2025 is the Year of Luke

by Arnold Troeger | Nov 24, 2024 | Bible

Luke’s Gospel ‘plus’ Acts is a two-volume work that continues the biblical history of God’s dealings with humanity found in the Old Testament, showing how God’s promises to Israel have been fulfilled in Jesus, and how the salvation promised to Israel and accomplished through Jesus has been extended to the Gentiles. The purpose of the two volumes is to provide certainty about the Christian instruction received. To accomplish this, Luke shows that the preaching and teaching of the early Church are grounded in the preaching and teaching of Jesus, who, during his historical ministry, prepared his chosen followers and commissioned them to be witnesses to his life, death and resurrection. This continuity between the historical ministry of Jesus and the ministry of the Apostles is Luke’s way of guaranteeing the fidelity of the Church’s teaching to the teaching of Jesus.

Luke’s story of Jesus and the Church is dominated by a historical perspective. This history is first of all salvation history. God’s divine plan for human salvation was accomplished during the period of Jesus, who, through the events of his life, fulfilled the Old Testament. This salvation is now extended to all humanity in the period of the Church. This salvation history is firmly placed in human history.

Luke presents Christianity as a legitimate form of worship in the Roman world, being a religion that meets the spiritual needs of a world empire. At the same time, he argues that Christianity is the logical development and proper fulfillment of Judaism.

By presenting the time of the Church as a distinct phase of salvation history, Luke accordingly shifts the early Christian emphasis away from the expectation of an imminent Parousia – the Second Coming – to the day-to-day concerns of the Christian community in the world. Luke is concerned with presenting the words and deeds of Jesus as a guide for Christian disciples in the period – between the Ascension and Jesus’ Second Coming – and with presenting Jesus himself as the model of Christian life.

Luke calls upon the Christian disciple to identify with Jesus, who is caring and tender toward the poor and lowly, the outcast, the sinner, and the afflicted – and toward all those who recognise their dependence on God – but who is critical of the proud and self-righteous, and particularly toward those who place their material wealth before the service of God and his people. No Gospel writer is more concerned with the mercy and compassion of Jesus, and with the role of the Spirit in the life of Jesus and the Christian disciple; with the importance of prayer, or with Jesus’ concern for women. While Jesus calls all humanity to repent, he is particularly demanding of those who would be his disciples.

Luke is identified as a Syrian from Antioch. He is not of the first generation of Christian disciples, being dependent upon what he received from those who were eyewitnesses of Jesus.