February 3, 2019 – Luke 4:21-30
Luke 4:21-30
From Cheers to Jeers or – Don’t Shoot the Preacher
4th Sunday after Epiphany – February 3, 2019
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
Last week Jesus was handed a scroll to read in his hometown synagogue.
This is his first public act in Luke’s Gospel – he’s gone home to preach his first sermon!
So he is handed the scroll.
Apparently he has some leeway in what he can choose to read from the scroll.
And he carefully chooses these famous and well-loved verses from Isaiah,
who had written them 600 years before.
They were written to a people struggling to rebuild their lives,
people who had recently returned from exile in Babylon and found their city in ruins.
In the verses Jesus chooses to read he reaffirms God’s promises to make everything well again:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor.
As we saw last week, Jesus then sits down and preaches a one sentence sermon.
He simply says, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
That’s it!
He simply announces that the waiting is over! God is about to begin the new age!
The new age of equity, and the generous sharing of God’s gifts in creation.
The new age of justice, peace, and harmony.
The new age of healing and wellness and forgiveness.
The new age when everyone will have enough and none will have too much.
Which sounds great!
The people are amazed!
They have been longing to hear this! Yay Jesus!
Everyone speaks well of him!
Only . . . only. . .
For those who were listening carefully, or who opened up their Bible app to
check on the accuracy of Jesus’ quotation from Isaiah they would have noticed
something super interesting.
They would have noticed that Jesus skipped a verse in Isaiah.
There is something Jesus left out.
You know what he omitted to say? You know what is not happening today in
God’s restoration of the universe?
Just this: “He has called me to proclaim . . . the day of vengeance of our God.”
In Jesus’ understanding, God’s new age does not include vengeance upon enemies.
It does not include violence.
It includes healing and justice and peace – but not through vengeance and violence.
In Jesus’ understanding these things will never bring healing and justice and peace.
But apparently at this point no one notices or cares that Jesus has omitted that part.
Maybe he just forgot? Maybe it was an honest mistake?
Is it one of those Biblical mysteries we will never know the answer to?
No! Because today we get the answer! We find out why Jesus omits that verse.
And he gets into a lot of trouble as a result.
All the cheers for Jesus turn into jeers.
The people likely assume that Jesus just forgot that little verse.
And here’s why: when Jesus says the year of the LORD’s favour is starting today,
people understand that to mean that God is going to violently overthrow
the Romans and give them their land back.
Because in the year of the LORD’s favour or jubilee year all land lost through
Debt or otherwise was simply returned to its original owner – at no cost.
So the people had longed for a king – a messiah – to lead them into battle to
get revenge on their enemies and get their land back.
So they cheer him! Yah, Jesus! You’re our guy! We love you!
But Jesus, seeing their misunderstanding, has to clarify for them what he means.
Ah, he says. You think this is about favouritism?
You think God wants to give you more blessing than anyone else because this is my hometown?
Let me set things straight for you.
Remember how there were lots of poor widows right here in Israel when there was a famine
back in the time of Elijah and Elijah didn’t feed a single one of them?
Remember how the only person he fed was a gentile foreign woman of another nation and race?
Or how about a little time after that when there were a lot of sick people in Israel but
the only person that the great prophet and healer Elisha healed was a leper
who was not only a foreigner but the general of your enemy Syria’s army?
3000 years later and the Bible is still unimaginably radical.
3000 years later and the Bible is still holding out a vision for us that upends, well, everything.
Jesus reminds the people of God’s lavish grace and mercy.
Of God’s love for all people.
Jesus reminds the people that God does not have favourites.
And that God not have enemies.
The Lutheran pastor Martin Niemoller, who spent 8 years in a Nazi concentration camp, once said, “It took me a long time to learn that God is not the enemy of my enemies. He is not even the enemy of his enemies.”
God’s vision for us and for our world is always so much bigger than we can imagine.
But this is hard for the people to accept.
It was really hard for the people Jesus spoke to on that day long ago in his hometown.
When the cheers suddenly and abruptly turn to jeers.
And they try to kill Jesus.
I am wondering, right now – just as a thought experiment – what could I possibly say to
make you want to kill me mid-sermon?
I honestly don’t know.
But preaching is a difficult profession.
Because it calls you to make people’s lives more difficult – and pay you a salary for doing it!
Jesus certainly made the people’s lives more difficult that day when he invited them into a vision
for themselves that called them to share the land with their Roman enemies so
everyone could prosper – Jew and Gentile, Israelite and Roman.
Yes: their debts would be forgiven in God’s new age.
But just so: they would need to forgive the Romans their debts of sin.
Apparently that is beyond what they can imagine doing – and I do understand that.
That is just too difficult.
The great Lutheran thinker Soren Kierkegaard lived in the 19th century.
He noted that he lived in an age when a lot of effort was being put into making
labour-saving devices that made people’s lives easier.
Well, we all can relate to that! “Alexa, turn on my lights!”
Which saves you all the trouble, you know, of pushing a button.
In any case, Kierkegaard decided that he would dedicate his life
to making people’s lives more difficult: so he became a preacher.
You’ve never tried to kill me. Thank you for that.
You’ve never tried to take me up to the bell tower and throw me off. Thank you for that.
I have called you to love one another.
I have invited you to make coffee on Sunday morning for each other,
which doesn’t seem like a big thing.
I’ve invited you to wash little cups in the communion room on a communion room team
every once in while. That doesn’t seem outrageous.
These are ways of loving and serving your brothers and sisters at First Lutheran Church.
I’ve invited you to make a meal for our neighbours at Sargent and Victor every now and
again. That really doesn’t seem very excessive to me.
I have asked you to be generous financially in supporting our ministry – and while
sometimes I asked for a little, sometimes the response was a lot,
sometimes the response entailed real sacrifice.
I’ve asked that you increase your giving by 10, 5, 3, or even just 2 percent a year
to keep pace with inflation – that doesn’t seem like much.
Now I’m thinking maybe I should be asking for more –
like maybe I’m doing something wrong since you have not yet
in all these 19 years tried to murder me.
In any case, in all these things I’ve invited you to do,
it has only and ever been because of God’s mission to
love bless heal and set free this whole world and every person in it.
It is only and ever because God’s mission is expansive, and world-changing.
It’s only and ever because God’s love is big, and it is for everyone –
and we get to be part of it.
We get to be part of it. It is so thrilling and meaningful to play a part in God’s restoration of
The world – and of this neighbourhood, and of one another’s lives.
God’s new age has begun in Jesus – the party is here! The promise is sure!
Jesus lives as if that is so: Jesus lives as if God’s healing is intended for everyone.
Jesus lives as if God’s abundant food resources are intended for everyone.
Jesus lives as if God’s forgiveness is intended for everyone.
Jesus lives as if good quality abundant life, where people are connected and
Care for one another in community is intended for everyone.
And today – today – he invites you to join the party and live the life –
and not . . . to shoot the preacher.
So together, let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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