The Text: Luke 6:27-36

 

A few years ago Matt Corby’s local Subway restaurant in Perth was caught short…literally. Matt measured the sandwich he bought, advertised as a “foot-long,” and found it stopped at 11 inches. After Matt posted a photo of the sandwich next to a tape measure on Subway’s Facebook page, his photo went viral. The Facebook page was flooded with thousands of angry customers demanding to know why the sub didn’t measure up. Who would think 25 millimetres of missing bread could cause such a furore!

Across the other side of the world, two men in New Jersey saw Matt’s Facebook post and decided to sue the company because their foot-long sandwiches also allegedly fell an inch short. Their lawyer, Stephen DeNittis, said: “The case is about holding companies to deliver what they’ve promised.”¹ The two men from New Jersey represented a huge class action against Subway―all persons in the United States who purchased a 6-inch or Foot-long sandwich at a Subway restaurant between January 1st, 2003 and October 2nd, 2015. The class action alleged that sandwiches sold by the Subway restaurant franchise:

“…sometimes fell short of the chain’s “foot-long” marketing claims. But there was no dispute that the actual weight of the dough and the amount of ingredients was, in fact, uniform for each sandwich; and even the named plaintiffs in the lawsuit conceded that the exact length of the sandwiches didn’t affect their purchases or change their future plans to eat at Subway.²

What was the result? The class action against Subway was successful and the court approved a $US 525,000 settlement. But every cent of that amount ended up with the lawyers, reimbursing their legal fees. The people they represented didn’t get anything. So then the US Centre for Class Action Fairness filed an appeal…and to cut a long story short, the appeal ended up being dismissed.

This is all a bit of food for thought, if you’ll pardon the pun, and I found the argument of those bringing the action against Subway a bit hard to swallow. Big business does need to be accountable―but this wasn’t about a failure to meet minimum working standards or a breach of health and hygiene in food preparation. We’re talking about 25 millimetres of missing bread. Did that really warrant a tirade of over 130,000 Facebook posts—the trial by social media where everyone has a right to say whatever they want to in the name of freedom of speech, no matter how or defamatory—and the subsequent legal action resulting in over half a million dollars?

The plaintiffs’ own admissions that this wouldn’t stop them visiting Subway stores in the future says this was more about individuals defining what their rights are and enforcing them at all costs without thinking through how that might impact others around them.

The Subway saga is just one instance of today’s culture exalting ‘the great me’. Yet some 2,000 years ago, Jesus addressed the same issue, with his words in today’s Gospel reading. With a series of short statements in his ‘Sermon on the mount’, Jesus gives his audience a pattern of life that is radically distinct form the world’s way of insisting on our rights and getting even, and making our others pay for their transgressions. They are to bless those who curse them, pray for those who mistreat them. If someone slaps them on one cheek, they are to turn to them the other also. If someone takes their coat, they are not withhold their shirt from them. They are to do good to those who hate them. They are to be merciful just as their Heavenly Father is merciful.

This pattern for living that Jesus gives is not in order to earn special blessing from God. It is the pattern of life for those who are already blessed; those who are children of their Father in heaven, not children of the world, and this pattern mirrors God’s own merciful, self-giving love. With what Jesus calls the disciples to do―turn the other cheek to be slapped, or giving their overcoat as well as their shirt, or being compelled to walk with a heavy load for two miles rather than one (Roman miles at that; nearly 5 kilometres each), lending to those who cannot repay, loving one’s enemies and praying for those who persecute them―Jesus is not saying that his people should become doormats to be trampled all over.

But Jesus is giving a visualisation of how radically different from the self-centred world their lives are to be. They are not to be self-absorbed as the world is and insist on their rights while sacrificing the good of others at the altar of the self. They are not to give only if they can get something in return. They are not to breathe hatred, bear grudges, place conditions on forgiveness, or seek revenge and pursue litigation if their sandwich isn’t quite right. But they are to love all people and be merciful just like their Heavenly Father. They are even to love their enemies, Jesus says.

And so are we.

Now surely that can’t be right?! We love those who love us, the ‘good’ people like ourselves. But surely not our enemies! Why would Jesus say that? If we were God, we would wipe evil out, right?

But what behaviour would be evil enough to stir us to take action? What standard, or benchmark would we use? Really big stuff, like drug trafficking, prostitution and terrorism would be fairly straight forward. Or would it? Would keeping the wrong amount of change mistakenly given to us be deplored as quickly as robbery, tax avoidance and embezzling church funds? If people did not get hurt would something that was wrong change to being OK? Would we be quick to condemn genocide, yet be more permissive about legalising abortion? Would situations, or our needs, determine what was right or wrong? What kind of behaviours would even determine who our enemies were anyway?

We would all most likely have different morals and tolerances towards evil and what is acceptable—and that is the issue. Only God’s standard is universally consistent. He gave us his commandments, to show us what his will is for our relationship with himself and others, and to curb and restrain hurt and wrongdoing. Yet the chilling shock for us is that when we reflect on the commandments we come to the realisation that the end to evil we wish for would leave none of us standing. Even the worst atrocities we witness on the news begin with a hurtful attitude, a selfish thought; attitudes and thoughts which none of us are exempt from.

Jesus says today “Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” We can’t do that ourselves, for the problem of the ‘great me’ is part of our natural human condition ever since Adam and Eve listened to Satan’s temptation to distrust God’s word and want their own way. “Did God really say?” the serpent hissed, and they fell for the serpent’s lie, seeds, core and all. Ever since then we have all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory.

In today’s text, Jesus is addressing his disciples…and you, his disciples of today. By ‘enemies’ Jesus means enemies of the church; those who reject Christ by persecuting and rejecting his people and his message they bring. They are whoever refuses to listen to God or worship him. The Apostle Paul explains that, because of sin, in our natural state we are all enemies of God, hostile to him (Romans 5:10 and 8:7). The problem is that in our enthusiasm to wipe out evil by hating our enemies rather than loving them, we place ourselves under the same sentence, for none of us can perfectly fulfil God’s law.

When we determine who is worthy of our love and mercy and forgiveness and to whom we should turn the other cheek or go the extra mile with―we in effect are saying to God that when we fail and fall short we should be judged by the same standards: ‘Refuse to forgive our sins as we refuse to forgive others” or “Place limits and conditions on your mercy to us as we place limits and conditions on showing mercy to others.” That’s not a good place to be for we have just passed the same judgment on ourselves. When we refuse to love our enemies, seeking revenge and retaliation; getting even with our offenders and insisting on our rights, we are only treating them the way the world does.

But God did not try to get even with us and make us pay. It was while we were sinners; while we were enemies of God, that God not only loaned to us—we who have nothing to repay him with—but opened the storehouses of heaven and poured out the treasure trove of his riches for us, sending his own Son into the world.

This is how God showed his mercy to us. It was Christ who came all the way from heaven to earth for you, to perfectly fulfil the law for us. Although he was completely innocent and righteous, he walked to the Cross to take our place, receiving the punishment for evil and sin that we deserved. It was Christ who was persecuted for us. He turned the other cheek when he was struck and slapped before the High Priest, he was forced to walk the extra mile to Golgotha and bear the crushing burden of the sin of the world upon his shoulders. Jesus came to reconcile the world―even those most wretched criminals, the least deserving―to his Father in Heaven by his precious blood.

Through faith in Jesus, we are no longer enemies of God but his friends. Even more, united to Christ and his own death and resurrection in baptism, Jesus’ Father is now our Father who loves us perfectly and calls us his own dear children. He has washed us and given us his forgiveness, freedom and fullness of life through faith in Christ. We receive Jesus’ own righteousness so that even though we can’t be perfect, our Heavenly Father says you have lived as perfectly as Jesus himself. God gives to us and does for us what we are powerless to do ourselves. He plunges the ‘great me’ into our baptism each day to be drowned. Then we shift from ‘my will be done’ to ‘Thy will be done’—and really mean it.

We are really free―not as the world defines freedom, but as God does. Jesus has made the way for us to overcome evil with good and to sacrifice self for the good of others by showing mercy to others.

He has freed us to die to ourselves and with it the human desire to get even, and make those who wrong us pay.

He has freed us to pray for our enemies rather than curse them.

He has freed us to welcome those who are not our brothers and sisters.

He has freed us to really love, not just a shallow reciprocal love like the world, showing care if we can get something in return, but loving with the merciful love of Christ, even to our enemies, just as God has first loved us and still shows us his mercy each day.  

And so living out our baptism each day is a life which focuses on the extra mile rather than the missing inch―for it is a life redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, freed by God’s own mercy, and shaped by his love. Amen.

The Text: Luke 6:20-31  

                                                           

Looking at his disciples, Jesus said: “Blessed are you…”

How blessed am I! How blessed are we! Have you ever made such an observation before? Have you found yourself in a situation where you feel truly and deeply blessed?

There are any number of circumstances that occur on a daily basis where we could make this observation. We probably don’t say it or think it enough. 

We could all say it in response to a good harvest or as we consider the abundance of good things that come under the umbrella of ‘our daily bread’. We can feel blessed to have good health, blessed to have a job, a roof over our heads, family and friends, a certain quality of life and on and on the list could go.

In our Christian context we of course include God when it comes to our understanding of being blessed. To receive God’s blessing means to have his favour upon us. We even include a blessing at the conclusion of every worship service to bring God’s blessing to us. It is such a blessing to be blessed, to feel blessed…until of course you don’t: until you don’t feel it; until you don’t think you are!

Every reason you can think of for being blessed has its opposite. What about when there is no harvest and has been no significant harvest for a number of years in succession? What about when your health is failing or when your relationships are breaking? What about when the roof over your head is no longer affordable or when your income is no longer reliable? What about when the blessings of life are torn away through death? 

If a number of things have gone wrong for you, when the bad news comes in threes and sometimes even more, then you might be hard pressed to consider yourself blessed. At such times you can start to doubt that you have God’s favour. You can feel as though you have earned God’s displeasure for something you have done or failed to do. You might even wonder what you have to do to get him on side again.

It is natural to think this way. But when it comes to God’s blessings we are not meant to think in terms of what is natural. The normal/natural rules don’t apply. You only need to listen to the teaching of Jesus in our Gospel reading from Luke to see that!

This bracket of teaching is similar to the beatitudes in Matthew 5 that Jesus included in his sermon on the mount. In Luke’s version Jesus is on a plain (6:17), but as with the Matthew account there is a large crowd of people who have gathered to hear him.

You can imagine there would have been people from all walks of life who were listening to Jesus that day. There would have been the rich and the poor, the young and the old, males and females. Some had come to be healed of their diseases; others were troubled by evil spirits (v18-19). All of these people would have heard the same teaching of Jesus – but I imagine they would have received in completely different ways. The same is true for us as we hear it. So what did they hear? What do we hear? We hear a radically different take on life, a radically different take on what it means to be blessed in life.

Jesus said: ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh. Blessed are you when people hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man’.

Jesus connects blessing with precisely the opposite things we would. How blessed do you feel when you are poor, hungry, sad or oppressed?

As the crowd listened to Jesus that day there would have been those who were in one or more of those situations. Surely some might have been angry or, at the very least, annoyed at these words. Try telling someone who is suffering that ‘she’ll be right – it will all work out in the end’, and see what response you get.

But others would have taken comfort from them. If you are poor or down-trodden with limited prospects of improving your lot in life, then these words appear to offer hope. The assurance that things will work out in the end, the promise of eternal life, has brought many people comfort during grief and other trials.

But Jesus didn’t stop there. His topsy-turvy definition of blessing has a flip-side that could create even more issues for certain sections of his audience, us included. For he continued: “…woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort. Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep. Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets” (v24-26).

How might these words have been received? The downtrodden and poor probably liked them. There might be some consolation for the disadvantaged in hearing Jesus take a swipe at the rich, promising that they would get their just desserts.

But anyone who was well off, or even just content in life, could have been confused, challenged, angered or unsettled by these words. Many of us probably fit into the ‘well-off’ category, don’t we? We are wealthy in comparison to others in the world. We are well fed. We laugh. Is it so wrong to receive comfort from some of the pleasures of life? Is it wrong to have sufficient food on the table, to have laughter in your life and to have a good reputation among others?

It can be hard to get to the bottom of the message Jesus is trying to convey here. But at the heart of it is the way Jesus challenges our natural understanding of what it means to be blessed. If you simply conclude from this teaching that Jesus is talking about future blessings, then you have missed the point of it.

Yes, there will be a day of reckoning at a time to be determined. We confess that Jesus ‘will come again to judge the living and the dead’. As to how he is going to sort out everything so that justice can be done on the one hand and mercy exercised on the other, is up to him to work out. That is why he has the job of Lord, not us.

But this teaching is primarily about understanding what it means to be blessed here and now. Listen to the opening line of Jesus’ teaching again: ‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God’. This teaching on blessing was not about a future reality but a present one – ‘yours is the kingdom of God’.

This went against everything that was ingrained in them. Wealth and health and happiness were seen as signs of God’s favour. Poverty and sickness and misfortune were seen as signs of God’s displeasure. Thankfully we are not so simplistic or superstitious in our understanding these days. Or are we?

The connection between what we have and how blessed we feel is still very much ingrained in us – as is the understanding that bad things shouldn’t really happen to God’s good, blessed people. It is ingrained so deep that Jesus had to use this provocative, in your face, teaching to try and draw it out. He made it very clear that our level of blessing is not dependent on circumstances: ‘blessed are you who are poor – woe to you who are rich: blessed are you who hunger – woe to you who are well-fed: blessed are you who weep – woe to you who laugh’.  

Wealth and health and popularity do not signify that a person is blessed, even though they might feel it. Poverty and sickness and oppression do not signify that a person is cursed, even though they may feel it. It is not circumstances that determine whether or not a person is blessed or cursed. God alone determines this!

And thank God for that! This means that a run of misfortune in your life does not affect your blessed status in God’s eyes one bit. Another way we could translate this teaching of Jesus is to say: ‘even if you are poor or hungry or sad or persecuted you are still very much blessed, because you belong to the kingdom of God’.    

We could also translate the flip-side in a slightly different way, as a warning: ‘if your wealth, provisions, happiness and popularity are coming between you and the things of God’s kingdom, then you could be living in a fool’s paradise that will come crashing down’. 

Being blessed is not about what we have. It is about who we are! We are God’s children. We are members of his family. We had nothing of worth to offer God in order to secure a place in his family. It has come about purely through his actions of grace. And that makes us truly, richly and fully blessed – already now and also in the future. Wealth and health and reputation can all be taken away – but ‘nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord’ (Romans 8:39).

With this definition and understanding of what it means to be blessed, it transforms the way we see and live our lives. Irrespective of our own circumstances, irrespective of how much or how little we think we might have, we can still be a blessing. When you know that no one can take away God’s blessing from your life you are suddenly free to be a blessing in so many ways. A miraculous healing can bear witness to the grace and power of God. But a believer who trusts in God, even in the midst of their suffering and grief and pain, can also be a powerful witness.  

The normal rules don’t apply anymore because there are no limits to the way God’s grace is received by us and no limits to the way it can flow through us. So regardless of whether we are rich or poor, well-fed or hungry, happy or sad, respected or oppressed, we can show the world through our faith, hope and love what it means to be truly, richly and fully blessed by God! Amen.    

Luke 5:1-11

 Do you have a favourite food to eat? In the times of Jesus, fish was most commonly eaten. There were many boats on the Lake of Gennesaret trying to catch fish during the night when the fish came closer to the surface of the water. Fish were even exported to Rome. The opening letters in the Greek word fish (ICTHUS) were used to symbolise what was central to the Christian Faith: Jesus Christ, God’s Own Saviour”. Boats were seen as symbols for the Christian community, the Christian Church.

It’s fascinating to watch people catch fish from a jetty. We can’t help but admire their dedication, patience and persistence. I wonder if this doesn’t have something to do with Jesus calling fishing folk to become His full-time disciples. Just before this event, Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law. Now Jesus is preaching at the lakeside, where a great crowd has come to hear Him speak God’s Word to them. He hops onto Peter’s boat and continues teaching from it so the people crowded around them can hear Him better.

Jesus is especially keen to make an impact on Peter, so after His preaching, He asks Peter to go out into deeper waters and let his nets down for a catch. Peter shows a bit of reluctance initially, because they had caught nothing all night, but ends up obeying Jesus and discovering what a blessing it is to obey our Lord. In today’s Gospel we see how Jesus calls the most unlikely and most unexpected of people to assist Him in the most important work in the world. Our Lord does His best work through those who have no tickets on themselves, those who are initially reluctant to serve Him because they feel not up to the task. Jesus can do wonders through such folk because they, in their humility, depend on Christ from start to finish. Jesus values those who come to Him only too aware of their failures and faults.

Jesus enters the workplace of Peter and his fellow fishermen, just when they’d been unsuccessful in their daily work. It’s there that He finally gets through to Peter and changes his life forever. When Jesus has finished preaching, he asks Peter to resume his work. Will you also do what Jesus wants you to do once today’s sermon is finished? Jesus asks Peter to do something contrary to regular practice. Now Peter often puts his foot in his mouth and speaks without thinking. He responds to Jesus’ request, saying, “Master, we have worked all night long, but caught nothing. Yet, if You say so, I will let down the nets.” Peter is no doubt tired from a night of unsuccessful fishing and is unsure about what to do. Who can blame him? Sometimes Jesus asks us to do something for Him when we feel too tired to do it. But when Jesus wants us to do something for Him He will provide us with the energy needed to obey Him.

Miracles often occur when someone takes Jesus at His Word and obeys Him. Taking on board our Lord’s agenda for our lives becomes a privilege rather than an interruption, the privilege of winning followers for Jesus among the people around us, and a privilege that creates persistence. Monica, the mother of Saint Augustine prayed for the conversion of her son for 30 years before her prayers were answered and he became Saint Augustine, the greatest biblical scholar who lived between New Testament times and the time of Martin Luther.  

Peter and his fishing friends experience the greatest catch of fish ever. They’re overwhelmed, not just at the catch of fish, but more so at discovering who Jesus is. Jesus isn’t just another teacher or preacher. Rather, He is the Lord of everyone, worthy of our wholehearted, lifelong loyalty and devotion. Peter, instead of being filled with immense joy and happiness at his good fortune, is overwhelmed with his own unworthiness and sinfulness. He feels he doesn’t deserve Jesus’ bountiful goodness and generosity. He feels all he can do is to kneel at Jesus’ feet and say, “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” Peter feels he is in God’s presence, full of regret for his failure to do what God expects of him.

Peter now realises that Jesus, the Son of God, treats him so much better than he deserves. Jesus is delighted with Peter’s confession and instead of rejecting him, calls him into lifelong service. We too are never more pleasing to our Lord than when we confess to Him our own unworthiness and feelings of inadequacy. He then welcomes us with open arms and helps us do things for Him that we never thought possible before. With Christ as part of our daily lives, we can do so much more than we could ever do on our own.

Jesus also says to us, “Do not fear, from now on you will be catching people alive”, that is, bringing them into close connection with Christ Himself, so that He can bestow on them life abundant, life that’s a joyful foretaste of eternity.

Above all, our Lord is seeking teachable people of all ages, people who never want to stop learning more about Him. That’s why He called Peter to follow Him. Peter becomes someone who is never satisfied with what he knows about Jesus so far. He wants to know all he can about Jesus, asking more questions of Jesus than does anyone else in all our four Gospels. Luther says, “God’s Word is a beautiful flower, the longer I have to enjoy it the better.” In the Book of Acts we see how Peter grew in his knowledge and understanding of God’s Word. For all Peter’s weaknesses, Jesus calls him to be His lifelong apostle because He sees Peter as He sees us, in terms of our future potential.

It’s so exciting to think that our best days of serving our Saviour may still be ahead of us. To encourage us, we’re assured that whatever we do for our Lord will never be in vain. Jesus reassures us that our service for Him will bear fruit beyond what we may see in our lifetime. Our best way forward is simply to serve Him faithfully day by day, week by week. It’s a contradiction is terms, is it not, to be a Christian and yet not serve Christ as best we can.

The story of the Fishless Fishing Folk illustrates this:

There were fishing folk who lived by a big lake full of fish.

They met regularly and spoke of their call to fish. They defined what fishing means and what were the best fish to catch.

They built beautiful places called “Fishing Centres”, where everyone was encouraged to go out into the lake and fish.

One thing they never did, though, was to go and catch any fish.

They appointed boards of enquiry to find out why this was so. The thick reports of these boards took lots of time to study and make recommendations.

Some folk felt their job was to relate to the fish in a good way so that the fish would know the difference between good and bad fishermen.

After a meeting on “The Necessity for Fishing”, one young person went fishing and caught two outstanding fish. He was honoured for his catch and, as a result, quit fishing to tell others of his experience.

They were all shocked when someone asked one day: “Is a person a fisherman if he or she never goes fishing?”

Don’t let this be true of you. Today or tomorrow, pray for the conversion or return to God of one of your friends or family members who has wandered away from Him. Ask God to give them a living, active faith in Jesus. And pray, “Revive Your Church, O Lord, beginning with me.”

Amen.

The Text: Luke 4:21-30  

Today Luke brings us back to the synagogue at Nazareth where we visited last week, to hear the amazing touring preacher, Jesus. Reports have circulated about him throughout the whole region and people who heard about the miracles he has performed in Capernaum have flocked to listen. The atmosphere is bubbling with anticipation and as you look forward intently, you can see Jesus step up to the lectern. A few people make shushing noises and the excited chatter of the crowd suddenly dissipates as the synagogue attendant hands Jesus the scroll of Isaiah the prophet. Jesus reads from chapter 61:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He has anointed me to proclaim the Gospel to the poor, He has sent me to preach deliverance to the captives and that the blind will receive their sight to free those who are oppressed to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.

Everyone leans forward on the edge of the stone benches they are sitting on and every pair of eyes is glued on Jesus. Without any fuss, he rolls up the scroll, hands it back to the synagogue ruler, and sits down. Then Jesus begins his sermon: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

Wow!! What does Jesus’ mean? It soon dawns on them that Jesus is proclaiming himself as the long-promised Messiah. He’s come to bring freedom at last—the freedom Israel longed for from the hated Romans who have taken over. And so everyone speaks well of him. This is exactly what they wanted to hear! All are amazed at the words of grace coming out of his mouth.

Then someone asks: “Isn’t this the son of Joseph?” And then it clicks for you—yes, you know this guy. He is Joseph’s son! He’s a hometown boy. Jesus continues:

“Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself. Do here in your hometown what we have heard you did at Capernaum.’ Truly I say to you that no prophet is accepted in his own town.”

To illustrate this, Jesus points to Elijah and Elisha who were well known for their teaching and miracles. But at critical times they and the message from God they brought were not welcomed in Israel, so God sent them to help those outside of Israel instead. When there was a chronic drought and a terrible famine affected the whole land, there were many widows in Israel, but God sent Elijah to bless a widow of Zarephath in Sidon, beyond Israel’s borders. Even though she had nothing to give God, God miraculously provided food for her. And in the time of Elisha none of the lepers in Israel were cleansed, but only Naaman from Syria.

Uh oh! This isn’t going to go down too well. Is Jesus daring to suggest that the gifts of God’s grace are not tied to one’s nationality? Does Jesus seriously think God would help and bless these Gentile outsiders…this unholy rabble!? God favours Sidon, not Israel?! Does God heal in Syria, not Nazareth?! How dare Jesus suggest that God should care about them—as if they are deserving of God’s help and favour. It’s impossible! The widow and Naaman are both Gentiles; pagans; heathens, they should get what they deserve! Whoever proof-read Jesus’ sermon should have told him this would have upset the Nazareth crowd. Is Jesus saying that Nazareth doesn’t have any special claim to blessing and God would turn from them to other nations?

That is the very thing that Jesus is saying. The episodes with Naaman the Syrian and the widow of Zarephath was the first glimpse that God was sending his saving help to all people…because he cared about them. His love and compassion for all people would be found in Christ, the one sitting there before them in the Synagogue at Nazareth, in whom is the fulfilment of Isaiah 61 for their deepest and most desperate needs: freedom from bondage to sin, death and Satan.

When the people thought Jesus meant that he would bring them political freedom they loved his ‘gracious words’. When they realised that he was saying Nazareth had no special claims to God’s blessing, and that they themselves needed forgiveness, they exploded with hostile rejection. In one of the biggest backflips ever, those who were so delighted with his words of grace are now fuming with outrage. In their eyes Jesus has gone from hometown hero to lowdown zero. He’s not the kind of Messiah these people wanted, and certainly didn’t tell them what they wanted to hear. So rising up they cast him out of the city and led him away to edge of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down.

This attempt at murdering Jesus foreshadows his later rejection in Holy Week. The shouts of ‘Hosanna!’ and welcome by people lining the streets who waved branches and threw their cloaks before Jesus as he rode triumphantly into Jerusalem, would wildly swing just days later to shouts of “Crucify him!” by those baying for his blood.

How unexpected that God should use the bitter darkness of human evil in which to shine his love so brightly. How unexpected that God should send Jesus into the world to love even those who rejected him and sought to kill him. How unexpected that Jesus should come for those so undeserving of his love. But that is what Jesus did all throughout his ministry, welcoming sinners and tax collectors and eating with them, ministering to the broken and unclean, those deemed by society not good enough to be included, let alone to be considered righteous.

The people at Nazareth didn’t realise that God’s love and favour was not just for them. They couldn’t comprehend that God could possibly care for and desire a relationship with the so-called no-hopers in this world; those who were outsiders; those who didn’t present well; those who didn’t measure up; those who were unclean; those who were offensive. But then again, God’s love is radically different from human understandings of what love is and should be like.

Paul describes what love is in our second reading today from 1 Corinthians 13. But it is not in our human efforts but in Christ that we see what true love is. Jesus did not come to boast, but to serve. He wasn’t proud or arrogant, but gentle and humble. He wasn’t envious, but self-emptying. He wasn’t self-seeking, but seeks the lost. Throughout Jesus’ life and ministry, in his perfect obedience to his Father, but especially in his brutal death on the Cross, the love of God and his compassion for all people—which is not just a feeling but a doing—has been shown to the whole world. The characteristics of love that Paul describes are the very characteristics of God’s enduring, long-suffering love that went to such astonishing lengths as Jesus, the son of Joseph and Son of God hung on the Cross, patient and suffering, for all people, patient and suffering for you. A love not counting our wrongs against us…but counting them against Christ.

God’s love is not just for us. It’s not just for those from a particular area. It’s not just for those in a particular group. It’s not just for those who meet our expectations or standards. God’s love is not just for those we like. God’s love is not dependent on what people look like, or what they are good at, or how well they perform, or whether they fit in. Nor does God withhold his love for those who we think are beyond love or who have gone past the point of no return. Jesus’ confronting words to the synagogue crowd in Nazareth show us that none of us have a monopoly on God’s blessing over and above others. The Cross shows us that. The Cross didn’t come with a list of postcodes or behaviour codes or dress standards. In his ministry Jesus came to those who had nothing, he came to sinners and tax collectors, those who were unwell, broken and disabled.

And he still does today.

Everyone needs Christians to show them God’s love. That’s why the Devil loves nothing more than to tempt us to write other people off; to tempt us to think they are beyond the point of no return; to think of ourselves more deserving of God’s love than others; to think of some people deserving of our kindness and others deserving of our rejection. That’s so dangerous. For there is a part of ourselves in every person we are tempted to write off. And when we fall to the temptation to do that, we have condemned ourselves. For you and I are like the destitute widow of Zarephath. We have absolutely nothing to give to God to earn his blessing. Indeed we were once outside the nation of heaven; once enemies of God. You and I were like Naaman the Syrian, unclean with the leprosy of sin.

Yet just as God showed his favour to those people for no other reason other than that he loved them, so too he has shown his favour to each of you here today. He paid the price that you were unable to pay, by giving what you were unable to give: the holy and precious blood of his own Son, purifying you from all your sin. And through the waters of baptism, God sought you and brought his love for the world to you personally so that, even though you don’t deserve it, all the saving benefits of Jesus’ death and resurrection have been given to you. In gentleness and kindness, Jesus washed you and gave you his very own righteousness so that you have the right to be called a child of God, and can join with him in having access to his Heavenly Father’s peace.

2000 years after Jesus preached in the place of worship at Nazareth, God continues to show his saving love to his baptised faithful, here in this place of worship today. For today, this Scripture Jesus first read at Nazareth is again fulfilled in your hearing. He is here again to read the Gospel for you. He is here to give the gospel to you, by not counting your wrongs against you but instead forgiving your sins. He proclaims his peace is with you, so that you and I and all those who have only ever known rejection can look forward to eternal acceptance as God’s own dear children.
Amen.