Luke 1:3

Until now Luke had described the work of previous writers. Now he referred to his own Gospel. He, too, had done careful research and proceeded to write an orderly account. Significantly Luke did not describe himself as an eyewitness of Jesus’ ministry but as a researcher of it.

"In consecutive order" (NASB, Gr. kathexes, "orderly" NIV) does not necessarily imply chronological order. It probably means that Luke wrote according to a plan that God led him to adopt. All the Gospel writers seem to have departed from a strictly chronological arrangement of events occasionally for thematic purposes.

This is one of the clearest proofs in the Bible that God did not always dictate the words of Scripture to the writers who simply copied them down. That view is the dictation theory of inspiration. He did this with some passages (e.g., Exodus 20:1-17; et al.) but not most.

Theophilus’ name means "lover of God." This fact has led to some speculation about whether "Theophilus" was really a substitute for the real name of Luke’s addressee, or perhaps Luke wrote generally to all lovers of God. The use of "most excellent" (Gr. kratiste) suggests that Theophilus was a real person of some distinction (cf. Acts 23:26; Acts 24:3; Acts 26:25). The name was common in the Greek world. He may have been Luke’s patron or publisher. [Note: See E. J. Goodspeed, "Some Greek Notes: I. Was Theophilus Luke’s Publisher?" Journal of Biblical Literature 73 (1954):84. See also Bock, Luke, pp. 23, 42-43, for further speculation about Theophilus’ identity.]