Luke

Purpose & theme

Luke is the longest and, in many ways, the most tender of the Gospels — a carefully researched, beautifully written account whose great theme is that Jesus is the Savior for all people. Writing as a careful historian who “followed all things closely” so that his reader might have “certainty concerning the things you have been taught” (1:1-4), Luke presents a Jesus whose salvation reaches beyond the boundaries of Israel to Gentiles, and beyond the respectable to the poor, the sick, the sinful, the outcast, women, tax collectors, and the lost. His genealogy traces Jesus not merely to Abraham but all the way back to Adam, marking Him as the Savior of the whole human race. And the mission of Jesus is captured in one unforgettable sentence: “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” (19:10).

Luke’s Gospel overflows with the notes of joy, praise, and the Holy Spirit. It opens with a burst of song — Mary’s Magnificat, Zechariah’s Benedictus, the angels’ “Glory to God in the highest,” and Simeon’s Nunc Dimittis — and it is filled with the activity of the Spirit and with Jesus at prayer. At its heart lies a long “travel narrative” (9:51-19:27), as Jesus resolutely journeys toward Jerusalem, teaching along the way in some of the most beloved parables ever told, found only in Luke: the Good Samaritan, the prodigal son, the rich fool, the persistent widow, and the Pharisee and the tax collector. The Gospel moves to the cross, where the Savior prays for His enemies and welcomes a dying thief into paradise, and to the resurrection, where the risen Christ walks the Emmaus road and opens the Scriptures to show that all of them point to Him. Luke is volume one of a two-part work continued in Acts, and it ends by turning the disciples’ eyes outward: repentance and forgiveness are to be proclaimed “to all nations.”