Reading the Gospels Together The Storyline of John’s Gospel – Part 3 Having begun with his bold theological claim that Jesus is the God-man, John now proceeds to introduce his readers to John, who the other gospel writers know as John the baptist. John indeed does baptize in John’s gospel but he is pictured more as John the witness who first reveals who Jesus is. Mark, Matthew and Luke had all understood John as Elijah who was to come to prepare the way for the coming Messiah. John; however, clearly states that John is not Elijah. Nor is John the Messiah, nor the prophet like Moses which is really another way of talking about the Messiah. John bears witness to Jesus and tells his followers and thus the readers of John’s gospel that Jesus is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. John also witnesses that he saw the Spirit descend and remain upon Jesus, but the gospel writer John does not tell his readers that John baptized Jesus. If we only had the gospel of John we would likely conclude that John did not baptize Jesus. Like Matthew and Luke, John has a lot more material about John the baptist than Mark did – in fact much more than Matthew and Luke. John the baptist plays a significant role throughout the beginning of John’s gospel. In their own way each of the gospel writers have dealt with the call of Jesus’ disciples. John is unique in that he tells his readers that at least a couple of Jesus’ disciples were first disciples of John the baptist. The first two disciples to be called are Andrew and an un-named disciple, likely the one who will become known and the “beloved disciple.” Andrew then calls his brother Simon, who Jesus calls Peter, to follow and so there are three. All of this action takes place at the Jordan River, to the east of Jerusalem. John now tells his readers that Jesus decides to go to Galilee and there he finds two more disciples. First he finds Philip and then Nathaniel. Philip is from Bethsaida, the hometown of Peter and Andrew. Only John names Nathaniel as a disciple. The movement of location from Judea to Galilee is important in John’s storyline and matches the storyline of Mark and the others to this point. John has not mentioned anything about the arrest of John the baptist though. For Mark, Matthew, and Luke the arrest of John happened just before Jesus first went to Galilee. Once he is in Galilee John tells his readers that Jesus and his disciples, presumably the five, go to a wedding at Cana in Galilee. Only John mentions the town of Cana. While at Cana, John introduces his readers to Jesus’ mother, Mary. Mary will not appear again in John’s story until the crucifixion and here it seems there is at least some measure of tension between Jesus and Mary. The host of the wedding has run out of wine so Mary goes and tells Jesus. Was she expecting him to do something about the need? John does not specify, but Jesus response to Mary is that his “hour” has not yet come. We will learn that the “hour” Jesus is speaking about is his death. This is another part of John use of symbolism. Why responding to the need for wine should lead to Jesus’ death is peculiar. But, even though Jesus first seems to rebuff Mary and refuse to help, he goes on to change water into wine. One of the things we will notice about John’s storyline is that often Jesus refuses at first and then does what he was asked to do. John tells his readers that this was the first sign that Jesus did and that his disciples believed in him. John will speak of seven signs – again symbolism is involved.