Third Sunday After Epiphany
Nehemiah 8:1-10 Psalm 19 1 Corinthian 12:12-31 Luke 4:14-21 Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Grace and peace to you from the one with a purpose. Amen We are still in the season after Epiphany, the season where our readings reveal who Jesus is and what he is about. So far in the time after Epiphany We’ve heard the story of Jesus’ baptism where the spirit came down and claimed him and God’s voice named him as beloved son, we got a glimpse of Jesus’ capacity for abundance as we watched him in action at the wedding at Cana turning a huge amount of water into a vast amount of fine wine so that by the grace of God relationships could be repaired and today Jesus announces his purpose, what he has come to do. From his baptism Jesus is driven out into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan, he successfully survives the test and that is where we pick up the story today when filled with the power of the spirit Jesus returns to Galilee and begins teaching, people are impressed and word begins to spread about how great this new teacher is and so of course he has to go home and teach in the home synagogue, local boy makes good better come home and share his talents right? So there is perhaps a greater sense of anticipation when Jesus, in his home town synagogue, among the people who watched him grow from a cute baby through those awkward teen years into the man before them, stands, takes the scroll and turns to Isaiah and reads: “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 captive and recovery of sight to the blind to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” And he sits down to teach and eyes of all in the synagogue are fixed on him. The people are holding their breath, what is this reportedly great teacher going to say about this passage? Will he talk about the tradition of the prophets? The hoped for messiah? And Jesus delivers his sermon in one sentence: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” That’s it. Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. The way the planners of the lectionary set it up we don’t get the crowds’ reaction until next week, so this week we get to unpack what is revealed about Jesus through his reading of Isaiah and his one sentence interpretation of the reading. These are the first words we hear from Jesus after he starts his ministry and in his choice of reading from Isaiah Jesus lays out his purpose for the rest of his ministry, Jesus is to bring good news to the poor, proclaim release to the captive, recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the lord’s favor Jesus has rooted himself firmly in the prophetic tradition and the expectations of the people of Israel, but we know of course that the way Jesus works is decidedly unexpected so we wonder what does Jesus mean when he claims that the scripture has been fulfilled? - we will see just what this all means, as Jesus lives out his purpose, in how he feeds the hungry, thousands with a few loaves and fish forgives those captive to sin with the words ‘your sins are forgiven’ heals those oppressed by sickness as simply as saying ‘get up take your mat and go’ Jesus will live his purpose out in more controversial ways as well by choosing to associate with tax collectors and sinners over the religious elite, he will break the law to fulfill his purpose whether it’s healing on the Sabbath or not washing his hands and in a grand display he will cleanse the temple of money changers and merchants selling animals for sacrifice, disrupting the established economic system in a bid to turn the focus of the temple from worldly gain to prayer to the creator of the universe. And as you can imagine all these actions disrupting the status quo upset the people who benefitted from the status quo which leads to the cross Jesus’ most unconventional way of being messiah, dying for the sake of life And it is Jesus’ short sermon in his home synagogue at the beginning of his ministry that starts this all off sounding the death knoll of the status quo because good news for the poor means consequences for those who are rich freedom is good news for the oppressed and means changes for those who oppressed them the year of jubilee, the Lord’s favor when the ancestral land is redistributed is exciting for those who have no land but perhaps not so much for those who have acquired great amounts of land. In the words of the hymn the Canticle of the Turning “the world is about to turn” Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. What are we to make of this pronouncement of Jesus Especially in light of all that’s going on in the world around us A world still full of the hungry, poor and oppressed. Allow me if you will to take a slight detour into the world of grammar. There is a tense called the perfect tense, and it describes actions that have been completed but whose consequences are ongoing in the present. For example the statement: I made lunch. The making of lunch is complete, an action of the past but the consequence of that statement is that there is now lunch available to eat. Jesus’ sermon is like that, In the perfect tense the words of the prophet Isaiah have been fulfilled. Completed by Jesus’ pronouncement but the consequences of his statement, of what he has done is still being worked out and we have a part in living them out As Paul said in our second reading for the day: “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one spirit we were all baptized into one body- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free and we were all made to drink of one spirit.” In our baptisms we were joined to Christ and when we were joined to Christ his purpose became our purpose, to bring good news to the poor, proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free and to proclaim the year of the lord’s favor. And as we look around at the world and see how many people are still poor, captive and oppressed we realize there is a lot of work left to do, and when this seems overwhelming we pause and look around at the body of Christ, made up of many members each with a role to play according to the gift of the spirit. Who, joined together as one in Christ live out God’s purpose in the world. Amen
0 Comments
Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
Leave a Reply. |
AboutPastor Emily Johnson preaches weekly at Christ Lutheran. These are manuscripts of her sermons given at Christ Lutheran. Feel free to engage with them in the comments section of the blog. Archives
December 2019
Categories
All
|