Now that I am almost finished preaching through the Gospel of Luke (two years and 69 messages) I have a confession to make.  I have been terrified to preach through a gospel, any gospel, for the past 30 years.  Seriously, I have preached through all of the easy books like Ephesians and Philippians.  I tackled a few that some people are afraid of, like Romans, and I didn’t even blink an eye.  In fact, I preached through Romans twice.  I preached through Hebrews–nobody does that.  I preached through First and Second Samuel and called it, “the Life of David.”  I have made you endure a few long books like Genesis.  I am actually the only pastor I know who preached through Key Doctrines in a systematic way.  And look ahead, Apologetics is next.  So why would a gospel scare me?

The short answer is that you can get a lot of things wrong as a pastor, but if you get this wrong you are in trouble.  I really wanted to do a good job honoring Jesus Christ and making sure we fell in love with Jesus more as we made our way through the gospel.  The climax of God’s redemptive story is in the Gospels. I wanted the series to have a real foundational feel for our church as we journey together.  Each gospel is valuable and the perspective they have is unique.  I am not quite sure why I choose Luke (it was two years ago) but I wanted to make sure I was consistent with Luke’s Holy Spirit inspired agenda and message.

Now that we are very close to the end I am looking forward to finishing (My commentaries by Darrell Bock and David Garland are falling apart).  I have another confession to make as well.  I think I am actually looking forward to preaching through another gospel some time in the next few years.  Trust me; I’ll not wait 30 years this time.

For the Only Cause that Matters,

– Ken