4th Day of Christmas - Gospels

On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me four calling birds.

The four calling birds can represent the four gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Skeptics of Christianity often state that the four gospels contradict each other because there are variants in the tellings. While this is true, it is a good thing that the gospels don’t tell the exact same story four times. Why? Because true eyewitness statements vary - each person notices something different about what happened and tells their perspective. That is exactly what we see in the gospels: four accounts that are similar enough to tell the same story from different perspectives. If the gospels were all exactly the same, any investigator would know that the authors collaborated with each other before writing so they could be “on the same page,” so to speak. The variations in the eyewitness accounts in the four gospels corroborates that they are, indeed, eyewitness accounts.

I appreciate that the Gospels all tell a slightly different story and show us who Jesus is with a different emphasis on who he is. Matthew shows us Jesus as the kingly Messiah, the Lion of Judah. Mark shows Jesus as a servant. While Luke emphasizes his humanity, John contrasts that with Jesus' divinity. Together, the Gospels form a unified account of who Jesus is and a fuller picture of his life on earth.