What Jesus Said He Came to Do: 3 Nephi 27, John 10 and Luke 4

A friend from my last job, Wes, said it over lunch a few weeks ago, and he wasn't being clever. "I'll let the church tell me what Jesus did," he said. "Tell me what he said he was for. In his own words, if there are any."

I told him there were, and that I'd get back to him. Sundays on this site sometimes get a topic in place of the next chapter, and this is one of those. I'm taking three places where Jesus talks about why he came and reading them next to each other: 3 Nephi 27, John 10 and Luke 4.

The one that says it in a sentence

The disciples in 3 Nephi 27 have been praying and fasting, and Jesus stands in the middle of them and asks what they want. They ask what to call the church, because people are arguing about it. He takes several verses to answer (a church called in Moses' name would be Moses' church, and one called in his name is his "if it so be that they are built upon my gospel," v. 8). Then in verse 13 he says what the gospel is:

Behold I have given unto you my gospel, and this is the gospel which I have given unto you—that I came into the world to do the will of my Father, because my Father sent me.

That's the opening definition, and it's a strange one for a church that was asking about a name. He doesn't start with a list of doctrines. He starts with an errand: someone sent him, and he came to do what that someone wanted.

Verse 14 fills in the errand, since the Father sent him "that I might be lifted up upon the cross" and after that "that I might draw all men unto me." Then the phrase turns around. "As I have been lifted up by men," the verse says, so should men "be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil." The same words carry two meanings in one verse, the cross first and then standing in front of him.

Verse 15 keeps the judgment attached to the drawing:

And for this cause have I been lifted up; therefore, according to the power of the Father I will draw all men unto me, that they may be judged according to their works.

Verse 16 says what happens to the person who repents and is baptized: he "shall be filled," and if he endures, "him will I hold guiltless before my Father at that day." The verse doesn't say filled with what, and I'll leave the blank where I found it.

He isn't finished, either. Verses 19 through 21 say the gospel again, this time as things to do. "Repent, all ye ends of the earth, and come unto me and be baptized in my name," he says in verse 20, and in verse 21 he says it outright: "this is my gospel." So the gospel in 3 Nephi 27 is stated twice, once as why he came and once as what he asks of us, and the second statement ends with an odd sentence: "the works which ye have seen me do that shall ye also do."

The same purpose, said against a thief

John 10 gets there from the other side. Nobody has asked Jesus what the gospel is. He's talking about sheep and a door and what happens when the wrong person comes to the door. Verse 10:

The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

Here the purpose is life, and it's set against someone who takes it. "More abundantly" isn't defined in the chapter, but the next verse says what it costs: "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep" (v. 11). The abundance stays tied to that verse.

Then verses 17 and 18, which sound a lot like 3 Nephi 27. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again." And on: "No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father."

He lays it down of himself, and it is a commandment he received, both in the same verse and with no apology from John. Put that beside "to do the will of my Father" in 3 Nephi and the two chapters are describing the same cross from different angles. I wrote about this chapter in May, in the post on the good shepherd and the oneness of the Father and the Son, and I've left verse 30 alone here on purpose. That's a different question.

What Luke has him read aloud

Luke 4 is the one where he reads a prophet aloud. He's in the synagogue in Nazareth, "as his custom was," and he's handed the book of the prophet Esaias, which is Isaiah. What he reads is this:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

Then he closes the book and sits down and says "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears" (v. 21).

Anyone with Isaiah 61:1-2 open beside it will see that Luke's text isn't the same. Among the differences, Isaiah has "good tidings unto the meek" where Luke has "the gospel to the poor," Isaiah has "bind up the brokenhearted" where Luke has "heal the brokenhearted," and "recovering of sight to the blind" doesn't appear in Isaiah 61 at all. Isaiah also has "the opening of the prison to them that are bound," which Luke doesn't. And Luke's reading stops at "the acceptable year of the Lord," where Isaiah goes on with "the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn." The text doesn't say why it stops there. I don't know. What I can say is that it stops in a different place than 3 Nephi 27, which keeps judgment attached to the drawing. The May post on this chapter, on temptation, rejection and the authority of the word, starts earlier and ends later than this scene.

One word turns up in all three, and I'll mention it once and move on. It's "sent," in 3 Nephi 27:13 and 14, in Luke 4:18 and again at the end of the chapter when the people find him in a desert place and try to keep him from leaving, and he says "I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also: for therefore am I sent" (v. 43). In John 10:36 he's talking about himself in the third person, "whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world." It's a small overlap, and the three passages mostly say different things with it.

Taking him at his word

Does he have one purpose or three? The Father's will, life for the sheep, preaching and healing. The passages answer different questions. 3 Nephi 27 tells you whose errand it is and where it ends, with a cross and then a standing before him. John 10 tells you what it's for, which is life, bought at a price. Luke 4 tells you what the work looks like on an ordinary Sabbath in Nazareth. Whether those are finally one purpose in three sets of words, the text doesn't say.

What changes if you take it at its word is the part Wes's question was really after. If the purpose is to do the will of the one who sent him, and the gospel includes "the works which ye have seen me do that shall ye also do" (3 Nephi 27:21), then the disciples are handed the same job. Six verses later it gets sharper: "what manner of men ought ye to be? Verily I say unto you, even as I am" (v. 27). That sentence is about the disciples in the room, and I can't find a way to read it as a comment on somebody else.

Luke 4:21 does the same thing with tense, and it's blunt about it: "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears." Not someday, and not in a century. John 10:18 has the shepherd as the one who decides, a stranger kind of authority than the hireling's in verse 12, who runs when the wolf comes. A purpose he chose and a commandment he received turn out to be the same purpose, and most of us manage to hold only one of those at a time.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "lifted up" mean in 3 Nephi 27:14?

It's used twice in the verse, and the first time it means the cross. The second time, "men be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged of their works," it means being brought before him for judgment. Verse 22 uses the phrase once more for people who do what he's described: "ye shall be lifted up at the last day."

Does "more abundantly" in John 10:10 mean a comfortable life?

Not as the chapter has it. It's set against a thief who comes "to steal, and to kill, and to destroy," and the very next verse has the shepherd giving his life. The chapter doesn't spell out what the abundance looks like.

Why does Luke stop before "the day of vengeance of our God"?

The text doesn't say. It shows where Luke's reading stops and where Isaiah goes on, and that's all anyone has to work with.

Is 3 Nephi 27:13 the whole gospel?

It's the opening definition, and he restates the gospel in verses 19 through 21 as repentance, baptism and works. Read verses 13 through 21 together and you get the errand and what follows from it.

This week

I'm writing Wes back tomorrow with verse 13 and verse 21 side by side and seeing whether he wants the rest. Then on Wednesday I'll read 3 Nephi 27 from the top and mark every place where the Father is the one doing something.

— D.