|
|
Fourth Sunday of Epiphany,
1. February 2004 |
Not Just for the People in the Club We pray: Kindle us, kindle us now. Ever hear of a "Ruby Begonia"? I am sure that some of you know what I am talking about. Can you imagine that a Ruby Begonia is what a city is proud of and for which it is noted? Well, there is one here in Texas. The city is Cuero. The Ruby Begonia is, catch this, a turkey! Yes, a bird, a variety of turkey! Every year Cuero proudly has Ruby Begonia races with some neighboring town to see which "turkey" is the fastest! Every town, village, hamlet, burg wants something, somebody, anything to make it stand out. I notice when I come into this town (Kerrville, TX) that there are no signs, stating Kerrville, the home of.... . Of course, the local school system does have the years of the high school being the regional and state champions of football, well displayed on one of its building for all passing by to see. Didn't see any recent years displayed, however. There was this burg, village called Nazareth in the hills of Galilee. 15 miles from the Sea of Galilee, 20 miles from the Mediterranean--in the middle of nowhere- passed by the Interstates of its day. It had a moderate climate, good for growing vegetables, but it had only one spring for water. So you had to drink rain water some of the time, and rain water soon tastes brackish. So the place was a place you didn't stay if you had another place to go. You didn't say: "I live in Nazareth." That was like saying you lived in Hell, Michigan; Bobo, Mississippi; or Boring, Maryland. But, and this is a big, "but" they had their "Ruby Begonia." They were at long last going to have someone of whom to be proud. They were ready to get the city signs repainted (if they had city signs) to read: "Hometown of the Famous Prophet, Jesus." They may have been slightly wrong about that, but what is that among so many small lies we hear in these days? They were no longer going to be the buffoons of the rest of the region. The derisive "What good can come out of Nazareth?" would forever be banished. Jesus was their boy, their hero. They had produced him. He had come home. Jesus, the person always loyal to tradition, a person of great piety, spends the sabbath studying Jewish law and custom in the synagogue. (Now I wish all of you would at least follow that pious example of Jesus, even if you can't follow much else.) He is in the church, we would say, of his small hometown. He is given the privilege, that was given to visiting teachers, of reading from the Holy Scriptures and giving a short explanation of its meaning. Jesus had done that. The Scripture was from the book written by Isaiah, a famous man of God from long ago, about 700 ago. Those words were: "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of the sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." The Good News of God appointed for today begins after Jesus had handed back the scroll of Scripture and sat down. "Today this is happening right here and now." Jesus says. This calls for an immediate response from the people hearing him. They were to respond not with some kind of tinkering with their ideas, not with some small tweaking of how they did things. They were to become people of action. There were two responses to Jesus. One was "Wow! Isn't he the best, the wisest you have ever heard?" and the other: "Who's fulfilling what around here? Isn't this the carpenter's son? He's Joseph's son." They didn't want action they wanted Jesus to do something for them, not for them to change and get moving. The rest of the story seems like Jesus just intentionally irritated them, egged them on, tried to get them upset with him. For all practical purpose he says, "You want me to do miracles like I did down there in the town of Capernaum. No way! I am not here to make you famous. I am like the great Old Testament man of God, Elijah who didn't get fed during a sustained period of drought in his homeland of Israel, but went outside to Sidon." The people of Nazareth knew Sidon all right. It was in the neighboring country. Elisha, Elijah's successor didn't cure anybody locally but a man, a sworn enemy of Israel, from the country of Syria. What's going on here? Where is the great love that our New Testament
Lesson for today speaks about: love is kind, gentle, and all the rest
of those things? This is shocking. Had Jesus decided to make Nazareth famous by staying there, making it a shrine for himself, we would never be sitting where we are today. Jesus is not a hometown person; he is for all people. His message is for the people of Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. His message of freedom from guilt, from shame, from sin, from addiction, from the thought process that either you are the hottest person who ever lived, or from believing you are nothing--that no one cares, no one is concerned about you. He give us eyes to see that it is not the end of your nose that is important, but the view of eternity, of life always and forever which he gives us through his cross, through his death, and through his resurrection. His message to you is that we suffer from a poverty of righteousness which cannot be purchased, earned or produced by us and that poverty turns into "riches" when he gives us the perfection that only God can possess and that we have by faith in this Jesus. But why the anger in the people, if that was Jesus' message? They wanted him for themselves. They wanted the exclusive rights to whatever he was or would become. His message said, "there is no exclusive club for my message. I am for all people everywhere." Now I notice as I come into this wonderful town, roadside signs telling us about three other Lutheran churches, several other churches, and then coming into the city itself, I can see other churches of several denominations. Now my question is: are they brothers and sisters in Christ, competition, or perhaps even the enemy? And what is this congregation about? Are we exclusive? Do we have fences so high that only people remarkably like us would find this place as the place of God in their life? Are we proud of being Lutheran or do we boast only in the cross of Jesus Christ? Because you have been baptized, confirmed, and are regular, what do they say? "A member in good standing," are you better than others? Are we open or do we want to be closed? I know most of the people that surround you here today are your friends, and that is wonderful, but Jesus is a friend to all, because he laid down his life for all. All people need to hear the wonderful message of Jesus and his forgiving love. All need it just as you continue to constantly need it. You can convince people of anything, but if you don't love them by giving yourself in service for them, you are a gong that people can hear, but calls them to nothing. You can tell it like it is and understand people and life really well, you can accomplish the impossible in life, but if you are not willing to accept them and serve them with the Good News of Jesus and in their other needs, you are nothing. You can give everything to others, and die for your faith, but you will have gained nothing if love was not present in those actions. Your example will prove nothing to anybody. When people are young, like children, we want exclusive rights. Children say, "This is mine. You can't play with it." Sometimes we are shocked when our friend has other friends we don't even know about. We wonder if that person is really our friend. We want to be exclusive. We have clubs to keep some others out. We are better, finer, whatever than others. God loved the whole world, the whole world, that all you have to do is believe in him as your Lord and Savior, you have eternal life. Which means, you will be taken care of always. Jesus says, Believe God loved the whole world. Believe he loves everybody in Kerrville, TX. Believe God wants everyone to hear of Jesus and make them as you are into his beloved children. No exclusive rights. No sign to say, "Jesus is only here." No boasting of who we are, save in the cross of Christ our Lord. Are we here today sitting in the synagogue of Nazareth listening to Jesus say: "Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing," and saying: "This is God's Son our Savior. Let's get others to hear what he has to say? Or are you saying, "I've had enough of this Jesus stuff." Where are you today? Walter W. Harms, retired pastor
|
|
(top) |