Amazement to Anger - A Reflection on Luke 4:16-30



When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 

 

And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say, ‘Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.’ ” And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown. But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land; yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.” When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

 

If this was part of a movie, this scene would have been a director’s delight. Picture it. Carpenter’s son returns home. He goes to the temple. He picks up the scroll of Isaiah and reads: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor, release for the captives, sight for the blind, set the oppressed free.” Then he rolls up the scroll and looks at his audience who have their eyes fixed on him. “Today,” he says, “this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” And they all go “oooh” in amazement. 

 

But then somebody says: “Is this not the carpenter’s son?” And Jesus suddenly takes off on them. Why? We will look at that in a moment. He speaks about a famine in Israel during the times of the prophet Elijah when it had stopped raining for three and a half years, and how Elijah was sent to a widow at Zarephat. She was a pagan lady in a pagan town. Then he speaks about lepers that existed during the times of the prophet Elisha, and how Elisha had healed a Syrian named Naaman. He was a pagan man in another pagan town. 

 

In both these cases Jesus was saying that God had blessed outsiders — the traditional enemies of Israel, instead of blessing the insiders — the Jews who believed themselves the chosen ones. It drove Jesus’ listeners crazy and they went from amazement to anger in just a matter of minutes. They pushed him out of the temple and took him to the edge of a cliff intending to hurl him off it but he escaped miraculously and went his way. Didn’t I tell you? A movie director’s delight!

 

I’d like to make two points. One, God is gonna do what God wants to do. He might bypass all the Christians all around the world and pick a non-Christian to be immensely blessed. He might, similarly, bypass all the learned theologians and scholars in the church and pick some ordinary guy to become a powerfully anointed preacher. We set boundaries; God shatters them. We see evidence of this right from the time of the conception of Jesus. And we need to learn from this, all those of us who set boundary lines.

 

And the second point is in answer to the question we raised earlier. Why did Jesus take off of these guys who were praising him? Because he sensed their underlying hypocrisy. He doesn’t want our praise without our obedience. What’s the point of admiring somebody and not following what he says and does? It is why Jesus once said“Not everyone who raises his hands and says “Alleluia, Alleluia” or “Praise the Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father in heaven” (see Matthew 7:21).

 

Watch a video of this reflection by Aneel Aranha here:  https://youtu.be/cWSNtdHKWB8

 

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