In today's modern age, man likes to think that he is so much smarter than our more simple-minded credulous brothers of yesteryear. Not only that, just with the fact that the New Testament is available so readily in every conceivable format, be it written or audio, computer or hard print, all at virtually no cost makes the scriptures truly democratic. Now, at man's leisure, the New Testament can be dissected, cross-checked, and chronologically rearranged, to such an extent, that clear and unequivocal contradictions will appear quite readily in numerous passages when compared to other gospels.
For instance, it seems disappointing to say the least, that John 19:14, has Jesus still on trial, " And it was the preparation of the Passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the Jews, Behold your King!" Whereas, in Mark 15:25, Jesus is, in fact, already crucified, "And it was the third hour, and they crucified him." So that, it is fair to state, that if the gospel writers aren't even sure as to when Jesus' trial was, nor of the time of his crucifixion, how many other things do these gospel writers have factually wrong, and in truth, there are many such troubling contradictionscontained within the Bible, to which, some scholars, usually apologetics, go to great lengths and stretches to prove how, in fact, somehow these aren't contradictions at all, but that each can be explained by various circuitous reasoning means, some sensible and reasonable, while others are fairly far-fetched.
There is, however, another way at looking upon the gospels and the writers of them, which is, first of all, to recognize that the gospel writers are not historians, and thereby are not trying to write a history of Jesus, as that isn't the primary purpose of their respective gospels. The primary purpose of their gospel is to successfully preach the message and the mission of the Christ, nothing more, and nothing less. This means, that each of the gospel writers is going to have a different perspective of the Christ, because each of the gospel writers, is an individual who has a completely different background and personality than the other gospel writers, demonstrated by the fact that the gospels were written by: a tax collector (Matthew), a young man (Mark), a physician (Luke), and a fisherman (John). Further to the point, if each of these writers were to write exactly the same story with exactly the same information, than three of these gospels would be redundant, but instead each of the gospels has its own perspective because the prism that these writers see the Messiah is different, because although each experienced our Messiah, their reflections and recollections will differ, just as each of us relates to our Creator in our own way, yet, He is changeless, although our experiences and interpretations of God are unique to ourselves.
So too, it is, that when we go a sporting event, or when we go to the theatre, yet, when we read a review of the event, none of us, will totally agree with that review, because each of us, has interpreted and seen the event through not only our own eyes, but have related to it with our own particular personality and upbringing, to which certain aspects of the event will be treated in significantly different ways by each individual, of which, none legitimately negates the validity of the other person's vision.
The gospels are not court documents, the gospels are not inerrant history, they are, though, the inspired word, events, teachings, and sayings of Jesus the Christ. The writers, each of them, are witnesses to the Christ, to which each of them has an overarching mission to preach the message to the people, to which, each has done, in his own inspired way. To get lost in the minutiae of the dates, times, places, and numbers, is to miss the big picture that this is the greatest story ever told, and told well, four separate times.