Beginning this Sunday, we at Seneca Presbyterian Church will be making a
journey through the Gospel According to Luke. The Narrative Lectionary will be
guiding us. The journey will take us through Easter. It's an appropriate
journey to take on these Sundays. We will remember the life of Jesus in the days
between the time we celebrate his birth and the time we remember his death and
celebrate his resurrection - his re-birth and our own. On this particular
journey, Luke will be our teacher and our guide.Each of our Christian Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) is unique and I am deeply grateful for that fact. I find it to be divine endorsement of the diversity of faithful expressions within the one affirmation of faith that all Christians share. Jesus Christ is Lord. He is the divine Incarnation, God with us, present with us on earth and in our lives on earth. In my own limited understanding of all the world's religions, that seems to be the unique contribution of Christianity. The world is not a place we seek to escape; it is the creation of God that humanity has spoiled and God is in the process of redeeming. Those of us who choose to follow His Son and to claim the name Christian are called to be partners with God in that re-creation.
Luke's Gospel was written for a world of both Jews and Gentiles. He wanted to show how the promises of God to Abraham had been fulfilled in the coming of Jesus of Nazareth, the promised Messiah. He claims to be writing an "orderly account" for his friend Theophilus, a name that means “lover of God” (Luke 1:1-4). He anchors his story in the context of world affairs, telling us that “this was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria” – to quote a familiar yet challenging line from Luke chapter 2.
Each Gospel was written for and in a specific community of Christian disciples. Yet because of their universal appeal, we don’t know just where each of them was written. That is one of the fascinating aspects of Gospel study. As we journey through Luke, we will discover clues about the unique make-up of Luke’s community and their unique challenges and gifts. That fact reminds us that the Gospels are not biographies of Jesus, especially as we understand that literary form. They are, in a sense, extended sermons whose purpose is to tell the Gospel story and bring us to faith, and once we claim that faith, to deeper discipleship.
Luke has blessed us with a much –loved Gospel story. Without Luke we would not know Zacchaeus, the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, Elizabeth and Zechariah, Simeon and Anna, and two disciples who walked the road to Emmaus with a stranger who ended up being the resurrected Lord. May that Lord and Savior walk with us as we journey with Luke.
Several years ago, while preaching on the baptism of Jesus as interpreted by Luke, I found that text inviting me into the entire Gospel. If you want to know more about Luke, I've posted that sermon as the page "A Year with Luke." You can access it by clicking on the bar at the side of this page.
I invite you to deepen your own journey by reading the entire Gospel of Luke through from beginning to end, in one sitting if possible. As you do, ponder what it means to be a disciple of the One whose birth we celebrate in these days.
