Luke gives us the details of John the Baptist and Jesus' birth and pre-birth, mentions the shepherds visit to the baby Jesus, and a picture of Jesus' childhood. Luke also gives a longer account of Jesus' resurrection appearances to His disciples. Luke also spend a lot of time on Jesus' journey to Jerusalem leading up to His passion. The differences between the synoptic accounts have led to various problems which theologians have sought to resolve. The primary criticisms used to accomplish this task have been source criticism, form criticism, and redaction criticism.
Source criticism pertains to the written records or sources used by the gospel writers.
Redaction criticism investigates the way the author's personal theology and bias affected the way he organized and recorded the historical gospel materials. Although these critical methods have been of some help, it can not evaluate the hand of God which inspired each writer in the way He did.