“A good tree doesn’t produce rotten fruit, and a rotten tree doesn’t produce good fruit. For every tree is known by its own fruit. People don’t gather figs from thorny plants or pick grapes from a thorn bush. A good person produces good from the good treasure of his heart, and an evil person produces evil from an evil treasure. For it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”
“Why do you keep calling me ‘Lord, Lord,’ but don’t do what I tell you? I will show you what everyone is like who comes to me, hears my words, and acts on them. He is like a person building a house, who dug a deep hole to lay the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the floodwaters pushed against that house but couldn’t shake it, because it had been founded on the rock. But the person who hears what I say but doesn’t act on it is like someone who built a house on the ground without any foundation. When the floodwaters pushed against it, that house quickly collapsed, and the ruin of that house was devastating.”
Luke 6:43-49
It is clear that Luke knows Matthew’s material, He has ordered his material in the same sequence as Matthew with the exception of Luke’s 6:31 which parallels Matthew 7:12 Luke has taken that verse and places it in the passage we dealt with in Gem 842. Matthew has the same verse placed in this sequence. Luke has moved it. There is a reason and it would be worth digging out but I have already passed the passage in Gems 842 and I am not going back. I will look at that the next time I go through Luke again. Notice also he has omitted the segments above in red, which I have listed in the last Gem. So in all he has omitted 72 verses from Matthew’s material and has moved this verse to a different location. If you look carefully at the verses before us yesterday and today, you will note Luke has also abbreviated today’s passage he has reduced Matthew’s 13 verses down to 7 verses. What is he doing? He seems to be heavily editing. Remember Luke told us in his introduction to the Gospel according to Luke that he has thoroughly researched the accounts of Jesus and is seeking to give us an order account.
Note too the differences between the versions as to how they treat the introduction to this segment or series of “sermonettes”. Is it really a series of unconnected sermonettes or does it all hang together? The following versions: CEV, GNB. GW, IBIS, ISV, MSG and NLT all disconnect it from what went before it. They simply set it as a new section butted up against the last but a different idea. Whereas the AMP, ASV, EMTV, ESV, ITB, KJV, LITV, NASB, RV and YLT link it to what went before it in various ways but primarily using “for” to translate the Greek conjunction [γάρ]. This conjunction expresses the idea of continuation in this case, not explanation or a causal link.
No, Luke did not mean this section to be a series of unconnected final little bits of sermons that don’t hang together. Sermons which Matthew has taken and expanded, Luke has contracted and put them together to flow on from one to another. Now it’s time for you to look at the passage and see if you can see the connection between the thoughts and determine why Luke has truncated and linked these units as he has. Clearly when Jesus first spoke these sermons they were longer. Matthew has the longer version, but the original was likely to have been longer still. Sorry we no longer have the full version of what Jesus spoke, only the pre-packaged cut down summaries of Matthew and Luke. But comparing the way Matthew and Luke have arranged the material is helpful to us.
Take some more time to do that and we will pull it apart in the next Gem. Firstly see if you can determine how these thoughts flow on from what went before it and see if there is connection between them. After that we will take time to look at the elements in a little more detail. But don’t worry too much. I don’t plan to spend the next week on it. Just a couple of Gems.
To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else, is a great accomplishment!
Rick Godwin
Work for a CAUSE, not for APPLAUSE. Live life to EXPRESS, not to IMPRESS.
Rick Godwin
If you care what people think about you, you will always be their prisoner.
Eveline Sandhi Lim
If you know who you are, then nothing will bother you, neither praise nor slander.
Mother Teresa