Luke 4:21-30 (Sermon for the week of January 28th)

21 And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture is 
fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 So all bore witness to Him, 
and marveled at the gracious words which proceeded out of 
His mouth. And they said, “Is this not Joseph’s son?”
23 He said to them, “You will surely say this proverb to Me, 
‘Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we have heard done in 
Capernaum,^[a] do also here in Your country.’” 24 Then He said, 
“Assuredly, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own 
country. 25 But I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel 
in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years 
and six months, and there was a great famine throughout all 
the land; 26 but to none of them was Elijah sent except to 
Zarephath,^[b]in the region of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. 

27 And many lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha 
the prophet, and none of them was cleansed except 
Naaman the Syrian.”
     
28 So all those in the synagogue, when they heard these things, 
were filled with wrath, 29 and rose up and thrust Him out of 
the city; and they led Him to the brow of the hill on which 
their city was built, that they might throw Him down over 
the cliff. 30 Then passing through the midst of them, 
He went His way.

SERMON:

Luke starts the story of Jesus' ministry with the events of 
Jesus' sermon in the synagogue in order to emphasize the paradigm 
and irony of His ministry and to emphasize the fact that salvation 
is available to everyone...not just Jews. Luke does not follow 
a chronological order, and chooses to arrange the events of 
Jesus' life in an order that supports one of many themes in 
Jesus' ministry. First, there are the ironies that take place. 
For example, Jesus will resurrect in order to conquer death and 
to prove Himself as the Messiah, and in this weeks reading Jesus 
escapes death on a smaller scale by miraculously "passing through" 
the midst of an enraged crowd bent on tossing Him off a cliff. 
Luke also emphasizes the importance of salvation to Gentiles. 
On that note let's look at the reading.

"21 And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture is 
fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 So all bore witness to Him, and 
marveled at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth."
         
Notice that once again, Jesus says: "TODAY". Today is not 
yesterday and today is not 2,000 years later. Today is NOW. 
NOW the scripture is fulfilled! Jesus is the One who fulfills 
the Scripture! It would seem ludicrous that you or I would 
stand before a crowd and exclaim that we have come to fulfill 
scripture! What would the crowd think if we did this? 
They would probably think that we had a screw loose! 
Jesus states this boldly and with authority and how does the 
congregation react? They marvel at His words! The scripture has 
and was fulfilled, and the fulfillment of this "scripture" was 
completed by Jesus. The waiting is over. The time has come. 
The Jews have waited and still wait for the Messiah. They have 
seen God work miracles throughout their history from the parting 
of the Red Sea to the destruction of the false prophets of Baal. 

We would expect the Jews to be ready and be able to recognize 
and accept the Messiah...but we are wrong, they are not ready 
TODAY. The Jews at the time of Jesus' birth have not seen or 
heard from any prophet in 400 years...they have grown weary of 
waiting like a guard who falls asleep at their post. Jesus says, 
"Today the scripture has been fulfilled" but today the Jews are 
not ready! The Jews start off by speaking well of Jesus, but 
soon turn against Him because Jesus does not do or fulfill what 
they want...they want freedom from THEIR captivity...
forget everyone else...they are the chosen ones, not the Gentiles. 

The reading this week also asks us for a decision...
no fence sitting. Did Jesus fulfill the scriptures or not? 
You have to make a choice, and hopefully this choice is based on 
actual investigation on your part.

"And they said, “Is this not Joseph’s son?”"

Mankind looks for power and wealth as attributes of royalty and 
high social status. The Jews expect their king to be born into 
terms that they have determined as worthy. They expect a king to 
be born into wealth and power as kings ususally are born into. 
Jesus as Creator knows this and purposefully "predestines" or 
creates the circumstances so that He is to be born into poverty 
and humility. Jesus does not come to fulfill the expectations 
of men, but to grant all people of this world with Salvation if 
they choose to accept Him. This verse is sarcastic. Joseph was 
a humble man from an insignificant town. Joseph was not born into 
wealth, but Joseph is a descendant of King David! We know that 
Jesus is the Son of God and not the son of Joseph...Jesus comes 
to fulfill the will of the Heavenly Father, GOD, 
not the will of men!

"23 He said to them, “You will surely say this proverb to Me, 
‘Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we have heard done in 
Capernaum,^[a] do also here in Your country.’”"

Luke has not reported yet on what Jesus has done in Capernaum, 
and Mark has Jesus teaching in Capernaum at the beginning of 
His ministry. It is obvious that Jesus is living in Capernaum 
at the time of this event in Nazareth. Jesus' hometown crowd 
expects Him to do wonderful things in His hometown of Nazareth. 
Their attitude stems from the belief that Jesus healed the 
undeserving people of Capernaum...He should heal the deserving 
people of Nazareth. It is a call for loyalty to the people of 
Nazareth, the people of Jesus' hometown.

"24 Then He said, “Assuredly, I say to you, no prophet is 
accepted in his own country."

A prophet is not going to please the people of his hometown, 
for a prophet is not bound by loyalty. A prophet has to move 
away from his hometown in order to be heard. The Jews have a 
long history of rejecting prophets because true prophets speak 
the truth that ears do not want to hear. Prophets tell of 
judgement and a call for change among the people and people 
seldom want to make these changes. What is acceptable to the 
Lord is oftentimes unacceptable to men. The rejection of Jesus 
in Nazareth is a foreshadowing of the rejection of Jesus in 
Jerusalem. Jewish rejection does not discredit who Jesus was in 
any way. One question: They were not ready for the Messiah then, 
and are they ready for the Messiah today? Are Christians ready 
for the Messiah today?

"25 But I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel in the 
days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six 
months, and there was a great famine throughout all the land; 
26 but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath,^[b]
in the region of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. 27 And many 
lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and 
none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”

This story is from 1 Kings 17 and would be familiar to this crowd. 
In the midst of a destructive drought, God sent Elijah to 
Zarephath to ask a poor widow for some water. The widow objected, 
but Elijah told her that God would replenish any food or water 
Elijah used. The widow was rewarded exactly as Elijah said she 
would, but later her son died. Elijah prayed that the son's life 
would be restored. There is one theme in this story from 1 Kings 
that would strike this crowd in an almost insulting way...the 
widow was a Gentile!
     
The same theme applies for Jesus' reference to Naaman the Syrian. 
Naaman was a Gentile. The point of these two themes is that the 
Jewish people cannot consider their relationship with God as an 
exclusive relationship. Jesus reinforces this point by beginning 
His ministry in Capernaum...a place heavily populated by Gentiles. 
The Nazareth crowd soon rejects Jesus because Jesus shoots down 
their expectations on what a Messiah, {if Jesus is the Messiah 
and Jews question this}, will do for them. Jesus shoots these 
expectations down with works and speeches like in this weeks 
reading because the Jews cannot expect exclusive "rights" to 
the Messiah just because they are Jewish.

"28 So all those in the synagogue, when they heard these things, 
were filled with wrath, 29 and rose up and thrust Him out of the 
city; and they led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city 
was built, that they might throw Him down over the cliff. 
30 Then passing through the midst of them, He went His way."

The scripture the Jews think of pertaining to Jesus' speech is 
Isaiah 61:1...the Messiah will bring good news to the oppressed 
Jews. Isaiah 61:2 speaks of "the day of vengeance of our God" 
which Jesus purposefully omits from the reading. The Jews expect 
the Messiah to deliver them from oppression and to punish their 
oppressors. Instead, Jesus reminds them of a time when God cursed 
the Jews and instead God showed mercy to a Gentile, 
Naaman the Syrian. Jesus' message is not want the Jews want to 
hear and become angry. Isn't this true today? If a person where 
to speak the Truth, would we like it? Or would we get angry? 
These people got so angry that they wanted to kill Jesus by 
throwing Him off a cliff! Why? Because they expect the Messiah 
to fulfill THEIR expectations and THEIR will...thinking like 
selfish, sinful, prideful humans. Leviticus 24:14 required the 
stoning of a FALSE prophet...usually they would take a person 
and throw them off a cliff into a lower place and then people 
would stand above them and stone them to death. This is what 
they wanted to do to Jesus.
     
Question: What was Jesus' charge? Speaking the Truth! 
Speaking words that they didn't want to hear because the Jews 
believed that they were Chosen and were deserving of redemption...
they alone. Jesus came to grant salvation, He came to deliver 
the oppressed, and HE DOES! He grants this to the whole world 
and not a select group. What the Scriptures speak of are 
God's Words...not open to our selfish interpretation and the 
expectations of men. Our job is to find the Truth in God's 
words...not place our will on God. The Jews disobeyed God's 
orders many, many, times and were fully aware of their actions 
and the consequences. This time the rest of the world has a 
chance at salvation. Notice that Jesus slips through the crowd 
and is not thrown off the cliff. How did He do that? A miracle! 
Could you escape a riot by "slipping through the crowd" when 
that crowd is rioting because of you? How about a crowd that is 
bent on stoning you or throwing you off a cliff? How could you 
"slip" through them unseen and unnoticed? I know I couldn't 
except by the Power of the Lord! The wait is over and Salvation 
is here for us TODAY! Our salvation was granted when the Messiah 
was here in a tent of flesh with the name Jesus, 2000 some years 
ago and that is something we can feel rojoice in NOW.

God Bless you and your families this week!



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