The Good News

"Then an angel of the Lord stood before them,

and the glory of the Lord shone around them,

and they were terrified,

and the angel said to them,

“Do not be afraid; for see - I am bringing you

good news of great joy

for all the people." Luke 2

What I propose here is that we follow a curriculum that will lead us through the study of Jesus who is the 'Good News.' We will ask who is Jesus? What is this good news? Since gospel means 'good news" we will actually be moving from consideration of THE GOSPEL (that is Jesus Christ) to the four canonical Gospels.

I hope this is OK?

What I am hoping is that we will learn to read the Bible very carefully. As we read together we will consider each of the four Gospels and try to imagine their place and purpose in the Bible. We will also try to imagine the social and historical context within which each book was written. So we will ask:

• why did the author write this book?
• how would the text have been heard in the early Church?
• what is the focus or purpose of the text?
• what is function of the text within the Bible?
• how do the four Gospels relate to each other? and
• (most importantly) what does the text say about Jesus?

It is great to hear you have got both books we will use! I really like Introducing the New Testament: Its Literature and Theology [Paul J. Achtemeier, Joel B. Green and Marianne Meye Thompson (eds.)] and I find Gospel Parallels: A Comparison of the Synoptic Gospels [Burton H. Throckmorton, Jr. (ed.)] intriguing.

I will usually quote Scripture from the NRSV translation.

Ok - let's get started.

For next week read:

Introducing the New Testament: Its Literature and Theology pages 1-13

thanks