Text: Luke 4:14-21 (Revised Standard Version)
The Beginning of the Galilean Ministry
14 And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee, and a report concerning him went out through all the surrounding country. 15 And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.
The Rejection of Jesus at Nazareth
16 And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and he went to the synagogue, as his custom was, on the sabbath day. And he stood up to read; 17 and there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah. He opened the book and found the place where it was written,
18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
19 to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
20 And he closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant, and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 And he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
In the Name of God, the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Amen.
“Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
Wow. Quite a statement! It sort of defines “chutzpah”!
But it may be that Jesus came by this naturally. He was a Galilean, and Galileans had been famous for centuries for having some pretty remarkable traits: “The Galileans themselves were the highlanders of Palestine. Josephus says of them, ‘They were ever fond of innovations and by nature disposed to changes, and delighted in seditions. They were ever ready to follow a leader would begin an insurrection. They were quick in temper and given to quarrelling.’ ‘The Galileans,’ it was said, ‘have never been destitute of courage.’ ‘They were ever more anxious for honour than for gain.’”[1]
In other words, the Galileans were ornery, independent, honorable, and brave. Given that, it doesn’t seem strange at all that this is where Jesus hailed from, or that these Galileans were his people.
It also makes sense that Jesus would choose his home town to flat-out declare that he was indeed the Messiah. This was, after all, the place he knew best; and that day in the synagogue he was no doubt surrounded by family and friends – people he’d known his entire life. So he came to tell the home town crowd what God was doing for them in the person of one of their own.
Next week’s lesson, which is the conclusion of this story, tells us that this did not go well.
The point for us today, though, is that this passage marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, as Luke records it. He quotes Isaiah 61 as his mission statement, the blueprint he’s going to follow for the next three years.
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
19 to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
And what a blueprint! Proclaiming good news to the poor, freedom for the prisoners, sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed…the boldness of it, the audacity of it, the chutzpah of it, to use that word again, takes your breath away.
Jesus’ words that day in the synagogue set out his beliefs and his intentions for all to hear. He drew a line in the sand about who he was and what he was about. This was his “inaugural address,” if you will. And Jesus fulfilled this blueprint in his ministry.
So, as followers of Jesus, how are we to follow this mandate he gives us? Because, friends, make no mistake: If this is his mission, it is also ours. If he was anointed, to quote Isaiah again, then we who are members of his body, are no less anointed.
We might well ask, for starters, what is the good news for the poor? Just who are the poor he’s talking about, anyway? Well, it’s not just the economically poor he’s got in mind. It’s also anyone who’s “poor in spirit,” anyone who’s been rejected, or broken, or marginalized, or kicked to the curb. And that pretty much includes any person who’s ever drawn breath, at one time or another. Think of the times in your life when you have felt lost and alone, friendless, misunderstood, maybe even ill-treated; and you wished, you prayed, that the phone might ring with a friendly voice at the other end of the line, or that there might be a knock on the door with a friendly face on the other side. Jesus’ mandate to us is: Be that friend.
None of us can do it all. That’s one reason why we are all in this together. Today, especially today, when we are about to hold our Annual Meeting for 2016, we need to remember this. We need to ask ourselves, as individuals and as a worshipping community, some important questions. Some of these questions are pretty basic, like “why are we here?” “Why do we do what we do?” “What is our purpose?” We all have answers to these questions, but I would guess that these answers show a diversity of opinion. But the questions that Jesus places today before us these: “Are we healing the brokenhearted?” “Do our works bring the Good News to the rejected and the forgotten?” “Do we work to restore sight to the blind – not physical sight, necessarily, but understanding, insight, and enlightenment?” “Are we willing to speak the truth, even though it might not be popular?”
Jesus’ mandate calls on us to, quite simply, follow not only the Golden Rule – “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” but also the prayer of Francis of Assisi:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive.
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
Amen.
If we dare to do that, we’re definitely showing the world that we’ve got chutzpah, too, and to spare!
I would like to share with you the end of an essay written about today’s Gospel passage by a woman named Sara Miles:
“Revealed or hidden, prophesied or remembered, God is always at work. Join in, come closer, lend a hand, and you will enter the present tense of Emmanuel, God-with-us. Of holiness in mortal flesh, God alive despite our poverty and blindness, filling our clumsy, broken lives, making everything new” (emphasis added).
Sisters and Brothers of St. John’s, let us join together with renewed resolve to make a more beautiful and compassionate world. Let us strive always for the greater gift of love. If we do, then this scripture will indeed be fulfilled this day, in this place! And the echoes will ripple down through the centuries unto all Eternity!
In the Name of God, the Holy and Undivided Trinity. Amen.
[1] Quoted in Barclay, William, The Gospel of Luke, Louisville, Kentucky, Westminster John Knox Press, 2001