Jack McKinney
Text: Luke 4:18-30
The Other Sermon
When Jesus was finished with his prophetic reading to the
liberal Christians he said,
“Today
this scripture has become true right in front of you.”
And everybody was okay with
him saying that. In fact they liked the edginess of his teaching. They were all
so amazed at how charismatic and brilliant he was that no one thought he was
arrogant. Instead, they teased him saying, “Are you sure you’re old Joe’s son?
We remember when you were a kid and all you wanted to do was play video games.”
Jesus
was irritated because he didn’t think they were taking him seriously, so he
said: “You have heard about all the things I have been doing for people in
other places and you probably want me to do them here in this church. The
problem, though, is that a prophet is never accepted in his home.”
And
to prove his point he said: “There is a lot of grumbling among you liberals
about George Bush and his policies, but I’ll tell you the truth, George Bush is
no more misguided in his decisions than you have been in some of your
decisions. And I further tell you that if you claim to have the love of God in
your heart, you must love President Bush as your brother and pray for him.”
These
words irritated the liberal Christians and they immediately changed their minds
about Jesus being charismatic and brilliant. Because they believed in tolerance
they said Jesus could come back to their church, but he couldn’t teach Sunday
school or preach. And Jesus departed to carry his prophetic message into all
the world. (Modern paraphrase of Luke 4:21-30)
Well, that puts things in a different
light, doesn’t it? What if Jesus’ words were directed at us this morning instead
of his hometown synagogue in
Before I say any more about this subject
I must first admit that I’m not preaching the sermon I wanted to this morning.
The other sermon, the one I wanted to preach, was going to be fun (at least for
me). I was going to get up on my high horse for awhile and ride alongside Jesus
as he provoked those hypocrites in his hometown. I mean, honestly, look at
those people. At first they are impressed with Jesus’ prophetic message and
proud of their native son, but when he mentions a couple of sensitive incidents
in their religious past, they immediately turn on him and want to do him harm. Oh,
how I would have enjoyed knocking those hypocrites down a peg or two. As long
as they thought Jesus’ ministry was going to aid them and support their firmly
held beliefs, he was the golden child. But as soon as his message challenged
those beliefs, they changed their minds about him. How sad.
Have you noticed how we read the
Bible, or watch a movie, or read a book? We immediately identify with the
heroic character and take up his or her cause. I call this the John Wayne
syndrome. As a kid my favorite movies were the John Wayne westerns where he
would do battle against his enemies, often the Indians, and always come out on
top. Never mind the fact that in reality the western settlers were the ones
often committing genocide against the Indians, in the John Wayne movies the
cowboys were the heroes and that’s who I identified with.
In a similar manner, when I read the
Gospels I tend to identify closely with the person and work of Jesus. If he
criticizes the religious leaders of his day I cheer him on as he confronts their
hypocrisy (never mind that I am a religious leader). If Jesus laments how slow
his disciples are to grasp his message, or how ego-driven they seem to be, I
celebrate his willingness to challenge their dedication (never mind the fact
that I am a disciple). It’s Jesus and I against the world, or against the
church, or against the powers that be. The two of us always seem to know best.
We always seem to have that prophetic word. We always seem to know the mind of
God.
So, you can see why that other sermon
was going to be so much fun for me. Jesus and I were going to kick booty again.
We were going to expose the narrow-minded bigots in this text; we were going to
stand up against the lynch mob and courageously state our case; we were going
to be faithful no matter what it cost us.
But I couldn’t do it. Not today.
Maybe next time, but not today. The law of averages finally caught up with me.
At least this once I couldn’t position myself with Jesus against the weak
hypocrites, or against the unjust leaders. I realized that in this sermon I
couldn’t be standing next to Jesus in the synagogue in
And what I noticed when I put myself
in the crowd that day, and tried to understand their reaction, was that the
context didn’t work. The words Jesus speaks in this passage that turn the
people against him reference two events in the past when God responded to the
Jews’ enemies, but not to the Jews, in a time of trouble. And the implication
Jesus is sending is that his message and mission is for the whole world, not
just his native
But you see, I can’t get worked up
over that. I don’t have any emotional connection to those events and I already
believe that God’s concern is for all people regardless of their nationality or
religion. And when I thought about that I was tempted to leave the crowd and
rejoin Jesus at the front of the synagogue in
Before I did that, though, I
considered another tactic. With the help of my co-conspirator, Nancy Petty, I
imagined what it would be like if the setting for this story wasn’t the
synagogue in
“There
is a lot of grumbling among you liberals about George Bush and his policies,
but I’ll tell you the truth, George Bush is no more misguided in his decisions
than you have been in some of your decisions. And I further tell you that if
you claim to have the love of God in your heart, you must love President Bush
as your brother and pray for him.”
And suddenly I got it. I got what it was like to sit in the
synagogue in
Being a
follower of Jesus has never been an easy thing, but it gets downright
unpleasant when we think Jesus may be challenging us to do the one thing we
think we cannot do. For many liberal Christians who have struggled with the
Bush presidency, and have grieved over the war in
But why is
this important? Why does it matter that we imagine Jesus standing here in our
church challenging us to do the one thing we find most difficult to do? And
maybe that one thing doesn’t have anything to do with the current resident in
the White House. Maybe it is something altogether different. But whatever it
is, why should we even concern ourselves with it? To answer that, I will let
Rev. John Ames speak.
When
you encounter another person, when you have dealings with anyone at all, it is
as if a question is being put to you. So you must think, What is the Lord
asking of me in this moment, in this situation? If you confront insult or
antagonism, your first impulse will be to respond in kind. But if you think, as
it were, This is an emissary sent from the Lord, and some benefit is intended
for me, first of all the occasion to demonstrate my faithfulness, the chance to
show that I do in some small degree participate in the grace that saved me, you
are free to act otherwise than as circumstances would seem to dictate. You are
free to act by your own lights. You are freed at the same time of the impulse
to hate or resent that person. (Robinson,
Why is it important that we try do that thing that is most
difficult for us to do, to love that person that most difficult to love, to
understand that person that is beyond our understanding? Because in doing so we
are freed to act otherwise than circumstances would seem to dictate. We are
freed to act by our own lights. We are freed from the impulse to hate. Simply
put, we are freed. And we can run Jesus out of town, or tell him he can’t speak
here anymore, or just ignore some of his more difficult teachings when they
make us uncomfortable. But we will remain in bondage and our souls will be less
than they could be. And that’s a shame.
Like I said,
the sermon I wanted to preach this morning would have been a lot more fun for
me. Jesus and I would have ridden together again. But only a fool truly thinks
the hard message is for everyone else but him. So I take my seat in the
congregation and try to hear the challenging word that I do not want to hear. I
will try to understand and love and forgive those who make decisions I abhor. I
will even try to understand and love and forgive myself when I make decisions I
abhor. And in doing these hard, almost impossible things, I will pray to be
free.