Luke 2:1-20
Wrapped and laid in a manger
A census, a town full of travellers, and a first announcement made to shift workers on a hillside. The sign given to them is not glory but swaddling clothes and a feeding trough.
People of the Bible
Jesus
Four accounts, one life, and the only figure in this catalogue every other sheet is arranged around.
Jesus is born in Bethlehem in the reign of Herod and grows up in a town nobody expected anything from. He begins publicly at about thirty, baptised by his cousin in the Jordan, and spends roughly three years teaching in Galilee and Judea, healing, eating with the wrong people, and arguing with the ones who kept the law best. He is arrested at night, tried twice, executed on a Roman cross outside the city, and buried in a borrowed tomb. On the third day the tomb is empty and the accounts do not agree on the order of the morning, which is part of why they read as testimony.
Scroll down to the storyThe movements, in the order the text gives them.
The story of Jesus
- 01
- 02
Matthew 3:13-4:11
The Jordan and the wilderness
He is baptised by a man who says he should be baptised by him, and a voice names him beloved before he has done anything public. Then forty days, three offers, and three answers out of Deuteronomy.
- 03
Matthew 5:1-7:29
The sermon on the mount
Blessings on the people nobody congratulates, then a raising of the standard past behaviour into motive, and an ending about two builders. The crowds are astonished because he teaches as one having authority.
- 04
Matthew 16:13-28
Who do you say that I am
At Caesarea Philippi he asks what people say, and then asks them. Peter answers, and from that time he begins to tell them he must go to Jerusalem and suffer and be killed and be raised.
- 05
Matthew 26:36-27:56
Gethsemane to the cross
A prayer with his face to the ground, an arrest with a kiss, two trials, a scourging, a crown of thorns, and six hours. The veil of the temple is torn from the top to the bottom.
- 06
Matthew 28:1-20
He is not here
The stone is rolled away for the witnesses rather than for him. He meets women first, then the eleven on a mountain in Galilee, and sends them to every nation with a promise about being with them always.
Why it matters
Everything on this site converges here. The promise to Abraham, the throne of David, the servant of Isaiah, the son of man of Daniel and the shepherd of Ezekiel all arrive at one person, and the New Testament spends its whole length saying so. The four gospels are not a single biography: Matthew writes for readers who know the law, Mark writes fast and physical, Luke writes as an investigator, and John writes seven signs and long conversations. Held together they are the most closely examined life in history.
187 songs
The music
Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.
Matthew 3:1-12; Mark 1:1-8; Luke 3:1-20; John 1:19-34
Prepare the Way
Matthew 4:18-22; Mark 1:16-20; Luke 5:1-11; John 1:35-51
Leave the Nets
Matthew 14:13-21; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-15
Give Ye Them to Eat
Matthew 21:12-23:39; Mark 11:12-12:44; Luke 19:45-21:4
A House of Prayer
Matthew 21:1-11; Mark 11:1-11; Luke 19:28-44; John 12:12-19
Hosanna
Matthew 26:47-75; Mark 14:43-72; Luke 22:47-62; John 18:1-27
Before the Cock Crow
Matthew 26:1-16; Mark 14:1-11; John 12:1-8
The Fragrance and the Silver
Matthew 26:17-35; Mark 14:12-31; Luke 22:7-38; John 13-17
This Do in Remembrance
Matthew 27:57-66; Mark 15:42-47; Luke 23:50-56; John 19:38-42
A Stone at the Door
Matthew 27:1-31; Mark 15:1-20; Luke 22:63-23:25; John 18:28-19:16
Behold the Man
Matthew 27:32-56; Mark 15:21-41; Luke 23:26-49; John 19:16-37
It Is Finished
Matthew 28:1-10; Mark 16:1-11; Luke 24:1-12; John 20:1-18
He Is Risen
John 20:24-31
Blessed Are They That Have Not Seen, and Yet Have Believed
