luke as
really a primary source tofigure out if, you know, the the
(08:58):
names of the time, the placesof the time.
Luke actually begins by himsaying something that's a very
kind of Greek thought of I'm I'minterviewing witnesses, I'm
taking my due diligence processto make sure that the history I
present to you is correct.
And I and again, I find that Ifind that very interesting as
well.
But it's just it's a veryrobust story.
It's the longest one, Ibelieve.
(09:19):
And it's it's it's the one thatgives me the most
archaeological trust.
It's the one that gives me themost, um, I don't know, like
historical trust.
David (09:31):
Yeah, which is which is interesting because you know, we
look at Matthew and John, thesewere direct apostles.
We look at Mark and Luke.
Mark was a missionary, andLuke, again, was a physician,
yeah.
He was a historian, but he alsohad no attachment as far as he
was not an apostle.
He was writing simply thehistorical accounts of it, which
sometimes is the greatest wayto get history, is from somebody
(09:52):
outside of it looking inbecause you're not getting
opinion, you're getting juststraight historical facts, which
is great.
Javi (09:57):
What I love about Luke is I mean, he starts off just, you
know, first of all, he's aphysician, right?
He's a he's a learned man, he'she's educated, right?
A man of science.
Right, a man of science, andhe's he's he goes out and he
starts off in Luke 1 1 through4.
Um, I'll briefly pick outsomething from there.
It goes, since I myself havecarefully investigated
(10:18):
everything from the beginning, Itoo decided to write an orderly
account for you.
He's talking to Theolopolis.
I probably said that wrong, butyou know, it's a guy that's you
know a learned man, right?
And he's gonna take his time toreally, you know, really figure
out what happened here.
Who's this special man calledJesus and what is what really
(10:39):
took account?
So we could trust that.
We could we could go, allright, at least he went out and
thoroughly presented this inthis way that was not a
follower, he was an outsider ina sense.
So and I love that.
That's why each one makessense.
I think you you you brought upa good point, David.
Jason (10:56):
Yeah, and and to that to sorry, to that point too.
I mean, look, I just realizedas you were saying it, Javi.
I mean, it also shows thatthere's different types of
believers, right?
There were people who were withhim who saw it firsthand,
experienced it veryheart-oriented and very
personally oriented, right?
And then you have Mark who uhwasn't there but still got the
(11:18):
experience of it secondhand.
It was still, it was still verytactile and and not entirely,
I'm not saying it wasn't, but itwasn't entirely cerebral.
And then you have Luke whosays, I'm a man of science, I
have done my research, I havedone my historical diggings, and
this is what I have found.
And you know, you have you havethe person who needs the logic
and this, you know, cognition ofwhy it's true, and he has
(11:40):
believed it's true.
And so there's another person.
Now let's get to John as wesorry, as I cut you off there,
but no, you're good.
David (11:45):
So John is is the word becomes flesh.
This is somebody who focuses onJesus being fully human and
also fully divine.
This is he focuses on the I amstatements, yes, focuses on the
strong belief of Jesus as bothGod and as man.
And this is again why it's socrucial for me, and one of the
(12:08):
ones that I love the most is alot of times, especially in the
Jewish faith, they believe thatthe reason why Jesus could not
have been God is because maybehe was the Messiah, maybe he was
a man who was sent as theMessiah, but God would never
lower himself, lower himself tobe a man.
Um meanwhile, this shows thehumility and and humbleness of
(12:29):
of God as well.
And for me, John showing thathe's fully man and fully God.
He really is word in the flesh.
This is why it's my favorite.
Jason (12:39):
Yeah, I mean, and that's also if if we're getting
technical, isn't that calledlike the high Christology of of
of Christ?
And you know, how quickly doyou, how quickly in the gospels
do they get to the fact thathe's not just a man, but he's
also partially God?
Um I'm not fully versed on it,but I I know that that's one of
the big things is that veryearly on, people we have we have
documented record of people notjust saying he's a great guy,
(13:00):
but saying he's God, that he isGod come in the flesh.
And that's and it's it'spartially in some of the other
ones, but I think John is theone where it's most uh most
explicit, if I'm not mistaken.
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
And I it's funny because I loveI love Luke, but if I had to
tell somebody which book toread, it would be John, because
I think John does the best jobof helping a non-believer to see
(13:23):
the full picture.
Um and as we've talked aboutthe differences in these three,
you know, this or four, thedifferences in these four, this
is the one that most gives youthat full picture.
I also want to go back and say,I think John is the last of the
gospels, which also makes awhole lot of sense because if
Matthew and and Luke were werewith him, they were going to be
(13:45):
experiencing it in the presenttense.
They were gonna be experiencingthese things in the present.
Say it again.
John was with them.
Javi (13:51):
Yeah.
Jason (13:51):
Yeah, John and Matthew.
But but if it was written atthe end, right, the people who
wrote early would have beenwriting about their experience
and what it meant to them at thetime.
And Luke would have writtenabout what it meant after some
time.
But John, having written at theend, had time to not only see
what happened to Jesus and whathappened in his life, but after
his life and then after adecade, and then after another
(14:13):
decade, and he starts to see theimpact of the story of Jesus,
which, and I maybe it's a goodtime to transition into
perspective, but you know,John's perspective when he wrote
was that I not only saw whathappened, but I saw how it
impacted the world.
I saw the how it flourishedafter he died, and I saw how it
in how people changed andsociety changed after him.
(14:38):
And that's and that's how hewrote it.
unknown (14:40):
Yeah.
David (14:40):
I think I think if you look at how people write, you
know, if somebody passes awayand they write something in the
paper about it, it actuallyfollows the same, the same, you
know, way is Matthew is verymuch about the fulfillment of
old time.
So this is this is who thisperson was.
And then they talk about theiractions and their miracles.
This is who their children are,their their wife is, things
(15:02):
like that.
And then you talk about theirhistory.
This is you know the thingsthat they have done in the past.
And then you look at theireternal life, their belief,
their deity, and all that.
Not that it's somebody's deity,but it's they're, you know,
going to be here.
They're going to be buried atthis point.
They're gonna have their itreally follows kind of the same
standard of of what these fourgospels are showing as well,
(15:23):
which is this old testament, youknow, prophecy, the action and
miracles, the compassion andhistory, and then ultimately the
belief.
That's really good.
Jason (15:31):
One of the things that I love is I I love how you just
explained it as kind of anobituary, David.
And that that that resonatedreally hardcore.
Like, you know, if if ifthere's a really great person,
I'm not gonna name anybodyparticularly, if there's a
really great person, in themoment that they die, their
obituary says they achieved allthe things that they set out to
achieve.
This is who they were, right?
(15:52):
That's the that's the obituary.
The the the news story, youknow, the the retro that they do
on the news a year later isgonna be different.
You know, yes, he did all thosethings, but this is what has
happened since then.
These are the people who, youknow, that this whatever.
But then you fast forwardanother, you know, 20 years and
you do a retro on this person'slife, and all of a sudden
they're in a history book.
You know, it's it's you know,this person did this and it
(16:14):
impacted this, and the movementthat came after it was this, and
the people who changed werethis, and that's like that's a
really easy way for us tounderstand it in the present
tense, I think.
I think you bring you actuallyexplained it a whole lot better
than I did.
I appreciate that.
That was really good.
No, no, no, I was I was just Iwas just riffing on yours.
You started it.
Javi (16:35):
So I love that.
I love that what you said,Jason.
I think you brought a goodpoint.
I think it's one of the thingsthat maybe we haven't spoken on,
like what are these, right?
These are the gospel is thegood news, right?
The good news of Jesus Christand and you know what he did and
what he came to earth to do andhis his prop, you know, the
prophecies fulfilled in so manyways.
But also, what kind of booksare these, right?
(16:56):
These are the accounts ofJesus, right?
These is this is not a poeticbook, this is not a apostolic
book.
This is history.
I would like to say this is anaccount, this is the eyewitness
account of someone that sawsomething happen and then wrote
it down.
And I think that's important toknow when when people read it
and understand it, not thishyperbolic thing.
I mean, there is some metaphorsand other things in there that
(17:19):
that happens, but yeah.
Jason (17:22):
I think that's an interesting point.
Yeah, go ahead.
No, go ahead.
You're probably just gonnaswitch it.
I think that's an interestingpoint, Javi, because look, I
mean, we've talked a lot in thispodcast about metaphor and
symbolism and those things.
And I think those are I thinkthose are more explicit in the
gospels, right?
Like when I mean Jesus himselfspeaks in parables much much of
(17:44):
the time.
And so it's very clear whenJesus meant for something to be
a symbol, when he meant for itto be a metaphor, when he meant
for it to be an allegory.
You know, he did he did that onHe did that on purpose.
And so that does make the theGospels a bit easier to
understand than any other partof the Bible.
And again, you could probablylift it up a level and and find
(18:08):
symbolism and metaphor andanalogy in the life of Jesus as
well.
But this I one of the thingsthat makes these easier is like
I said, they're just it's veryclear what's supposed to be
literal, what's supposed to bemetaphorical, what's supposed to
be a lesson, and what'ssupposed to be, you know,
something that you reflect on.
Javi (18:24):
I wanted to say, like going back to a little bit when
you said when you guys weretalking about it being written
so many years after, you know,one of the things that I kind of
when I came across the gospelsof just kind of reading the
Bible, it's like, wait a minute,this is written, why is it
written you know, 30 years afterJesus?
Like, why not written thenthere?
And I think you David didobviously did an episode
(18:47):
recently just kind of explainedthat.
If you want to reiterate that,J David, I think it was really
done really well what you whatyou were explaining about you
know how that came about, andnot only that, other literature
that we take as the Bible, likeyou know, and and like this is
true.
What happened to Alexander theGreat in history books that is
written way past what the Biblewas maybe written.
David (19:09):
Yeah.
Yeah, I just think listen, thisis human nature.
I think when you look at thesedifferent people, when you look
at Caesar and him being writtenabout hundreds of years later, I
just think that what happens istypically when something is
happening, people don't writeabout it, they write about it
afterwards.
This becomes history.
You know, Jason just said thatwhen somebody first dies, you
go, hey, this this is the waythey lived and this is how it
(19:31):
was.
And then a year or two later,then the story comes out, the
the piece comes out about whathow that impacted the world.
And I think what happens is youhave Jesus who impacted the
world greater than any person inthe face of this earth ever
did.
In all history.
And at that point, in allhistory, and at that point it
was written about and it neededto take effect.
(19:53):
So, yes, we look at it and go,we need to read up read about
Jesus.
You know, why didn't somebodywrite about him at that time?
Right, which by the way, theythey definitely could have.
Just because we haven't foundit yet doesn't mean it doesn't
exist.
Right, right.
Um, so finding one from 30years past is an incredibly
quick account of it, which makesit true.
But um, it's not to say that wecan't find one that's 10 years
(20:15):
or five years or written duringhis life, right?
But typically people arewaiting and they're writing
about the effect of what thisdid to the entire world.
And that's why when you see 30years later, you're going, man,
this is so much quicker thanevery other historical figure
that has ever lived.
It is amazing.
And I think people look at thatand they try to trip you up and
(20:36):
say, Oh, it took them so long.
I'm like, no, they were writingabout it while all the people
that would have been there arestill alive and could have said,
Hey, that's not how ithappened.
Yeah.
Jason (20:46):
That's a bit they never did.
Yeah, I mean, look, I I thinkAlexander the Great was like 400
years after he was ever writtenabout, I mean, ever, ever
lived, right?
Literally, like the firstwriting we found is like 400
years after him, and yet nobodygoes, Alexander the Great didn't
exist.
Not to mention, you know, oneof the other things, and I'm
again, I'm not a scholar onthis, but it's a statistic I've
heard one time, and I think itdoes it it helped me to put more
validity in in the scriptureswas that people go, Oh, yeah,
(21:10):
but it's we don't have manycopies of it.
No, we have many, many copiesof it.
I think there's like 5,000 orsomething scriptural pieces, and
you align them on top of eachother, and they all align to a
to a very, very large extent.
And when you look like likeSocrates, who we know we know
existed, but yet we say, Did he?
You know, Socrates was somebodywho we don't actually have any
(21:30):
actual writings from, but weknow he does because we've
because because of any number ofreasons, but yet we have 5,000
from Jesus and we questionwhether he existed.
Javi (21:38):
You know, I think now that we we we understand that, we
know that Jesus existed, right?
We know that this is truth thatpeople are claiming, and it's
he I have no doubt.
So now it's up to you to takeit and go, Well, is that true?
Let me look further.
And when you look further,where are you looking for there?
You should look at where thepeople that walk with him is.
(21:59):
So you should go to the Bibleand go to the to the actual
accounts that present them as asa historic figure, and they say
certain things, and up to youto really look further if if
this is true now, what?
Right, and I think that's a bigthing that people fail to
realize that Jesus is anhistoric figure, not only in the
Bible and present them as that,but outside there's other
(22:22):
writings, and David could, Imean, David could probably
attest to that that there'sother writings outside of the
Bible that show Jesus as anhistoric figure through
different historians, and wehave to we have to, as people,
is this true?
Look further.
If he it is true that Jesus didcome, what did he say?
How should we go about it?
How could we take about it?
(22:43):
You know, so to me, it's it's abig thing to to look at it that
way, and I think the gospelpresents it really well.
Yeah, yeah.
David (22:49):
I mean, I think um Tacitus, Pliny the Younger,
Josephus, just to name three ofthem, those are all extra
biblical accounts that you canlook at.
Um, I just want to kind ofdouble back for a second.
You know, I I know we weretalking earlier about the
obituary that Jason actuallyexplained better than I did, but
that was a kind of a simpleexplanation.
I want to actually add somesymbology and maybe a little bit
more deeper of a conversationof the four gospels.
(23:13):
You know, if you look atEzekiel and you look at
revelation, there are uh acreature with four heads.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Yeah.
David (23:20):
And if you look at those four heads, they actually relate
really, really well to the fourgospels as well.
So if you look at the head ofthe lion, this would be Matthew.
This is the lion of Judah, thisis the king who reigns.
If you look at Mark, that's theox.
This is now slain forsalvation.
This is the suffering servant.
Luke would be the man who isfull of compassion.
(23:43):
This is history, man.
And then John finally is theeagle who, again, now you're
looking at divinity.
This is soaring in the heavens,this is God.
So when you look at the fourcreatures, it also relates
perfectly to the four gospelsand where each of them come
from.
I just want to put that outthere as well.
Just, you know, again,sometimes people think that this
is an afterthought.
God never does an afterthought.
(24:04):
This is you know, this issomething that was planned from
the start, and and God does abeautiful way of putting that
all together.
Jason (24:12):
Yeah, and and here's an interesting thing that I had not
considered about that too.
I mean, John wrote Revelationas well, right?
Yes.
Yeah.
And John is one of the fourgospel writers, but at the time
he wrote it, he probablywouldn't have known that there
were four other gospels.
He he probably wouldn't haveknown that there, that these
things existed.
So he was, he was, you know, itwasn't like you can say, well,
(24:32):
Revelation was written at theend.
I think a lot of people, justespecially not knowing the
linear times of these things,would say, Well, John was
written at the end, so clearlythey know these other four
things.
But in fact, John wouldn'thave, you know, John wouldn't
have known any of those fourthings.
There's no way he could haveknown that when he was writing
Revelation and having his ownrevelation, right?
Very true.
David (24:50):
So all right, so here we come.
We're coming to that that pointwhere we're going to name some
of these things that seem asthough, hey, these are so
different in the gospels thatthere's something wrong.
Not that, hey, there's fourdifferent accounts, which we've
been talking about, but there'ssomething wrong here.
That somebody got it wrong, andthis shows that it's not true,
(25:11):
and they made a mistake orsomebody copied it the wrong
way.
And if you don't mind, I'llkick it off with the first one,
which is a biggie, and it's onethat I hear a lot, which is
during the crucifixion, theRomans had a practice of putting
a placard up stating what thecrime was, and they did that
here as well.
And when you read all fourGospels, they are read very
(25:33):
differently.
The account is very different.
And what people say is this isa placard, this is something
written.
If you were gonna read it, itshould read the same thing every
time, and it shouldn't bedifferent.
But what you don't realize isthese are written in different
languages.
You actually have Greek,Hebrew, and Latin written.
(25:53):
So when you start to take thisaccount and you go, hey, this
was written written differentlyin each account, it's probably
because they were reading it intheir own language.
Matthew was probably reading itin Hebrew, which you know, then
it would have said, This isJesus, the king of the Jews.
If you were reading it in John,Jesus of Nazareth, the King of
the Jews.
Uh, again, we look at it andgo, What's the big deal?
(26:16):
It's it's all the same.
This is Jesus, King of theJews, and the King of the Jews.
That was the four differentaccounts.
Right.
It sounds exactly the same tous, but there are skeptics who
look at it and go, if this was asign, we would have had the
exact same writings about it inall four.
And what you realize is fourdifferent languages, you're
going to get four differentversions of it.
Jason (26:37):
Yeah.
I think beyond that, you havesomething else you have to
consider, which is that fourdifferent people see things four
different ways.
I mean, yeah, even in yourexample of the sign, if if
somebody speaks, you know, isbilingual and speaks English and
Spanish and they see a sciencein English and Spanish, they
know when sometimes they'remistranslated, right?
They might even acknowledgethat, like they, you would never
know, David, if if somethingwas, you know, slightly
(26:59):
mistranslated, even though itwas just under, you're like, oh,
that's the Spanish version.
That just says that.
But you wouldn't know if therewas a slightly different
translation.
You wouldn't know if it saidsomething slightly different.
And then you have the English,you know, the American person or
the English person who'sspeaking who's reading the
English and not the Spanish.
You have the Spanish personwho's not reading the English,
you have the bilingual personwho's reading both.
Um, and so, you know,perspective for for all good and
(27:21):
all bad that it is, we arehumans and we do exist in human
bodies, and those are subject toperspective differentiations.
And you know, you're gonna getthose, you're gonna get those,
those differences.
You're gonna get thosedifferent accounts, despite the
fact that the truth is actuallysomewhere in the center.
David (27:40):
That's a very good point.
Javi (27:41):
Yeah.
I love the differentperspective, and I think I
wanted to also include this thatwe we mentioned before, maybe
not to be to not to continue torepeat it, but just like the
courtrooms, courtrooms will havedifferent eyewitnesses to prove
you know what happened thatnight or whatever it is, what
happened to that person, just tokind of show what's going on.
Is we do that in the courtroom,we do it to now to this day.
(28:04):
Lawyers use differenteyewitnesses to prove a certain
um size to certain things.
So I love this.
Jason (28:11):
Yeah, I again I go back to that idea of perspective,
right?
Like if you were to ask thethree of us about the history of
how this podcast came to be,you would get three very
different stories.
Yeah, you would get threedifferent and and those stories
could be influenced by a varietyof things, you know.
It could be influenced by thethe things that I was going
through at the time that youguys, you know, brought up this
(28:33):
idea in the first place.
Definitely means I have aperspective that's that's suited
to that.
I've I've said it before, Ithink that you know I had been
praying previously, you know,use me, Lord, use me, Lord, the
the song that gets me everytime.
Um and I had been like kind ofsinging it in church, but I'd
also been coming home andpraying it over and over and
over, and then you guys asked todo that.
So my it's very miraculous tome, very, you know, divinely
(28:55):
inspired to me that you guys,without knowing that I'd been
praying that would ask would askthat.
You know, I'm sure you know youguys had conversations before I
was ever even aware of it.
So your history of it would bedifferent, right?
Your inspiration would bedifferent.
Your meaning that you ascribeto any individual experience
would be different than mine.
(29:16):
And again, I think that's whatthese gospels are about.
It comes from different peoplewho have from different walks of
life, yeah, with differentdifferent experiences of how
they came to know Christ, andtheir testimony is unique to
them.
And in no case is it wrong.
In no case is it wrong.
It is unique to them and theirexperience.
(29:38):
And when we look at the gospelsas written by people and not
gospels um, you know, that arethat are some perfect union of,
you know, a group of corpor, youknow, a corporate entity who is
all decided on the samedetails.
You know, yeah, if you read atextbook, you're gonna get
something pretty homogenized.
But these are written byindividuals, and those
individuals have perspectives.
David (30:00):
The last one I want to bring up just before we we close
out because this is the biggieand I was hoping when he goes
trying to get it.
Jason (30:07):
I was gonna let you hit it because it's a big one.
David (30:10):
Is there one angel or two uh when when the tomb was was
empty?
And also who gets there first?
Who gets there first?
Who gets there first?
Yeah.
And this is one, I mean, uhagain, I think that Jason, you
definitely hit it home withlisten, different opinions,
different people.
This one seems to be, and thisis one of the biggest ones that
people really have a hang upover.
(30:31):
And I'm gonna make a referenceto The Matrix, okay, only
because I love the movie, butthere's a point at which Keanu
Reese is walking and LawrenceFishburne is talking to him, and
he looks at the woman in red,and Lawrence Fishburne says,
Were you paying attention orwere you looking at the woman in
red?
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Yeah.
David (30:48):
And it was only because Keanu Reeves' focus went on
something completely differentthan where Lawrence Fishburne's
focus was.
Yes.
And I think that this is thatmoment where there could very
well have been two angels in thetomb.
The account was somebody here,you look at Matthew and Mark,
(31:08):
they have it as one angel.
Yeah, they were focused on theone angel speaking, where you
have, you know, Luke and Johnsaying there were two there.
They're not saying that therewasn't one just speaking,
they're just saying, hey, therewere two in the room.
Yeah.
Where Matthew and Mark aresaying, yes, there might have
been two in the room, but we'reonly focusing on the one who's
actually doing the speaking.
So I think it's worth, I thinkit's a focus thing more than a
(31:30):
difference thing.
Jason (31:31):
I think so too.
I mean, that's what I wassaying about perspective, right?
Like if if if I get there and Iam so blown away by everything
going on, and that I get hyperfocused, I it's very possible I
miss some crazy.
You ever seen those videos, bythe way?
Have you ever seen those videoswhere it's like count the
amount of times that we dribblethe basketball?
Javi (31:50):
Yes, with the gorilla.
Jason (31:51):
This is crazy.
I I I'm gonna give it away foranybody who hasn't seen it
before, but they'll but there'sthis thing where they they they
say count the amount of timesthat these people dribble
basketballs.
And you're sitting therefocused on counting the
basketball.
And then at the very end, itsays it says, Did you see the
gorilla walk by the back?
And you're like, there is nopossible way a gorilla walked by
the screen and I didn't see it.
(32:12):
And then you watch the videoback and there was a gorilla in
the back.
This is a true, this is a realthing, and it sounds ridiculous
until you do it.
And if you've ever done it, Ihope that you remember that
feeling in this moment becauseit's very easy to miss very
basic stuff or very in intensestuff when you're hyper focused
on something else.
And I think that's just one ofthose examples of it's us
(32:33):
humans.
David (32:34):
Yeah, I love that.
I have not seen that video, butI actually know that from
sorry.
No, I I actually know thisthere's a training that they do,
and I'm sure for FBI and thingslike that, which is very
similar, it's about focus.
And you'll have somebody comein the room during a speech, and
they will hand them some apiece of paper and they'll walk
out.
And then after the speech isdone, they'll say, What color
was that person and shirtwearing?
(32:55):
Yeah, and all that.
And it's it's really cool whenwhen the brain does that.
Jason (33:00):
It's also very it's also very dishearten it's also very
disheartening when the braindoes that because you realize
how much how much we don'tcontrol.
But again, we we have torealize that these were written
by people, right?
We have to realize that thesewere written by people, and we
also have to trust in God'ssovereignty and that you know he
he had all this happen for areason and he allowed them to
pay attention or somethingbecause there's a message in all
(33:20):
of them for somebody.
And so, you know, I I but I Ifound it really I used to
struggle a lot with that angelthing too, until that gorilla
thing.
And then I was like, man, it'svery possible.
I mean, you can you can stareright at it and not see it
because it's not where yourfocus is.
Javi (33:34):
Yeah.
I think the value of all thisis like going back, it's what
what matters and what eventhough it was tough, but what
matters is Jesus was an historicfigure that said certain truths
and he made some certain truthclaims, and and if you believe
in that, then for him is he cameto the world to save us, right?
(33:56):
To give us salvation.
He died and resurrected andinstilled us with the Holy
Spirit.
And I think that's whatmatters, and that that narrative
does not change from thebeginning of the Bible to the
end of the Bible.
And I think that's what youknow, sometimes we could get
hung up on these, like you know,these things, but um not to say
that our thing and what we'retalking about is not warranted.
(34:16):
I think it's good for us todiscuss this, but you know, when
we really look at it, we have aGod that loves us, came to the
earth, you know, gave ussalvation, and he left us with
the Holy Spirit, he's with us.
But I think you mentioned that,David, in one of your episodes
last week or so.
You know, God is with us.
The Ark of the Covenant, wemight not need it anymore
because he is still with us.
I mean, his name itself, right?
(34:37):
Is it Emmanuel?
Or what that means God has.
God with us.
Yep.
Yeah.
And I love that.
And I think that's the beautyof what we're reading right now
in the gospel and the Bibleitself.
Jason (34:47):
Yeah, I I totally agree.
I mean, that's that's theimportant part, right?
We we get so we're humans andwe look for flaws, and we we
find these little minor, youknow, variations, and we we stop
paying attention to what is theconsistency.
The consistency is that he wasthat that he was divine, that he
was part God and part man, thathe did miracles, that he showed
(35:11):
us how to live, and that hedied on the cross for our sins
and was resurrected.
I mean, no, that's the thethat's the consistency.
And, you know, one other thing,and this might be a little left
field, but it's something thatI heard one time that really
helped me, and it was like thefinality that I needed to like
get over these little things wasthat it's all the same story,
and yet imagine if you were totake somebody's story and put
(35:35):
every story on a note card andput it up on a wall, right?
The story is the story, itdoesn't change.
I can't tell you the wholestory, and I've got a short
period of time to do it.
So I'm gonna pull the notecards that that work in order to
tell the story I need to tell.
So I might pull these 10, 12,15 note cards and then tell you
that story across those.
Somebody else might pullanother, you know, six or twelve
(35:55):
from another side and tellthose stories.
And and again, like I said,it's it's not that it's a
different story, it's that it'stold from a different
perspective.
It's told in a dip in sometimeseven a different order, but it
is nonetheless the same story.
Javi (36:08):
I love it because John John 20 says that.
John 20 says, let me explainthat right.
John 20, 30-31 says, Jesusperformed many other signs in
the presence of his disciples,which are not recorded in this
book.
There are so many other thingsthat maybe he did that we did
not know, that we don't know hedid, or you know, other
(36:29):
miracles, other things that heprobably said.
It's only it's finite.
We're just as finite as much asthese books are, these the
pages in the books, right?
So I love that you said that,Jason.
I think that's a good point.
David (36:41):
I I'll tell you just to uh kind of reiterate, but also
on my perspective, I I'mfinishing the steps of authoring
my own book, right?
And I can't tell you how manytimes I've gone back and wanted
to change it.
And I was I was thinking aboutwhat you said about you know
some of these apostles and andthe writer, the gospel writers,
and and think about them going,you know, how many times, you
know, if they come back todayand go, man, I missed that
(37:03):
detail, it wasn't done, youknow, with any intention other
than they're trying to writeeverything down.
And there are times you canrevise and revise, and it'll,
you know, I think about my owntestimony, and it's my
testimony, it's happened in mylife, and I've told it
differently every single timeI've told my testimony.
Absolutely, absolutely.
Jason (37:23):
Yeah, what a what a point, what a point.
Yeah, guys, this is this hasbeen enlightening for me.
Um, and it continues to be aform of worship for me to look
at these gospels and to remindmyself of their importance, to
remind myself of their truth,and to remind myself of of the
(37:44):
good news, right?
The good news of Jesus, thatthat he has died on the cross
and resurrected for our sins sothat we can be saved because we
can't do it by ourselves.
So I I love listening to this,I love talking about it.
And I hope that if anybody outthere has struggled with the
gospel's variations, that thishas helped to clarify that for
you.
So I really do appreciateeverybody listening.
(38:04):
As always, we love to hear yourcomments, we love to hear your
your feedback.
And if we can ever be of anyhelp to you in any way, please
reach out.
And we look forward to talkingto you again next week.
Thank you very much, guys.
See you guys.
Bye.
Welcome to the Boundless Bible.
My name is David Shapiro.
Hey, I'm Javi Marquez.
And I'm Jason Holloway.
Welcome back, guys.
I'm really excited for today'sconversation.
I'm going to start off a littlebit different.
I'm going to start with a storythat I'm going to tell you
guys.
Uh, and this actually comes myfamily a few years ago.
I try to pride myself infinding really cool places to go
(00:24):
and to look at.
And I found a place in centralFlorida called Spook Hill.
And Spook Hill is supposed tobe this hill that appears as
though when you're going up,you're actually going down.
And I brought my family here,and it was one of the worst
things I ever chose.
It really didn't, I didn't seewhat other people were seeing.
So what I ended up doing is Ididn't want it to be a waste,
(00:46):
and I ended up stepping on thegas.
So I would go uphill because Ithought you were supposed to
roll uphill.
It was a weird it wasn't reallyclear.
Okay.
Um, but coming back, you know,we've talked about that story
before, and you know, my sonremembers the story by me
stepping on the gas and himlooking at me, going, Hey,
you're stepping on the gas, andme trying telling him to be
quiet.
So his younger sister wouldn'tknow that.
(01:07):
She remembers it just being adisaster and me being
frustrated, you know, my wifewas kind of laughing because
usually I'm really good at thisstuff.
But what I found out is we hadfour very different thoughts of
the same exact day.
And when you ask everybodyabout it, they're gonna give you
four completely differentstories that all have to do with
Spook Hill.
They'll all remember that, butthey're gonna remember it in
(01:29):
their way.
And what it reminds me of isthe four gospels.
This brings me to where a lotof people, a lot of skeptics as
well, kind of go, Hey, why arethere four gospels and why are
they so different?
So I want to kind of open thatup as an intro and say, hey,
let's let's talk about thisbecause it's an interesting
topic.
Jason (01:47):
Yeah, I think it's a great topic.
I mean, I I think it's reallyimportant to like tackle it head
on because this is somethingthat I'll say honestly, a lot of
people don't read the gospelsand they don't know.
They don't realize it and theynever even understand this.
But for those who are digging ahair deeper and they are
reading the Bible, and they readMatthew, then Mark, then Luke,
then John, they they realizethat it's not the same story.
(02:10):
Um, you know, and and thatcauses questions.
And then there are well, I meanlater we'll talk about, I'm
sure, that there are some evendetails that differ.
And, you know, again, that cancause some strife for people.
So I love that we're havingthis conversation today because
I think it's going to help us tokind of assuage some of those
fears or their thosecomplications for people.
Javi (02:31):
Yeah.
I love what you agree speakingto you about this, Jason.
I love what you say.
What is it?
The four, not five.
Jason (02:38):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, I yeah, I think thatwe we said this before.
Why are there four?
Was the question.
And I said, because three wouldbe too little and five would be
too much.
That's the that's that's theeasy answer, right?
It's three, three is notenough.
Five is uh is too much.
So four, perfect number, righton target.
Yeah.
David (02:54):
Yeah.
One of the things I'll sayright off the bat is in
Deuteronomy 1915, part of thelaws is you want witnesses for
when somebody is accused ofsomething, when you're trying to
figure out what the story is.
Deuteronomy actually says youneed more than one witness.
Yeah, and here you have fourwitnesses to the same account.
And I feel like this is alsoGod going by his own law, his
(03:15):
own standard, and saying,Listen, I'm gonna give you four
different accounts of the lifeof Jesus.
And I think so, right off thebat, we're starting off with
something that's necessary, notjust, hey, why did he?
He gave us these because that'spart of his law that he's
following.
Javi (03:29):
Yeah, and Deuteronomy 19, 15, it goes two or three
witnesses, God said, I'm gonnagive you four gospels.
So just he just always, alwaysoutdo himself, you know.
And I think it makes sense.
I think it makes sense when welook at news publications and
like we see the same story butdone in different, you know,
explained in different ways, orjust sharing, you know, you
(03:52):
know, different books ondifferent topics, right?
Even a lot of books on Jesusand stuff like that.
And it's just it's good to hearand see different perspectives,
different angles on it to getthe full story of what happened.
Jason (04:05):
I think it's interesting that you brought up news, right?
Because we we particularly livein a in a society now where you
either live listen to one sideof news or you listen to the
other side of news.
And that's even though you feellike you're well versed, re
realistically you're you'relooking at one side of a
spectrum or the other side of aspectrum.
And the thing about the gospelsis that you have four of them,
(04:25):
right?
And so it clearly is not adichotomy.
It's and and you add to yourpoint, David, you have a third
person involved who's able to,you know, commiserate which one
of the three is right.
And then you have another onestill, just to add nuance to the
story, just to add perspective.
And so if if I really wanted tounderstand, I imagine if I was
a detective, I wouldn't want tohear one person's side of the
(04:46):
story.
I'd want to hear two people'sand three people's.
And by by the fourth person, Ireally feel like I get a I get
an account of it.
And so again, I'm I didn't tiethat back to the political thing
or the news thing, but youknow, right now we're kind of in
this very dichotomous thing,and it's I'm right or you're
right, but there's no there's nomeeting in the middle.
The gospels are a really goodexample of why you shouldn't
listen to one or the other.
You need to listen to two,three, four, even sometimes even
(05:10):
opposing views in order toreally understand where the
middle is.
And I think that's one of themain reasons that there's four
gospels, personally.
Yeah.
David (05:17):
Yeah.
And it also speaks to four verydifferent people.
So when you look at the fourgospels, yes, you know, Matthew
is speaking to the Jewishpopulation.
Uh, you have Mark that'sspeaking to the Roman, you have
Luke that's speaking to theGreek, and then even with John,
he's speaking more to theevangelistic.
So it's it's four completelydifferent people that are
actually being spoken to throughthe gospels.
(05:39):
And and listen, there areMatthew being the one speaking
to Jewish people, that should bethe one that would speak to me
the best, being that I was bornand raised in a Jewish
household, but it doesn't.
Mine's actually John.
Uh mine goes to thattheological, you know, uh
evangelistic theme, and that'swhat speaks more to me.
So it also speaks differentlyto different people.
Javi (05:59):
Yeah, that's cool.
I would say for me, I'm Ididn't grow up Jewish, but
Matthew is probably one of myfavorite ones.
Is it?
Because it speaks on it justthe whole genealogy is amazing
to me and just kind of like thebreakdown of how we got to Jesus
and him being, you know, thatthat that lineage, right?
If I'm saying that right.
And yeah, I think they're allgreat, and I think they all have
(06:21):
they all have a value in theoverall story of Jesus, and it
all points to Jesus being thethe the son of God that was here
on earth that came to be thesavior to a promise of the
world, right?
And he's just he, you know, forfor us as sinners gave us
salvation, but also one thingthey also all mention is the
(06:44):
resurrection.
Yes.
So we can't forget that.
Jason (06:47):
Yeah.
I mean, uh Dave, why don't wewhy don't we talk about how I
mean I don't think people evenknow about the four, you know,
the four audiences they may havebeen speaking to.
Maybe we take talk a little bitabout that.
David (06:57):
I mean, you talked about Matthew being to the Yeah, so
this is, you know, very he talksabout the Old Testament
prophecy quite a bit.
This is speaking to God'schosen people.
It is really focusing on Jesusbeing the Son of God, the one
who came down to suffer.
This is a prophecy from Isaiah.
So he heavily talks about thatthe gospel of Matthew is about
(07:20):
how Jesus came down as theMessiah, as the one that the
Jewish people have been waitingfor.
And that's really where hisfocus is.
It's the fulfillment of thisOld Testament prophecy.
Yeah.
When you look at Mark now, hereally focuses more on the
miracles.
He focuses on the action andwhat's going on.
So it's a very specific and acompletely different crowd.
Not that he doesn't care aboutOld Testament prophecy, but he's
(07:42):
not the person who can speak onit.
Right.
So he takes a step back and hekind of looks at the action.
Jason (07:47):
Well, and if he's speaking and if he's speaking to
the Romans, one of the thingshe's trying to do is show the
importance of this Jesus personbecause he can't set it up as
prophecy and fulfillment becausethey didn't have that prophecy
for them.
So to them, he's trying toexplain the divinity.
He's trying to express thedivinity, he's trying to let
them know the speciality of thishuman and why they should be
(08:08):
paying attention to it.
David (08:10):
Yeah.
Luke, who I happen to think isprobably your favorite, Jason.
Jason (08:13):
This is the well, the book is, yes.
David (08:17):
This is the physician.
This is the one that focuses alot on history, also on
compassion.
He focuses his attention.
Now you're looking at the Greekand Gentile world, who really
focuses on the philosophy andlove, but also kept a really
good history.
And this was the physicianLuke.
So this is what his gospel did,which is why I knew this would
be your favorite, Jason.
Jason (08:38):
Well, yeah, I mean, there's there's there's a couple
reasons it's my favorite.
One is that it expands, it'sprobably the most robust in
terms of historical value.
Um, it's the most robust interms of historicity.
I know I've heard Weshoff talkabout how they use Luke as
really a primary source tofigure out if, you know, the the
(08:58):
names of the time, the placesof the time.
Luke actually begins by himsaying something that's a very
kind of Greek thought of I'm I'minterviewing witnesses, I'm
taking my due diligence processto make sure that the history I
present to you is correct.
And I and again, I find that Ifind that very interesting as
well.
But it's just it's a veryrobust story.
It's the longest one, Ibelieve.
(09:19):
And it's it's it's the one thatgives me the most
archaeological trust.
It's the one that gives me themost, um, I don't know, like
historical trust.
David (09:31):
Yeah, which is which is interesting because you know, we
look at Matthew and John, thesewere direct apostles.
We look at Mark and Luke.
Mark was a missionary, andLuke, again, was a physician,
yeah.
He was a historian, but he alsohad no attachment as far as he
was not an apostle.
He was writing simply thehistorical accounts of it, which
sometimes is the greatest wayto get history, is from somebody
(09:52):
outside of it looking inbecause you're not getting
opinion, you're getting juststraight historical facts, which
is great.
Javi (09:57):
What I love about Luke is I mean, he starts off just, you
know, first of all, he's aphysician, right?
He's a he's a learned man, he'she's educated, right?
A man of science.
Right, a man of science, andhe's he's he goes out and he
starts off in Luke 1 1 through4.
Um, I'll briefly pick outsomething from there.
It goes, since I myself havecarefully investigated
(10:18):
everything from the beginning, Itoo decided to write an orderly
account for you.
He's talking to Theolopolis.
I probably said that wrong, butyou know, it's a guy that's you
know a learned man, right?
And he's gonna take his time toreally, you know, really figure
out what happened here.
Who's this special man calledJesus and what is what really
(10:39):
took account?
So we could trust that.
We could we could go, allright, at least he went out and
thoroughly presented this inthis way that was not a
follower, he was an outsider ina sense.
So and I love that.
That's why each one makessense.
I think you you you brought upa good point, David.
Jason (10:56):
Yeah, and and to that to sorry, to that point too.
I mean, look, I just realizedas you were saying it, Javi.
I mean, it also shows thatthere's different types of
believers, right?
There were people who were withhim who saw it firsthand,
experienced it veryheart-oriented and very
personally oriented, right?
And then you have Mark who uhwasn't there but still got the
(11:18):
experience of it secondhand.
It was still, it was still verytactile and and not entirely,
I'm not saying it wasn't, but itwasn't entirely cerebral.
And then you have Luke whosays, I'm a man of science, I
have done my research, I havedone my historical diggings, and
this is what I have found.
And you know, you have you havethe person who needs the logic
and this, you know, cognition ofwhy it's true, and he has
(11:40):
believed it's true.
And so there's another person.
Now let's get to John as wesorry, as I cut you off there,
but no, you're good.
David (11:45):
So John is is the word becomes flesh.
This is somebody who focuses onJesus being fully human and
also fully divine.
This is he focuses on the I amstatements, yes, focuses on the
strong belief of Jesus as bothGod and as man.
And this is again why it's socrucial for me, and one of the
(12:08):
ones that I love the most is alot of times, especially in the
Jewish faith, they believe thatthe reason why Jesus could not
have been God is because maybehe was the Messiah, maybe he was
a man who was sent as theMessiah, but God would never
lower himself, lower himself tobe a man.
Um meanwhile, this shows thehumility and and humbleness of
(12:29):
of God as well.
And for me, John showing thathe's fully man and fully God.
He really is word in the flesh.
This is why it's my favorite.
Jason (12:39):
Yeah, I mean, and that's also if if we're getting
technical, isn't that calledlike the high Christology of of
of Christ?
And you know, how quickly doyou, how quickly in the gospels
do they get to the fact thathe's not just a man, but he's
also partially God?
Um I'm not fully versed on it,but I I know that that's one of
the big things is that veryearly on, people we have we have
documented record of people notjust saying he's a great guy,
(13:00):
but saying he's God, that he isGod come in the flesh.
And that's and it's it'spartially in some of the other
ones, but I think John is theone where it's most uh most
explicit, if I'm not mistaken.
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
And I it's funny because I loveI love Luke, but if I had to
tell somebody which book toread, it would be John, because
I think John does the best jobof helping a non-believer to see
(13:23):
the full picture.
Um and as we've talked aboutthe differences in these three,
you know, this or four, thedifferences in these four, this
is the one that most gives youthat full picture.
I also want to go back and say,I think John is the last of the
gospels, which also makes awhole lot of sense because if
Matthew and and Luke were werewith him, they were going to be
(13:45):
experiencing it in the presenttense.
They were gonna be experiencingthese things in the present.
Say it again.
John was with them.
Javi (13:51):
Yeah.
Jason (13:51):
Yeah, John and Matthew.
But but if it was written atthe end, right, the people who
wrote early would have beenwriting about their experience
and what it meant to them at thetime.
And Luke would have writtenabout what it meant after some
time.
But John, having written at theend, had time to not only see
what happened to Jesus and whathappened in his life, but after
his life and then after adecade, and then after another
(14:13):
decade, and he starts to see theimpact of the story of Jesus,
which, and I maybe it's a goodtime to transition into
perspective, but you know,John's perspective when he wrote
was that I not only saw whathappened, but I saw how it
impacted the world.
I saw the how it flourishedafter he died, and I saw how it
in how people changed andsociety changed after him.
(14:38):
And that's and that's how hewrote it.
unknown (14:40):
Yeah.
David (14:40):
I think I think if you look at how people write, you
know, if somebody passes awayand they write something in the
paper about it, it actuallyfollows the same, the same, you
know, way is Matthew is verymuch about the fulfillment of
old time.
So this is this is who thisperson was.
And then they talk about theiractions and their miracles.
This is who their children are,their their wife is, things
(15:02):
like that.
And then you talk about theirhistory.
This is you know the thingsthat they have done in the past.
And then you look at theireternal life, their belief,
their deity, and all that.
Not that it's somebody's deity,but it's they're, you know,
going to be here.
They're going to be buried atthis point.
They're gonna have their itreally follows kind of the same
standard of of what these fourgospels are showing as well,
(15:23):
which is this old testament, youknow, prophecy, the action and
miracles, the compassion andhistory, and then ultimately the
belief.
That's really good.
Jason (15:31):
One of the things that I love is I I love how you just
explained it as kind of anobituary, David.
And that that that resonatedreally hardcore.
Like, you know, if if ifthere's a really great person,
I'm not gonna name anybodyparticularly, if there's a
really great person, in themoment that they die, their
obituary says they achieved allthe things that they set out to
achieve.
This is who they were, right?
(15:52):
That's the that's the obituary.
The the the news story, youknow, the the retro that they do
on the news a year later isgonna be different.
You know, yes, he did all thosethings, but this is what has
happened since then.
These are the people who, youknow, that this whatever.
But then you fast forwardanother, you know, 20 years and
you do a retro on this person'slife, and all of a sudden
they're in a history book.
You know, it's it's you know,this person did this and it
(16:14):
impacted this, and the movementthat came after it was this, and
the people who changed werethis, and that's like that's a
really easy way for us tounderstand it in the present
tense, I think.
I think you bring you actuallyexplained it a whole lot better
than I did.
I appreciate that.
That was really good.
No, no, no, I was I was just Iwas just riffing on yours.
You started it.
Javi (16:35):
So I love that.
I love that what you said,Jason.
I think you brought a goodpoint.
I think it's one of the thingsthat maybe we haven't spoken on,
like what are these, right?
These are the gospel is thegood news, right?
The good news of Jesus Christand and you know what he did and
what he came to earth to do andhis his prop, you know, the
prophecies fulfilled in so manyways.
But also, what kind of booksare these, right?
(16:56):
These are the accounts ofJesus, right?
These is this is not a poeticbook, this is not a apostolic
book.
This is history.
I would like to say this is anaccount, this is the eyewitness
account of someone that sawsomething happen and then wrote
it down.
And I think that's important toknow when when people read it
and understand it, not thishyperbolic thing.
I mean, there is some metaphorsand other things in there that
(17:19):
that happens, but yeah.
Jason (17:22):
I think that's an interesting point.
Yeah, go ahead.
No, go ahead.
You're probably just gonnaswitch it.
I think that's an interestingpoint, Javi, because look, I
mean, we've talked a lot in thispodcast about metaphor and
symbolism and those things.
And I think those are I thinkthose are more explicit in the
gospels, right?
Like when I mean Jesus himselfspeaks in parables much much of
(17:44):
the time.
And so it's very clear whenJesus meant for something to be
a symbol, when he meant for itto be a metaphor, when he meant
for it to be an allegory.
You know, he did he did that onHe did that on purpose.
And so that does make the theGospels a bit easier to
understand than any other partof the Bible.
And again, you could probablylift it up a level and and find
(18:08):
symbolism and metaphor andanalogy in the life of Jesus as
well.
But this I one of the thingsthat makes these easier is like
I said, they're just it's veryclear what's supposed to be
literal, what's supposed to bemetaphorical, what's supposed to
be a lesson, and what'ssupposed to be, you know,
something that you reflect on.
Javi (18:24):
I wanted to say, like going back to a little bit when
you said when you guys weretalking about it being written
so many years after, you know,one of the things that I kind of
when I came across the gospelsof just kind of reading the
Bible, it's like, wait a minute,this is written, why is it
written you know, 30 years afterJesus?
Like, why not written thenthere?
And I think you David didobviously did an episode
(18:47):
recently just kind of explainedthat.
If you want to reiterate that,J David, I think it was really
done really well what you whatyou were explaining about you
know how that came about, andnot only that, other literature
that we take as the Bible, likeyou know, and and like this is
true.
What happened to Alexander theGreat in history books that is
written way past what the Biblewas maybe written.
David (19:09):
Yeah.
Yeah, I just think listen, thisis human nature.
I think when you look at thesedifferent people, when you look
at Caesar and him being writtenabout hundreds of years later, I
just think that what happens istypically when something is
happening, people don't writeabout it, they write about it
afterwards.
This becomes history.
You know, Jason just said thatwhen somebody first dies, you
go, hey, this this is the waythey lived and this is how it
(19:31):
was.
And then a year or two later,then the story comes out, the
the piece comes out about whathow that impacted the world.
And I think what happens is youhave Jesus who impacted the
world greater than any person inthe face of this earth ever
did.
In all history.
And at that point, in allhistory, and at that point it
was written about and it neededto take effect.
(19:53):
So, yes, we look at it and go,we need to read up read about
Jesus.
You know, why didn't somebodywrite about him at that time?
Right, which by the way, theythey definitely could have.
Just because we haven't foundit yet doesn't mean it doesn't
exist.
Right, right.
Um, so finding one from 30years past is an incredibly
quick account of it, which makesit true.
But um, it's not to say that wecan't find one that's 10 years
(20:15):
or five years or written duringhis life, right?
But typically people arewaiting and they're writing
about the effect of what thisdid to the entire world.
And that's why when you see 30years later, you're going, man,
this is so much quicker thanevery other historical figure
that has ever lived.
It is amazing.
And I think people look at thatand they try to trip you up and
(20:36):
say, Oh, it took them so long.
I'm like, no, they were writingabout it while all the people
that would have been there arestill alive and could have said,
Hey, that's not how ithappened.
Yeah.
Jason (20:46):
That's a bit they never did.
Yeah, I mean, look, I I thinkAlexander the Great was like 400
years after he was ever writtenabout, I mean, ever, ever
lived, right?
Literally, like the firstwriting we found is like 400
years after him, and yet nobodygoes, Alexander the Great didn't
exist.
Not to mention, you know, oneof the other things, and I'm
again, I'm not a scholar onthis, but it's a statistic I've
heard one time, and I think itdoes it it helped me to put more
validity in in the scriptureswas that people go, Oh, yeah,
(21:10):
but it's we don't have manycopies of it.
No, we have many, many copiesof it.
I think there's like 5,000 orsomething scriptural pieces, and
you align them on top of eachother, and they all align to a
to a very, very large extent.
And when you look like likeSocrates, who we know we know
existed, but yet we say, Did he?
You know, Socrates was somebodywho we don't actually have any
(21:30):
actual writings from, but weknow he does because we've
because because of any number ofreasons, but yet we have 5,000
from Jesus and we questionwhether he existed.
Javi (21:38):
You know, I think now that we we we understand that, we
know that Jesus existed, right?
We know that this is truth thatpeople are claiming, and it's
he I have no doubt.
So now it's up to you to takeit and go, Well, is that true?
Let me look further.
And when you look further,where are you looking for there?
You should look at where thepeople that walk with him is.
(21:59):
So you should go to the Bibleand go to the to the actual
accounts that present them as asa historic figure, and they say
certain things, and up to youto really look further if if
this is true now, what?
Right, and I think that's a bigthing that people fail to
realize that Jesus is anhistoric figure, not only in the
Bible and present them as that,but outside there's other
(22:22):
writings, and David could, Imean, David could probably
attest to that that there'sother writings outside of the
Bible that show Jesus as anhistoric figure through
different historians, and wehave to we have to, as people,
is this true?
Look further.
If he it is true that Jesus didcome, what did he say?
How should we go about it?
How could we take about it?
(22:43):
You know, so to me, it's it's abig thing to to look at it that
way, and I think the gospelpresents it really well.
Yeah, yeah.
David (22:49):
I mean, I think um Tacitus, Pliny the Younger,
Josephus, just to name three ofthem, those are all extra
biblical accounts that you canlook at.
Um, I just want to kind ofdouble back for a second.
You know, I I know we weretalking earlier about the
obituary that Jason actuallyexplained better than I did, but
that was a kind of a simpleexplanation.
I want to actually add somesymbology and maybe a little bit
more deeper of a conversationof the four gospels.
(23:13):
You know, if you look atEzekiel and you look at
revelation, there are uh acreature with four heads.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
Yeah.
David (23:20):
And if you look at those four heads, they actually relate
really, really well to the fourgospels as well.
So if you look at the head ofthe lion, this would be Matthew.
This is the lion of Judah, thisis the king who reigns.
If you look at Mark, that's theox.
This is now slain forsalvation.
This is the suffering servant.
Luke would be the man who isfull of compassion.
(23:43):
This is history, man.
And then John finally is theeagle who, again, now you're
looking at divinity.
This is soaring in the heavens,this is God.
So when you look at the fourcreatures, it also relates
perfectly to the four gospelsand where each of them come
from.
I just want to put that outthere as well.
Just, you know, again,sometimes people think that this
is an afterthought.
God never does an afterthought.
(24:04):
This is you know, this issomething that was planned from
the start, and and God does abeautiful way of putting that
all together.
Jason (24:12):
Yeah, and and here's an interesting thing that I had not
considered about that too.
I mean, John wrote Revelationas well, right?
Yes.
Yeah.
And John is one of the fourgospel writers, but at the time
he wrote it, he probablywouldn't have known that there
were four other gospels.
He he probably wouldn't haveknown that there, that these
things existed.
So he was, he was, you know, itwasn't like you can say, well,
(24:32):
Revelation was written at theend.
I think a lot of people, justespecially not knowing the
linear times of these things,would say, Well, John was
written at the end, so clearlythey know these other four
things.
But in fact, John wouldn'thave, you know, John wouldn't
have known any of those fourthings.
There's no way he could haveknown that when he was writing
Revelation and having his ownrevelation, right?
Very true.
David (24:50):
So all right, so here we come.
We're coming to that that pointwhere we're going to name some
of these things that seem asthough, hey, these are so
different in the gospels thatthere's something wrong.
Not that, hey, there's fourdifferent accounts, which we've
been talking about, but there'ssomething wrong here.
That somebody got it wrong, andthis shows that it's not true,
(25:11):
and they made a mistake orsomebody copied it the wrong
way.
And if you don't mind, I'llkick it off with the first one,
which is a biggie, and it's onethat I hear a lot, which is
during the crucifixion, theRomans had a practice of putting
a placard up stating what thecrime was, and they did that
here as well.
And when you read all fourGospels, they are read very
(25:33):
differently.
The account is very different.
And what people say is this isa placard, this is something
written.
If you were gonna read it, itshould read the same thing every
time, and it shouldn't bedifferent.
But what you don't realize isthese are written in different
languages.
You actually have Greek,Hebrew, and Latin written.
(25:53):
So when you start to take thisaccount and you go, hey, this
was written written differentlyin each account, it's probably
because they were reading it intheir own language.
Matthew was probably reading itin Hebrew, which you know, then
it would have said, This isJesus, the king of the Jews.
If you were reading it in John,Jesus of Nazareth, the King of
the Jews.
Uh, again, we look at it andgo, What's the big deal?
(26:16):
It's it's all the same.
This is Jesus, King of theJews, and the King of the Jews.
That was the four differentaccounts.
Right.
It sounds exactly the same tous, but there are skeptics who
look at it and go, if this was asign, we would have had the
exact same writings about it inall four.
And what you realize is fourdifferent languages, you're
going to get four differentversions of it.
Jason (26:37):
Yeah.
I think beyond that, you havesomething else you have to
consider, which is that fourdifferent people see things four
different ways.
I mean, yeah, even in yourexample of the sign, if if
somebody speaks, you know, isbilingual and speaks English and
Spanish and they see a sciencein English and Spanish, they
know when sometimes they'remistranslated, right?
They might even acknowledgethat, like they, you would never
know, David, if if somethingwas, you know, slightly
(26:59):
mistranslated, even though itwas just under, you're like, oh,
that's the Spanish version.
That just says that.
But you wouldn't know if therewas a slightly different
translation.
You wouldn't know if it saidsomething slightly different.
And then you have the English,you know, the American person or
the English person who'sspeaking who's reading the
English and not the Spanish.
You have the Spanish personwho's not reading the English,
you have the bilingual personwho's reading both.
Um, and so, you know,perspective for for all good and
(27:21):
all bad that it is, we arehumans and we do exist in human
bodies, and those are subject toperspective differentiations.
And you know, you're gonna getthose, you're gonna get those,
those differences.
You're gonna get thosedifferent accounts, despite the
fact that the truth is actuallysomewhere in the center.
David (27:40):
That's a very good point.
Javi (27:41):
Yeah.
I love the differentperspective, and I think I
wanted to also include this thatwe we mentioned before, maybe
not to be to not to continue torepeat it, but just like the
courtrooms, courtrooms will havedifferent eyewitnesses to prove
you know what happened thatnight or whatever it is, what
happened to that person, just tokind of show what's going on.
Is we do that in the courtroom,we do it to now to this day.
(28:04):
Lawyers use differenteyewitnesses to prove a certain
um size to certain things.
So I love this.
Jason (28:11):
Yeah, I again I go back to that idea of perspective,
right?
Like if you were to ask thethree of us about the history of
how this podcast came to be,you would get three very
different stories.
Yeah, you would get threedifferent and and those stories
could be influenced by a varietyof things, you know.
It could be influenced by thethe things that I was going
through at the time that youguys, you know, brought up this
(28:33):
idea in the first place.
Definitely means I have aperspective that's that's suited
to that.
I've I've said it before, Ithink that you know I had been
praying previously, you know,use me, Lord, use me, Lord, the
the song that gets me everytime.
Um and I had been like kind ofsinging it in church, but I'd
also been coming home andpraying it over and over and
over, and then you guys asked todo that.
So my it's very miraculous tome, very, you know, divinely
(28:55):
inspired to me that you guys,without knowing that I'd been
praying that would ask would askthat.
You know, I'm sure you know youguys had conversations before I
was ever even aware of it.
So your history of it would bedifferent, right?
Your inspiration would bedifferent.
Your meaning that you ascribeto any individual experience
would be different than mine.
(29:16):
And again, I think that's whatthese gospels are about.
It comes from different peoplewho have from different walks of
life, yeah, with differentdifferent experiences of how
they came to know Christ, andtheir testimony is unique to
them.
And in no case is it wrong.
In no case is it wrong.
It is unique to them and theirexperience.
(29:38):
And when we look at the gospelsas written by people and not
gospels um, you know, that arethat are some perfect union of,
you know, a group of corpor, youknow, a corporate entity who is
all decided on the samedetails.
You know, yeah, if you read atextbook, you're gonna get
something pretty homogenized.
But these are written byindividuals, and those
individuals have perspectives.
David (30:00):
The last one I want to bring up just before we we close
out because this is the biggieand I was hoping when he goes
trying to get it.
Jason (30:07):
I was gonna let you hit it because it's a big one.
David (30:10):
Is there one angel or two uh when when the tomb was was
empty?
And also who gets there first?
Who gets there first?
Who gets there first?
Yeah.
And this is one, I mean, uhagain, I think that Jason, you
definitely hit it home withlisten, different opinions,
different people.
This one seems to be, and thisis one of the biggest ones that
people really have a hang upover.
(30:31):
And I'm gonna make a referenceto The Matrix, okay, only
because I love the movie, butthere's a point at which Keanu
Reese is walking and LawrenceFishburne is talking to him, and
he looks at the woman in red,and Lawrence Fishburne says,
Were you paying attention orwere you looking at the woman in
red?
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Yeah.
David (30:48):
And it was only because Keanu Reeves' focus went on
something completely differentthan where Lawrence Fishburne's
focus was.
Yes.
And I think that this is thatmoment where there could very
well have been two angels in thetomb.
The account was somebody here,you look at Matthew and Mark,
(31:08):
they have it as one angel.
Yeah, they were focused on theone angel speaking, where you
have, you know, Luke and Johnsaying there were two there.
They're not saying that therewasn't one just speaking,
they're just saying, hey, therewere two in the room.
Yeah.
Where Matthew and Mark aresaying, yes, there might have
been two in the room, but we'reonly focusing on the one who's
actually doing the speaking.
So I think it's worth, I thinkit's a focus thing more than a
(31:30):
difference thing.
Jason (31:31):
I think so too.
I mean, that's what I wassaying about perspective, right?
Like if if if I get there and Iam so blown away by everything
going on, and that I get hyperfocused, I it's very possible I
miss some crazy.
You ever seen those videos, bythe way?
Have you ever seen those videoswhere it's like count the
amount of times that we dribblethe basketball?
Javi (31:50):
Yes, with the gorilla.
Jason (31:51):
This is crazy.
I I I'm gonna give it away foranybody who hasn't seen it
before, but they'll but there'sthis thing where they they they
say count the amount of timesthat these people dribble
basketballs.
And you're sitting therefocused on counting the
basketball.
And then at the very end, itsays it says, Did you see the
gorilla walk by the back?
And you're like, there is nopossible way a gorilla walked by
the screen and I didn't see it.
(32:12):
And then you watch the videoback and there was a gorilla in
the back.
This is a true, this is a realthing, and it sounds ridiculous
until you do it.
And if you've ever done it, Ihope that you remember that
feeling in this moment becauseit's very easy to miss very
basic stuff or very in intensestuff when you're hyper focused
on something else.
And I think that's just one ofthose examples of it's us
(32:33):
humans.
David (32:34):
Yeah, I love that.
I have not seen that video, butI actually know that from
sorry.
No, I I actually know thisthere's a training that they do,
and I'm sure for FBI and thingslike that, which is very
similar, it's about focus.
And you'll have somebody comein the room during a speech, and
they will hand them some apiece of paper and they'll walk
out.
And then after the speech isdone, they'll say, What color
was that person and shirtwearing?
(32:55):
Yeah, and all that.
And it's it's really cool whenwhen the brain does that.
Jason (33:00):
It's also very it's also very dishearten it's also very
disheartening when the braindoes that because you realize
how much how much we don'tcontrol.
But again, we we have torealize that these were written
by people, right?
We have to realize that thesewere written by people, and we
also have to trust in God'ssovereignty and that you know he
he had all this happen for areason and he allowed them to
pay attention or somethingbecause there's a message in all
(33:20):
of them for somebody.
And so, you know, I I but I Ifound it really I used to
struggle a lot with that angelthing too, until that gorilla
thing.
And then I was like, man, it'svery possible.
I mean, you can you can stareright at it and not see it
because it's not where yourfocus is.
Javi (33:34):
Yeah.
I think the value of all thisis like going back, it's what
what matters and what eventhough it was tough, but what
matters is Jesus was an historicfigure that said certain truths
and he made some certain truthclaims, and and if you believe
in that, then for him is he cameto the world to save us, right?
(33:56):
To give us salvation.
He died and resurrected andinstilled us with the Holy
Spirit.
And I think that's whatmatters, and that that narrative
does not change from thebeginning of the Bible to the
end of the Bible.
And I think that's what youknow, sometimes we could get
hung up on these, like you know,these things, but um not to say
that our thing and what we'retalking about is not warranted.
(34:16):
I think it's good for us todiscuss this, but you know, when
we really look at it, we have aGod that loves us, came to the
earth, you know, gave ussalvation, and he left us with
the Holy Spirit, he's with us.
But I think you mentioned that,David, in one of your episodes
last week or so.
You know, God is with us.
The Ark of the Covenant, wemight not need it anymore
because he is still with us.
I mean, his name itself, right?
(34:37):
Is it Emmanuel?
Or what that means God has.
God with us.
Yep.
Yeah.
And I love that.
And I think that's the beautyof what we're reading right now
in the gospel and the Bibleitself.
Jason (34:47):
Yeah, I I totally agree.
I mean, that's that's theimportant part, right?
We we get so we're humans andwe look for flaws, and we we
find these little minor, youknow, variations, and we we stop
paying attention to what is theconsistency.
The consistency is that he wasthat that he was divine, that he
was part God and part man, thathe did miracles, that he showed
(35:11):
us how to live, and that hedied on the cross for our sins
and was resurrected.
I mean, no, that's the thethat's the consistency.
And, you know, one other thing,and this might be a little left
field, but it's something thatI heard one time that really
helped me, and it was like thefinality that I needed to like
get over these little things wasthat it's all the same story,
and yet imagine if you were totake somebody's story and put
(35:35):
every story on a note card andput it up on a wall, right?
The story is the story, itdoesn't change.
I can't tell you the wholestory, and I've got a short
period of time to do it.
So I'm gonna pull the notecards that that work in order to
tell the story I need to tell.
So I might pull these 10, 12,15 note cards and then tell you
that story across those.
Somebody else might pullanother, you know, six or twelve
(35:55):
from another side and tellthose stories.
And and again, like I said,it's it's not that it's a
different story, it's that it'stold from a different
perspective.
It's told in a dip in sometimeseven a different order, but it
is nonetheless the same story.
Javi (36:08):
I love it because John John 20 says that.
John 20 says, let me explainthat right.
John 20, 30-31 says, Jesusperformed many other signs in
the presence of his disciples,which are not recorded in this
book.
There are so many other thingsthat maybe he did that we did
not know, that we don't know hedid, or you know, other
(36:29):
miracles, other things that heprobably said.
It's only it's finite.
We're just as finite as much asthese books are, these the
pages in the books, right?
So I love that you said that,Jason.
I think that's a good point.
David (36:41):
I I'll tell you just to uh kind of reiterate, but also
on my perspective, I I'mfinishing the steps of authoring
my own book, right?
And I can't tell you how manytimes I've gone back and wanted
to change it.
And I was I was thinking aboutwhat you said about you know
some of these apostles and andthe writer, the gospel writers,
and and think about them going,you know, how many times, you
know, if they come back todayand go, man, I missed that
(37:03):
detail, it wasn't done, youknow, with any intention other
than they're trying to writeeverything down.
And there are times you canrevise and revise, and it'll,
you know, I think about my owntestimony, and it's my
testimony, it's happened in mylife, and I've told it
differently every single timeI've told my testimony.
Absolutely, absolutely.
Jason (37:23):
Yeah, what a what a point, what a point.
Yeah, guys, this is this hasbeen enlightening for me.
Um, and it continues to be aform of worship for me to look
at these gospels and to remindmyself of their importance, to
remind myself of their truth,and to remind myself of of the
(37:44):
good news, right?
The good news of Jesus, thatthat he has died on the cross
and resurrected for our sins sothat we can be saved because we
can't do it by ourselves.
So I I love listening to this,I love talking about it.
And I hope that if anybody outthere has struggled with the
gospel's variations, that thishas helped to clarify that for
you.
So I really do appreciateeverybody listening.
(38:04):
As always, we love to hear yourcomments, we love to hear your
your feedback.
And if we can ever be of anyhelp to you in any way, please
reach out.
And we look forward to talkingto you again next week.
Thank you very much, guys.
See you guys.
Bye.
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