Come and See For Yourself

N. Scott Cupp

Description

Giving insight into Jesus’s life, this spirituality book offers a new perspective on the gospel story, answering many questions in the telling.

People have been telling the story of Jesus ever since he was resurrected. In Come and See, author N. Scott Cupp offers a new perspective on this great story. Presenting a simplified narrative, it tells the gospel story from beginning to end in a chronological way unlike any other.



Answering a host of questions that arise throughout, Dr. Cupp shares the story as if meeting Jesus for the first time. Who was he, really? Did he really walk on water? Did he actually heal all those people? What was his message? Was he killed because he was proclaiming peace and love? Was he the message or the messenger? What is the message of the gospel for today, and how does it impact our world?



Presenting an understanding of Jesus’s life, Come and See for Yourself supplements what you’ve read and learned in your prior Christian studies. Dr. Cupp lets you decide what to think of the messenger.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Discipleship
• Christian Living
• Christian Education
• Personal Growth
• Philosophie et théologie
• El Mesías
• Jesús de Nazaret
• Gospel harmony
• Spiritual formation
• Bible study
• The Way
• Jesus
• Disciple (Christianity)
• Kingdom of God
• Religious studies
• Adult education
• Resurrection
• New Testament
• Christology
• Christianity
• Easter
• Renewal
• The Cross
• Christian
• Résurrection (homonymie)
• Messiah
• Gospel
• Disciple
• Christ
• Jésus de Nazareth

Informations

• Publié par: WestBow Press
• Date de parution: 24 mai 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781664296107
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

COME AND SEE FOR YOURSELF
 
The Gospel—As if for the First Time
 
 
 
 
 
N. SCOTT CUPP
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
Copyright © 2023 N. Scott Cupp.
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
 
 
 
WestBow Press
A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan
1663 Liberty Drive
Bloomington, IN 47403
www.westbowpress.com
844-714-3454
 
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
Contemporary English Version (CEV) - Copyright © 1995 by American Bible Society: Used by permission
 
Good News Translation® (GNT) - (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society: Used by permission
 
New English Translation (NET) - (NET) Bible® copyright ©1996-2017 All rights reserved. Build 30170414 by Biblical Studies Press, LLC: Used by permission
 
New International Version (NIV) - Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide: Used by permission
 
ISBN: 978-1-6642-9608-4 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-6642-9609-1 (hc)
ISBN: 978-1-6642-9610-7 (e)
 
Library of Congress Control Number: 2023905563
 
 
 
WestBow Press rev. date:  05/04/2023
 
In Grateful Me mory
Thanks to
Rev. Dr. Harold Nebelsick, Professor of Christology
Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary,
Louisville, KY,
for inspiring me to try to create this gospel harmony so many years ago.
Thanks also to
Melani Pyke for her permission to use “Jesus heals a blind man”
and
Rev. Dr. Eugene Turner
for his support and encouragement,
and last and especially
Antonia (Tonia) Cupp—my wife—for supporting the labor of love over the years!
CONTENTS
Introduction
 
Chapter 1       The End of the Beginning
Chapter 2       John the Baptizer
Chapter 3       A Time for Decisions
Chapter 4       Capernaum
Chapter 5       The First Mission Tour
Chapter 6       A Time of Training
Chapter 7       The First Trip to Jerusalem
Chapter 8       Galilee
Chapter 9       Teaching on a Mountain
Chapter 10     The Second Feeding of a Multitude
Chapter 11     A View from a Mountain
Chapter 12     Going Back to Jerusalem
Chapter 13     Judean Ministry
Chapter 14     Gathering Storm Clouds
Chapter 15     A Week to Remember
Chapter 16     Friday: Day of Reckoning
Chapter 17     Wisdom Is Known by Her Children
Chapter 18     In the Gathering Darkness
Chapter 19     An Announcement
Chapter 20     The Road to Emmaus: Stay with Us
Chapter 21     Epilogue
 
Endnotes
INTRODUCTION
People have been telling the story of Jesus ever since he was resurrected. The most commonly known tellings of the story are found in the four Gospels we know as Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The first three are known as the synoptic Gospels because they tell the same story in only slightly different ways. However, many others were not accepted as canon for many reasons and, as a result, are largely unknown to most of us.
Tatian, a Christian theologian from Syria who lived a little over a hundred years after Jesus, authored a book entitled The Diatessaron . It was a harmonization, a continuous telling, of the four Gospels and tried to tell the story in a way that smoothed out some of the clear differences among them. For example, he left out the genealogy narratives of Matthew and Luke, he had no nativity story, and he reduced the stories of blind men being healed into one.
Tatian’s writing was so insightful that it served as the text for the Syriac-speaking church from about 170 to 400 CE. It was translated into several languages and seems even to have served as the basis for the Islamic belief about Jesus. We do not have a copy of this work in the original Syriac. Nevertheless, the Christian community of the Middle East used this harmony as a part of its liturgy and teaching until the church set the text of the Gospels.
Since then, many people have written harmonies. The height of such writings was perhaps during the Reformation when such notables as John Calvin and Andreas Osiander wrote their harmonies. Others continued to write up to the beginning of what is known as the higher criticism study era of scripture that began in the mid-1800s. From that point on, the practice was increasingly abandoned because of many difficulties. Writers largely chose to summarize the similarities in a columnar fashion, simply listing the parallels. Others have placed the various texts side by side rather than attempting any sort of narrative.
Even so, a few people have continued to try to write an acceptable harmony. In 1963 Bernard Orchard wrote A Synopsis of the Four Gospels . However, it was in Greek, which made it largely unavailable to the average Bible student. Kurt Aland edited the book in 1984. Before and since then, several people have offered up their best efforts, one of the latest being published in 2007.
In writing any harmony, whose order is best to follow—the Synoptics or John? Or is there another order to follow? How is it organized—according to specific events, or do the holy days serve as turning points in the telling? Is it possible to tell the story in a way that brings together the various texts without changing them significantly? And are these changes defensible or even justified if they are made?
Other questions arise in the reading as well. Did Jesus cleanse the temple at the beginning or the end of his ministry? Elsewhere, did the centurion come directly to Jesus to ask him to heal his servant, or did he send intermediaries? Generally, did Jesus teach in short, memorable parables, or did he use long and sometimes convoluted arguments?
I listened to gospel stories with wonder when I was a little boy. And as I grew older, I wondered, How could a baby born in December die as a grown man on a cross by the end of April? Did he really walk on water? Did he actually heal all those people? What was his message? Was he killed because he was proclaiming peace and love? Was he the message or the messe nger?
Who was or is this guy? I wanted to somehow go back and meet him as if for the very first time. There did not seem to be a way to do it. I went to seminary to learn more and graduated with a Master of Divinity. I began my ministry still in search of answers to my questions.
On Easter morning in 1978, I introduced a harmonization of the Easter story at an early morning worship service. It was well received, and people asked for more. I worked on the text some more, adding Maundy Thursday and Good Friday stories to what I had already written. They too were to become a part of the liturgy.
Over the intervening years, I have slowly added various stories, often in response to what I learned in my studies. The narrative began to take shape. The last elements to be added were completed as I included Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of Holy Week to complete the telling.
While I am not an original Greek scholar, I do know enough Greek to be able to use the tools at my disposal. And when I felt it necessary, I went to the best resources available to look up a variety of words or concepts that would help clarify the story. Generally, I have relied on the scholarship of others, carefully choosing the wording from the New International Bible, the New Revised Standard Version, the Contemporary English Version, and several other quality translations that have become available in recent years. I have woven them into one story. To do that I often cut and pasted the texts together in my order.
As you will discover, I principally use the synoptic Gospels and the primacy of Mark. On occasion, I have woven in portions of John that I feel are consistent with the character of Jesus that is discussed in the Synoptics, especially when the pericope seems to advance either the story or to clarify the overall theme—the kingdom of God.
Jesus’s parents, Mary, and Joseph, named him Yehoshua, which means “God is Savior,” after one of the great heroes of Israel, the successor to Moses and leader of the people of Israel. Joshua led them out of slavery, out of the wilderness, and into a new land and a new future. Jesus’s parents named him as they did, like so many parents before and since, in the hope he would live up to his namesake.
He would be called many things over the years, in many lands and civilizations. Most recently we have called him Jesus. In this telling, I call him Joshua, which is a closer transliteration of his name.
A word is in order as to how Jesus becomes Joshua in the telling of this story. The Gospels we have were primarily written in Greek. Several were also written in Syriac or perhaps Aramaic. For many years, the Catholic Church translated the gospel into Latin. As you can see, this poses the problem of translating one language into another. In some circles, Hebrew was used.
Aramaic is similar to Hebrew, so their respective words looked a