Skip to main content

Luke 4:14-30: Today!

Picture a famous Torontonian leading a big rally at the ACC, under all the championship banners hanging from the rafters, extolling the virtues of the ‘greatest hockey franchise ever’ and as everyone in Toronto here is cheering about how they will win another Stanley Cup and maybe even soon - understanding the speaker to be talking about the Leafs - and the crowd is all worked up and then he yells out ‘God bless Canada’s greatest hockey team... the Montreal Canadiens!’ This would be the feelings aroused in these scriptures. And even more, it would be like Jesus extolling the virtues of the greatest country on earth, working us all up into a frenzy believing he is talking about Canada and then says ‘God bless America’ or ‘God bless Saudi Arabia’… ‘Oh you, thought I was talking about Canada?’You can see why they might get a little upset.

They came here wanting words of encouragement and wisdom. Jesus read and spoke about the scriptures and he gave them some words alright. They thought he was blessing them in the synagogue but he was telling them quite plainly that just like God could have saved Israelites in the times of Elisha and Elijah but he chose rather to save their enemies; so too today. This is why they are upset.

Jesus is – as always - concerned about people on the fringes: the poor, ill, and the marginalized; our enemies, our rivals, and others who are on the outside. Those who think they are healthy do not seek a doctor (Lk 5:31; Mt 9:12, Mk 2:17). Those who think they are saved are not looking for salvation. Jesus here foretells and more Israel’s rejection of her and our messiah and how regardless of that, Israel’s saviour is going to save her enemies and anybody else too.

Now this is offensive but honestly the people there should know this. They should be and the Pharisees would be very familiar with the fact that Israel was not chosen to be saved in place of other people; Israel was chosen to bring salvation to the entire world (Jn 3:16-17). God says to Abraham, before Israel even exists, that ALL the nations of the earth will be blessed through you (Gen 12:3). Israel was chosen by God not to be saved from the world but to bring salvation to the world and though they had not been to that point faithful in that task, still God uses the Israelite, Jesus, to save the world. God loves everyone and He wants everyone to be saved and even in this (cf. Gal 3:28, 1 Cor 12:13), as John Wesley says, He has a preferential message for the poor and the marginalized. We need to still bring and be brought that message here today.

The truth is that as John 3:17 proclaims, Jesus didn’t come into the world to condemn the world but instead he came so that whosoever, anyone and everyone, might be saved. And this is wonderful news: salvation is not just for the privileged few. It is for any of us and especially those of us when we are in real need. As Jesus says, Luke 11:18-19:

- today good news is announced to the poor;
- today he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners;
- today, he has sent me to preach recovery of sight to the blind;
- today, he has sent me to set the oppressed free;
- today, he has sent me to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.

Today is the day of the Lord’s favour when we can all be rebuilt, restored, and renewed; do we believe that?
More daily blogs at
More articles, sermons, and papers at
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hosanna! The Triumphal Entry into Holy Week (Matthew 21:1-11)

Today  is Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday is when we commemorate the Sunday before Jesus’ death. Jerusalem was occupied then, like it is now; now it is occupied by the Israelis, then it was occupied by the Romans. The Judeans in the first century didn’t like being occupied then any more than the Palestinians like it today. The Romans were harsh, not nearly as brutal as modern Israel, but harsh enough that the first century had their version of … (Remember the suicide bombers of the ‘70s and ‘80s?) …suicide bombers: the Sicarii (zealots), Judean terrorists / revolutionaries would walk into crowds with daggers looking for Romans to kill –. One of Jesus’ followers, Simon, was arguably a Sicarii or zealot.   Passover is the commemoration of ancient Israel’s birth as a nation. The Angel of Death passed over Egypt and the nations of Isreal and Judah were created through the Exodus. Passover, in the Roman period, was a time when many people of Judean descent descended upon Jerusalem. I ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lanterns (Matthew 25:1-13, Psalm 146)

  The topics I chose from our Lenten list for today are “God has rescued us from the Dominion of Darkness”; “He has Freed Us from the Power of Sin”; the Kingdom of God is at hand. Do we believe that? Do we live that?   In theology we use the term ‘prolepsis’ to refer to the time when the Kingdom of God begins, which is now, the time between the resurrection of Christ and His return at the eschaton. This is the time in which we are living and as Christians it is our responsibility to be willing instruments of God to display what it means that He has rescued us from the Dominion of Darkness; He has Freed Us from the Power of Sin, that the Kingdom of God is at hand. But do we even actually believe that He has already done this? And if He has why does it not seem that the Sin and Darkness still reign?   We know the parable of the bridesmaids (holy ones) in the Bible who needed to keep their lanterns lit – because lit lanterns were to be there when the Bridegroom Jesus returns...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bah Ram You Shaggy Goat (Daniel 8)

This book is written in a couple of different languages as we  have it  tod ay. Ch apter 7  that Susan looked at with us  is the last Aramaic chapter - if that is on purpose then chapter 7  probably concludes  the first  section  of Daniel  rather than  beginning  the  next  section   but Ch apter 8  that we are looking at today  (and everything flowing from it)  is obviously connected to  Chapter 7  as Da n iel  refers to the first dream when relaying the second one.   Chronologically speaking,  Chapter 8 and  Chapter 7 take place before  C hapters 5 and 6.  In Chapter 5, Babylon falls, Belshazzar is killed and  the Persians take over. None of that has happened in Chapter 8 which we are about to read .   Verses 1-4   8 In the third year of King Belshazzar’s reign, I, Daniel, had a vision, after the one that had already appeared to me. 2 In my ...
2 comments
Read more