Hi Friends,
For the winter quarter we're following Dr. Laura C.S. Holmes, SPU New Testament professor, on a journey through Mark's gospel. Laura has a gift for making the gospel of Mark come alive with powerful insights for walking with Christ! Read the assigned scripture passage, then read or listen to Laura's commentary. Make sure you leave some time for the reflection/discussion questions at the bottom of her weekly commentary page.
Here's the reading schedule for the winter quarter.
Here's her first commentary post:
A Redundant Sequel?
Good news. Death and Darkness. Revelation.
Misunderstanding. Miracles. Mystery. Authority. Suffering. All of these
contrasting terms characterize the vivid portrayal of the good news in the
Gospel of Mark. This gospel tells the story of Jesus’ life, death, and
resurrection in a way that engages the novice yet intrigues the scholar.
As a Lectio community, the last time we were in the
gospels was one year ago, when we read the Gospel of Matthew together. In many
ways, Mark’s second place in the canon may feel like a redundant sequel to
readers of Matthew: 90 percent of Mark’s narrative is included in the Gospel of
Matthew, and much of what is not included in Matthew is material some modern
readers continue to deem odd (e.g., 14:51–52).
This overlap between the first two canonical gospels, in
particular, poses the question: Why do we need Mark, if Matthew includes much
of the same information? To state this problem even more pointedly, Mark is
missing much of the material Christians are likely to consider central to the
gospel:
There is no Christmas story.
There is no Good Samaritan.
There is no Prodigal Son.
There is no Sermon on the Mount.
There are no parables about a humble tax collector and a
hypocritical Pharisee.
In the original text of Mark, it is possible that there
was not even an account of the resurrected Jesus appearing to anyone.
So Why Do We Need Mark?...