And Testing one, two three, testing one, two one two three this is radio free Mormon on the air

broadcasting behind enemy lines well it's that time of year again, Christmas time of year, it's December of 2016, Christmas trees

are going up, Christmas lights are being hung, and here at Radio Free Mormon in honor of the

season we will be taking a deep but very brief dive into the

new testament story of the birth of Jesus Christ. Perhaps more specifically I

should say the new testament stories of the birth of Jesus Christ.

By way of background, what I'll be talking about tonight is not something that I'm making up

out of my head.

Some of the things I say may be new to you, but I assure you that what I'll be talking

about represents the consensus of the vast majority of New Testament scholars today. And not just

a day, but really they've known about this stuff for around 200

years. It's just we don't talk about this very much in church so it may sound new to

some of you. Let's talk briefly about the four Gospels that we have in the New Testament, Matthew, Mark,

Luke, and John. Scholars are agreed that the first of these is Mark. Mark was probably written

around 65 AD. And when we talked about the Gospel of Mark, it's also important to note that we're only

calling it the Gospel of Mark because that is the title that has become associated with

this gospel.

The original manuscripts do not have any titles associated with them.

If you look at the earliest manuscript of the Gospel of Mark, it doesn't start off by

having a title saying, this is the Gospel of Mark.

Instead it just starts with the text.

These titles not only for Mark but also for Matthew, Luke, and John

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