The Story of Christmas, Luke 1:1-4

"So many others have tried their hand at putting together a story …that took place among us, using reports handed down by the original eyewitnesses who served this Word with their very lives. Since I have investigated all the reports in close detail, starting from the story’s beginning, I decided to write it all out for you, most honorable Theophilus, so you can know beyond the shadow of a doubt the reliability of what you were taught."  Luke 1:1-4

We don’t know much about Theophilus but he must have been someone Dr. Luke cared a great deal about.    Luke wanted Theo to know “beyond the shadow of a doubt” the story that was going to change the world.  Or at least change Theo’s life.  Many of us know a Theo.  Many of us have been a Theo, a person in need of something…a story…or the certainty of knowing something to be true.  Perhaps the certainty of knowing that we are known…and loved…and have purpose.

In any story, it is always good to start at the beginning.  But from time to time its helpful to peek at the end.  Not the Christmas story’s end but Luke’s end.  He would eventually be hung in Greece because of his faithful retelling of this story.  If the worth of a story is measured in the cost of the telling then this is a priceless story.  At least to Luke.  And certainlyTheo.  

So this Christmas story is not some children’s tale or marketing trick or a kind remembrance of something supposed to make us feel warm inside.   No, Luke’s Christmas story was much more than that.  

Theophilus may have been the first to hear Luke’s story but he wasn’t the last.  Up until his death years later, Luke the physician told the story of Christmas to any soul who wanted to know “beyond a shadow of a doubt” that God really had visited a little town of Bethlehem.  That’s the beginning.