Why do you go to the doctor? It is time for my annual checkup. I’m not super motivated. I feel fine. I mean, other than the occasional aches and pains that comes along with getting older. I have felt a little light headed lately, but you know what, I’m fine. I have a friend who told me that as long as they don’t go to the doctor they will not be told that something is wrong. There is a logic here that I can identify with. Just so you know, I know that it is flawed logic. Avoiding the doctor does not mean there is nothing wrong with you. It may mean that you don’t discover what is wrong with you until it is too late. Feeling fine does not mean you are fine. I’m not trying to fear monger here. I have merely come to realize that an annual visit to the doctor is a good thing.
I am beginning a series of articles in the Gospel of Luke. The first thing to know about Luke is that it is volume one of a two volume story. Luke/Acts was originally written together and intended to be read together. Somehow, through years of copying and compiling, Luke and Acts became separated in the canon and in the minds of readers. You have the four gospels and then you have the book of Acts. Because of this some connections are sometimes overlooked. For the sake of this article I want to focus on a couple. The Holy Spirit is clearly visible in the birth narratives of John the Baptist and then shows up like a thread through both volumes; guiding, connecting. Luke wants his readers to understand that the story of Jesus is the story of the movement of God and that definitely includes the story of Jesus’ continuing activity in the lives of his disciples after his resurrection. The other thing is that Luke composed both volumes with a sense of order. He is often referred to as the father of Christian historians. He lets his readers know up front that he is recording this history with a bias. He had compiled eye-witness accounts from servants of the word. There is no pretense at having no bias here; no false claim at balanced reporting. He is telling the story of Jesus with a stated agenda. I like that. Everybody has an agenda whether stated or not. I study the Bible with an obvious bias – I believe it is truth – and when I talk to people about Jesus I have an agenda – I want them to know truth; to be shaped by truth.
As we journey through the Gospel of Luke, one of the things that leaps out at us is that the outcasts of society, the sinners, tax-collectors, women and Gentiles are accepted by Jesus. This is true in the other gospel accounts but it seems to leap a little higher in Luke. Jesus seems to go out of his way to include the ostracized; the people who have been devalued by the religious elite; the people who have been told they don’t matter to God. And conversely, the religious elite hate Jesus. Tension builds in an orderly fashion until the climax.
It is this acceptance and rejection that I want to focus in on as we begin this journey. It has everything to do with Jesus being the Great Physician. Imagine a group of people who have been told much of, if not their whole, life that there is no hope for them. Their condition is just too horrible, too terminal. God has given up on them and so had the religious experts. Along comes Jesus and he receives them with love and compassion. He doesn’t treat women as if they were inferior; second class citizens whom God grudgingly tolerates. He doesn’t tell the poor that they are poor because they are not favored by God. He tells them they are blessed. He doesn’t yell “Traitor!” at the tax collectors. He chooses them as his disciples. And they clamor for Jesus because they know they need him; they know they are sick. And the experts, well the experts, they hate Jesus because in their minds physicians should only attend to the religious healthy. These experts feel that they are the physicians, doling out prescriptions of tithing, fasting, prayer and a horse pill of pride and condemnation, chased down with righteous indignation. And along came Jesus telling them they needed a doctor; demonstrating that real doctors tend the sick. Hatred boiled.
So, how will read the Gospel of Luke? Will you let Jesus be the doctor? Will you swallow down his prescription of poverty of soul; admitting you are a sinner in need of redemption; a prodigal who is not worthy to be called a son? Or will you consult with Jesus? “I agree that immorality begins on the inside, but I will have to disagree with the whole eating with sinners thing.” I am the tax collector pounding my chest and crying out “Lord redeem me! I am a sinner!” I am the centurion who said, “I am unworthy for you to come under my roof.” I need the Great Physician. I need his prescriptions! Swallow! Peace.