1. The 5th Gospel

Sep 12, 2026

You're familiar with the four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

There's a 5th Gospel. Not a newly found ancient manuscript or what's often called a "lost Gospel." This one's not lost. This one everyone knows. Just not by that name. And it's hiding in plain sight. This study session will explain.

The 5th Gospel

Yes, a 5th Gospel. And without realizing it, most Christians prefer it over the four. We take something from one, add details from another and another. And we construct a conflated 5th Gospel.

And we do this without regard to the distinctive messages of each one.

It's like putting you in a room with three other people and saying to each, "Tell your own story … Oh, but wait! You're not allowed to talk unless the other three comment on everything you say. This way, we'll get the real story."

You wouldn't like that. No one would.

The Gospels are treated just this way. Yes, the individual pieces come from the Gospels, but in bits and pieces. The resulting message does not come from any one of them.

And so, we end up telling a story that no Gospel writer tells. We call it "harmonizing" the Gospels, and we say that it's not only good, but necessary.

In actual practice it ends up as simple conflation—we mash them like potatoes into one new lump. And we prefer that version over the four.

Caught in the Act

The story of the Transfiguration is a good example. We pull the dazzling clothing from Mark, add Matthew’s shining face, include Luke’s sleeping disciples and conversation about Jesus’ “exodus,” and then pry John’s larger theology of glory from a Gospel that never even tells the Transfiguration story. We mash all these pieces together and call it “the Transfiguration.” But it's our construction. And we tell ourselves, "Here's the full story—the real story."

We do this because we've been taught to do it.
We're told things like:
"What one Gospel says the others must mean."
Or "They're like four scattered witnesses to a car wreck."[1]
We're told that we're supposed (i.e., intended) to combine them to see the full story—the real story.

I heard a sermon on the Gospels quite recently from a preacher in a large church in central Indiana. The speaker was quite pointed: "The Gospels simply must be read by letting one fill in the blanks of the other." He then went on to mash one Gospel into the next, without any consideration whatsoever for what one or the other Gospel was up to, or whether it made any difference.

Unfortunately today, this is the most common approach to the Gospels.

I like listening to Alistair Begg. But I recently heard his sermon on the Transfiguration in Mark 9, and he makes this offhand remark:

Incidentally you will find this passage, the parallel passage, in Matthew 17 and also in Luke chapter 9, and if this morning I appear to say something which is not in your text as you look down at it then that is probably because the reference that I'm making is either to the Matthew passage or to the Luke passage and you can check up on me either now or later on. [2]

I was disappointed. And I just can't express enough just how unfortunate and backwards this is.

Theological Thinking

Now, I'm not suggesting that it is illegitimate, at some point along the way, to compare how the Gospels tell their stories—to notice both the similarities and the differences, and the reasons why those occur. Actually, that can be a very useful, insightful, and rewarding exercise. Once we know each one intimately, then, at that point, we can invite all of them around the table for a responsible and respectful group conversation.

Indeed, all legitimate and healthy theological thinking across the Gospels will flow out of a respectful reading of each Gospel in its coming down to us—its origins in remembered and transmitted Jesus traditions, its relationship to other Gospel traditions and texts, its recoverable manuscript forms and textual history, and even its interpretive journey.

The Gospels Are Not Potatoes

But comparing is one thing; conflating is another. The Gospels are not potatoes. If by harmonizing we end up meaning obliterating the distinctions between them in our rush towards our own 5th Gospel, then without knowing it, we actually end up destroying the individual messages of the four.

Because this 5th Gospel has become so familiar and is so pervasive among Christian teachers, reading one Gospel for its own sake might be considered an OK thing to do. But it's also seen as only part of the story—an incomplete telling of the real story.

So, even when reading through a single Gospel, we can't help ourselves from dragging in "more details" from the other Gospels. Again, it is one thing to compare, another to conflate.

As a result, for many, reading only one Gospel at a time and allowing each Gospel to stand on its own two feet—to speak for itself—initially feels strange, or unnecessary, or even not telling the whole story.

But what we don't seem to care too much about is this: Each Gospel has its own story to tell, and each one tells that story in particular ways for specific reasons. And when we only read them entangled one with the other, as if bound by hay-baling twine, we not only can interfere with, we can override their distinctive voices.

A Bible Study Challenge

This series of ten (10) posts is intended to be supportive and restorative of Christians and the most fundamental of Christian principles—how we read and apply the Gospels. But to do that, it will also go against much popular Christian grain. It will challenge a common approach and become an advocate for reading one Gospel at a time, allowing each Gospel to stand on its own two feet—before they are compared one with the other.

It will challenge today’s conflated 5th Gospel in ten total sessions—this being the first, each building on the one prior. It will explain why the distinctive voices of Mark, Matthew, Luke–Acts, and John must first be heard on their own terms. We'll take this one step at a time.

And so, allow me to get even more direct and more personal, here. I'm inviting you to try something—a Bible study challenge. Pray about it, and then make a decision: For just nine (9) more weeks, give yourself to consider with me how we read the Gospels.

Why Accept This Challenge?

Why decide to take this path? Well for one thing, maybe you've never tried this before. So, if you haven't, it can be a new experience.

But even more importantly, when we bring in outside "details" from someone else's story—realize it or not, this can actually interfere with, undermine, mask, or even dilute the story of whatever Gospel we're reading.

On the other hand, when we allow each Gospel to speak in its own distinctive voice,

We can show ultimate respect for each Gospel writer.
We have a chance to see that each writer had a unique perspective—a singular story to tell.
We can hear familiar Gospel stories in a new light.
We begin to discover elements to each story we may never have noticed.
We can discover dimensions of the greatest story ever told that the conflated 5th Gospel has hidden from us.

When we stop mashing the four Gospels into one lump, we begin to hear the heartbeat of each one. And that brings us one heartbeat closer to getting more from Bible study.

https://www.biblicalconversation.com/more

Questions to Consider

When you picture a familiar Gospel story, how much of what you “remember” actually comes from one Gospel—and how much comes from several Gospels mashed together?
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If no Gospel writer tells the complete story we construct by harmonizing them, why are we so confident that our combined version is the “real” story?
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What might we be missing when we bring details from Matthew, Luke, or John into Mark before we have allowed Mark to speak for himself?
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Are you willing, for the rest of this series, to resist filling in the blanks and let each Gospel stand on its own two feet before comparing it with the others?
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Next Week

2. "From Sacred Stories to Gospel Texts"
How did remembered stories about Jesus become the distinctive written Gospels we now have?

Series Note

This is Study Session #1 of the free, online, nine-session Bible study series: Beyond the 5th Gospel. It is best to begin here and follow the entire study in the proper order, on a week-by-week schedule.

Because this is copyrighted material intended for personal or goup study, you are granted the right to freely use this material in Bible classes, small groups, private study, or similar settings—as long as you keep the material intact and unchanged, including this series note.

If you have come to this study session out of sequence, please go here for the beginning of the series:
https://www.biblicalconversation.com/blog/5th-gospel-prelude

Go here for all available PDF downloads:
https://www.biblicalconversation.com/studiesbc#section-1788376027032

Thank you.
Gary D. Collier