Reading the Gospels Together The Storyline of Luke’s Gospel – Part 1 Once again I want to remind you that one of the assumptions that I bring to this study is that Luke, like Matthew, has used Mark’s gospel as the basis for his own gospel. Some sort of literal dependency between Mark and Luke must be assumed since there are far too many instances of nearly direct wording and order to defend any other conclusion. The strongest argument is that it is Luke who is dependent upon Mark. As we mentioned with Matthew, there are some ways in which Luke is restricted by Mark’s gospel too. And, as we saw with Matthew, Luke is aware of Mark’s issues but is not hesitant to change them when he feels so compelled. Like Matthew, Luke has confidence in Mark’s gospel; however, he also is aware of a need to say some things in a new way to meet new circumstances. And, a second assumption, that Luke and Matthew share some common material that is not in Mark but was in a document that is no longer available to us needs to be stated. One might ask if Luke was perhaps dependent upon Matthew, or even the other way around to account for the material they share. That is highly unlikely. It makes far more sense to presuppose that Luke and Matthew wrote independently of one another. As with Matthew we might wonder what the circumstances were in which Luke wrote his gospel. Again, we need to assume that Luke is writing some time following Mark’s gospel. Since we have already proposed the late 60’s or early 70’s for Mark it is very likely that Luke wrote in the late 70’s or more likely in the early 80’s just a we have proposed for Matthew. One other factor needs to be taken into account with Luke and that is that he wrote a second book we know as the Book of Acts. As we examine both Luke and Acts one of the things that we discover is that the tension between Jewish people and followers of Jesus in Luke’s circumstances seems diminished. Luke seems to go out of his way to highlight the many Jewish believers in Jesus who are a part of his story. Luke is not hostile toward Judaism. In fact, Luke seems intent on defending Jewish Christians as a legitimate group who follow Jesus. Perhaps this indicates that Luke was writing more for a Gentile audience than for a Jewish one, but that is not fully certain. It could also mean that Luke wants his readers to understand that Christianity is an expression of Judaism – the true Judaism – and therefore his many examples of believing Jews helps to demonstrate the Jewish people did receive the coming Messiah. Once again our task is to trace the story of Jesus that Luke tells his readers. It will, once again, be important to take note of the location of the action, the pace of the story, and the development of characters by Luke. Like the others, Luke writes as an omniscient narrator and treats his readers as being outside the story and thus able to be given information that the characters in the story are not privileged to know. As with Matthew, I will focus mostly on those parts of Luke’s gospel where he differs the most from Mark. So let’s begin to trace Luke’s storyline. Luke begins his story in a way that many ancient historians would begin their writings. His four verse preface is a very important part of his gospel and a gift to us as Biblical interpreters. Luke tells us that he is aware of others who have written an account of the story of Jesus. There is a basis for our assumption that gospel writers are sometimes dependent upon others. At least we can be sure that Luke was dependent upon others, most likely Mark and the material he shares with Matthew, since he tells us so. Luke also tells his readers the motive for his writing which is that they might know the truth. What does Luke mean by truth? Certainly he is does not mean just historical accuracy since such verification is really beyond anyone and actually not that important. Luke is concerned about the authenticity of the story of Jesus – and on a deeper level the authenticity of Jesus, himself. Luke tells us that he has some material he considers to have come from eyewitnesses and other material he receives from other servants of the word. All of this is information Luke wants to share with his readers prior to the actual beginning of his gospel. We can be thankful that Luke has done this for us.