John 20:31 But these are written that
you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing
you may have life in his name.
What do
we believe about Christ? What is the teaching about Him?
Why do
you think the four Gospels were ever written? Surely there can be no hesitation
about answering this question. They were written—God caused men to write them
and guided them through the Spirit as they did so—in order that the truth
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ might be known exactly. All sorts of false
stories were current in the first century. They were apocryphal gospels, and in
them things were being ascribed to Him and He was reported to have done and
said things that had never happened. So the Gospels were written in order to
define the truth, in order to exclude certain falsehoods and give the facts
plainly and clearly.
Luke, in
the introduction to his Gospel, says: (Luke 1:1–4) Many have undertaken to draw
up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they
were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and
servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated
everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly
account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty
of the things you have been taught.
You will
find that John, at the end of his Gospel, virtually says the same thing: John
20:31 But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the
Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
But not
only do the Gospels tell us that—there are also several sections in other parts
of the New Testament that specifically make the same point. Take the first
epistle of John, for example. Why was it written? To counteract the false teaching that was current, the teaching that
denied that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh, that docetism, that false
doctrine.
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