Rethll'born are ad.led. The olose of the Aots shows tll! the foundation or the Church at Rome; but Rome waa but a branch, an offshoot, of the great Chnrohes of Antiooh and Jernsalem. St. Luke traoee the various stages in tbi11 development-from Bethlehem to Nazareth, from Nazareth to Capernanm, from Capernaum to the Galihean and Perroan villagee, then to Jerusalem. The Actll takes up the wondrous story, and shows how the Church, adva.nord from Jerusalem to the Syrian Antiooh, from Antiooh tG the cities of Asia Minor, from great Asian oentres like Ephesus across the !'68.8 to the old world-renowned cities of Greece. and then from Greece to Italy, and the story olosee with tbe beginning of the Ohuroh at Rome. Nor does St. Luke alone depict with bis great skill the geographical development of the Church of J eeus Christ. He deeoribes, too, how the toork of the Divine Master and hie ohosen instruments developed. First, we have the story of the birth and growth of the pioneer, John the Baptist; then the birth and childhood of Jesus himself, He paints the beginning of hie organized Church, when he snmmons the twelve out of the number of believers who gathered round him soon after he began his public ministry among men. The wants of the growing organization soon called for more workers. In the Third Gospel the solemn summons of the seventy is related. For a moment the advancing work seems arrested by a fatal blow, and the death of the Master on the cross puts, as it seems, a final stop to the new Church and its work; but the Resurrection, which St. Luke describes as quickly following, gives a new and irresistible impulse to the Church and the Church's work among men. The same men are at work, and the same Master is guiding their labours. But the homeless Master is no longer guiding them as they walked together among the fields of Galilee and the streets of Jerusalem, but from his glory-throne in heaven; and the men, the same men, a.re quite changed : it is as though they had drunk of the waters of another and stronger life. Luke describes in the Acts, the sequel to his Gospel, the rapid progress and the swift though orderly development of the now great and numerous Church. Deacons a.re chosen to assist the apostles; then we read of prophets and teachers and elders, of the foundation-stories of a great and powerful organization.
II. Sou or THE SPECIAL FEATURli'B OJ' ST. Lmrn's GOSPEL. We have dwelt upon the pOfli.tion of St. Luke's Gospel as a great Chris- tian writing in the earliest days of Christianity, its teaching being con- sidered as absolutely authoritative, as oontaining the mind, even the very words, of the Divine Founder. We have shown how it was received before four score years had been counted from the Asoension Day, not only by all t!.ie Churches, but by the principal heretical sects which sprang up so soon in the Christian story; and our data for this general very early acoeptanoe THE GOSPEL .ACCORDING TO ST. LUKE. xiii
of the Third Gospel were drawn, not merely from the scanty fragments which remain to us of individual scholars and teachers, but from vnsiuns which were the publio work of whole Churches. Its author and hi 11 peculiar sohool of thought will be presently disCllssed. We will n,,w 1•roceed to e. more detailed consideration of some of the contenta of the Gospel ne.med after St. Luke. Of the three synoptical Gospels, St. Luke, thongh not the longest, is the fullest, that is, it contains the most details of the Saviour's life on eart1. And some of these details peculiar to St. Luke are of very high importance in their practical teaching, as also in their bearing on the blessed life. Among the more striking of these are-the raising of the son of the widow of Nain; the episode of the woman who was a sinner kneeling at the feet of Jesus when he was at the banquet given in the house of Simon the Pharisee; the tears which the Master wept over Jerusalem ; the famous rarables of the good Samaritan, with its broad, universal teaching; the parable showing how and why Jesus loved the lost-the lost drachma, the lost sheep, and the lost son; the parables of Lazarus and Dives, of the unjust steward, the unjust judge, the Pharisee and the publican, etc.; the prayer on the cross for those who were doing him to death; the promise to the dying thief hanging on the cross by hls side; the walk to Emmaus, and the conversation during the walk after the Resurrection. We must not omit here to mention two considerable sections of this Gospel which contain many peculiar details touching the life or the teaching of Jesus, which alone are told by St. Luke. (1) The first two chapters treating of the infancy and boyhood of the Saviour. (2) The account of that prolonged journey, or perhaps four distinct journeys, toward Jerusalem related in eh. ix. 51-xix. 27. Some of the events related in this impor- tant section, and some of the words spoken by Jesns on these journeyings, are repeated in one or other of the evangelists, notably in St. John; but much in this great section is peculiar to St. Luke.
III. THE ESPECIAL TEACHING OF ST. Lmm.
St. Luke's Gospel has been charged by some critics with teaching certain doctrines alien to the teaching of primitive Christianity, in some respects differing from the teaching in St. Matthew or in St. John. 'l'hese critics complain that St. Luke, different to the older apostles, teaches in the Third Gospel "a universalism "-a breaking-down of all legal privileges and class distinctions, a free admission of all sinners alike to the meroy of God upon their repentance, a universality in Christ's prorni~es, which jars upon some minds peculiarly constituted and specially trained, in the nineteenth century equally with the first. Then, is no doubt that this Divine piuture of the Lord's life and teach~ ing that we call St. Luke's was mainly the work of that great servant of Jl:tH\8 Christ whom men call Paul, only we maintain that there is nu real INTRODUCTION TO