Luke 3:16

3:16 John answered them all, ¹  “I baptize you with water, ²  but one more powerful than I am is coming – I am not worthy ³  to untie the strap ⁴  of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. ⁵ 

Luke 5:36

5:36 He also told them a parable: ⁶  “No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews ⁷  it on an old garment. If he does, he will have torn ⁸  the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. ⁹ 

Luke 6:42

6:42 How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck from your eye,’ while you yourself don’t see the beam in your own? You hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

Luke 13:25

13:25 Once ¹⁰  the head of the house ¹¹  gets up ¹²  and shuts the door, then you will stand outside and start to knock on the door and beg him, ‘Lord, ¹³  let us in!’ ¹⁴  But he will answer you, ¹⁵  ‘I don’t know where you come from.’ ¹⁶ 

[3:16]  ¹ tn Grk “answered them all, saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant and has not been translated.

[3:16]  ² tc A few mss (C D 892 1424 pc it ) add εἰς μετάνοιαν (ei" metanoian, “for repentance”). Although two of the mss in support are early and important, it is an obviously motivated reading to add clarification, probably representing a copyist’s attempt to harmonize Luke’s version with Matt 3:11.

[3:16]  ³ tn Grk “of whom I am not worthy.”

[3:16]  ⁴ tn The term refers to the leather strap or thong used to bind a sandal. This is often viewed as a collective singular and translated as a plural, “the straps of his sandals,” but it may be more emphatic to retain the singular here.

[3:16]  ⁵ sn With the Holy Spirit and fire. There are differing interpretations for this phrase regarding the number of baptisms and their nature. (1) Some see one baptism here, and this can be divided further into two options. (a) The baptism of the Holy Spirit and fire could refer to the cleansing, purifying work of the Spirit in the individual believer through salvation and sanctification, or (b) it could refer to two different results of Christ’s ministry: Some accept Christ and are baptized with the Holy Spirit, but some reject him and receive judgment. (2) Other interpreters see two baptisms here: The baptism of the Holy Spirit refers to the salvation Jesus brings at his first advent, in which believers receive the Holy Spirit, and the baptism of fire refers to the judgment Jesus will bring upon the world at his second coming. One must take into account both the image of fire and whether individual or corporate baptism is in view. A decision is not easy on either issue. The image of fire is used to refer to both eternal judgment (e.g., Matt 25:41) and the power of the Lord’s presence to purge and cleanse his people (e.g., Isa 4:4-5). The pouring out of the Spirit at Pentecost, a fulfillment of this prophecy no matter which interpretation is taken, had both individual and corporate dimensions. It is possible that since Holy Spirit and fire are governed by a single preposition in Greek, the one-baptism view may be more likely, but this is not certain. Simply put, there is no consensus view in scholarship at this time on the best interpretation of this passage.

[5:36]  ⁶ sn The term parable in a Semitic context can cover anything from a long story to a brief wisdom saying. Here it is the latter.

[5:36]  ⁷ tn Grk “puts”; but since the means of attachment would normally be sewing, the translation “sews” has been used.

[5:36]  ⁸ tn Grk “he tears.” The point is that the new garment will be ruined to repair an older, less valuable one.

[5:36]  ⁹ sn The piece from the new will not match the old. The imagery in this saying looks at the fact that what Jesus brings is so new that it cannot simply be combined with the old. To do so would be to destroy what is new and to put together something that does not fit.

[13:25]  ¹¹ tn The syntactical relationship between vv. 24-25 is disputed. The question turns on whether v. 25 is connected to v. 24 or not. A lack of a clear connective makes an independent idea more likely. However, one must then determine what the beginning of the sentence connects to. Though it makes for slightly awkward English, the translation has opted to connect it to “he will answer” so that this functions, in effect, as an apodosis. One could end the sentence after “us” and begin a new sentence with “He will answer” to make simpler sentences, although the connection between the two sentences is thereby less clear. The point of the passage, however, is clear. Once the door is shut, because one failed to come in through the narrow way, it is closed permanently. The moral: Do not be too late in deciding to respond.

[13:25]  ¹² tn Or “the master of the household.”

[13:25]  ¹³ tn Or “rises,” or “stands up.”

[13:25]  ¹⁴ tn Or “Sir.”

[13:25]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “Open to us.”

[13:25]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “and answering, he will say to you.” This is redundant in contemporary English and has been simplified to “he will answer you.”

[13:25]  ¹⁷ sn For the imagery behind the statement “I do not know where you come from,” see Ps 138:6; Isa 63:16; Jer 1:5; Hos 5:3.