ST. LUKE THE EVANGELIST
By Jason Barker
Department of Youth Ministry
A prologue to the Acts of the Apostles, written approximately 160‑180, gives the following summary of the life of St. Luke:
Luke is a Syrian, a native of Antioch, by profession a physician. He was a disciple of the apostles and afterwards accompanied Paul until the martyrdom of Paul. He served the Lord without distraction, without a wife, without children, and at the age of eighty-four he fell asleep in Boeotia, full of the Holy Spirit.
As this prologue states, and later confirmed by Church historians like the fourth century bishop of Caesarea, Eusebius, St. Luke came from Antioch. As can be seen from his name, Luke (from the Greek Lucas, or Lucanus), St. Luke was a Greek follower of Jesus Christ. St. Luke was one of the seventy disciples sent by our Lord to preach the Gospel (Luke 10:1‑3), and Jesus appeared after His Resurrection to Ss. Luke and Cleopas as they walked along the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13‑35).
St. Luke traveled with St. Paul on the second missionary journey. They also traveled together from Macedonia to Jerusalem at the end of St. Paul’s third missionary journey. It is commonly believed that St. Luke stayed in Judea and Caesarea while St. Paul was imprisoned in Caesarea. St. Luke accompanied St. Paul on Paul’s journey to Rome. St. Paul testifies in the epistles he wrote while imprisoned in Rome that St. Luke was his companion and fellow worker (see Colossians 4:14; 2 Timothy 4:11; Philemon 24). Blessed Jerome wrote in the late third‑early fourth century that St. Paul probably referred to St. Luke when he wrote in 2 Corinthians 8:18 about “the brother whose praise is in the gospel throughout all the churches,” and that St. Luke is probably one of the individuals who carried St. Paul’s epistles to the church in Corinth.
Epiphanius the Philologist, a sixth century translator, writes that St. Luke left Rome following the deaths of Ss. Peter and Paul and preached in Achaia, Libya, Egypt and the Thebaid. While there is debate among scholars regarding the way in which St. Luke died, tradition maintains that St. Luke was hung from an olive tree in the city of Thebes (the capital of Boeotia) approximately 150 AD. St. Luke’s relics were taken to Constantinople in 338, and by the twelfth century to Padua, Italy.
St. Luke was a physician (Colossians 4:14), but was also a skilled artist. He is traditionally believed to have written the first icon of the Theotokos, who after seeing the icon proclaimed, “Let the grace of Him Who was born of Me and My mercy be with these Icons.” He is also believed to have written icons of Ss. Peter and Paul.
The Protestant scholar Michael Green notes several personal characteristics and abilities of St. Luke that make him a powerful role model for modern Christians:
First, St. Luke was a deeply humble individual: even though he played an important role in the early Church, traveling with St. Paul and serving several churches, he never bragged or made himself a central figure in the Acts of the Apostles.
Second, he lived sacrificially: even though he was a physician, with all of the lucrative prospects for money and position offered to many physicians, he sacrificed these prospects to serve wherever he was called by God to work. This same sacrificial lifestyle influenced his artistic abilities: his skill with words and painting could have made him a successful commercial artist, but he instead offered these abilities to the Church.
Third, he was highly evangelistic: his entire life was dedicated to proclaiming the Gospel and leading others into a relationship with God.
Fourth, he cared for the disadvantaged: a focus of his gospel record and the Acts of the Apostles is the concern of Jesus and the early Christians for the health and well being of the sick and poor.
Fifth, he was a man of prayer and praise: his writings are filled with the prayers of Jesus and the early Christians, and their praise for God regardless of their circumstances.
Sixth, he was deeply loyal: even when other Christians abandoned St. Paul, St. Luke stayed faithful to his friend (see 2 Timothy 4:11).
Finally, St. Luke was committed to the Holy Spirit: while the Holy Spirit is mentioned five times in the Gospel according to St. Matthew, and four times in the Gospel according to St. Mark, St. Luke mentioned Him fifty-three times in his two books.
St. Luke’s feast day is October 18th.
Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke, intercede with our merciful God, that He may grant to our souls the forgiveness of our sins.