Introduction
We have four gospels about Jesus. Among them, the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which have similar contents, are called the Synoptic Gospels, and the Gospel of John is called the Fourth Gospel. There are many explanations for why there are four gospels about the life and ministry of Jesus, but the most important is to provide a more complete picture of Jesus Christ.
The Gospel of Matthew expresses Jesus Christ as the Messiah who came to this earth as King, and the recipient is a Jew. So, in the Gospel of Matthew, starting from the genealogy of Jesus Christ, it is revealed that he is a descendant of David.
The Gospel of Mark expresses Jesus Christ, who came to this earth as a servant who serves, and the recipients are Romans. Therefore, Mark does not have a genealogy or birth story of Jesus Christ, but begins with his ministry.
The Gospel of Luke mainly highlights the human side of Jesus, and the recipient is a Greek. Therefore, the preface we read today reveals the contents, materials, recipients, and purpose of the Gospel of Luke.
The Gospel of John emphasizes the divinity of Jesus, and its recipients are people from all over the world.
The Gospel of Luke was written by the Greek physician Luke, who also wrote the Acts. Both of these books are dedicated to a man named Theophilus.
I. An Account of the Things that have been fulfilled Among Us (v. 1)
When Luke wrote the Gospel about Jesus Christ, it was not to write a biography of Jesus. Look at verse 1. “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us.” What Luke wanted to record was ‘an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us.’ ‘An account of the things that have been fulfilled among us’ is not about finding out how the prophecies about the Messiah in the Old Testament were fulfilled. Jews are more interested in the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies. Therefore, in that regard, Matthew wrote the Gospel of Matthew for Jews.
Because the recipients of the Gospel of Luke were Greeks, Greeks did not know the Old Testament and had a hard time understanding the Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah. Therefore, what Luke said was ‘an account of the things that have fulfilled among us’ was about God’s blessing that came to this world through the coming of Jesus. In other words, it meant to explain what changes occurred in people when Jesus came to this world and how they experienced God's amazing blessings. All those who met Jesus and believed in him were liberated from the power of sin and lived a new life. This did not just happen to one or two people, but it happened to most people who met and believed in Jesus. Luke is trying to testify about this amazing and joyful fact.
God's amazing blessings that began with Jesus Christ continued to spread wherever Jesus Christ was testified. Anyone who hears the gospel of Jesus Christ and believes in it will receive amazing blessings, just like those who heard the words directly from Jesus. So the most amazing thing in this world is that everyone continues to spread the amazing things about Jesus. Luke was neither a disciple of Jesus nor an apostle. However, when Luke believed these amazing words about Jesus and preached them to the Greeks, the amazing work of salvation happened to the Greeks as well through Luke.
Most believers in the early church were Jews. It was not that difficult to tell them about Jesus Christ. Because they believed in the LORD God and were looking forward to the Messiah. They hoped that when the Messiah came, the Jewish nation under Roman oppression would become independent and things would become like the time when King David and King Solomon ruled. However, Jesus did not talk about building an earthly kingdom on earth, but about the kingdom of God that focuses on the salvation of souls. So the Jews thought that he was not the Messiah they were expecting and crucified him to death.
However, when Apostle Peter quoted the Old Testament and explained the phenomenon of the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and preached that Jesus, whom they had killed, was resurrected, ascended to heaven, and poured out the Holy Spirit, the Jews realized that Jesus was the Messiah. And 3,000 people repented, were baptized, and became Christians. They naturally believed in Jesus Christ and came to church.
But the case of the Gentiles was different. It was not enough to tell Gentiles, such as Greeks, to come to church unconditionally and believe in Jesus Christ. They did not know what it was to believe in Jesus. So the church needed to teach them who Jesus is, what it means to believe in Jesus, and why they should believe in Jesus Christ. As a result, they needed systematic content about faith. That was why Luke wrote the Gospel of Luke to help the Greeks live their lives of faith. How did Luke write the gospel? Luke revealed that when he wrote the Gospel of Luke, he referred to previously recorded fragmentary information about Jesus and other materials, and also met and interviewed living people who actually saw or received teachings from Jesus.
II. Carefully investigated everything from the beginning (vv. 2~3a)
Look at the verse 2 and the former part of verse 3. “Just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning.” Looking at verse 3, it seems that Luke was not a direct eyewitness to what Jesus came and did. In verse 2, there are two types of people: ‘eyewitnesses’ and ‘servants of the word.’ ‘Eyewitnesses’ were people who saw and experienced with their own eyes what Jesus did, and ‘servants of the word’ were people who directly heard the lessons Jesus spoke, memorized them, taught them, and spread them.
Peter testified, “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:6), and Apostle John said, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, what we have seen with our own eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched - this we proclaim concerning the Word of life.” (1 John 1:1). Also, Jesus appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers after resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:6).
However, as the people who directly witnessed what Jesus did and those who listened to Jesus' teachings and became servants of the Word were growing old and dying one by one, many people tried to record what they knew before they died. So, in the early days, the contents of the Gospel were recorded and used in various fragments. Perhaps Luke initially intended to translate the materials into Greek and use them as is. Luke carefully looked through the materials to inform the Greeks about Jesus in detail, but some of them were missing and some were different, so he investigated everything in detail from the beginning in his own way.
The ‘beginning’ mentioned by Luke refers to the first event that made it possible to know about Jesus. The beginning that Luke found about Jesus was the story of the birth of John the Baptist. From there, Luke sequentially collected reliable materials about Jesus. And Luke recorded the Gospel by dividing the materials he collected by region and time.
If we look at the entire Gospel of Luke, the setting first began with the temple in Jerusalem. Centered around the temple, the story of John the Baptist's father, John's birth, and naturally the birth and circumcision of Jesus were recorded. And the setting was moved to the Judean wilderness, where John the Baptist preached the baptism of repentance, and Jesus was baptized by John and was tested in the Judean wilderness. And the next setting was Galilee. Jesus performed many miracles and taught his word in the region of Galilee. And the following contains his preaching on his journey up from Galilee to Jerusalem, especially in Berea. Lastly, Jesus suffered in Jerusalem, died on the cross, and was resurrected.
Luke’s purpose in writing the Gospel was, as stated in verse 4, ‘you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.’ Around A.D. 60-61, when Luke wrote the Gospel, the era of the apostles and eyewitnesses had passed and the second age of the gospel had begun. The number of believers who heard the message of Jesus was increasing more than those who experienced Jesus directly. In particular, in the Greek region where Apostle Paul preached, there were no people who had direct experience with Jesus. Peter also said to the saints in Asia Minor, “Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him.” (1 Peter 1:8).
So the Gospel of Luke contains the most information about Jesus. 40% of the Gospel of Luke is content that cannot be found in other Gospels. Among the Greeks at that time, there were people who believed in Jesus Christ, but their knowledge of Jesus Christ was vague and unclear. So, Luke wrote this Gospel to ensure that people knew and believed everything about Jesus.
Christians at that time were going through many hardships. It must have been a difficult choice for them to become martyrs for Christ, holding on to faith only through the words they had heard. Some might have doubts when choosing faith. Luke wrote it in detail to help those people know what kind of person Jesus was.
III. Most Excellent Theophilus (vv. 3b~4)
A characteristic of the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles is that the recipient is a man named Theophilus. Look at the middle of verse 3. “It seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus.” We cannot know for sure who Theophilus was. There are many speculations as to who Theophilus was, but the most plausible is that Theophilus was the administrative head of the area where the church where Luke preached the gospel was located. Since the honorific title ‘most excellent’ was also given to Felix and Festus, Theophilus can also be seen as a Roman dignitary or governor.
In the past, in order for a book to be recognized as not being socially subversive, it had to be approved by the person in charge of the administrative office. The author of the book wrote it in a way that he dedicated it to the person in charge of administration in order to get recognition that his book was a very wholesome book that did not harm the morals of society at all. In one such example, although the times were different, Calvin presented his commentary on the Book of Isaiah to King Edward VII of England. This means that Calvin's commentary on Isaiah was not a subversive document, but was recognized in the name of the king as a book of religious benefit to British society.
If we understand it from this perspective, we can see that the Gospel of Luke was not a secret document to be read secretly only among Christians, but a book that had already been recognized by administrative officials in the general society and recommended for anyone to read. In Korea, during the military regime, all books had to receive an inspection stamp from the Ministry of Culture and Information to be published. And books that did not receive an inspection stamp were confiscated. How much more controlled was the publication of books during the Roman rule? However, the Gospel of Luke had already been approved by most excellent the Governor, so it could be freely read by the general public, and there was a possibility that it might have been popular as a bestseller.
There was a time when any country or society burned any Christian books or punished those who possessed them. Even today, if you bring a Bible into countries like North Korea, Morocco, Libya, or Somalia, you will be fined a lot and the Bible will be confiscated. However, we can guess that the gospel was being freely preached in the area where most excellent Theophilus was located. It seems that Theophilus already knew or began to believe in Jesus at this time. Because in verse 4, Luke said, “So that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.” And since the title ‘most excellent’ does not appear in the Book of Acts, we can see that Theophilus had already become a member of the Christians. The name ‘Theophilus’ means ‘one who loves God.’
What we are thinking about here is that, like Luke, we must preach the gospel to whoever we are targeting, doing the best we can for them. He wrote the Gospel for the Greeks about the life and teachings of Jesus Christ in an easy-to-understand manner. And Luke believed that the more the gospel of Jesus Christ was preached, the more people would be freed from sin and the evil power of the devil would be defeated. That is why correct proclamation of the gospel is important. When the correct gospel is proclaimed, the devil can no longer control people, and they can no longer be controlled by superstition.
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Conclusion
We also need to know more clearly about Jesus Christ in whom we believe. We must clearly know about Jesus Christ, on whom we rely and entrust our lives and all of our livings, and to whom we entrust our hopes and future. Why do we need to know Jesus? Because knowing Jesus is eternal life. Look at John 17:3. “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” Therefore, the more we know about Jesus, the more confident we will be about salvation and the more powerful we will be in living a life.
Therefore, it is very important for us to know who Jesus is and what he has accomplished. Through the words of the Gospel of Luke, we will meet Jesus, who is the Almighty God, but who also cried over the cries of a weak child. The boy who knew his calling, the image of him debating with the teachers of the law in the temple at a young age, the image of Jesus revealing himself as the Messiah through the confirmation of John the Baptist, God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit, the kind God who cares for the poor and oppressed, the image of the Almighty God who heals the sick those who are possessed by demons, and Jesus Christ who is the Word who proclaims the truth. We will learn about the Savior Jesus Christ, who overcame sin through his death and resurrection, and the amazing words of God that came out of his mouth. We will see people who were surprised, thankful, and praised the words, character, and signs, and people who turned away coldly. Please look forward to it.
