Mark

Mark is the shortest and fastest-moving of the Gospels, widely thought to be the earliest, and by tradition drawn from the preaching of Peter. Its favourite word is 'immediately': Jesus is constantly on the move, a man of action whose deeds of power reveal who he is.

Mark presents Jesus as the suffering Son of God, driving toward the cross; its turning point is Peter's confession and Jesus' repeated announcements of his coming death. Vivid, urgent and unadorned, Mark presses one question on the reader: 'Who then is this?' — and answers it at the cross, on the lips of a Roman centurion.