Our family went down a Wikipedia rabbit hole last night at the dinner table. For reasons I already don’t remember, we started looking up famous people who had attended our high schools and the high schools Margaret might attend next year after we move. My high school had Bill Nelson, a congressman who also traveled to space during the shuttle program. Phil’s had a member of the 1924 US Olympic soccer team. Geneva doesn’t have a page of famous alumni, but we came up with a couple from our own memory, including the recent Olympic triathlon medalist. In Pennsylvania we found a couple of football players and the author of The Devil Wears Prada.
Hometown hero stories are fun, aren’t they? When our heroes that we’ve known since they were “this small” come home the local newspapers and television stations come out to take pictures and interview them. There’s a sense of pride and excitement. Maybe they get to wave to the crowd from the middle of the football field during half time!
Jesus came back to Nazareth just such a hometown hero.
Following his baptism and time in the desert, full of the power of the Spirit, he had been on a preaching tour. He hadn’t been followed by a camera crew that let folks back home know what he was up to and how he was astounding the countryside with his preaching. Yet still, when he arrived back in Nazareth word had already gotten back to them about what he had been doing, what he had been preaching and teaching in the time that the boy next door was gone. And they had heard he was even GOOD!
Certainly they expected him to come to worship on the Sabbath; Jesus and his family never missed a week. Certainly they expected him to come to the synagogue as he always had, but with a reputation that had preceded him home they weren’t going to just let him sit back and worship. Jesus, the hometown hero, the boy-next-door turned respected preacher, was certainly going to be invited to read and interpret when he walked through the door of First Synagogue of Nazareth. “Local boy makes good” the headlines would have read if they existed. “Come and hear him for yourself” the invitation would have beckoned to the whole town.
The scroll of Isaiah was the one handed to him, but Jesus must have picked the passage. He actually picked two passages and put them together, then claimed they were fulfilled even that day in the hearing and presence of the community. He claimed that the one of whom the prophet is speaking, the one to whom the Spirit of the Lord has come, is Jesus himself. The one who has been anointed to bring good news, proclaim release and recovery, let the oppressed go free, is Jesus, the hometown boy standing, well, now sitting right in front of them. The folks in Nazareth had heard he was good, but THIS good? Really? The fulfillment of Scripture? Jesus the carpenter’s son?
The surprise starts as excitement. At first, the congregation spoke well of him and was amazed at his gracious words. You can imagine them beaming with pride. “This one is one of ours! That’s our boy! That’s Joseph’s son!”
However, the excitement doesn’t last too long once he continues.
He begins to talk about himself as if he is on the same plain as the great prophets of their faith. He talks about how these prophets the were rejected in their hometowns, and how Elijah and Elisha both took their ministries beyond the people and nation of Israel.
That’s not really the message they expected to hear. It started alright, uplifting; it felt good – like good news even, but these later comments, when he started talking about… well… not them – that this good news might be for someone else – that didn’t sit quite the same. That wasn’t what they expected at all.
The people of Nazareth were listening carefully, carefully enough to see the significance of what Jesus was saying about himself, his ministry, and even the love of God. What he was saying, it wasn’t hard for them to see, was going to define and guide the rest of his ministry. It was to be his mission statement, and, he was saying, it was a divine mission statement, too. In his preaching he tells who he has come to touch. He tells who it is God desires to approach. He tells who is included in the Lord’s favor, and who should be among God’s beloved community – and it’s not just them, the hometown crowd.
In this, his first proclamation of his public ministry back home, the place where the circles of love and care and compassion draw people inward, Jesus makes it clear that his gospel is focused outward. The good news he preaches is not just for the poor we know, in our family, in our town, in our nation, it’s for, using Isaiah’s definition or the poor, and Elijah and Elisha’s witness of an expansive ministry, those who are afflicted, those who are oppressed, wherever they may be found. Release is proclaimed for those who are held unjustly, near and far. Health and wellness, insight and wisdom is granted to those like us AND those who differ. The oppressed are liberated wherever the Lord has sovereignty, and that is far beyond the limits his hearers can imagine.
Now, this challenges his formerly tolerant friends and neighbors. They were thrilled at the Spirit’s anointing and the good news when they thought they were at the center of it, but the more they heard, the less certain they were, and the less comfortable they felt. What do you mean it’s not all for us? What do you mean there is mercy for those outside of our town, our experience? They question the words Jesus has claimed and proclaimed in their presence They question Jesus himself, even running him out of town, trying to throw him off a cliff. This isn’t really what they thought they had come to synagogue for.
In another now very famous worship service, one that took place just this week in our nation’s capital, some worshipers heard a message that wasn’t quite what they thought they would hear when they came to church. The Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde, the Episcopal bishop for the Diocese of Washington, preached a sermon about the foundations of unity, which she identified as honoring the inherent dignity of every human being, honesty in both private conversation and public discourse, humility, and mercy. It is the plea for mercy, in which Rev. Budde, directly addressed the newly inaugurated president, that is getting most of the press, but the whole sermon is worth a read or a listen.
You will find, if you haven’t already, a sermon that is brilliantly written for the occasion and the context, but… and I say this with utter respect for the preacher… a message that shouldn’t have been all that shocking. I mean, it shouldn’t be all that shocking for anyone who pays attention to the gospels, to the words and life of Jesus Christ, to his teachings, to the very mission he proclaimed he was all about. Her sermon, even and especially the plea for mercy from those in power on behalf of those who are poor and afflicted, captive and oppressed, proclaimed exactly the good news that Jesus said he came to fulfill for all people. For. All. People.
It’s exactly the mission this followers are called to be a part of. It’s exactly the work of those who understand themselves to be part of the Body of Christ. There were no surprises in Rev. Budde’s sermon that was proclaiming the good news of Jesus which promises
- mercy for those who are suffering,
- safety for those whose lives are in danger, whose access to medical care is being threatened,
- release for those who are held unjustly,
- compassion for those who are bound to be left out of the halls of power, the center of political decisions.
Those who were astonished and even offended, those who found her words ungracious, uninspiring, even nasty in tone, they seem to have missed that the whole thrust of Jesus’ mission of redemption is about the salvation he brings for those at risk of being abused by power structures. It promises that the seats of honor go not to the rich who pay enough money to influence the emperor, but to those who have no money to even by bread to eat and instead wait for morsels to come their way, those who serve without recognition, those who reach out in desperation to touch even just the edge of the cloak of the healing.
An apology was demanded and the preacher’s very freedom and life have been threatened, because the sermon isn’t quite what the hometown crowd wanted to hear. But let those with ears, hear.
As those who claim his name, those who are members of his body – his hands and feet, his ears and eyes, his mouth and his heart – we are called to be led not by a mind of fear and anger and oppression and scarcity and greed, not by building walls of exclusion or drawing lines of division. But we who are gathered by the Spirit of God, we who are listening to and following the words of Jesus who preaches the year of Gods favor, we who are part of his body of which he is the head, we are called to take on his mind and his mission. Always, but especially in this time
- when neighbors with and without documentation are fearing for their lives and livelihood,
- when access to healthcare is being threatened for those who depend on government provision,
- when the basic human dignity and right to proclaim one’s own identity is being denied,
- when prejudices and racism are not just being ignored in the public and private spheres, but enshrined in policies and norms
– our call as the Body of Christ in the world, especially in these days, is to bring good news to the poor. We are sent to proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor to all people. We must be his eyes looking for injustice. We must be his hands offering aid. We must be his feet going into unexpected, even dangerous places. We must be his voice speaking truth to power. We must be his heart, showing love for all people, and especially the last and least of these.
Jesus tells the hometown crowd at First Synagogue of Nazareth, he tells them and he tells us, that he came to bring his mercy NOT only to those on the inside who expect they deserve it, but to those on the outside who think they don’t.
- He came, he tells them and us, to carry the favor and love of God to the ones who feel like they’ve been forgotten, to those who struggle to see God’s grace, to those who are beaten down by people and systems that block their access to resources and peace of mind.
- He came, he tells them and expects us to follow, to free those who are held captive by injustice and a lack of compassion, a scarcity mindset that cannot see the abundance there is to share in this world.
- He came, and we are called to understand and replicate, to include those who are excluded, to bring in those who are usually shut out, to lift up those who are usually tossed aside, and share the good news of God’s favor with them.
This is his mission and it must also be ours. Amen.
For Some Reason 