The Parish Church of St John-at-Hampstead

When I was teaching clergy and readers about preaching – the liveliest session was often the one where we discussed different ways of beginning a sermon. How do you gain people’s attention? We would think about how films, or novels or newspaper articles do this. Do you begin with a brief summary of what you want to say? Do you start with an illustration or an anecdote? Do you try to intrigue or surprise your listeners? Applying this question to our gospel writers we find a variety of approaches. Matthew seems the least successful though he might have appealed to the Hobbits who were fascinated by family history. Matthew begins with Jesus’ genealogy going back to Abraham; for a certain kind of reader it establishes Jesus’ importance and authority straight away. Mark starts with a kind of fanfare announcing the beginning of the Good news about Jesus Christ the Son of God – just one sentence, before we’re into the dramatic story of John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness. Continuing the musical analogy we might say that John begins with a slow and mysterious melody on the lowers strings, which gathers force as it develops… ‘In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God.’ Luke’s gospel begins in a very different way, unique in Scripture. It seems rather secular – the language of officialdom – which can sound very odd when read out in church. ‘Inasmuch as many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things which have been accomplished among us…’ The one very long sentence is formal but rather self conscious, rather compressed and with a high flown vocabulary, difficult to translate and usually broken down in English into two sentences to make it clearer. There is much debate about what Luke is trying to say and who he is trying to say it to and for what purpose.
Perhaps we don’t often think about how and why the gospels were written or why there are four of them, but the answer to these questions can seriously affect the way we read them. Books were much rarer in the 1st century AD, fewer people could read, much more was communicated by word of mouth, the book trade operated very differently and not many people actually owned books. So what did the gospel writers think they were doing? There are many answers to these questions but by way of example it’s been suggested that Mark was written for evangelists who were like travelling story tellers. Mark’s gospel, being the shortest, is rather like an Everyman pocket edition. The reader would sit down in the market place attract an audience and then begin to tell his story in one or two sittings. Matthew on the other hand may have been written to be read as part of worship. The congregation would first hear a reading from the Old Testament and then a reading from Matthew which linked into what had just been heard as a kind of commentary or fulfilment. John’s gospel seems to have been an evolving text within a particular community. There is some evidence that the book we have now went through several editions as the community developed and changed. Luke, however, is the only gospel that seems to tell us why and how it was written. It was written for someone called Theophilus – but who he might have been is a bit of a mystery. His name means ‘lover of God’ – the name given in its Latin version to Mozart – Amadeus. He is addressed as ‘Most Excellent’. So Theophilus might have been an official in a provincial government office, perhaps in Antioch in Syria. Perhaps Luke is writing this account for him because he knows Theophilus has heard a lot of bad things about Christianity and he wants to put the record straight, so that Theophilus will then give his colleagues a fairer picture of this seemingly new and dangerous faith. On the other hand the word translated ‘most excellent’ may be a form of friendly address, the equivalent of ‘Dear So and So’ at the beginning of a letter – Luke may know Theophilus quite well and is addressing him as a most worthy man. Perhaps Theophilus has been undergoing Christian instruction and has become rather confused or has problems with the account he has been given. Perhaps by writing this gospel for him Luke is hoping that Theophilus will have copies made and circulated so that Luke’s account of the faith becomes more authoritative. Hence the rather ambiguous language – Luke doesn’t want to seem to be criticising the sources from which Theophilus has so far learnt about the faith but at the same time Luke thinks a better account could be given. What are these sources of which Luke could be critical? Well probably Mark’s gospel and maybe Matthew’s version too or perhaps rather the collection of material which Matthew added to Mark and which Luke chooses to use in a rather different way. Whatever the case the idea that the gospels were written to improve on what had gone before and in some instances even to disagree with it – may strike us as interesting. It shouldn’t threaten our confidence in the gospels but it might help us to see that a debate about the meaning of the faith goes right back to the gospels themselves as though they were in conversation with one another about the things that have been fulfilled among us – as Luke puts it.
But what has all this to do with Advent? Advent is of course the start of the church’s year – we are a week into the beginning of its first chapter. Advent is a time in which we are supposed to wonder with some excitement about what is going to happen next – we are supposed to look forward to the denouement of Christmas and the even more dramatic conclusion of the final volume at the coming of the kingdom. Except of course, in the first instance, we have heard the story many times before and in the second we have absolutely no clues as to how the story will end – it is almost unimaginable. Luke will provide much of the story we hear at Christmas – and when he wrote his gospel the expectation that the kingdom was coming soon had begun to weaken. In its place came a greater concern for the life of the community now. As he begins his story Luke reflects on the process of handing on; he acknowledges his reliance on the witness and courage of the servants of the word who came before him. Because of his careful attention to what they have given him he can formulate an orderly narrative for himself and others which will bring about conviction in the faith. And that perhaps is the way to begin the churches year again and to discover anew the significance of Christmas. The life of any Christian community and the individuals who make up that community depends on our being able to tell the story of Jesus for ourselves. Our life depends on the value we place on that immensely rich tradition which has been handed onto us by innumerable servants of the word. Our life depends on the part we play in the conversation set up by the gospel writers for we too must be servants of the word. And serving the word means retelling the story for our selves and our time. Luke’s gospel begins as we have seen with a statement of purpose; it ends with the disciples in the Temple praising God. Let us learn to tell the story for ourselves that God may here truly be praised.