1 Jesus, 4 Portraits: Why You Need Each Gospel’s Narrative Theology

When I was first asked to teach a seminary course on the New Testament Gospels (over thirty years ago now!), I was immediately confronted with a difficult decision. The Gospels—and especially the three Synoptic Gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke—have many of the same stories, some in nearly identical language. I had to decide whether I would teach each Gospel individually, or whether I would teach the four together, combining them into a single “life of Christ” or “harmony of the Gospels.”

I looked to see what other professors were doing and found that both approaches are quite common. Both also have a long history in the church. The most important early attempt to bring the four together into one story was the Diatessaron (meaning “through the four”), a harmony of the Gospels produced by the early Church Father Tatian around AD 170. Tatian’s work was very popular in its day and became the primary text of the Gospels in the Syrian church until around 400.¹

In the end, however, the church chose to retain the four individual Gospels. This was the right decision both theologically and literarily. Theologically, the Holy Spirit inspired four Gospels, not one. So the four individual accounts—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—are God’s Word to us. A single “cut-and-paste” harmony of the four is not. Literarily, each Gospel is a narrative masterpiece that provides a unique perspective on Jesus and develops particular theological themes through the use of narrative features like characters, settings, and plot. If we harmonize their accounts by bringing details from one into another, we risk obscuring each author’s Spirit-inspired message.

Let me illustrate this by pointing to some distinct theological contributions by each of the four Gospels.

4 unique portraits of Jesus

There is certainly a great deal of overlap in the presentation of Jesus found in the four Gospels. All four present Jesus as the promised Messiah who establishes the kingdom of God and brings salvation to the world. Each identifies him as the Son of God and the Son of Man. Yet there are important differences in emphasis.²

Matthew has the greatest focus on Jesus as the Jewish Messiah who fulfills Old Testament prophecy. Matthew has a dozen or so fulfillment quotations, using a formula like, “This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet …” to identify events in Jesus’s life as the fulfillment of the Hebrew Scriptures (for the fulfillment formulas, see Matt 1:22–23; 2:15, 17–18, 23; 4:14–16; 8:17; 12:17–21; 13:35; 21:4–5; 27:9–10; for other fulfillment passages without the formula, see Matt 2:5–6; 3:3; 10:34–35; 11:2–6; 11:10; 13:14–15; 15:7–9; 21:16; 21:42; 26:11).

Mark also affirms that Jesus is the Messiah and that his coming is the fulfillment of God’s promises, but he places a greater emphasis than the other Gospels on Jesus as the suffering Servant of the Lord who gives up his life as an atoning sacrifice for sin. Those who wish to be his disciples must take up their cross and follow his example of self-sacrifice and service (Mark 8:31–34; 9:30–35; 10:32–45).

Luke, too, reflects many of these same themes, but has an even greater emphasis onJesus as the Savior for lost people everywhere. In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus shows repeated concern for outsiders and those of lower status—the poor and oppressed, sinners and tax collectors, women and children, Samaritans and gentiles. This theme of the Gospel for outsiders sets the stage for Luke’s second volume, the book of Acts, where the gospel message goes forth from its original Jewish audience to all people everywhere, to the “ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

While John, like the other Gospel writers, presents Jesus as the Jewish Messiah who fulfills God’s promises to Israel, he places greater stress than the others on Jesus’s full humanity and true deity. Jesus is the divine Son of God who came to bring eternal life to all who believe in him (John 3:16).

If we bring the Gospels together into one story, we risk missing the richness of these four portraits.

4 unique introductions

Each of the four Gospel writers introduces his story in a way that highlights its main themes.

Matthew, for example, begins with a genealogy tracing Jesus’s lineage from Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, through David, Israel’s greatest king (Matt 1:1–17). This genealogy confirms that Jesus is the Messiah: the fulfillment of God’s Old Testament covenants and the legitimate heir to the throne of David.

While Mark’s Gospel also begins by identifying Jesus as the Messiah whose coming fulfills Scripture (Mark 1:1–8), Mark skips any description of Jesus’s birth or ancestry and instead plunges immediately into his public ministry (“immediately” [Greek euthys] is one of his favorite words!). For Mark, Jesus’s divine authority in healing the sick, casting out demons, forgiving sins, raising the dead, and commanding nature confirm his messianic identity (1:14–8:29).

Luke begins his Gospel with a prologue that confirms his careful historical research and use of eyewitness testimony (Luke 1:1–4). This fits well with Luke’s strong historical and apologetic focus throughout Luke and Acts. Like Matthew, Luke provides a genealogy, but he traces Jesus’s ancestry not just to Abraham, but all the way back to Adam, the father of the human race (3:23–38). This fits Luke’s theme that God’s salvation is for all humanity, not just for Israel.

Finally, John introduces his Gospel with a magnificent prologue that identifies Jesus as the “Word” (Greek Logos) of God, the fully divine Creator of all things, who “became flesh” in order to reveal the Father and bring light and eternal life to all who believe in him (John 1:1–18).

Each of these serves as an appropriate introduction to its respective Gospel, highlighting the portrait of Jesus found there and the narrative themes unique to each author.

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4 unique selections and orderings

Near the end of his Gospel, John notes that Jesus performed many other signs that are not recorded in his Gospel and (with some hyperbole) that all the books in the world could not contain these wonderful things (John 20:30; 21:25). This confirms that the Gospel authors were selective in their choice of material, drawing stories and teaching from a much larger body of Jesus tradition to develop their particular portraits of Jesus.

The Gospel authors were selective in their choice of material to develop their particular portraits of Jesus.

We could look at dozens of examples of this, but let me mention just a couple.

The temptation of Jesus

The first is Jesus’s temptation in the wilderness, an event referred to in the three Synoptic Gospels (Mark 1:12–13; Matt 4:1–11; Luke 4:1–13). Mark merely states that Jesus was tempted by Satan for forty days in the wilderness, without describing individual temptations. The scene recalls both the testing of Adam and Eve in the garden as well as Israel’s testing in the wilderness. Jesus remains faithful and succeeds where Adam and Israel were rebellious and failed.

Matthew and Luke have fuller accounts, describing three specific temptations. The Israel-in-the-wilderness motif is even stronger here, as Jesus responds to Satan’s temptations by quoting Scripture passages recalling Israel’s experience in the wilderness (Deut 8:3; 6:13, 16).

What is interesting, however, is that the last two temptations are reversed in Matthew and Luke. In Matthew, the third temptation is Satan’s offer of the kingdoms of the world. This takes place on a high mountain. In Luke, that is the second temptation. The third is Satan’s challenge to jump off the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. The final and climactic temptation in each case is significant. Matthew has a special emphasis throughout his Gospel on mountaintop revelations (Matt 5:1; 15:29; 17:1; 24:3; 28:16), developing a Moses/Israel typology with reference to Jesus.

Luke has a special emphasis on Jerusalem and the temple (Luke 9:51, 53; 13:22, 33, 34; 17:11; 18:31; 19:11, 28, 41; Acts 1:4, 8). His Gospel begins and ends at the temple in Jerusalem (Luke 1:5–22; 24:53); Jesus’s extended journey to Jerusalem represents a unique and important central section of Luke’s Gospel (Luke 9:51, 53; 13:22, 33; 17:11; 18:31; 19:11, 28, 41); and all of Luke’s resurrection appearances and even the ascension of Jesus occur in the vicinity of Jerusalem. In the book of Acts, then, the gospel goes out from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8; cf. Luke 24:47). Jerusalem thus plays an important and ambivalent role in Luke–Acts as the place of God’s salvation but also a symbol of Israel’s rejection of their Messiah (Luke 13:33, 34; 19:41–44).

Jesus’s rejection in Nazareth

Another example of reordering for theological impact occurs immediately after the temptation in Luke’s Gospel. It is the account of Jesus’s rejection in his hometown of Nazareth. Matthew and Mark place this episode chronologically much later in Jesus’s Galilean ministry (Matt 13:53–58; Mark 6:1–6). In both, the emphasis is on Nazareth’s loss of blessing because of the townspeople’s lack of faith.

Luke, however, brings this episode forward to the beginning of Jesus’s ministry (Luke 4:14–30). It is the first thing Jesus does after his baptism and testing in the wilderness. Luke’s account is much longer than the others and recounts the sermon Jesus preached on this occasion. He reads from Isaiah 61:1–2 (and 58:6), identifying himself as the Anointed One who has come to set the poor and the oppressed free and to bring sight to the blind (Luke 4:17–21).

The people respond favorably (Luke 4:22) until Jesus illustrates his point with examples from the Old Testament where God blessed gentiles! The people are outraged over Jesus’s claim that God’s grace is for gentiles as well as Jews, and they try to murder him (4:22–30). The episode thus becomes programmatic foreshadowing for the whole of Luke and Acts, where the gospel will be rejected by many in Israel but will bring blessings to the gentiles (cf. Luke 2:30–32; Acts 13:46–48; 28:26–28).

This is narrative theology: The story is told in such a way as to bring out key theological truths.

4 unique perspectives on the crucifixion

For all four Gospels, the crucifixion is the climax of the narrative. Yet each Gospel writer has his own unique perspective.

For example, the four Gospels together record seven sayings of Jesus from the cross. A number of these statements have profound theological significance. Sermons—especially during Good Friday services—are often preached on these seven “words” of Jesus from the cross. Here are the seven (in likely chronological order). Can you identify which appear in each Gospel?

1. “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
2. To his mother: “Woman, here is your son.” To the Beloved Disciple: “Here is your mother.”
3. To one of the criminals: “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
4. “I am thirsty.”
5. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
6. “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.”
7. “It is finished.”

In fact, sayings 1, 3, and 6 appear only in Luke. These all fit well with Luke’s narrative theology. As we have noted, throughout Luke’s Gospel, Jesus reveals God’s grace and forgiveness to sinners and outsiders. It is appropriate, then, that here Jesus offers forgiveness to sinners from the cross (“Father, forgive them …”; “Today you will be with me in paradise”). Jesus’s prayer life and intimacy with the Father are also important themes in Luke (3:21; 5:16; 6:12; 9:18, 28; 11:1–4, 5–13; 18:1–8; 21:36; 22:32, 40; 23:34, 46). So from the cross, Jesus expresses his dependence on the Father (“Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”).

Sayings 2, 4, and 7 appear only in John. These, too, fit John’s narrative theology, highlighting the role of the “disciple whom Jesus loved,” emphasizing Jesus’s true humanity (“I am thirsty”), and identifying Jesus’s death as the accomplishment of God’s plan of salvation (“It is finished”).

Finally, notice that in Mark (15:34; cf. Matt 27:46),³ Jesus says only one thing from the cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (quoting Ps 22:1). This, too, fits well with Mark’s narrative theology, which places great emphasis on the Messiah’s suffering role. The narrator draws the reader into Jesus’s isolation and despair, as he experiences God’s judgment as an atoning sacrifice for sin (see Mark 10:45). It is important at this point to hear Mark’s narrative on its own terms. Interjecting Luke’s reassuring “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” or John’s triumphant “It is finished” would diminish the impact of Mark’s point.

Conclusion

In the past, it has often been more liberal scholars who have emphasized the theological nature of the Gospels. It is sometimes said that the Gospels are theological—written to promote a particular perspective—rather than historical. Conservatives and evangelicals, by contrast, have been inclined to emphasize the historical, sometimes to the point of disregarding the theological. The Gospels are sometimes harmonized into a single story to create a chronological “life of Christ” and to demonstrate “what actually happened.”

I suggest we need a both/and approach. The Gospels are certainly historical narratives. The Gospel writers believed these events took place in space and time. Yet the Gospels are also theological narratives. The stories are told in such a way as to bring out certain theological truths.

In this regard, each Gospel has a story to tell, and that story needs to be heard on its own terms. To merge the Gospels together into a single account or to fill in details taken from one Gospel into another risks distorting each author’s unique (and Spirit-inspired) contribution.

So while a “harmony” of the Gospels may be useful for historical and apologetic purposes (for example, to resolve apparent contradictions), it is not the best way to preach and teach the Gospels. This is true whether you are preaching a series of messages through one Gospel or whether you are preaching a single passage found in a particular Gospel. As you read through each Gospel, listen for its narrative theology, the theological truths the Spirit-inspired author is seeking to convey.

Resources for studying the Gospels as narratives

Explore the unique theological contributions of each Gospel

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1. A number of books on Tatian’s Diatessaron, as well as various harmonies of the Gospels, can be found in Logos’s store. See also Logos’s Parallel Gospel Reader interactive.
2. See Mark L. Strauss, Four Portraits, One Jesus: A Survey of Jesus and the Gospels, 2nd ed. (Zondervan, 2020). For more detailed analysis of each Gospel, see Michael J. Wilkins, A Theology of Matthew’s Gospel (Zondervan, 2025); David E. Garland, A Theology of Mark’s Gospel (Zondervan, 2015); Darrell L. Bock, A Theology of Luke and Acts (Zondervan, 2012); Andreas J. Köstenberger, A Theology of John’s Gospel and Letters (Zondervan, 2009).
3. Most scholars believe Matthew is following Mark as his primary source here. For the relationship between the three Synoptics and evidence of Markan priority, see Strauss, Four Portraits, 65–66.