When It All Works Together . .

When It All Works Together . . .

Luke 4:14-21

It may not surprise you but I, a Methodist preacher, can be somewhat methodical in how I approach things. For example, I have a method for my morning devotions which, from the outside, can seem both random and routine. It can seem random, because there doesn’t seem to be an organizing theme. It can seem routine, because I do the same thing most every morning.

It begins with letting the dogs out and then feeding all of our pets. That may not seem like devotions to some, but it reminds me that I am called to serve without even the expectation of finding pleasure in the service. This is an important spiritual insight in a world that often starts and stops with one question: What’s in it for me?

After a simple breakfast, I turn on my laptop to see the Upper Room’s picture of the day. This picture invites me to look at the world with the expectation that God is at work. This is an important spiritual insight in a world that believes that nothing is real unless we can see and measure it.

I then read the Upper Room devotion for the day. This reminds me that faith can be expressed simply and deeply in just a few word. This is an important spiritual insight when you have been trained to think theologically, where nothing is as simple as it seems to be.

Still online, I then go to the Hunger Site. I click through the nine charities that are hosted on this website, offering prayers while each page slowly loads. The pages are slow because there are lots of sponsors on each page, and each sponsor donates to the charity whenever someone clicks on the page. It is not a lot of money per click, but when thousands of people do it every day, it becomes bowls of rice, books for children, screenings for women, treatments for veterans, and more. This is an important spiritual insight when we tend to make faith all about what I do, and not what we can do together.

The next thing I do may seem frivolous, but it also serves a spiritual and formative purpose. I read several comic strips online. They remind me that I do not save the world through my efforts, and that it is both OK and necessary to let go of the world for a few moments. It invites me to let go of trying to be God, and to practice humility.

The last thing I do, before spending time on a treadmill, and then getting cleaned up and heading to the church, is to work two crossword puzzles. These puzzles challenge me to make connections, to think through the clues, and to try and understand what the puzzle-maker was thinking, and to see how it all fits together when I have solved the puzzle. It helps to “prime the pump,” to get me thinking creatively, so that I can be more prepared to faithfully and thoughtfully face the challenges of the day.

Feeding the dogs, looking at pictures, reading a few words, clicking through pages, reading comics, and working cross word puzzles – that hardly sounds like the work of a saint. And if that was what I did all day long, I would have to agree with you. And if I did these things to please myself, there would be little usefulness to be found in doing these things.

Yet because I do these things intentionally, purposefully, prayerfully, and with an eye to pleasing God in all that I do, these activities become exercises to form me for service, presence, patience, generosity, humility, and mindfulness. That’s not a bad way to start your day and to grow in faith as a disciple.

In our reading, there are some activities that may seem unimportant. They are just the kinds of things you do because that’s the way things are done. You do these things without thinking about it, and they end up meaning little or nothing at all. It doesn’t occur to us that even doing these things could mean anything.

Yet when Jesus does these things, they mean something. Everything Jesus did was with an eye to pleasing God. By every thought of his heart, by every word of his mouth, by every work of his hand, Jesus was seeking, and revealing, the glory of God. And we remember from last week, the glory of God that Jesus reveals is God’s love for us all. Because of this, everything Jesus says and doescan reveal something important about the will, and the kingdom, of God. So, let’s take a few moments to notice how Jesus related to the scroll.

We are told that Jesus receives the scroll, unrolls the scroll, reads the scroll, rolls the scroll back up, and then returns the scroll. It seems to be nothing more than doing what needs to be done because that the way the thing gets done. Yet, each of these actions mean something.

Jesus received the scroll. Even though Jesus was the Son of God, and he was filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus received the scroll, the Torah, the Old Testament, the Word of God for the People of God. Jesus received this scroll from the attendant, who was responsible for keeping the scroll undefiled.

By this action, Jesus shows us that it is not enough to be filled with the Holy Spirit, not if we think being filled with the Spirit separates us from the received Word of God. Jesus received it, and he kept it undefiled.

Jesus unrolled the scroll. Even though he had received it as the Word of God, and he kept it undefiled, it becomes a false idol if it is not then opened and read. As Mark Twain once quipped, “The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.” There is no advantage to receiving and owning a Bible if it sits on a shelf collecting dust. You have to open it and read it.

By this action, Jesus shows us that it is not enough to own a Bible, or to carry a Bible, or to declare that you believe the Bible is the holy word of God. You actually have to open it up and read it.

Which leads us to Jesus reading the scroll, and more to the point, how Jesus reads the scroll. If we look closely at what Luke’s gospel reports, we have a problem. The passage Jesus reads is from Isaiah 61, but he doesn’t include all of it in our reading. In fact, Jesus added some things to the reading that are not found in this Isaiah passage.

Jesus reads, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor,” but he omits "to bind up the brokenhearted." Jesus reads, “He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives,” when Isaiah 61 is usually translated as "to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners.” Jesus reads, “and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,” which isn’t in Isaiah 61 at all. Finally, Jesus reads,“to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor,” but he omits "and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn."

The problem may be in how Luke’s gospel reported this story. If Luke was a Christian Gentile who was unfamiliar with Isaiah, he might have been working from a memory that started with Jesus reading in the synagogue, but then Luke may have also included other points of emphasis from Jesus’ teaching and ministry that were consistent with this memory. We can all agree that Jesus is the fulfillment of all he said in this passage, even if we have to stitch it together with other passages to make it work. That’s how many scholars who recognized the discrepancy deal with the problem.

Another possibility I think we should consider is to remember that Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit when he read this passage. Jesus may have been giving us more than a simple, literal, word-for-word reading of an 800-year old passage. He may have been making a Spirit-filled translation which accounted for the living presence of God in the words on the page. He may have been making a translation which accounted for the living presence of God that was in the One reading the words.

This translation may have been necessary because Jesus is the Word of God, and his presence and ministry changes how we are to approach and understand these words. Maybe we are not supposed to read the Bible looking for a simple, literal, word-for-word translation from an ancient story into today’s world. Maybe we are to hear the story through the Spirit-filled life of Jesus Christ, the Word of God.

For example, when God spoke through Isaiah, people needed to be comforted because their hearts had been broken through sin and death. Jesus didn’t need to say he came to bind up the broken-hearted because he came to take away the reason their hearts could be broken. It is sin that breaks our heart, and Jesus came to defeat sin. It is the death of those we love that breaks our heart, and Jesus came so that those who believe in him would never perish but would have eternal life.

When God spoke through Isaiah, the people of Israel were captives of an oppressive regime, and many were actually locked away as prisoners. Jesus didn’t need to make that distinction between captives and prisoners because he came to make us citizens of the kingdom of God, where we are released from our captivity to sin and death.

When God spoke through Isaiah, the “vengeance of God” was the language used to declare that God would make right whatever had been wronged. Jesus didn’t need to make that distinction because he came to be the atonement for all that we had done wrong before God. Jesus came to make right what we had made wrong – our relationship with God and our neighbors.

Jesus rolled the scroll back up and returned it to the attendant. He didn’t toss it aside. He didn’t declare it null and void. He didn’t dismiss it as a collection of stories and myths. He didn’t set it on fire, or shred it into tiny pieces. He rolled it back up and gave it back to the attendant so that it would be ready and available for the next time the people gathered to worship. By this action he declared that it was still the Word of God for us.

Receiving the scroll, unrolling the scroll, reading the scroll, rolling the scroll back up, and returning the scroll. These actions mean something important for our faith and formation. But it’s meaning isn’t complete at this point.

Our passage began by telling us that Jesus was filled with the power of the Spirit. It ends with “the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Jesus.” That’s how the scripture has been fulfilled.

The scripture is not fulfilled when we bring good news to the poor, but when we see Jesus who comes to us in the poor. The scripture is not fulfilled when we proclaim release to the captives, but when we see Jesus freeing the souls captured by sin. The scripture is not fulfilled when we help people see Jesus, but when we are all focused on Jesus together. The scripture is not fulfilled when we let the oppressed go free, but when we can see that Jesus has set us all free through God’s love and we then live into that glory.

Or, to say it as simply and clearly as our reading did, the scripture is fulfilled when we are all fixed on Jesus. When our eyes are fixed on Jesus, there are no meaningless thoughts, words, works, or interactions. It is by every thought of our hearts, and by every word of our mouths, and by every work of our hands, and by every interaction we have with others, that the scripture is fulfilled and the kingdom of God comes as revealed in Jesus Christ.

It is by every thought of our hearts, and by every word of our mouths, and by every work of our hands, and by every interaction we have with others, that the scripture is fulfilled, and the Spirit works in and through us to bring the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven. Whether it is when we are doing something as methodical as our morning devotions, or when we are open and humble to how God is present with us in any given moment, when it all works together, Jesus reigns, the kingdom comes, and the scripture is fulfilled!

UMH 157 “Jesus Shall Reign”