New Testament · The Gospels · World English Bible
Luke
"He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives."
— Luke 4:18 
The Reading LensEvery verse pulled to the top of a book is chosen by three questions: Where is God’s heart here? Who is He protecting? Who is being saved by the action? It marks the place where those answers come into clearest focus — a “look at this, in this book.”
About the Gospel
The longest of the four, addressed to one named reader, Theophilus, and opening with a statement of method — many have undertaken accounts; the author has investigated everything carefully from the beginning and is setting it down in order.
Luke and Acts are one work in two volumes by the same hand. Between them they make up roughly a quarter of the New Testament.
Its particular attention is to the people the other accounts mention in passing — women, Samaritans, tax collectors, shepherds, the poor. The programme is read aloud in the synagogue at Nazareth in chapter 4, and the parables found only here bear it out: the good Samaritan, the prodigal son, the rich man and Lazarus, the Pharisee and the tax collector.
24 Chapters
Two Annunciations
A priest struck silent at the altar, and a young woman told she has found favour. Elizabeth and Mary meet, and Mary sings about the hungry filled and the rich sent away empty.
Shepherds, Simeon, Anna
The census, the manger, and the announcement made first to night-shift labourers. Then two old people in the temple who had been waiting — and a boy left behind for three days.
John, and the Genealogy
Dated to the fifteenth year of Tiberius. John asked three times “what then shall we do?” and answering practically each time. The genealogy runs backward, past Abraham, to Adam.
Nazareth
The temptation, then the scroll of Isaiah handed to him in his home synagogue: good news to the poor, release to the captives, sight to the blind, the oppressed set free. They try to throw him off a cliff.
The Catch, and the Roof
Nets breaking. A leper touched. Friends who cannot get through the crowd and take the tiles off instead. Levi’s banquet, and the complaint about the company he keeps.
The Sermon on the Plain
The twelve chosen, then blessings and matching woes — blessed are you who are poor, woe to you who are rich. Love your enemies. Judge not. The two builders.
The Widow at Nain
A centurion who says he is not worthy. A funeral procession stopped, and a son given back to his mother. Then a woman with an alabaster jar, and a parable about two debtors told to the man who invited him.
The Women Who Funded It
Mary Magdalene, Joanna and Susanna named as providing for them out of their own means. Then the sower, the storm, the man among the tombs, and the girl raised.
Who Do You Say I Am
The twelve sent out, five thousand fed, Peter’s confession, the transfiguration — and an argument about which of them is greatest, answered with a child.
The Good Samaritan
Seventy sent out. Then a lawyer’s question, and a story in which the two respectable men pass by and the despised foreigner stops, pays, and promises to come back. Then Martha and Mary.
Teach Us to Pray
The prayer, the friend at midnight, ask and it will be given. Then woes on those who tithe mint and rue and pass over justice and the love of God.
The Rich Fool
The barns torn down for bigger ones, on the night his life is demanded. Do not be anxious. Sell what you have and give to the needy. Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Those Eighteen
The tower that fell and the question of whether the dead deserved it. A fig tree given one more year. A woman bent over for eighteen years straightened on a sabbath, and the indignation that follows.
The Banquet
When you give a feast, invite those who cannot repay you. Then the invitation refused by everyone with a reason, and the streets and lanes swept for the poor, crippled, blind and lame.
Lost and Found
One sheep out of a hundred, one coin out of ten, and one son out of two — with the older brother left standing outside at the end, still being pleaded with.
Lazarus at the Gate
The shrewd manager. Then a rich man in purple and a poor man at his gate covered in sores, and the reversal after death — and the closing line that they would not be convinced even by a resurrection.
The One Who Came Back
Forgive seventy times. Ten lepers healed at a distance; one returns to give thanks, and he was a Samaritan.
The Persistent Widow
A widow who wears down an unjust judge. A Pharisee and a tax collector praying in the same temple. Children brought and not turned away. A ruler who cannot part with what he has — and a blind beggar who will not be quiet.
Zacchaeus
A short man up a tree, and a house entered to the crowd’s disgust — followed by half his goods given to the poor and fourfold restitution. Then the entry into the city, and weeping over it.
The Questions in the Temple
By what authority. The tenants and the heir. Taxes to Caesar. The resurrection. And a warning about those who devour widows’ houses and say long prayers.
Two Small Coins
A poor widow putting in more than all of them. Then the temple foretold in ruins, and the instruction to stand up and lift your heads.
The Supper, and the Denial
A dispute about greatness at the table itself. The bread and the cup. Gethsemane, the kiss, an ear healed on the way out — and a rooster, and a look across a courtyard.
The Crucifixion
Herod and Pilate made friends the same day. The women of Jerusalem told not to weep for him. “Father, forgive them.” The criminal promised paradise, and Joseph of Arimathea asking for the body.
The Road to Emmaus
The women disbelieved. Seven miles of conversation with someone they do not recognise until the bread is broken. Then the room, the broiled fish, and the ascension at Bethany.