We have access to some amazing resources meant to help us better understand the Bible. From commentaries to lexicons to systematic theologies, we of all people are most blessed. One especially helpful resource that will help devotional Bible readers as much as pastors or theologians is a harmonized narrative of the life of Jesus. God could have given us just one account of the life of his Son, but in his wisdom he saw fit to give us four. And while Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all write biographies of the same individual, they all write in different voices, at different times, for different audiences, and for different purposes. They sometimes provide overlapping information and sometimes provide information unique to them. Sometimes they overlap in content but not in perspective or detail. It can all become a little confusing to know how all the parts fit together logically and chronologically. Many years ago Lorraine Boettner assembled a harmony of the four gospels. He took the words of the gospels and arranged them chronologically as a single narrative, removing any repetition (which means that his book is only about three-quarters the length of the source material). P&R has just re-released this as The Gospel of Jesus, a beautifully-crafted and well-formatted hardcover book. This new edition changes the Bible translation from the outdated ASV to the contemporary Christian Standard Bible, a highly-regarded translation that employs “optimal equivalence” to describe its commitment to maintaining the form of the original language while still conveying its meaning in a way … Continue reading The Gospel of Jesus