Pastor's Corner
March 2025
Inspired: Gospel Stories
As we continue our journey through the book, Inspired, by Rachel Evans, we come to take a closer look at the stories of the gospels, which focus on the story of Jesus, his birth, his ministry, his death, and his resurrection. We have four gospels that are all telling the story of Jesus, but not necessarily in the same way. John’s gospel tells us about a God who has come to be with us in the person of Jesus. No longer do we have to go searching for God because God has come to find us. No longer do we have to figure out where to worship God because God is with us, therefore we can worship God wherever we are. In Matthew and Mark’s gospels, we have a Jesus who is the long awaited Messiah, who has come to take up his rightful place as King, not just over Israel, but over all of creation. After all, as Jesus tells his disciples at the end of Matthew’s gospel, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.” Finally, there is Luke, the physician, who has a heart for the oppressed, the vulnerable, those who have been crushed down by life and by other people. Luke shows us what it means that Jesus has come to liberate and set people free.
Yet, what is so surprising about the gospel stories is how down to earth they are. Jesus generally doesn’t hang out with dignitaries, the well to do, or the movers and shakers of society. Instead, he spends most of his time with fishermen, outcasts, and most of all, with sinners and tax collectors. Jesus hobnobs with both Jew and Gentile, men and women, sick and healthy. Jesus doesn’t interact with people with a prescribed, formulaic approach. Instead, he meets the people where they are, in the unique circumstances of their lives, and he tells stories. Jesus tells stories to cast a vision for what life looks like when God’s Kingdom is present in the midst of God’s people. The Kingdom of God, or the Kingdom of heaven, is not some far away destination. It is a living reality that is present in the lives of God’s people in the here and now. In such a vision, the prodigal is welcomed home. All the day laborers are given a living wage, not just the ones who worked the most hours. Forgiveness is doled out, not with a dropper, but with a fire hose.
As we spend time with the gospels, we will discover that different parts of the gospels will appeal to us in different ways. The reason for this is because we come to these stories from different circumstances, different life experiences, different needs and wants. It is for this reason that we must guard against trying to distill the gospel stories down into a single perspective and then demand that everyone accede to that one perspective in order to be considered “truly Christian”. On the other hand, we must also guard against tearing the gospel stories of out their contexts in such a way that we twist and shape them to mirror our own particular agenda. The gospel stories are not private stories. They speak to and speak from the whole community, and it is in community that we will discover our greatest insights into the meanings of these stories.
Rachel Evans sums up her insight into the gospels with these words. “Jesus invites us into a story bigger than ourselves, bigger than our culture, bigger even than our imaginations, and yet we get to tell that story with the scandalous particularity of our particular moment and place in time. We are storytelling creatures because we are fashioned in the image of a storytelling God. May we never neglect the gift of that. May we never lose our love for telling the tale.
From the Pastor.....
