Luke

The Son of Man Came to Seek and to Save

Luke is the only Gospel writer who tells us up front how he did his work. Many had already written accounts, he says, so he went back to the eyewitnesses, “having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first,” and wrote it all out in order for a man named Theophilus, “That thou mightest know the certainty of those things, wherein thou hast been instructed” (1:3–4). Luke was a careful man, and his Gospel reads like it. It is the longest of the four, and the first of two volumes. The second is the book of Acts.

It is also the warmest. Luke is the Gospel of the shepherds and the manger, the Good Samaritan, the prodigal son, Zacchaeus in the tree, the thief on the cross, and the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. More than any other Gospel, it shows Jesus going after the people everyone else had written off: the poor, the sick, women, Samaritans, tax collectors, and sinners. Luke’s key verse says it plainly: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (19:10).

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Authorship & Setting

The Gospel does not name its author, but the early church agreed it was Luke, and the evidence points the same way. Acts opens, “The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus” (Acts 1:1), so the same man wrote both books. In Acts, the writer shifts from “they” to “we” when he joins Paul’s travels (Acts 16:10 and after), which places him among Paul’s companions. Paul names Luke as “the beloved physician” (Colossians 4:14), and near the end of his life writes, “Only Luke is with me” (2 Timothy 4:11).

In Colossians 4:10–14, Paul lists the men “of the circumcision” who were with him, then names Luke separately, which suggests Luke was a Gentile. If so, he is the only Gentile author in the Bible, and that fits his Gospel. He traces Jesus’ genealogy not just to Abraham but all the way back to “Adam, which was the son of God” (3:38). Jesus is the Savior of the whole human race.

Acts ends with Paul under house arrest in Rome, around AD 62, with no word of his trial’s outcome. Because Luke was written before Acts, many conservative scholars date it around AD 60 or a little earlier. Others place it later. Luke writes as a historian, anchoring events to rulers and dates (2:1–2; 3:1–2). He also gives us material found nowhere else: the birth of John the Baptist, the songs of Mary, Zacharias, the angels, and Simeon, and many of Jesus’ best-known parables.

Key Figures

• Theophilus — the “most excellent” man Luke wrote for, probably a person of rank who had been taught about Jesus and needed to know it was true.
• Zacharias and Elisabeth — an aged, childless priestly couple, “both righteous before God” (1:6), and the parents of John the Baptist.
• Mary — the young virgin of Nazareth who answered Gabriel, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word” (1:38).
• Simeon and Anna — two faithful elders who waited for years in the temple and recognized the infant Jesus as the Lord’s Christ (2:25–38).
• Martha and Mary — two sisters in Bethany: one busy serving, the other sitting at Jesus’ feet (10:38–42).
• Zacchaeus — a rich chief tax collector in Jericho who climbed a sycamore tree to see Jesus and came down a changed man (19:1–10).
• The penitent thief — a dying criminal who asked to be remembered and was promised paradise that same day (23:39–43).
• Cleopas — one of two disciples on the road to Emmaus who walked with the risen Christ without knowing it (24:13–35).

Greek Word Study

σῴζω · sōzō

“To save,” and also “to heal” or “make whole.” Jesus tells the sinful woman, “Thy faith hath saved thee” (7:50), and tells the woman with the issue of blood, “thy faith hath made thee whole” (8:48). It is the same verb both times. In Luke, salvation is never only about the soul. Jesus came to make the whole person whole.

σπλαγχνίζομαι · splanchnizomai

“To be moved with compassion,” literally to be moved in the gut. Jesus feels it for the widow of Nain (7:13). The Samaritan feels it for the beaten man (10:33). The father feels it when he sees his son a great way off, “and had compassion, and ran”(15:20). This is what God’s heart looks like toward the lost.

σήμερον · sēmeron

“Today,” “this day.” “For unto you is born this day… a Saviour” (2:11). “This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears” (4:21). “This day is salvation come to this house” (19:9). “To day shalt thou be with me in paradise”(23:43). In Luke, salvation is never only someday. It arrives today.

χαρά · chara

“Joy.” Luke begins with “good tidings of great joy” (2:10) and ends with the disciples returning to Jerusalem “with great joy” (24:52). In between, Jesus says there is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents (15:7, 10). Luke’s Gospel is full of people singing.

Eight-Movement Narrative Outline

MOVEMENT ONE

Songs Before the Dawn (1:1–2:52)

Gabriel tells Zacharias in the temple that his barren wife will bear a son, and he is struck mute for his doubt. Six months later Gabriel comes to Mary in Nazareth. She believes, and when she visits Elisabeth, she sings: “My soul doth magnify the Lord” (1:46). John is born, and Zacharias’s tongue is loosed in praise. Then Jesus is born in Bethlehem and laid in a manger, and angels appear to shepherds: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (2:14). In the temple, old Simeon takes the baby in his arms and says he can die in peace. At twelve, Jesus stays behind in the temple: “wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?” (2:49).

MOVEMENT TWO

Son of Adam, Son of God (3:1–4:13)

Luke dates John’s ministry to the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, then shows John preaching repentance with practical fruit: share your coat, collect only what is owed, do no violence. Jesus is baptized while He is praying, a detail only Luke gives, and the Spirit descends in bodily shape like a dove. Then comes the genealogy, traced back to Adam, the son of God. Immediately after, Jesus is led into the wilderness, where He is tempted forty days and wins every round with the word of God.

MOVEMENT THREE

The Nazareth Sermon (4:14–6:49)

In His hometown synagogue, Jesus reads from Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor” (4:18). He rolls up the scroll, sits down, and says, “This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.” When He reminds them that God sent Elijah and Elisha to Gentiles, the crowd tries to throw Him off a cliff. He goes on to Capernaum and heals many. After a miraculous catch of fish, Peter falls at His knees: “Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (5:8). Jesus calls him anyway, calls Levi too, and teaches on a level place: “Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (6:36).

MOVEMENT FOUR

Faith Among the Outsiders (7:1–9:50)

A Roman centurion shows more faith than anyone in Israel. At Nain, Jesus stops a funeral and gives a widow back her only son. In a Pharisee’s house, a sinful woman washes His feet with tears and dries them with her hair. The Pharisee is offended, but Jesus says, “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much” (7:47). Luke notes the women who traveled with Jesus and supported Him from their own means (8:1–3). He stills the storm, frees the man with Legion, heals a woman, raises Jairus’s daughter, and feeds five thousand. Peter confesses Him as “The Christ of God” (9:20), and on the mountain Moses and Elijah speak with Him about His coming death in Jerusalem.

MOVEMENT FIVE

Setting His Face to Jerusalem (9:51–13:35)

Then Luke turns the whole story toward the cross: “he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem”(9:51). Much of what follows is found only in Luke. A lawyer asks, “Who is my neighbour?” and Jesus tells of the Good Samaritan: “Go, and do thou likewise” (10:37). Martha is busy and anxious while her sister sits and listens, and Jesus says, “Mary hath chosen that good part”(10:42). He teaches His disciples to pray and to keep knocking. He warns the rich fool, “this night thy soul shall be required of thee” (12:20). And He laments over Jerusalem, the city that kills its prophets.

MOVEMENT SIX

Lost and Found (14:1–16:31)

Jesus tells of a great supper where the invited guests make excuses and the poor, maimed, halt, and blind fill the hall. Then, with Pharisees grumbling that He eats with sinners, He tells three stories in a row: a lost sheep, a lost coin, and a lost son. The younger son wastes everything and comes home rehearsing a speech. The father sees him a great way off, runs to him, and throws a feast: “For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found” (15:24). The elder brother, who never left home, refuses to go in. The section closes with the rich man and Lazarus, a warning that the great gulf is fixed after death.

MOVEMENT SEVEN

Seeking the Lost on the Road to the Cross (17:1–21:38)

Ten lepers are healed, and only one comes back to give thanks, and he is a Samaritan. A widow keeps coming to an unjust judge until he gives in. A Pharisee prays about himself, while a publican will not lift his eyes: “God be merciful to me a sinner” (18:13), and he goes home justified. In Jericho, a blind beggar receives his sight, and Zacchaeus climbs a tree, receives Jesus into his house, and gives half his goods to the poor. Jesus enters Jerusalem and weeps over it. He cleanses the temple, answers His enemies, praises a widow’s two mites, and warns of the city’s coming destruction and His return.

MOVEMENT EIGHT

The Cross, the Road, and the Upper Room (22:1–24:53)

At the Last Supper, Jesus tells Peter, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not” (22:31–32). In the garden, His sweat falls like great drops of blood, and He heals the ear of the high priest’s servant. When Peter denies Him the third time, “the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter”(22:61). On the cross He prays, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (23:34), promises the thief paradise, and dies with “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit” on His lips. On the third day, two discouraged disciples walk to Emmaus with a stranger who, “beginning at Moses and all the prophets… expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” (24:27). They know Him in the breaking of bread. He appears to the eleven, opens their understanding, and is carried up into heaven as He blesses them.

Christ Typology

The Last Adam. Luke places the genealogy right before the temptation, and that order matters. The list ends with “Adam, which was the son of God,” and the next scene shows another Son of God facing the tempter. The first Adam was in a garden with every tree but one and fell. The last Adam was in a wilderness, hungry after forty days, and stood. “The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit” (1 Corinthians 15:45). Luke wants every son of Adam to know there is a new Head of the human race.

The Year of Jubilee. In the Nazareth sermon, Jesus reads that He has come “to preach the acceptable year of the Lord” (4:19). That is Jubilee language. In Leviticus 25, every fiftieth year liberty was proclaimed: debts cancelled, slaves set free, family land returned. Jesus announced that the true Jubilee had arrived in Him, release for the captives and liberty for the bruised. What Israel practiced once every fifty years, He came to accomplish for good.

The New Exodus. On the mountain of transfiguration, Moses and Elijah speak with Jesus about “his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem” (9:31). The Greek word translated “decease” is exodos. Moses led the first exodus out of Egypt through the blood of the Passover lamb. Jesus was about to lead a greater one out of sin and death, through His own blood, at Passover.

The Whole Bible Is About Him. On the Emmaus road and again in the upper room, Jesus teaches that everything “written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms” was about Him (24:44). That is the conviction behind this whole series. Every type and shadow we have traced from Genesis to Malachi, the risen Christ claimed as His own.

Personal Application

Salvation is for today. Luke keeps saying “this day.” The shepherds didn’t wait. Zacchaeus came down in a hurry. The thief had only hours left and was promised paradise that same day. If there is something you have been putting off with God, Luke’s Gospel says: not someday. Today.

The Father runs. The prodigal came home with a speech prepared, and never got to finish it. The father was already running, already embracing, already calling for the robe and the ring. Whatever distance you have put between yourself and God, He sees you a long way off, and He is not waiting at the door with His arms crossed.

Choose the good part. Martha was not doing anything wrong. She was serving Jesus. But she was so busy working for Him that she had no time to sit with Him. Service that crowds out time at His feet will eventually turn into resentment, the way Martha’s did. The one thing needful is to listen to Him first.

He has prayed for you. When Satan asked to sift Peter, Jesus did not say He would stop it. He said, “I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.” Peter still fell, but his faith did not die, and Jesus already had his next assignment ready: “when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.” If you are in a season of sifting, your High Priest is praying for you by name.

Let Him open the Scriptures to you. The two on the Emmaus road were not short on information. They were short on understanding. When Jesus opened the Scriptures, their hearts burned within them. Read the Bible looking for Him, and ask Him to walk with you while you read. He still makes Himself known to those who invite Him to stay.

TO GOD BE ALL THE GLORY · MARANATHA

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