Back Home and Beyond!

Epiphany 3c13, Luke 4:14-21 with I Corinthians 12:12-31 in the b.g. and Nehemiah 8 in the b.g. (Jan. 27, 2013)

Have you ever been away from home for quite a while and then attempted to go back for any significant amount of time or event? It's not easy. We as people have a tendency to keep thinking of others in the same way. We remember when they were little or very young and messed up. Then we keep thinking about that particular person in that particular way. IN our minds we don't let them grow up or change. We then don't expect them to have a word or a life that may reveal something filled with wonder, amazing, new. So, it's not easy to go home, when you have been away for awhile – especially if you are going to live and move and have your being there. It's far too easy to be pigeon-holed by others and even allow ourselves to fall into such a trap.

 

Nevertheless,  Jesus goes home anyway, back to Nazareth. Many people knew him there, remembering that he was Mary's boy, the carpenter's son. When a family is known in a smaller place – they are held in a particular way in the collective mind's eye. Once at home Jesus goes to the synagogue where everyone knows him. They remember when he was little – everything about his family – the good, the bad, the ugly. If he ever got into a trouble – if he ever uttured a hurtful word (remember he was human and related to other human beings) – well they wouldn't forget.

 

Now as an adult Jesus comes to his home-town synagogue. As any male would be allowed to, he stands up to read. The scroll of Isaiah is given to him. He selects two brief pieces. This is what they hear. Do we also hear him? "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring GOOD NEWS TO THE POOR, and RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO LET THE OPPRESSED GO FREE, TO PROCLAIM THE YEAR OF THE LORD'S FAVOR." Then he rolls up the scroll and sits down. You better believe – every eye is fixed on him. What will he say? He doesn't hesitate. He speaks to them, 'TODAY THIS SCRIPTURE IS FULFILLED IN YOUR HEARING!"

 

Can you imagine? Everyone in the other Galilean places had been speaking well of him. He taught with authority, insight, knowledge. There was something about him. But now home in his "own" place, apparently he doesn't know his place. Now he is claiming through the words of Isaiah, that he, himself, is the long expected deliverer that those people had been waiting SO LONG for. How could he be the One? They know him. He is from among them, their little, insignificant town. Rumour has it that he is even the scandalous child of a common mother and a man they have known all their lives. How could HIS CLAIM, ever be true?  

 

Then when Jesus goes on throwing their feelings about him in their faces – they begin to lose it. Now they want to hurt him. They want him out of their place – even though everything he proclaims, they and so many others obviously desperately need. Don't the poor need good news both literally and figuratively? Don't those who are blind, including us, need new sight even if that greater vision isn't easy? Still,  can't such vision be wonderful?  And don't the oppressed needed to be freed – even ourselves when we are hung up in hatred, fear, trapped by obsessions and addictions? Don't we all need a year (at least) of the Lord's favor? This latter reality was decreed by God that every 50 years all debts would be forgiven so that no one would end up enslaved to others. How would that look in our society?

 

Jesus declares all of this. He is filled with the power of the Spirit following His baptism and his temptation in the wilderness. Indeed, the Spirit of the Lord is upon Him!

 

But what about us? Is the Spirit of the Lord upon us? We too have been baptized! We too struggle with temptation. Granted, we have not always resisted. Nevertheless God is with us to empower us, to deliver us to new life and new beginnings. What is our mission, as sons and daughters of God, called to bear God's creative and redeeming word to the world?

 

Surely our mission as followers of Jesus can't only be to care for those like us. Surely our mission as followers of Jesus can't only be what will happen to us and others when we die. What about the children who are hungry now: hungry for food, to know they are loved, to experience that someone cares enough to do something with and perhaps even for them? What about our friends and neighbors caught up in broken relationships. They may feel,  "that's life" – the way things are. Nothing can be done about "it".  But we know different don't we? We are people called to forgiveness each day, to new beginnings – to seeing and experiencing both the death and resurrection of Christ as reflections of God's love for us and for the world, here, now and forever. That's what the Spirit of God allows us to see, to trust, to experience and share.

 

To be sure – having a mission, a purpose that is bigger than us – my friends and family, this Church, is not easy. We might be led to places like South Africa, or to the inner circle of friend's families where things at times aren't pretty. Such a mission demands that we will have to be honest with and about ourselves: our brokenness, especially with God, with ourselves and with those we love. Getting involved and caring hurts and is often risky, EVEN DANGEROUS. Becoming involved will cost us money, time, and sacrifice on many levels. But – REMEMBER THIS.   

 

There is one who is leading us. There is One whom we are called to follow. He is Jesus. The Spirit is upon him. Through Him the Spirit is upon us. It's hard to believe – but this Spirit thing is His promise, not mine. He is the One who in calling us to so follow, also equips us. For God knows – sometimes even though we are rich we are incredibly poor – even though we have 20/20 eyesight we are still too often blind to God right in front of us. Even though we claim that we are part of the true north strong and free, we are often anything but. How we also need the freedom and power of God to love rather than hate, to care instead of hiding, to forgive and dream instead of being filled with a desire for vengeance while being caught up in so many ruts.

 

By God's grace hear the Spirit speaking through Jesus in that synagogue long ago. The Spirit of God is upon Him. That same Spirit wishes to drive and direct even us, here and now. The poor, the blind and the oppressed remain.  We all need good news - the good news enfleshed in Jesus and poured into our hearts and minds, through water, wine, bread and words. Let's share His life, and love right where we are, at home, at work and at play. Such living results in ripples of love and compassion that flow and flow and flow.  

 

May it be so among us for Christ's sake, Amen!