John

The gospel of John is a gospel that basically stands alone in giving its account. Luke, Matthew, and Mark are all considered to be the Synoptic gospels.  John starts out by presenting Christ as the Word of God.  He then goes on to tell of how the Word became flesh and dwelt among the people as Christ came down from heaven and took the form of a human and lived as a human for thirty three years.  John gives the best account of how John the Baptist had many people following him thinking he was the Messiah and also the account that John rejected such teaching and acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah.  The Gospel of John contains the first miracle of Jesus in which he changes the water into wine.  It contains the account of a Sanhedrin Nicodemus asking Jesus questions which led to salvation in Christianity being referred to as the "born again experience."  John tells of how Jesus gave water to a Samaritan woman.  John frequently uses the terms light and darkness.  John contains a few miracles as well.  It presents Jesus as the bread of life.  The word used here is matzah which refers to a Jewish bread with stripes on it, believed by conservative theologians to be symbolic of the stripes of blood Christ bore on the cross.  It also contains the account of how many disciples desert Jesus.  It tells of how jesus goes and teaches at the Feast of Tabernacles.  John contains several miracles that er not mentioned in the Synoptics.  It also contains an account with Jesus and a woman caught in adultery.  it presents the most brutal confrontations of Jesus with the Pharisees as it gives the account of how he told them that their Father is the Devil.  Jesus does the most controversial of all things he did in chapter 8 by referring to himself as I am(Yahweh).  It also presents Jesus as the shepherd of the flock of sheep and that he watches after his sheep.  In chapter 11, it uses the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead as a reference to Jesus as the resurrection and the life.  It devotes the most time to the events leading up to the trial crucifixion and resurrection of Christ and also presents the most detailed depiciton of the betrayal of Judas.  It gives an account of how Jesus washed the disciple's feet.  It also gives the account of how he promises to return for us after he has prepared a place for us.  Jesus refers to himself as the Vine and his followers as the branches.  He talks about how the disciples will be hated by the world but that they should keep going in spite of that.  It also contains the account of the prayer of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemene write before he is arrested.  It then gives the account of Jesus before the high priests and the account of Peter's denial of Jesus.  Then it goes into the crucifixion and the resurrection.  After the resurrection, Jesus confronts Peter because of his denail.  Jesus asks Peter does he love him unconditionally.  In the Greek, Peter says I love you but only in the general sense of the term.  This hapens twice, and then Jesus asks Peter if he loves him in the general sense of the term and Peter weeps.  Jesus tells Peter to feed his lambs which refers to the believers.  He then predicts that Peter will die a glorious death.  It also gives the account of Jesus' appearance to Thomas.  Thomas is iften noted for doubting Christ and often blasted.  However, it is better to look at Thomas as one who wanted to make sure of the matter at hand and needed logic to do such.  In a time when many people were rising up and claiming to be the Messiah, Thomas wanted to make sure that Jesus truly was the Messiah.  One thing that has not been discussed in the gospels is why Judas betrayed Jesus.Judas was the most religious of all the disciples. He knew that Jesus was the Messiah but like the other Jews of that die, he wanted the Messiah to be a conquering king.  Yet Jesus said that he did not come to fight the power of Rome but to fight the power of sin.  Judas then gets abgry and decides to start a revolt by turning Christ in.  Yet it all backfired and the world of Judas crumbled before him all because he was enmeshed in the religious tradition about Christ.  Thus, he committed suicide.  John is the best gospel to recommend to the general public to let them know that Jesus offers the gift of eternal life.