Episode 39: Pick Your Own Story! Resurrection Edition

In today's episode Laurie shares a bewildering experience from her college days, when a Religion Professor (who also happened to be an ordained pastor) spent the semester pointing out spots in the Bible where there are discrepancies in the telling of the same story.  But the bewildering part came when he encouraged his students to "throw out" the Bible as a credible source because of those differences.  WHAAAAT?  

Laurie didn't fall for his tricks, and neither should you.  She spends this episode pointing out the differences in the four gospels in the telling of Jesus's resurrection stories, along with her analysis of those differences.

Laurie welcomes back her guest Josine Young.  Their interesting conversation takes them to some diverse topics.  Here are some links in follow up to the interview:

God's Not Dead (movie)

God's Not Dead (song) 

The Apocrypha

The Passion Plan in Oberammagau

Transcript

0:02

Hi, I'm your host Lori Larson, and this is the year I read the Bible. Welcome a Lifelong Christian. I thought I was familiar with the Bible, but in 2023 I accepted the challenge of reading the whole thing, cover to cover. Whenever I encountered something I didn't understand or wanted to learn more. I jotted it down, but I kept reading to stay on schedule. Then I reached the end Imagine Confetti rating down on me, and a huge sigh of relief. I had 40 topics to research in 2024. I started diving into all those topics. I did research, I wrote blogs and I shared them with whoever might wanna learn too. And in 2025, the project continues. I published a book containing all my essays, and now a podcast. Is there something you can learn from that dusty book that sits on all of our shelves? Yes. Yes, there is. Let's dive into The year I read the Bible. Hello listeners. This is Lori Larson and I am here with you today with a brand new episode of the year. I read the Bible. I call it Pick your Own Story, resurrection Edition. As a college student, I attended a liberal arts school and earned a bachelor of Arts degree. Our curriculum included hours of classes in lots of different subjects, which were intended to make us well-rounded learners, not just in our major field of study, but in a wide variety of topics. One semester. As I was selecting classes for my upcoming term, I needed to fulfill an elective requirement. One of the choices was a basic religion class. The exact name of the course escapes me, but the lessons were all based on the Bible. The professor had previously gone to seminary and had spent decades as a church pastor before transitioning into academia. I was excited to sign up and see what I could learn. Considering the professor's background, I was a bit dismayed when in the first class of the semester he drew our attention to many instances of conflicting information within the pages of the Bible. In other words, how many times the same story is recounted by multiple sources, but results in variances between writers. And here's the dismaying part. He drew the conclusion that if the Bible offers so many inconsistencies within itself, he as a professor is obligated to throw out as invalid, all conflicting biblical material. And since he was teaching our college level course. He was encouraging us to do the same bewildered I walked out of class that day pondering my options. Should I drop the class immediately and try to pick up another elective that fulfilled the requirement? Should I go back with an open mind and see if he would convince me to eliminate the Bible as a valid source for my religion? In the end, I returned to class, learned the material enough to complete the course successfully and stubbornly refused to allow the professor to shake my belief in the sacred word of God. As we've learned the four gospels, each tell stories about the life of Jesus. Some of the stories are repeated across multiple gospels and some only appear in one. The four authors of the gospels all had different backgrounds, education levels, and degree of involvement with Jesus. So it's understandable that each one might remember an event with slightly different details. Does that mean we throw out each story that differs slightly between tellers? No, to me, it means that although the Bible is the word of God, it was written by humans, and therefore it is subject to the different viewpoints, understanding level, and writing skill of the author. Today we're looking at Jesus's resurrection, the singular event in Jesus' life that defines our faith. After all, if Jesus was born. Taught people in his earthly ministry healed the sick and was crucified. End of story. Christianity wouldn't exist these thousands of years later. The current number of Christians worldwide sits at 2.65 billion. With a B billion people, if the resurrection hadn't occurred, that number would be zero. We are Christians because of Jesus's resurrection. He was crucified as the ultimate sacrifice, taking on the sins of the earth to seek redemption from the Father for all of us. But he conquered death. He beat death and rose again, and that's at the center of our faith. Of course, all four gospels tell the resurrection story. I won't quote the four different versions for the sake of time, but here are the locations of each story for you to look up in your own Bible, Matthew 28, 1 through 10. Mark 16, one through eight, Luke 24, 1 through 10, and John 21 through 18. But they're all slightly different. Let's take a look at the differences. My big thanks goes to Coley Clay's article, comparing the gospel accounts of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. For the help all list, the specific area of inconsistency, and then list what each gospel says on that topic. First of all. The time of day, Matthew said it was at dawn on the first day of the week. Mark said very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise. Luke, very early on the first day of the week, John, early on the first day of the week, still dark. My analysis all pretty consistent with minuscule differences in the way the author describes the time. Next who went to the tomb? Matthew said it was Mary Magdalene and the other Mary Mark said it was Mary Magdalene. Mary James's mother, who was also Jesus' mother and Slo Luke. The women and John said it was Mary. My analysis, Mary Magdalene's name was common between all four gospels. So we know that she was one of the first to go to the tomb. Also, we know from gospel accounts of the crucifixion that Mary was there at the foot of the cross, never leaving Jesus throughout the horrible ordeal. We know she was a common traveler with Jesus and the 12 as they preached, we know Jesus saved her from demon possession. That's how they first met. So she was extremely devoted to him. So it's logical that she would want to dress his body with oils to preserve it in the tomb. Remember that he died on Friday and Saturday is a Jewish day of rest, the Sabbath, so they would not have been allowed to dress the body for burial on Saturday. Sunday was the first day to do that kind of work under Jewish law. What's also clear is that none of the gospel writers were present, so they were writing this part of the story based on what they heard later. They didn't necessarily document every attendee of the tomb that morning because they didn't witness it firsthand, and it wasn't as important as what the women discovered the empty tomb. The next topic is events that occurred, the supernatural events that occurred during the time of Jesus's crucifixion and resurrection, Matthew said there was a violent earthquake. An angel speaks to them and the women meet Jesus. Mark said women bought spices. Angel speaks to them. Women fled the tomb, but said nothing. Luke reported that the women take spices to the tomb. Two angels appear. The angel speaks to them and told the disciples what they found. John reported that Mary Magdalene ran to get Simon Peter. Simon Peter and John went to the tomb. The disciples left and Jesus appears to marry my analysis. Although there are some differences between the telling of the same event, I don't see any conflicting information between the four. Obviously it was a supernatural event with lots going on, and again, none of them were eyewitnesses. They heard Mary's excited report and made their own opinions as to the most important information to document. This could be attributed to the viewpoint of each author focusing on the one detail that most spoke to him. It will be different by author as I witness any time we do writing prompt exercises. In my writing groups, the leader reads a short prompt and we're given five minutes to write wherever our imagination leads us. The exercise always leads to a wide variety of results. Salts, another topic is the angels. Matthew said one angel came down from heaven whose appearance was like lightning and his clothes were white as snow mark reported, a young man dressed in white robes was sitting on the right side. Luke said two men appeared in clothes that gleaned like lightning stood beside them, and John said, two angels in white seated where Jesus' body had been. One at the head, the other at the foot. My analysis. If we look at the common factors among all four gospels on this topic, we know that at least one angel was present, that he looked like a young man, that he was dressed in white and his appearance gleamed like lightning. Why did two of the gospel writers include a second angel? Here's what author Coley Clay has to say quote. It is likely that one angel was designated to speak to the group of women despite there being two present at the time. Matthew and Mark May have known there were two, but it was unnecessary to talk about the second. As the second angel never spoke to the women, they simply say one spoke, which does not discount the fact that there could very well be two angels. In the tomb. And the last topic we're going to explore about the differences between the gospels is what Jesus says, his words in Matthew. He says, greetings, do not be afraid. Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee. There they will see me. And in John woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for? Mary, do not hold on to me for I have not yet returned to the Father. I am returning to my father and your Father. To my God and your God, my analysis, again, I can attribute this to writer's viewpoints. What is similar among both these sets of dialogue from Jesus is his kindness, his desire to calm and comfort the women, to explain and teach what is happening and what will happen next. So with all these differences, what is the same? I'll give Coli, clay the final word. It is safe to say that the four accounts of the resurrection of Jesus Christ agree on all the main and important points. It is because of this that we can trust in the truth of the resurrection for there are no contradictions in the fundamental truths of this occurrence. The variations can be explained away simply by the author's impression of what was witnessed that day. There are far more similarities between the four accounts than first appear on the surface, and for this we can be truly grateful. It is because of these similarities that we can find and know the truth of what happened to Jesus Christ during that time end. What do you think? Do the slight differences in the telling of this amazing story make you doubt the event itself? Or do you accept by faith that they're all true though slightly different descriptions of this key element of Christianity? And now let's pray. Dear Jesus, thank you for going to the cross for us and an immense thank you for not allowing death to stop you. We adore you, the risen Christ who conquered death to save us from the sins of the world. Help us every day to remember your teachings and to live our lives in a way that would make you proud. Amen. And now stay tuned for an interview with a good friend of mine as we unpack this particular topic.

Laurie 15:25

Welcome back, listener. I am so excited to reintroduce my friend Josse. She was on the podcast with me back on March 10th when we did Peter's denial. And here she is again for this episode on Pick Your Own Story, resurrection edition. Welcome back, Joss.

Josine 15:45

It's great to be here. Thank you so much.

Laurie 15:48

I started out the essay with my experience from when I was in college and I had to pick an elective and I picked a religion class, just a basic, I don't know, religion 1 0 1 probably. imagine my surprise when the professor who was a pastor or who had been, basically tried to convince me that the Bible wasn't real or wasn't true or wasn't accurate. Have you ever had anyone tell you that or any experience that was similar to that and how did you handle it?

Josine 16:22

Well, I remember that in your and I thought, wow, I, that's really interesting what you had experienced. And I didn't personally experience something like that. I went to a Christian college every course was centered around Jesus, everything. So there was no denying any accuracy of, or any. But I do remember, I dunno if you've seen the movie, and if you haven't, we could watch it together. God's Not Dead. Did you ever?

Laurie 16:49

I've heard of it, but I don't think I've seen it.

Josine 16:53

and atheist professor, he was impossible to deal with. You know, I felt so bad for his students'cause he was trying to change their minds into not believing that God even existed or that Jesus was the Messiah. Until

Laurie 17:07

Yeah.

Josine 17:08

and he gave his life to Jesus at the end. It was a miracle. It was just awesome.

Laurie 17:13

Oh

Josine 17:13

to watch

Laurie 17:14

wow,

Josine 17:15

We'll watch that.

Laurie 17:16

okay. I wrote it down. God's not dead.

Josine 17:18

And there's also a song too, by the news boys. On the Christian Radio. God's not Dead. He's surely alive.

Laurie 17:24

Yeah, we definitely will listen to that. But yeah, it kind of shocked me. This was not like a full-time professor at our college. I think he was adjunct, and I believe he still was preaching. He still had a church that he was responsible for. So I wonder what God was doing in his heart or speaking to him to share with a bunch of. Impressionable, I guess you are fairly impressionable during college. I mean, you're learning and you're searching, that, the Bible is not an accurate book, because of the differences between the gospels. So, yeah, I don't know how he could, sleep at night knowing he was teaching us that.

Josine 18:03

trying to put doubt in your minds and for some reason Godly knows the answers to that.

Laurie 18:09

Yes. If I remembered his name, I should look him up. See whatever happened to him. In the essay I talk about the resurrection, not in a lot of detail, mainly focused, like I said, on how the resurrection story, which is described in all four gospels, the slight differences between the four, but in general, I know it's a big question, but what does Jesus' resurrection mean to you?

Josine 18:37

That's a big question. What does a resurrection mean to me? It means to me that God is fulfilling his promise. he came here, he died for us to open the gates of heaven for us and. He came back. it's just mind blowing.

Laurie 18:52

If Jesus wasn't resurrected, there would be no Christian faith. Now if, if all that happened was back. In, Jesus's timeframe of, 30 ad if there was a man who walked around, preached the gospel, did miracles tried to teach people about God, got crucified and then the story ended. we probably wouldn't even be talking about him now. The resurrection was absolutely necessary for God's plan to come to fruition. And as we learned back at the very beginning of this whole, the year I read the Bible podcast experience, the Holy Trinity was in place before creation even began. So. The father, the son, and the Holy Spirit made this amazing plan and then waited, for the right time for Jesus to come to Earth and do his ministry, get crucified and, resurrected in order to save everyone that believed in him. So it's. Massive story. And of course it's not over yet'cause there's still revelation to come. Right? The book of Revelation is talking about the future, which hasn't happened yet. It's pretty amazing.

Josine 20:13

It is.

Laurie 20:15

So Mary Magdalene was consistently documented by all four gospels to be the first person, or among the first to go to Jesus's tomb and discover it empty. Tell us your thoughts about Mary Magdalene, not just at Jesus's resurrection, but throughout the gospels.

Josine 20:36

throughout the gospels, Mary, much like Martha Sister Mary. at the foot of Jesus. I mean, she was the first female apostle. She was a disciple. She was a disciple of Christ.

Laurie 20:47

Absolutely.

Josine 20:48

And she also like Peter she was there, but then she couldn't do what, she was just too much going on in her life. She didn't feel worthy. She's like us. We're like her. it, it didn't surprise me at all that she'd be there. That early Sunday morning to see, to pray there and to bring, more perfume for him and, yeah.

Laurie 21:14

the one thing I wanted to bring up about the fact that the empty tomb was presented. By angels to Women. First of all, the women were the first ones to receive the message that Jesus had left the tomb. He was risen. And let's just talk for about that for a moment, because at the time. Women did not have a full place in society like they do now. Men held all the leadership roles in the family, in business, in ministry. Women were there to support and, of course to have the children and to raise the children and to cook and to do all that stuff. But the fact that God chose the women to reveal his plan two, what do you think about that?

Josine 22:02

it's, not the first time, of course, we saw the woman at the well. And that conversation, and he told her to go tell everybody, spread the word. I'm here. It's just amazing. He had such a deep love and respect for his mother he, he had a special place in his heart for women, whether they were second class citizens of that time, but he, you know,

Laurie 22:24

Yeah,

Josine 22:25

her in her faith,

Laurie 22:26

The women, were bringing the, oils they were going to, treat the body. The. Body of Jesus was put in the tomb late, on Friday, but because it was Sabbath on Saturday, they were not allowed to do any work, but. They came back first thing Sunday morning because they wanted to serve. They wanted to work. They wanted to do what needed to be done. So consistent with women, right? We're always thinking That's right. We're always thinking of the details, what needs to be done in order to accomplish this. We're the ones who do the cooking. We're the ones who do the cleaning. That's so consistent, even today of, women's role, is to take care of all the details.

Josine 23:14

And then you could also just picture Peter and John pushing past the women. Get outta my way. I wanna go in there first.

Laurie 23:21

That's right. Or James and John, the, sons of Thunder.

Josine 23:25

Yes.

Laurie 23:25

Yeah.

Josine 23:27

And they still didn't understand. That's the funny thing, like where'd he go? His clothes are here, but he is not here.

Laurie 23:33

Yeah. So, going back to the, point of this essay, which was each gospel writer reporting on the same event have slightly different stories. What does that mean to you? Does that mean that we can't believe what's documented in God's word? Or do you just accept by faith that they're all true? Those slightly different? Descriptions of this, key element of Christianity.

Josine 24:02

I think all the gospel writers wrote. Their version to people who heard it a certain way, like Matthew was just cut and dry. Luke, I love Luke's version because he was very descriptive and you could just picture everything, even though he wasn't a follower of Jesus, so I think. those writers. By faith, that's it. Everything is factual. I believe in everything, but I think the gospel writers wrote it to, to people how they learned, how they would understand in their own words.

Laurie 24:36

Yeah. Matthew being a mathematician, I mean, he was a tax collector. He's probably more comfortable with numbers than words, so he's like you said, kind of straight to the point, just the facts, ma'am. You know, Luke being a, well, he's a doctor, but. He was educated, he was more broadly educated than some of the others. He is probably, much more comfortable with, the written word and descriptions. I mentioned in the essay about in my writers groups, sometimes we'll do a writing prompt and, you pull something out of a pile and you say, okay, write about, X, Y, and Z and you've got five minutes and everybody starts writing and. None of'em are the same. They're always different because every single writer brings something unique. They bring their own perspective. And to me, that's okay. I disagree with my college professor. That doesn't mean that none of it's true. And you can't depend on it. It means that it's all true. And, we can depend on all of it. So, I'm gonna throw this one at you. This was a unscripted question. There were other books that were written at the time that were submitted, I guess you would say, to be included in, the New Testament that were not chosen. And I'm not exactly sure of. Who was responsible for those decisions or when? We have them now. I have a book called, The Apocrypha, that it's all the books that were submitted to be a part of the Bible that weren't selected. And I believe there's a reason. Why they weren't selected, and I think God was at the heart of it. I mean, humans wrote the Bible, but I think that it's God's inspiration that came up with the final Bible. Do you have any input into that? Are you familiar with that at all?

Josine 26:34

know. There's definitely other, there's the gospel according to, Mary Magdalene. I mean,

Laurie 26:39

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Josine 26:41

Even Judas, I mean, wouldn't we love to know what he was going through? Yeah, definitely. But

Laurie 26:46

Yeah.

Josine 26:47

we had the,

Laurie 26:47

Yep.

Josine 26:48

gospels, divine words from God and that's what's in the Bible. Yeah. So that's what he wants us to go away with.

Laurie 26:55

That's right. And we'll just trust him. Is there anything else that you'd like to talk about before we wrap it up? Josephine?

Josine 27:03

This is so funny. John and I are married almost 45 years and two weeks before.

Laurie 27:08

Congratulations

Josine 27:09

And two weeks before we got married, we were in the first annual. Passion play. It depicted the last week of Jesus' life on Earth. And I played Mary Magdalene and I sang to Jesus, I Don't Know How to Love Him, which was a popular tune back in 1981.

Laurie 27:27

from Godspell. Yes. Wow. I've seen God's bill and I've seen Jesus Christ superstar, but I have never seen the passion play,

Josine 27:39

It's awesome. Our kids grew up being part of that, having that, in their system, going to Catholic school, they had a lot of Jesus, But, it

Laurie 27:46

Yeah.

Josine 27:47

It was like, you

Laurie 27:48

Well.

Josine 27:49

of the Bible came to life, you know, so.

Laurie 27:52

The city I grew up in had an annual passion play. It was called the Consistory. It was a big theater, that they put it on every year, but for some reason we never went. I wish I had,

Josine 28:04

one day we go to Germany'cause they put that on every 10 years. We'll look into

Laurie 28:09

yes. Well, it's funny you should say that because this past summer I took my first Viking cruise through France, and it was my uncle, my two cousins and my husband's cousin. The five of us traveled together and we had so much fun. And at our last supper before we went home, I said, so would you guys ever wanna do this again? And my two cousins said, we wanna go, is it Omer Gau? Or

Josine 28:39

like that.

Laurie 28:40

something like that. That cruise will be offered the year that they're doing the passion play again. And I don't know if they're already pre-registered or whatever, to go I would like, is it where the passion play started? Is that why it's so?

Josine 28:54

They had a plague and everybody around them died except for this town who would dedicate their lives to putting on this passion plague for Jesus. And they do it every 10 years because the whole town included. It's like a weekend long thing. It's just amazing.

Laurie 29:12

Well, we're gonna have to look into that.'cause that's quite a way to travel. It's a Viking riverboat.

Josine 29:17

definitely.

Laurie 29:20

All right. Well listen, I know that you are doing this interview from a vacation spot, so I wanna thank you for taking a few minutes away from your, although chilly, but sunny vacation to talk to me. But I really, really appreciate your, concepts, your thoughts, your inspiration, and also your dedication to get this done.

Josine 29:43

you so much. I really appreciate it and I feel so blessed that you asked me to be part of this.

Laurie 29:48

Thank you, Josephine. Well, I look forward to when you come home and we'll see each other in person then. Take care.

30:03

​and that's it for today. Thank you very much for being here with me on the year I read the Bible Podcast. We'll be back with another episode next week. If you enjoy this podcast, please do all the normal things to spread the word like it. Review it, share it with your friends. If you are interested in additional the year, I read the Bible resources such as the book, the video channel, and the blog, I will certainly include the links in the show notes, and I'd love to hear about your own journey to read the Bible cover to cover. Have you done it or are you doing it right now? Please reach out to me and let me know how it's going. Until next time, it's Lori Larson with the year I read the Bible. Bye.