Sermon on Luke 4:21-30

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

This part of the story picks up right after last week’s reading. Jesus had been preaching in the synagogues in the area where he grew up and had been making a name for himself.

One day, he read from the book of Isaiah in the synagogue in his hometown. The passage says this:

“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 captives

    and recovery of sight to the blind,

        to let the oppressed go free,

to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

And Jesus sat down and told them that this scripture had been fulfilled in their hearing.

I like to think of this as Jesus declaring his mission statement.

His mission statement is exciting: full of good news for suffering and oppressed people. Jesus is here to bring about the Reign of God, which has tangible good things for people who are neglected and mistreated by society.

And Jesus’ hearers are excited about it. They’re amazed and speaking well what Jesus is saying.

But then something changes. In the span of a few sentences, Jesus’ hearers go from speaking well of him to trying to throw him off a cliff!

It’s challenging at first read to figure out what makes them so upset.

The only quote from anyone in the crowd is: “Is not this Joseph’s son?”

And then, Jesus reacts and starts putting words in their mouths.

But what he said must have hit a nerve, because they don’t just leave or kick him out—they try to kill him.

So, let’s take a closer look at information we have.

Someone in the crowd says, “Is this not Joseph’s son?”

The implication could be: “We saw this guy grow up; why should we listen to him?”

Or, “This guy’s family isn’t influential—what gives him the authority to say he’s fulfilling scripture?”

But then, when Jesus puts words in their mouths, it doesn’t sound like he’s reacting to either of those implications.

He assumes they will say, “Doctor, cure yourself,” and “Do here also in your home town the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.”

Jesus seems to be assuming that they want proof, as in, “Do a miracle, Jesus! Show us what you can do!”

Or, “We heard you did really cool things over there. We’re your people—do those things for us, too!”

And then, Jesus alludes to a couple Bible stories. The first is when God sent the prophet Elijah to a poor widow to find food. She and her son only had enough food for a tiny snack each before they were going to die of starvation. Elijah convinces her to share with him, and the food lasts until God sends rain again.

Then, Jesus alludes to the story of Naaman, a military leader who contracted leprosy. A young Israelite captive tells Naaman to seek advice from Elisha, Elijah’s successor. Elisha tells Naaman to wash himself in the river Jordan and he will be cured.

These stories seem a little random. But Jesus tells them that there were many widows in Israel, but God sent Elijah to the foreign land of Zarephath. And there were many people with leprosy in Israel, but God healed Naaman, who was a Syrian.

This gives us a clue about why Jesus’ hearers get so angry.

Jesus is refusing to play their game and prove that he’s who he says he is.

His hearers want him to give them special treatment, because he’s a local boy, one of their own.

But this goes against the very words that Jesus just read from Isaiah:

Jesus is here, not to play favorites, but to bring good news and healing and freedom to those who are most marginalized.

He’s not going to do parlor tricks for people who want to be in the in-crowd—the Reign of God is for everyone!

Let me make this clear, though. Jesus is not saying that the Reign of God is for Gentiles and not for Jewish people. On the contrary—Jesus is Jewish and he’s talking to his fellow Jewish people in their sacred gathering place. Jesus isn’t saying that God isn’t going to bring good news, healing, and freedom to Jewish people. He’s saying God is bringing these things for everyone.

But Jesus’ hearers become enraged by this. To the point of wanting to do violence.

They were hoping that their new hometown celebrity would bring them special benefits. Surely Jesus would heal them first, bring abundance to them first.

They’re disappointed and jealous.

We’ve learned a thing or two about disappointment in these last couple years, haven’t we?

From two weeks of stay-at-home orders to two years of quarantining, closures, social distancing, and cancellations.

We grieve those who have died.

We miss those we don’t see as much or at all.

We’re disappointed when we don’t see our friends at church or our families for holidays.

I know there was a lot of disappointment late last summer when there had been hopes of regathering in a big way at First Lutheran—having celebrations like Jim’s retirement party, having more in-person gatherings, and getting things feeling a little more normal again. Then the delta variant and now omicron have made it wise to be more cautious again. That’s discouraging when we’re tired of masks and being concerned about gathering and all we want to do is hug our friends and family, eat with them, and enjoy being in each other’s company.

It’s all so disappointing.

Jesus’ hearers that day were feeling disappointed. Jesus wasn’t going to do what they hoped. Today, they say about job hunting “it’s not about what you know; it’s about who you know.” The folks in Jesus’ hometown hoped they were going to get special treatment because “they knew him when.” But Jesus wasn’t playing their game. They weren’t going to get to jump the line in the Reign of God.

So, they got territorial and even jealous that Jesus was referencing stories about God doing good things for “outsiders.”

But they needn’t have been jealous. God wasn’t choosing others over them. God was choosing others and them.

It can be tempting when we feel disappointed to start getting territorial or jealous.

When we’re missing our friends who are watching the livestream instead of sitting in the pew next to us, we can start resenting the megachurch down the street.

When we’re frustrated that yet another event we were looking forward to gets canceled, we can start saying uncharitable things about the next-door neighbor who makes different choices than we do when it comes to COVID restrictions.

Sometimes our emotions, which are valid and important, run away with us. Hopefully not to the point of violence, like Jesus’ hearers in this story. But, our emotions can sometimes make us act in ways we’re not proud of. When we’re disappointed or discouraged, we can sometimes take it out on other people—like that next-door neighbor who won’t wear a mask or that person with a bumper sticker you disagree with or that family member that’s doing that thing that’s so annoying.

The good news and the bad news is this: the Reign of God is for them too—the Reign of God is for whoever we define as “them.”

Jesus wasn’t telling the people in his hometown, “I’m not here for you.” He was saying, “I won’t be controlled.

I won’t be boxed in by the limitations of your imagination.

I won’t be boxed in by what you want me to do, because I have something so much bigger, so much better in mind. You have no idea.

But if you trust me, I’ll help you imagine the world as it should be, as I intended it to be, and as we will make it together.”

The people in his hometown couldn’t hear it, because they were too caught up in what they wanted Jesus to do, for whom, and in what order.

When we’re disappointed and discouraged, we can fall into that trap of doing things that don’t align with our best selves. We can fall into that sense of scarcity that we talked about a couple weeks ago.

But we have a God of abundance, who says, “I’m here for everyone. I’m here for the outsiders, the foreigners, the forgotten. And I’m here for you, too. You just don’t get to tell me where and when I get to do my work. I have something better in mind than you ever dreamed.”

So, think this week about how you can rest in God’s abundance.

How can we show grace to each other in the face of disappointment—remembering that everyone else in the world is disappointed, too?

How can we live like we believe every person is important, and that God works in everyone’s life, if only we pay attention?

The Reign of God that Jesus invites us into is more abundant and more joyful and full of more love than you could ever imagine. And everyone’s invited.

Let’s show one another and everyone around us that we trust in a God like that.

Because everyone’s invited.