Luke 5 tells the amazing story of Jesus in his early days of ministry, giving Simon Peter and his cohort of fishermen a miraculous catch of fish. So many that, when the crews of two fishing boats tried to haul them in together, both boats began to sink! And this after a whole night of fishing where they had caught nothing.
It was in this moment that Simon Peter, in awe, fell at Jesus’ feet and worshiped for the first time. And, it seems, Peter saw the depth of his own sinful state in that same moment, because he also begged Jesus to get away from him.
But Jesus didn’t go away. Instead, He pressed in, telling Simon Peter, along with John and the others, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
So these fishermen lay down their nets for good. They abandoned their livelihood, their family businesses — even walking away from fathers — to follow Jesus.
In light of what just happened, their choice is unsurprising. A miracle like this would shake anyone to the core and give rise to an immediate re-ordering of priorities and way of life.
However, this story isn’t told exactly the same by the other gospel writers.
Matthew and Mark don’t even mention this miraculous catch of fish; they only report Jesus showing up on the shores of Galilee, telling the fishermen to follow him, and that they do. John doesn’t mention this episode at all. This easily raises doubts about the divine inspiration of Scripture in those who assume that divine inspiration is incompatible with discrepancies in the four gospel witnesses to Jesus’ life and ministry.
As a new student of Scripture, discrepancies like this gave me pause. But after a few decades of absorbing the Bible and observing how the Spirit works through people, I am convinced that discrepancies are actually evidence of God’s amazing partnership with man.
God chose to enfold us into His plan and work, in spite of our limitations and flaws.
Consider these these things with me:
Every author whose writings made it into the Canon of Scripture were humans like you and I; filled with the Holy Spirit, yet imperfect. These firstfruits Spirit-filled Christians lived in the most amazing, mind-bending time in history. They grew up with just another guy from Nazareth, who suddenly walked away from his carpenter shop, declared He was the Son of God, then spent a few years doing miracles and demonstrating his power over every kind of evil and sickness. The religious leaders then insisted the Roman government kill him. They whip and beat him until he is hardly recognizable and crucified him. Three days later Jesus returns near his empty tomb with a new body bearing five scars from the crucifixion.
His disciples, even seeing him in his raised body, struggled to grasp this new reality. After appearing to them a few times to confirm his resurrection, he came to them in a very personal, familiar way just before He returned to heaven for good.
After another night of catching zero fish, the discouraged and still a bit bumfuzzled fisherman heard a guy calling them from shore: “Friends, haven’t you any fish?” No, they answered. As John tells the story in his gospel version in John 21, the man on shore then told them to throw their net on the right side of the boat to find some fish. “When they did,” John 21:6 says, “they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.”
Recognition is swift! They’ve seen this before. John shouts to Peter, “It is the Lord!” The excited fishermen quickly get their boat to shore, to find Jesus already cooking fish over a charcoal fire for them. He invites them to add some of their catch, then shares a meal of bread and fish with them on the beach. Afterwards Jesus instructed them to feed his sheep, and to continue to follow him. He then returned to heaven, and did not appear to them again.
Shortly after, just as Jesus promised, the Father released the Holy Spirit upon them all. They went forth to minister as Jesus had taught them, demonstrating the same power and authority over evil.
John’s gospel story of this amazing catch of fish isn’t repeated in any of the other gospels. But taking all four gospels together as a record of Jesus’ time with them, it is clear that this event, on his last earth day with them, was a perfect bookend to go with the miracle of fish that inspired them to follow Jesus that first day. God knows how to do stuff. How to create touch points in your soul to help you recognize when its Him, and not merely some random person standing on a beach grilling fish.
As he signs off his gospel account, John says:
Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.
John 21:25
Clearly, the options for how to tell the story of Jesus’ life and ministry were huge.
Besides that, they didn’t record their stories right away. For many years these witnesses went about their work expecting Jesus to return any day to complete the establishing of His Kingdom on earth. Some thirty years later, these aging disciples realize they should record what they experienced and witnessed for the next generation.
If they hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t have the amazing body of work we have today in Scripture, the stories of Jesus’ work and teachings. We should treasure it all, not pick it apart or find reason to doubt.
These came to us from the memories of men. They were not written down perfectly. They didn’t get together, apparently, and agree on their stories, which adds even more authenticity. Memories are subjective things, to be sure. Each Gospel witness emphasized different things about Jesus’ life and work, sharing personal viewpoints and writing for the audience they assumed would come. Which meant, in all likelihood, none of them envisioned an audience like us.
The Gospel stories don’t match, but together, they tell the story God wants you to know.
Like an artist who blends two or three colors for just the right shade for to use in a painting, God has painted us a beautiful and true portrait of Jesus’ life. He did it through imperfect men, knowingly entrusting imperfect people with this crucial task. Together with the indwelling Spirit He sent, we have all the proof we need of His plan to partner with us in His kingdom building work on the earth.
Therefore, seeing the work of those who went before us, we need not shrink back from our own calling and passions and work for Him, for fear of not doing it right. Especially if we see ourselves as part of the team, the family who works together.
We need one another. We need to hear and honor the various ways other disciples express their witness to Jesus, and cheer them on, even while staying true to what the Spirit stirs personally in us.
Being part of a team is great news. if we don’t get our part perfectly right, God will use the work of someone else in the kingdom to make it more perfect. And your contribution is undoubtedly doing the same for others.
The Canon of Scripture ended up just right
The fact that we have four gospels, four witnesses to Jesus’ life that live side-by-side in our Bibles, is God’s final word: He isn’t afraid to entrust His work to the best efforts of His imperfect servants.
To say that the Word of God is divinely inspired is not to say God dictated every word, but that taken together, the Spirit, working within flawed men, succeeded in telling the truth about God. That truth is consistent from cover to cover in your Bible. It reveals God’s heart, His values, His plans.
All of which YOU are woven into, together with the rest of His creation. God’s creation is the result of His heart’s desire. His values are unchanging and meant to sustain your life. His plans don’t depend on perfection, but they do depend on a perfect (i.e., complete, wholehearted) partnership of you and Him together. The fact that your Bible is full of words, numbers, and stories that don’t match in exact perfection is evidence that God is willing — even committed — to work with His people, take their best efforts, and proudly present that jointly created work together to the world.
God is an artist.
God the artist created you. God the artist created a work we call the Word of God. If you go to a museum to view the beautiful creation of any artist, you could not take it in by standing two inches from the painting with a magnifying glass. If you did, you’d come face-to-face with the amazing little choices the artist made with every stroke, mixing colors, choosing brush sizes, methods of applying paint strokes on the canvas. While that would cause you to marvel at the artist, it also would enable you to detect some some imperfections up close. In the end, if you didn’t stand back and take in the work of art as a whole, you would miss the purpose of the artist.
Your Bible is the Word of God. Don’t pick it apart. Never doubt that it is divinely inspired — by God revealing Himself to men — knowing He would have to work through their flaws and filters. Don’t forget to marvel that someone like you dared to record what they saw, or heard God whisper. If this crowd of witnesses hadn’t gotten over themselves enough to risk sharing, we wouldn’t have God’s revelation of Himself and His kingdom in the Bible. His imperfect, yet perfectly inspired work. Just like you.
God imprinted His perfect image on imperfect you, too. The canon of Scripture is closed, and cannot be altered. But you, child of God, can be perfected day by day as you walk with the Spirit of Christ.
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