Saints, I want to introduce you to a friend of mine. His name is Luke. We have been acquaintances since I was a little boy. It wasn’t until I began my studies at seminary in 1996 that we began to be good friends. I took a class with Luke and his brother, who has an interesting name. I enjoyed that class so much that I basically took every class that Luke was in during my seminary years, including one where it was only Luke and myself in the class. Our friendship has only grown deeper over the last 26 years.

Now, there are some things you should know about my friend Luke. He is older than me. Like, a lot older. I was born in 1971. We are not really sure how old Luke is. People have all kinds of different guesses. The best ones date his origins to sometime in the mid to late 1st century AD. That’s pretty old.

Another thing about my friend Luke. He is not a person but a book (though the author’s name is also Luke). And he is a special kind of book called a gospel. A gospel is kind of hard to describe. It is like a biography but not exactly because Luke leaves out huge portions of his subject’s life. It is more like ancient historiography where certain events and teachings of a person's life were compiled for some purpose and so only those parts necessary to achieve that purpose were included.

Luke is part of the Fab Four. No. Not John, Paul, George, and Ringo. But Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Each of these focus on the same person, Jesus of Nazareth. Now, John’s account is significantly different from the other three. Luke shares a good deal of similarities with Matthew and Mark.

But there is also much in my friend Luke that we don’t find in the other three gospels. Here is a small sampling:

The infancy narrative of chapters 1-2

Several events such as Jesus’ encounter with Mary and Martha or with Zaccheus

Teachings on topics such as warning about greed or the cost of discipleship

Several parables (Prodigal Son, The Good Samaritan, The Rich Man and Lazarus)

The post-resurrection encounter on the Road to Emmaus

Luke is also the only gospel that has a sequel, his brother, Acts.

Now, as I mentioned, Luke is called Luke because that is the name of his author. The author was taught by and was a traveling companion of the Apostle Paul. The more I get to know my friend Luke, the more I can see how Paul has influenced him.

I love my friend Luke and I am looking forward to you, saints, getting to know him better on Sunday mornings this Fall as we look at the opening two chapters (we’ll find out more about my friend in subsequent Falls). But even more important than getting to know my friend Luke is my hope that you will get to know more deeply the one whom Luke loved and followed. His name is Jesus and I know Luke would find great joy if through him, you would grow to love and follow Jesus too.