Rev. Linda B. Hirst

January 28, 2001

Luke 4:14-30

 Every once in a there comes along in the church - a young boy or young girl -  who you just know is going to grow up and make the ministry his or her vocation, his or her life’s work.   You can tell by just looking at - let’s just say it’s a girl - that one day she will be a missionary, or work with inner-city youth or maybe even be a preacher.  And so you
watch as this child sings in the choir and then goes on mission trips, and you listen as she stands before the congregation and wows you with her ability to share God’s love and you smile because you know that you - the congregation - have helped to nurture this child, you have surrounded her with prayers and love and guidance and wisdom, you had a hand in helping her become who she is.  And when this young  woman does enter the ministry, you - who have known this woman since she was a little girl - are as proud as her parents.  You hear from family and friends that she is doing well; that she has found her calling.  "That’s our girl" you say, because in a way she is.  And  when the young woman comes back to town - to preach in her home church one Sunday, you are there - the entire congregation is there to welcome her back and hear what she has to say.

  This is where we find Jesus today in our story.  Jesus, who grew up in Nazareth, who was active in the synagogue - which back then was not only the place where you worshiped, it was where you went to school,  it was the community center and the center of the everything. Jesus who came from a loving family,  Joseph and Mary’s son.  Who, after being baptized began his life’s work - began his ministry.  And pretty soon, the people back home are hearing things - good things -  reports from around the country: he is teaching in the synagogues, amazing and impressing people everywhere he goes. And now he’s coming home.

 Coming home to Nazareth, to the synagogue where he was brought up, where he is surrounded by family and friends, people he’s known his whole life.  As he stands up to read the scripture,  I  bet a few of them are whispering with  pride: "That’s our boy!" They can’t wait to hear what he’s going to say.  The synagogue attendant hands him the Torah,
t opens it to the words of the prophet Isaiah and Jesus begins to read the familiar words, the words they know by heart that tell of what the Messiah will do when he comes:  And he reads:

 "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,  because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind.."

 And then he sits down to teach, all eyes are fixed on him - and he begins:  Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.

 The congregation smiles and nods - all speak well of him...at first:  didn’t he do a nice job reading Isaiah, he has such a beautiful speaking voice...but then the mood shifts as they wonder at the words he has spoken.   Wait a minute... did he just say the Spirit of the Lord is upon him?  God has appointed him?  Is he claiming to be the Messiah?  Our Savior?  Our K
ring?    Isn’t this Joseph’s son? What’s going on here?

 And just as they’re beginning to make sense of what they heard - this is pretty big stuff - Jesus claiming to be the Messiah, he drops another bombshell on them.

 The good news is that God’s love, God’s favor, God’s promises are for all people. It embraces all kinds, the poor, the rich, the oppressed, the blind, the lame, the righteous and the sinner, Jews AND - this was the hard part for them to swallow - the non-Jews - the Gentiles.  It is for the gentiles in Capernaum, and it is for the widow in the land of Sidon, it is for a leper called Naaman in Syria.
 This is the good news that Jesus has come to preach.

 Well, the people in the synagogue are shocked.

 For thousands of years the Jews had lived as God’s chosen ones. God chose Abraham - an Israelite - and made them a covenant people.   God chose Moses to lead them - the Israelites - out of Egypt, through the wilderness for forty years, to the promised land.  It was God who guided them in building their temple and when the temple was destroyed and they were taken away to a strange land,  God gave them prophets to keep their hope alive
.  And when the Messiah comes he will come to them alone - and the Jews alone will be saved.  Everyone else who lives outside the covenant - well...they’re just out of luck.

 And now in waltzes Jesus, telling them that the good news is that God’s love, God’s favor, God’s promises are for all people?  I don’t think so.  The people are filled with rage, and they take Jesus to the edge of the city with the intent to throw him off a cliff.  But, Jesus passes through the midst of them and goes away.

 On that day, in that synagogue in Nazareth, Jesus’ home town, the word of God had  been fulfilled in their hearing...and it threw the people for a loop.  The gospel - the good news of God’s grace and God love - had come home to them...hit them square in the face - and it was more than they bargained for and they were having trouble dealing with it.

 What do you do when the gospel hits home?  When the word of God comes to rest in your heart, or settles in your
 mind, or grabs your soul and all of a sudden, everything you know is challenged, the way you live, work, play, worship.  What do you do when the word of God is fulfilled in your hearing and it’s much more than you bargained for?  What do you do when the gospel hits home?

 I want to share a story with you...about ten years ago, in a lovely affluent coastal town in Connecticut, a few people from local churches came up with the idea of building a shelter for the homeless.  For years the churches had been giving money to the shelters in neighboring cities but these shelters were often full, turning people away.  And it was apparent that even in this lovely affluent coastal town - there were homeless men, women and children.  High rents were forcing families out of their homes. People with mental illnesses were being released from hospitals and having to leave the only home they ever knew.  If we truly profess to be Christian, these few people wondered, shouldn’t we be providing a shelter - a safe place for them right here?

 They took their dream to their different congregations, to the town hall, to the people.  A small shelter - 20 beds - in the center of town.  A place to sleep, a place to eat, a place where they can get their feet back on the ground. "Jesus came to preach good news to the poor" they said.  Isn’t this what we’re supposed to do?   The reaction of the people in the pews, the people in town was...not that great.
Many were fearful - who are these homeless people...what if they hurt someone?  Others were angry - we moved to this town because it was a lovely, affluent coastal community - having a shelter in town will change all that.  Others were curious - what will the homeless people do during the day?  Walk around town?  With us?

 You see it’s one thing when the gospel happens out there - when the good news is preached to the poor, the blind, the lame - over there,  in a neighboring city - that’s o.k.  It’s quite another thing when the gospel hits home.

 When the gospel hits home, in our town, in our church, in our lives, it means we  really have to think about what it means to love our neighbors - even those people, especially those people who we don’t particularly like, or we may really have to think about what it means to forgive our enemies, or what it really means to preach good news to the poor, and to be a light to the world with our words, our actions, our prayers.

 There’s this story of a sunday school teacher who was telling the story about the Good Samaritan to her class - the man who was robbed and beaten and left by the roadside to die - first a priest passes by ignoring the man, then a Levite - a religious leader walks to the other side to avoid him, finally a third man - a Samaritan, the one most unlikely to help - stops to bind the man’s wounds, he takes him to an inn and pays for his care.  The teacher asked her children, "what would you do if you saw a man lying by the road, all bloody and beaten," and after a pause a young girl raised her hand and said; "I’d throw up!"

 When the gospel hits home - when God’s word is fulfilled in our presence - we often get more than we bargain for.  The bible is full of hard stuff - hard truths - and there are times when we’re faced with some of these truths that we feel like the people in Jesus’ home town: furious, angry, or sad, confused - we may even feel like throwing up!
 

 But that doesn’t stop the good news from being the good news.  And it doesn’t stop the gospel from breaking into our lives again and again.   That day on a hillside, the Jews tried to silence the good news but they couldn’t.  Jesus passed through the midst of them and went away, continuing to bring the good news to those who needed to hear it and even those who didn’t.   And along the way,  he found people who when the gospel hit home for them, who, when they found God’s word fulfilled in their presence, instead of becoming angry or scared... rejoiced.  People, who thought that a God who loved and cared for all people was something to celebrate.  People for whom the good news truly was the good news.
 

 Back to that lovely affluent coastal town in Connecticut.  After years of contentious debate; ministers preaching about love and acceptance, mission committees talking about caring for the least of these among us, the shelter was finally built -  and it’s there today  serving the homeless in the community.  And a funny thing happened about two years into its existence...the grumbling gave way to support.  Church people and non-church people gathered to serve meals  and even sit down with the residents to chat after supper.  Before too long,  the men and women who lived at the shelter began to come to worship at the neighboring churches where they were welcomed and invited to coffee hour and bible study.  As they sat side by side, worshiping together, it was apparent to all who were there that God’s word was being fulfilled in their presence.  They found that when the gospel hit home - they not only got more than they bargained for, they got more than they could have hoped for.  And it was good  news indeed.  May it be so for us.