The Gospel
Mark, Matthew, Luke, & John in One
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Consolidation
In order for people to understand each gospel’s unique observations on many of the same events and topics, readers must carefully compare the different accounts. Thus, even after many years of reading the Gospels, it is often difficult to achieve a holistic understanding of all the episodes, events, and topics in Jesus’ ministry. Unless we identify the points of agreement and disagreement, our efforts to form a clear chronological and holistic understanding of Jesus’ ministry will remain impossible. This book relieves such difficulty.
For example, Jesus used many parables. One of the most famous is that of the sower of the seed, which is covered in three Gospels (Matthew 13:1-23, Mark 4:1-20, and Luke 8:4-18). After Jesus gave this parable to the disciples, he explained its hidden meaning— the secret of the kingdom of God (Matthew 13:18-23, Mark 4:13-20, Luke 8:11-15). For this passage, Matthew, underlined, serves as the base text and the following is the unified version of Jesus’ explanation:
[Then, Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand this parable? How then will you understand any parable (Mark 4:13)]. 18 “Listen then to what the parable of the sower means that [The seed is the word of God. (Luke 8:11)]: [The farmer sows the word (Mark 4:14) of God]. [Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. (Mark 4:15)]. 19 [As soon as (Mark 4:15)] anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one [or Satan (Mark 4:15)] comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart, [so that they may not believe and be saved (Luke 8:12)]. This is the seed sown along the path. 20 The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. 21 But since they have no root, they last only a short time. [They believe for a while (Luke 8:13)], but when trouble or persecution [or but in the time of testing (Luke 8:13)] comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. 22 The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word [but as they go on the way (Luke 8:14)], but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth [and pleasures (Luke 8:14) and the desires for other things come in (Mark 4: 19)] and choke the word, making it unfruitful [and they do not mature (Luke 8:14)]. 23 But the seed falling on good soil refers to [or stands for (Luke 8:15)] someone who hears the word [with a noble and good heart (Luke 8:15)], [accepts it (Mark 4:20), retains it (Luke 8:15)], and understands it. He produces a crop [by persevering (Luke 8:15)], yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times [thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times (Mark 4:20)] what was sown. As illustrated in the above examples, this unified version of the parable merges three Gospels into one without losing any part of each.
After the descriptions of Jesus’ resurrection, each gospel makes its own unique observations: Matthew (28:11-15) on the Jewish leaders’ bribery of the guards who witnessed the resurrection, Luke (24:13-35) on the conversations between Jesus and the two disciples on their way to Emmaus as well as His appearance to other disciples, John (20:24-31) on Jesus’ appearance to Thomas and others in Galilee, Matthew (28:16-20) on Jesus’ command to give a great commission to His disciples, Luke (24:44-53) on Jesus’ teaching on His resurrection, and Mark (16:9-20) on Jesus’ ascension. Such diachronically unified narration of Jesus’ ministry becomes possible as a result of reading the Bible chronologically. Again, such understanding is hard to obtain when reading the four Gospels independently of each other, especially for laymen and young children.
On a given topic in Jesus’ ministry, this book uses as its base whichever gospel is the “greatest common denominator (underlined),” consolidates identical or similar parts from other Gospels, and integrates the unique and different elements of each book into a single story. This book adds no extra unbiblical text but merely compiles the original words, phrases, and sentences of the Gospels, as demonstrated above.
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About the Book
This book merges and harmonizes the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John into one. This unified version, which I call “The Gospel,” is based on the faith that the four different gospels exist in order to form together the complete story of Jesus’ life and ministry. I consolidated these sources by identifying common denominators among them as well as parts that are unique to each, and then interweaving it all into a single narrative, using only original texts. This integrated version may offer greater incentive to our youth, laymen, and non-believers as well as professionals to read and learn more about what Jesus did and taught. (Acts 1:1).
In the past, there have been many attempts to make the four Gospels easier for readers, often displaying similar episodes in parallel columns, in an effort to resolve the Gospels’ narrative complexity by harmonizing them in one way or another; however, in regard to the text itself, previous books do not rise to the level of precision and completeness that is achieved here.
Answering this need for a clear chronological telling of “The Story of Jesus,” this book unifies ‘every’ account of the four Gospels into a single story, without omitting or compromising any part. On a given topic in Jesus’ ministry, this book uses as its base whichever gospel is the “greatest common denominator”, consolidates identical or similar parts from other Gospels, and integrates the unique and different elements of each book into a single story.
About the Author
Jongwoo Han is a lifetime Christian (ordained as a deacon) with a Ph.D. in Political Science from Syracuse University. While teaching courses on Korea, IT and democracy, he led Syracuse-Kim Chaek University (North Korea) academic exchanges and has constructed the Korean War Veterans Digital Memorial (www.kwvdm.org) serving as president of the Korean War Legacy Foundation. He has published 4 books on Korea.