Luke 4:14-21 - "Shortest Sermon"

         Four years ago, my cell phone rang early on the morning of January 20^th.  It was our son, Paddy, who had been standing for quite some time on the mall in Washington, DC, in the freezing cold, amidst 1.8 million other people, waiting to hear President Obama’s first inaugural address. 

         He and a friend had started making their way to the mall from their downtown apartment at 5:00 A.M.  To this day, Paddy considers the morning of January 20, 2009 to be some of the most memorable hours of his life.  The excitement of a first time experience, of singing along with old and young as he stood elbow to elbow both for warmth and in solidarity is something he says he will never forget. 

         As Paddy watched the first African-American take the oath of the Office, he knew intuitively that he was part of an historic moment – something that those people who sat in the congregation of the synagogue in Nazareth more than 2000 years ago probably did not know as they listened to Jesus read from the Holy Hebrew Scriptures and preach his first sermon.         

         Nazareth was a rather obscure, backwater town with a population of about 500.  Many villagers would have known Jesus – the local lad – now some sort of itinerant rabbi – who was either just passing through or who perhaps had decided to come back home. 

         According to the writer of the Gospel of Luke, Jesus had been recently baptized by John in the Jordan River and then had been whisked away by the Holy Spirit to spend 40 days of serious abstinence, prayer, and reflection in the wilderness.  Now returned from his retreat, Jesus had begun preaching and teaching. 

         Interestingly enough, our Gospel writer does not have Jesus healing the sick, exorcising demons, and multiplying loaves and fishes just yet.  No – instead, the writer tells us that Jesus wandered the countryside, stopping in towns and villages along the way: telling stories, listening to the concerns of the peasantry, perhaps even trying out different ways of putting the gist of his ministry into words.  Now, he was finally returning home – to his roots – where he would formally lay out his agenda, articulate his mission statement, share his vision, and offer his own inaugural address.         

         Apparently Jesus had been asked to be the liturgist for the weekly Shabbat service – a reader of Scripture, a guest preacher of sorts.  When he stood up, a couple of the old timers in the back row nudged each other, nodding their heads, and smiling – home town boy made good, back with us now, “that’s our boy – right here” – and the Jewish mothers fluttered their hands, clucking to one another, and glancing at their young unmarried daughters, hoping, hoping that this handsome lad would come back to their house for a post-service meal. 

         Jesus opened the scroll, quickly found his place, and read in a loud and clear voice.  He read confidently, with much expression, and with great passion because he knew that he was not reading a jumble of words strung together.  He was reading his story, their story.  Through Jesus, the prophet Isaiah came alive to all who had gathered in the synagogue:

God’s Spirit is on me;
    

he’s chosen me to preach the Message of good news to the poor,


Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind,


To set the burdened and battered free,
    

To announce, “This is God’s year to act!”

         When the reading was done, Jesus rolled up the scroll, gave it to the assistant, and sat down, for that was the custom in those days.  And the Jewish mothers clucked some more and glanced pointedly at their unmarried daughters.  Look alert Rebekah!  The boy Jesus would be a good catch indeed!  United Methodist elder, Alyce S. McKenzie, describes the reaction of the congregation this way:  “The people buzzed with admiration. ‘Such a beautiful passage …a lovely passage! And his voice, so melodious! His eyes, so glowing. His manner, so confident!....What a fine speaker!...We are mesmerized! What uplifting and comforting words will he have for us?’’

         And they all listened intently for Jesus’ reflection – the sermon - on the Scripture.  And Jesus looked out at the full assembly, noticing that all of them were sitting there in the ancient synagogue equivalent of the comfortable pew. 

         And when he spoke, it seemed that he spoke to each person individually.  And when he spoke, he preached one of the shortest sermons in history.  And when he spoke, he said, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” 

         That was it.  You know, Jesus would have flunked any seminary preaching course with that one – no doubt about it.  Not only was the sermon not the requisite 15-20 minutes long, but it contained no jokes designed to make you laugh.  It offered no pithy illustrations to capture your attention and make the message clear. 

         Apparently Jesus thought that his message was clear enough. Next week we shall learn just what the congregation in Nazareth thought of that sermon.  But for now, suffice it to say that even as we read this same passage all these millennia later – the sermon is the same.  “Today - this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

         And what does this Scripture say?  Good news for the poor, release to the captives, sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed, and even what is called the Year of Jubilee! 

        Presbyterian pastor Phil Windsor tells us what this Year of Jubilee was all about in one of his own sermons: The Year of Jubilee (he says) was “set at every seven years and every fifty years, ‘no business as usual can be done...slaves must be given their freedom...families can return to lands lost in litigation...farmland and field get a Sabbath of rest, for there can be no planting or harvesting; debts are...cancelled, there's to be a moratorium on marketing and the commoditizing of life.’ The Jubilee Year is to be a fore-taste and celebration of the Kingdom of Heaven. “Liberation, restoration, health restored, jails unlocked, land returned: a whole array of social justice revolutions.’”

         This Scripture, this “whole array of social justice revolutions” is Jesus’ agenda, an outline of his ministry, the foundation of his gospel.  This Scripture is Jesus’ inaugural address, his vision, his challenge to each one of us – and it is all about our connection to the poor, the marginalized, the battered, and the beaten.  That single relationship is the essence of Jesus’ politics – and so it must be at the core of ours as well.        

         As retired Episcopal priest Grant Gallop says, “There isn't a word in Jesus' inaugural address about anything BUT social justice issues: there's no talk about the sanctity of private property, the glory of the free market, nor the duty to pray three times a day or to avoid eating ham hocks or lobster tails. Nothing about swift and certain hanging for capital offenses. Nothing that you might expect from a religious leader. It's all about how society is to be changed--how there's to be a kinder, gentler society.”

         If I were to ask you why Jesus came to this earth, how would you answer? Maybe some of you would reply, “He came to save us.” Or, “He came to die for our sins.” Or, “He came to show us God loved us.” Or, “He came to fulfill what was said about Him in the Old Testament.”

         But, you know, the Gospel writer of Luke would disagree with all of these abstract theological and, in many ways, future-oriented notions.  The Gospel writer of Luke is concerned with restoration of this world and transformation of our lives now – today – and that is why he or she chose to begin the story of Jesus’ ministry with this very short sermon based on the 61^st chapter of Isaiah.

This Scripture is the way, the road map, the route to find Jesus.  And that can mean only one thing for us:  If we are drawn to Jesus as his followers, if we see church as anything other than a social time, then we have no choice but to be drawn to his message as well – or we are just kidding ourselves using the term “Christian” to label our religious preferences. 

         And so the question for us is this: Is the Spirit of the Lord upon us – this congregation – this church family?  Because if it is, no matter how inadequate we might feel at times, we – you and I - are the hands, feet, heart, eyes, ears, brains, and lungs of Jesus. 

         And because of that, because we are the Body of Christ, Jesus calls us to sing out the Good News and to strategize the best way to get that pivotal message out to the most people.  He calls us to fill the bowls of the hungry and to walk for the sick.  He calls us to proclaim our solidarity with the ones that society has left on the sidelines and to listen for the people crying into the bleak darkness of their lives.   He calls us to do all of these things - because the spirit of the Lord is upon us too. 

         As Methodist blogger Jim Parsons so eloquently wrote, “The one who is to come, has come. The one who will set the people free has broken the chains.  The one who ushered us into the kingdom of God is watching and waiting for you to do your part. What we can take from these scriptures is an example of how. Jesus could not do it without the Spirit and neither can we. ….So our challenge is to find our roles, find our calling, find what we are created for, and then to proclaim it and do it.

         Just do it, as the Nike Corporation reminds us.  Just do it - but not in some future time.  Just do it today.  That is also the message of this Scripture. 

         Jesus says that it is fulfilled today.  And so we are not called to live in the past and remember the good old days and only sing the good old hymns and be imprisoned by the way things used to be.  And we are not called to live in the future either, dreaming of an ideal tomorrow.  Some day there will be peace.  Some day the world will be a better place.  Someday our church will have the money and the volunteers to do everything we ought to be doing.  Some day I’ll go to heaven, and everything will be OK. 

         We are called to fulfill this Scripture today – and that is terrifying because it means that we  - as individuals and also as the church – this church – are called to radical action now.  Jesus is saying that the impossible can and is happening today – even as we speak.  In other words, the train is leaving the station.  Are we on it?

         That, of course, is a question each one of us must answer, but if you are inclined to answer in the affirmative, then I challenge you to bring something – an idea, a suggestion – to the Annual Meeting today that will fulfill this Scripture as Jesus calls us to fulfill it. 

What are we doing here in this church (and what might we do more or better) to fulfill the Scripture:

To preach the message of good news to the poor,


To announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind,


To set the burdened and battered free,
    

        

         This is our story, our Scripture, our calling, and if we intentionally work together to live that story, fulfill that Scripture, and pursue that calling and if people outside of these four walls see that in all we do we are indeed the small church with the big heart,

then I believe – I totally believe - that as a faith community we will grow with like-minded individuals and families who also, like us, want to honestly announce:  “This is God’s year to act!”