Annual Sermons: Vol. 12 Sermon 1
Bob Marcaurelle 2 Tim. 4:10-11
LUKE - THE MAN WHO DIDN’T BAIL OUT
“. . . Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me. . . Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is helpful to me in my ministry” (2 Tim. 4:10,11).*
1. Two Quitters. This text is about starting and finishing. It is easy to start something. The test comes when the price is high and we see if we have the grit to go on. Illustration: I started exercising three years ago. Now I have a $200 stationary bike to hang my clothes on. I started something I never finished. Mark did the same. He left Paul and Barnabas on the First Missionary Journey and ran home. So displeased was Paul that he absolutely refused to take Mark on the second journey. But Mark shows us, here, that no failure has to be final. Forgiven by God’s love and empowered by God’s Spirit he became a useful servant, one Paul now wanted with him. Demas, who Paul years before called his “fellow worker” (Phm. 24), is here shown to be a quitter also. Why did he leave? Was he saved? Did he come back like Mark? We will look at that next week.
2. The Man Who Didn’t Quit. The man in our text who did not quit was Luke. From the day he joined Paul on his second missionary journey, around A.D. 53, until the words of our text, 14-15 years later, in spite of all the devil threw at him and Paul, he had the grit to go on.
I. A FILTHY GENTILE (Col. 4:11-14).
From Colossians 4:11-14 where Paul lists him with non-Jews and from the style of his writing, New Testament scholars agree that Luke was a Gentile, a non-Jew, a Greek.
1. His Make-Up. To the Jews this meant he was filth. Luke became a Christian and stayed faithful as a Christian in spite of unbelievable prejudice. The Jews and Gentiles despised each other. The Jews said God made Gentiles to fuel the fires of hell and a devout Jew would not let his shadow touch that of a Gentile. The Gentiles returned the hate, and still do. Anti-Semitism is alive and well.
2. His Message (Luke and Acts). Luke, somewhere along the hard road, found that even though these people who called themselves “God’s people” didn’t love him, the God they claimed to know did. He sent His Son, a Jew, to die for him. And Luke never got away from this amazing grace. He could sing, “Gladly I read whosoever may/Come to the fountain of life today/But when I read it I always say/Jesus included me too/Jesus included me/Yes, He included me/When the Lord said, Whosoever, He included me.”
And out of this salvation experience came Luke’s message.
1) It Was Universal (Acts). Luke showed in Acts how Christianity went from Jerusalem to the whole world. He closed Acts with no formal conclusion. Why? Because the Book of Acts, the acts of the church, the acts of the Holy Spirit is still going on. And it is for all men - red, yellow, black and white. They are, says Luke, precious in his sight.
2) His Message Was Individual (Luke). Luke brings God’s love down into the streets and into the homes of individuals and many are individuals like him who were despised by the Jewish church. In his gospel only do we find the Prodigal Son; the sinful woman who, when saved, bathed Jesus’ feet with tears; the little tax collector, Zacchaeus, etc. Luke, despised by the world, but loved by the Lord, wrote his gospel for the underdogs, for those looked down on and said, “When the Lord said, Whosoever, He included YOU!” Luke was also. . .
II. A FIRST RATE PROFESSIONAL
Luke steps into Scripture history as an educated professional of the highest order.
1. Luke the Historian. Luke-Acts, which are part 1 and 2 of Luke’s history book, are outstanding historical works. We know this is because the Bible tells us, it was written because “. . .men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Pet. 1:20). But God did not pour out these Scriptures on Luke like we pour water on someone’s head. He said of his life of Jesus, “I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning” (Lk. 1:3). It was in study, research, prayer, thought, interviews, etc., that God worked the truth through him like sweat. The first sentence in Luke has been called the finest example of Greek in the New Testament.
Illustration: In the middle of the 19th Century, the world famous scholar Sir William Ramsay set out to write a first century history. He was strongly biased against Luke’s book of Acts because it differed from secular historians and Ramsay felt it was filled with errors. As Ramsay began to dig he found ancient sources that also differed with secular histories and time and time again AGREED WITH LUKE. After 30 years of research he wrote, “Luke’s history is unsurpassed in respect of its trustworthiness.” Application: We know why, don’t we? It is
1) The Bible’s Supernatural Authorship. It was the guiding hand of God that makes Luke’s words God’s inerrant, trustworthy, infallible, absolutely true WORD. May I chase a rabbit down a short road and tell you - YOU CAN TRUST YOUR BIBLE. The Bible is laughed at and charged with error today as it has always been, but it stands as it always has, unharmed - the anvil of truth that destroys every hammer brought against it. And one evidence of this, seen in Luke and Paul, writing the Gospel and Acts together, to be read by all people of all ages, throughout all history until the end of time is
2) The Bible’s Universal Appeal. Paul, a rabbinic Jew and Luke, a Greek historian, reared in two different cultures, feed their souls from the same blessed Book. Today, in Africa, 1000 people a day are converted to Christ by the preaching of the Bible. The Bible knows no culture, color, national, social or educational limitations.
2. Luke the Physician (Acts 16:1-10; Col. 4:14). Luke, the professional man, was also a physician. Paul called him “the beloved physician” (Col. 4:14), I believe, because he was the one God used to keep him strong and able to serve the Lord. 1) The Coming of Luke (Acts 16). Around A.D. 53, Paul was in Asia Minor, on his second mission trip. He wanted to go north toward Asia, but he said the Holy Spirit stopped him. He turned south and once again the Spirit would not allow him to go (Acts 16:6-8). He went west to Troas, by the sea, and stopped. Since there are no dead ends in the will of God, God, in a vision, called Paul to take the gospel to Europe. It could well be that it was sickness - Paul’s thorn in the flesh or Paul’s bad eyes in having to write huge letters that sent him to Troas for rest. It was here that the story of Acts first used the word “we” - when Paul sailed for Europe, his beloved physician, the first medical missionary, Luke, was with him. With great humility he put himself in the story, simply by using the word “we.” 2) The Conversion of Luke? Was this when Luke was converted? As he helped Paul physically, did Paul help heal him spiritually by introducing him to the Great Physician? We don’t know. What we do know is that from the day he met Paul his life changed forever. He gave up his medical practice to serve the gospel. He gave up money, comforts, his home and no doubt many Gentile friends, to serve the Lord and Paul.
III. A FINISHER. Around 15 years later, in 68 A.D., Paul, facing death, said, “Only Luke is with me.” Some were somewhere else serving the Lord; some, like Demas, defected to serve himself, but Luke was there - he was a finisher. After Paul’s death, we lose sight of Luke, but ancient church traditions tell us he lived to be 84 years old. Wherever and however he died, we can be sure he could say with Paul, “I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith, I have FINISHED my course.” We cannot prove it but I believe Mark and Timothy made it to Rome before Paul died. But I know this; when, as tradition says, Paul was led out of the city, made to kneel down, and with the flash of the executioner’s axe - beheaded, Luke was there. This time he couldn’t save his life, but he could be “there to care” and see his friend off to heaven.
Application: Sometimes I feel we preachers are too dramatic, too grandiose. We will probably never have to face the dangers of standing by someone executed for the Lord. A few years back, when I had a stiff neck for six months, I had a beloved physician in this church who slowly took away the constant pain. In that healing office was a little sign, “OPPORTUNITIES FOR GREAT ACTS OF SERVICE SELDOM COME, BUT OPPORTUNITIES FOR LITTLE KINDNESSES COME EVERY DAY.” Let, us, like Luke, never bail out of our service for God and others.
Luke was not able to save Paul’s life, but as a friend he could be there to care. It hurt me as a Pastor to see so many people I wanted to help but couldn’t- folk with broken homes, cancer, lost jobs, troubled teens. Then I read a story that changed my perspective and my life. In the days of WWI, the armies faced each other from long trenches. Between the trenches was “no man’s land” where bullets and bombs were common. A young soldier was wounded and cried out for help. His comrades, who made it back to the trench, heard him, and a friend started to go over the top to get him. The Lieutenant pulled him back and told him he had seen the boy’s wound and there was no hope for him. There was nothing he could do. The young man bolted over the top and was gone for about a half an hour. Crawling back in, he was pulling the dead body of his friend. The Lieutenant said, “I told you there was nothing you could do for him.” To which the young soldier replied, “Yet there was, sir. Before he died he looked at me and said, ‘I knew you would come.’”
