Bible Study - The Christmas Story Part 4 - Luke 1:1-4; Others

Last week, we looked at a lot of short Bible passages that told us why Jesus had to come as He did, as a substitute for us. He had to be a true human man, a second Adam, since the first Adam had failed to do God’s will and brought sin into the whole world and to us, too. Jesus had to be tempted as we are, yet never sin, and be the perfect person we should be but fail to be. God’s own Son had to be the One to take on that human flesh, for only He could be, as God, as well as man, great enough to substitute for and pay the penalty for all sinners, for the whole world, including us.

Look now at a few more Scriptures about Jesus as our Substitute, suffering the punishment for our sin, in our place. 2 Corinthians 5:19 says that “in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them.” How could their own sins not be counted against people? V.19 says, “For our sake, God made Jesus to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
This is the great exchange. Jesus took all our sins upon Himself and gave us forgiveness and counts us as holy and acceptable to Him, as we simply trust in Him and what He has done for us, in suffering the just punishment for sin in our place.

Look also at 1 Peter 1:18-19. We all lived in futile ways, from Adam onward, but were ransomed by Jesus. We were set free by the “precious blood of Christ " - real human blood, shed on the cross for us. Gold or silver would not be enough, but the sacrifice of the true Son of God, like a perfect Lamb, without spot or blemish - no sin - is great enough to pay for the sins of the whole world. (See John 1:29 and 1 Peter 2:22-25.)

Jesus “committed no sin but “bore our sins in His body (a real human body) on the tree” of the cross. As a result, because He was also God the Son, we “die to sin and live in and for righteousness. By His wounds, we are healed and returned” to Him, our Good Shepherd. In all this, we do not earn or qualify ourselves for forgiveness and new life. God did it all, with His rescue plan for us in the God/man Jesus. “He qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.” He delivered us from darkness and “transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:12-14). Christmas happened so that Jesus could come into this world to do and complete this saving work for us.

And how did Christmas happen? We turn now to the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, where we have the true details God chose to reveal to us of the coming of Christ. We begin with Luke 1:1-4. Who was Luke, the author of this Gospel? We actually know very little about him. He was a physician and a Gentile, not a Jew (Colossians 4:11-14). He was somehow brought to faith in Christ and first appeared with Paul on his second and third missionary journeys. Luke also wrote the Book of Acts and indicates his (Luke’s) presence whenever he says “we” did this or that, and these things happened to “us.” (See Acts16:10-40 and 20:5-21:18 and 27:1-28:16.)

Luke also sends greetings, along with Paul, later on in Paul’s Letter to the Colossians and to Philemon. He was clearly very important to Paul and was called “beloved” and a ”fellow worker” of Paul; and he was the only person with Paul when Paul was in prison in Rome for the second time, near the time of his execution for being a Christian, at the hands of Nero and the Romans.

That is all that we know of Luke from the Scriptures, other than what we learn indirectly, as we turn to the Gospel of Luke, Luke 1:1-4. Luke was a very learned man, and his Greek is some of the best in the Scriptures. He begins his Gospel with an introduction, a prologue, as famous Greek historians often did. The difference is that these historians introduced and highlighted themselves. Luke focuses upon “the things that have been accomplished among us” by God - actions done by God on our behalf.

This is not philosophy for our living or what we are to do to succeed in life or be happy. Luke does not mention or identify anything much about himself. He does talk about those original disciples and others who were with Jesus “from the beginning” and how important their teaching and witness had been. (That is apparently how Luke himself had become a believer in Jesus, through their witness.)

See John 15:26-27 and Acts 1:21-22, as examples of the importance of followers “from the beginning” who could tell all about Jesus from the start. See the importance of “eyewitness” testimony, in what Peter says in 2 Peter 1:16-21, and his focus on the “prophetic Word” of God revealed to him by the Holy Spirit. Peter does not “follow cleverly devised myths” but simply proclaims the truth of “the power and coming of our Lord Jesus.” He and others were there and saw and heard these very things when they were with Jesus. See also Acts 6:1-4, where the original disciples knew that they had to be busy with “preaching the Word of God” and carrying out “the ministry of the Word.”

Much was being done, but at this point, probably only the Gospel of Matthew had been put in writing. Some think that Mark’s Gospel was also written at this time, but as I indicated in the Gospel of Mark study, other evidence says that Mark wrote only after both Paul and Peter had died for the faith.

So, “it seemed good” to Luke “to write an orderly account” (see also Acts 11:1-4 and 1 Corinthians 14:40, for emphasis upon speaking and writing in an “orderly” way) about the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. Luke says that he had “followed all things closely for some time," and he had surely met many early Christian people and talked with them. Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 3:16, while Luke was with him, saying: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” God definitely used Luke to add much to what Matthew had written about the birth and early years of Jesus, as we will see in weeks ahead.

Paul wrote this Gospel and Acts for a friend, Theophilus, whose name means “Lover of God.” (See the mention of Theophilus also in Acts 1:1-2 and the clear mention that Acts was the second book written by Luke, after his Gospel.) Above all, Luke says that through what he has written, he wants to give Theophilus and all of us, too, greater “certainty (firmness, confirmation) concerning the things we have been taught.” The word for what is “taught” is the Greek word from which we get our word “catechism.” The Word of God is our primary “catechism” and we use Luther’s catechism only because it faithful to the Word and filled with the Word.

One final thought for today. Some groups say that as long as we focus on Jesus, the rest of what the Bible says isn’t really so important. Christ is the key to the Scriptures and is our Savior. However, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and is useful,” as we heard Paul say. Look at the little story Luke included in Acts 18:24-26. Apollos was eloquent, knew Scripture, and taught accurately about Jesus. Wasn’t that enough?
It was not, for Apollos did not even know about Christian baptism. An early Christian couple, Aquila and Priscilla, had to take Apollos aside to teach him the way of God more accurately - especially the meaning and importance of Christian baptism.

Read through Acts and notice how often baptism is mentioned and how many people are baptized, together with hearing the Word. In fact, the word for teaching more “accurately” is the same word used by Luke in Luke 1:3 for following all things “closely."  It is very important to follow the Word of God “accurately” and “closely." It all fits together in God’s saving plan for us, and everything is important.

Next week, we will get into what Luke tells us about the one who was prophesied to prepare the way for Jesus, John the Baptist, and how he is important, too.