The Melodic Line of Luke-Acts

Approaching Luke without considering Acts or approaching with Acts without considering Luke is as misguided as reading half of a murder-mystery novel and never returning to the book.  These are two parts of one work.  While still two books (as Luke names them in Acts 1:1), they are married to make one narrative. 

  It is a mistake to think that the book of Luke is about Jesus and the book of Acts is about the Holy Spirit, or the Apostles, or the Church.  Both books are about Jesus and his work.  The author (Luke) said that he wrote Luke to show Theophilus that he could be certain about what he was taught regarding Christ (Luke 1:1-4).  In the opening of Acts, he clarified his purpose for the book of Luke, writing, “In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up” (Acts 1:1-2a, italics added).  The implication is that Acts accounts for what Jesus continued to do after his ascension.  The line between the two volumes is the ascension, shown at the end of Luke and the beginning of Acts (Luke 24:51 and Acts 1:9).  The overlap connects and divides the two books. Yet, the reality of Jesus’ saving work is at the core of both books. 

  Acts does indeed show the actions of the Holy Spirit, a small sample of the Apostles, and the Church, but these are the means by which Jesus continues his salvific mission while seated at the right hand of the Father.  The melodic line running through the two books exposes what is happening in both books. 

  The melodic line (a term favored by the Charles Simeon Trust) is the idea that just as every song has a unique, identifiable melody, every book of the Bible has a similar melody running from start to finish.  It is the significant theme with reoccurring “notes” by which the book moves along.  It is the message of the entire book, and it helps the reader understand how each passage relates to that key message.  Luke and Acts share the same melodic line.  They fit snugly together.   

  One note of the melodic line is the word “salvation.”  The word and similar words like “saved” ring often.  Another note is “believe” and similar words like “belief.”  In the book of Luke, the salvation/saved note plays at 1:69, 1:71-77, 2:30, 3:6, 6:9, 7:50, 8:12, 9:24, 13:23, 18:26, 19:9-10, and 23:35-39. Believe/belief rings out at 1:20, 1:45, 8:12-13, 8:50, 20:5, 22:67, 24:11, and 22:25.  This should be expected of a gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ in Luke.  But the melody continues to play in Acts.  Salvation and saved show up in Acts 2:21, 2:40, 2:47, 4:12, 7:25, 11:14, 13:36, 13:47, 15:1, 15:11, 16:17, 16:30-31, 27:20, 27:31, 27:43, and 28:28.  Belief and believe show up in Acts 2:44, 4:4, 4:32, 5:14, 8:12-13, 9:26, 9:42, 10:43, 10:45, 11:17, 11:21, 13:12, 13:39, 13:41, 13:48-49, 14:1, 14:23, 15:5, 15:7, 15:11, 16:1, 16:31, 16:34, 17:12, 17:34, 18:8, 18:27, 19:2, 19:4, 19:18, 21:20, 21:25, 22:19, 24:14, and 26:27. 

  Some of the melody notes found at the beginning of Luke and the end of Acts are echoed at the end of Luke and the beginning of Acts. Luke opens with a statement about John, who will turn people's hearts to the Savior (Luke 1:16-17).  At the birth of Jesus, Mary sings that Jesus will “give knowledge of salvation to his people” (1:77).  Simeon says he saw God’s salvation when he held Jesus as a baby (2:30).  And in Luke 3:6, Luke quotes Isaiah’s statement that “all flesh will see the salvation of God.” At the end of Acts, Paul speaks of a people never hearing or seeing, but then says, “Let it be known to you that his salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will listen” (Acts 28:28).  The bookends of the two-volume work shout of salvation. The message of salvation runs through both books. At the end of Luke, Jesus appoints his disciples to proclaim repentance and forgiveness of sins because Christ rose from the dead (Luke 24:46-47).  In the opening of Acts, Jesus calls his disciples to be his witnesses (Acts 1:8) to proclaim Jesus’ message of salvation.  Paul preaches that they were “sent the message of salvation” (13:26).  Even the girl possessed by a demon declared that Paul and Barnabas were preaching the way of salvation (16:17).  Luke and Acts are about salvation found “in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved,” as Peter preached in Acts 4:12.    

  Another note of the melody is Jesus in the middle of the action.  Luke sets the stage, but that part of the melody does not end in Acts.  It is the opposite.  Jesus calls those who are far off in Acts 2:39. It is Jesus adding new believers to his church in Acts 2:47 and 11:21.  Jesus sent the angel to open the doors of the jail (5:19 and 12:11).  Jesus gives direction to his disciples in 8:26 and 9:11. It is Jesus who opens the hearts of those who hear the preached word (16:14). He strikes down his enemies in (12:23).  Jesus reveals himself to Stephen in 7:59-60 and appears to Saul in 9:11. Jesus speaks to Saul (9:5, 18:9, 23:11), to Cornelius (10:4), and to Peter (10:14).  And Jesus called Paul to preach the gospel in 20:24. People were healed, raised from the dead, and called upon to believe in and by the name of Jesus.  The name of Jesus (not even counting all the times he’s only referred to as “the Lord”) appears 71 times in the 28-chapter book of Acts.  Jesus is the chief actor in the Book of Acts.   

  Still, another note is the constant reversal of expectations when those who the world perceives to be outsiders (women, the poor, the sick, tax collectors, and gentiles) are brought into a relationship with God.  Jesus is bringing salvation to all people.  What was clearly shown in Luke continues in Acts, especially with the Gentiles, and Jesus is present and working in both books.  In Luke, Jesus preached much (but not all) of the proclamation of the Good News.  In Acts, Jesus uses the means of the Apostles and the Church to make the same proclamation of the gospel, empowered by the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus promised he would provide (Luke 12:11-12).

  Nancy Guthrie offers an outstanding discussion of the melodic line of Luke and Acts in her book Saved (Crossway, 2024), which was, in part, used in the preparation of this article.  Her proposed melodic line of Luke is, “God is working for the salvation of his people through the incarnation, Jesus’s sinless life, his death, and his resurrection” (6).  For the book of Acts, she suggests, “The Lord Jesus is continuing to work out God’s eternal plan of salvation for his people through his ascension, his session as he sits at God’s right hand ruling over and interceding for us, and in pouring out his Spirit at Pentecost” (6-7).  She goes on to clarify that God’s people are from all the earth, “every tribe and language” (Revelation 5:9).   

  Luke and Acts show us that Jesus’ work brings salvation to and for all people who repent and believe.  This is true whether during Jesus’ earthly ministry or beyond.  It is even true before his earthly ministry.  Any study of Luke or Acts should be grounded in the line that runs through both books.