“Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” These words begin Jesus’ inaugural address in Luke’s gospel. In last Sunday’s gospel Jesus reads a passage from Isaiah that describes a prophet whom the Spirit anoints to bring good news to the poor, freedom to captives, sight to the blind. This prophet will inaugurate a jubilee in which those who have lost out in society get a new chance to thrive. Jesus begins the first major policy speech of his ministry by declaring he is that prophet.
Jesus invites the synagogue congregation to hear Isaiah’s word not as an ancient, someday promise but as a present claim on their future. He, Jesus, is the Spirit-filled prophet anointed and appointed to make the human race a whole, flourishing community in which no one is left out.
At first the people react with amazement and praise Jesus’ interpretation of the scriptures. They seem to entertain Jesus’ declaration that the words of the prophet can come alive. But quickly their certainties overtake their dreams and they begin to wonder how the local carpenter’s son can possibly bring the world round right.
- What is a sermon that you try to live? Who gave it?
- What turns the hometown folks from marveling to indignation?
In last Sunday’s gospel, Luke tells us that Jesus went to the synagogue on the Sabbath as was his custom. Gathering to hear and interpret God’s word is the way Jews continually build up their identity as God’s people. The Word of God functions like a constitution. It creates a community that lives its story into the future.
Within the Sabbath assembly individuals become a people who share a common history and story that tells them who they are. Sabbath by Sabbath and generation by generation the word goes forth to bear fruit in people’s lives and to create an ongoing community of mercy and justice.
On this Sabbath Jesus lays claim to a radically new and flourishing future by remembering Isaiah’s ancient promise. Today, he says, is the day for looking at the world from God’s point of view in which the poor and blind are as important as the rich and seeing.
The Sabbath is the day for resting in the goodness and connectedness of all that is. So it is on a Sabbath in the midst of his own people that Jesus proclaims the Spirit, the giver of life, will work through him to heal, forgive, set free, and lift people up.
- What gospel words animate your community of faith? What words constitute its mission?
The Sabbath sermon that begins with Isaiah’s words of promise climaxes with Jesus’ words of judgment. Jesus reminds his hometown listeners of two foreigners in Israel’s history who accepted prophets that Israel rejected.
The widow of Zarephath in the region of Sidon north of Galilee is Jesus’ first example of a believing Gentile. God sends Elijah to live with the widow to keep him safe and fed after he angers King Ahab and Queen Jezebel by proclaiming it will not rain again in Israel until God says so. The people have followed Jezebel in worshiping Baal and forgotten who is really God in Israel.
The widow from Zarephath grumbles and even swears when Elijah turns up wanting food and water. She sees Elijah as a danger, as bringing the power of God too close for comfort. But she does what he asks and makes him, her son, and herself small cakes.
For three years after that her flour jar and oil jug never run out. His prophetic word proves true in her life. Jesus uses her faith to reproach his unbelieving hearers.
Jesus’ second example of a believing Gentile is Namaan, a Syrian general who seeks out the prophet Elisha, Elijah’s successor, to heal him of leprosy. Elisha commands the general to bathe seven times in the Jordan River. Naaman objects that this is far too impersonal and humble a way for a person of his stature to be cured. But an aide convinces Naaman to try the prescribed cure. Elisha’s prophetic word proves true. Jesus angers his audience with the example of Naaman’s willingness to act on a word he doesn’t fully trust.
Both the widow and Naaman struggle and wrestle with a prophet’s words. They fear, challenge, and doubt the word, yet try it and find it true, nourishing, and healing.
- With which of Jesus’ prophetic words do you struggle and doubt?
- Which words call you to try them and let them prove themselves?