Listening with Luke
As part of our ongoing discernment of the future paths we may take as churches, we will be conducting conversations in three upcoming services (13th February – joint zoom service; 27th February – St. David’s Uniting; 6th March – Castle Square URC). For these services, alternative written reflections will be made available. Today’s our friend John Henson shares some of his Biblical wisdom as he takes us into the beginning of Jesus’ ministry as outlined in the gospel according to Luke. Through the use of his own translation of The Bible – Good As New – and commentary thereon, John brings these passages to life and challenges us with some profound questions.
Luke 4: 14-21
Full of enthusiasm, Jesus went back to Galilee, where he quickly became a local celebrity. He taught in the places of worship, and everyone spoke well of him.
Then he visited Nazareth, his home town. He went to worship on Saturday as usual. He offered to read and was given a book of one of God’s speakers. The part he chose went like this,
‘God’s Spirit has inspired me
To bring the poor good news;
She tells me, “Get the blind to see,
Bust the jails and set folk free;
God’s arms are open lovingly.”‘
Jesus shut the book and gave it back to the person in charge. Then he sat down to teach. Everyone was watching him carefully. Jesus began by saying, “Today these words are coming true, and you’re here to see it.”
Comment
‘Home is the place where you are loved the most.’ Maybe, but it is also the place where your faults and weaknesses are well known. Jesus was becoming famous. But not at home. They could remember when Jesus had done something or said something that was far from holy or worthy of a prophet. He was alright, people said, but a bit strange, weird even. Good carpenter, perhaps even better than his father. Made some good boats for the fishermen. But he shouldn’t have made those crosses for the Romans. That was helping the enemy. It caused a lot of ill feeling. So, we didn’t see him as a very good candidate to be Messiah, The Son of God. Interesting to hear what he was going to say, though.
Thus, Jesus was very much on probation as far as we in Nazareth were concerned. Then he had a very strange of dealing with the scriptures. Instead of reading the set lectionary reading, he asked the leader of the synagogue to hand him the scroll of the anonymous prophet of Babylon. Then, what do you think, he left out the line in the prophet’s poem about God’s vengeance. You can’t do that with the scriptures! You can imagine we were not in the best of humours to listen to him right from the start!
Luke 4: 21-30
Jesus shut the book and gave it back to the person in charge. Then he sat down to teach. Everyone was watching him carefully. Jesus began by saying, “Today these words are coming true, and you’re here to see it.” Everyone found his style of speaking impressive, and made favourable comments. They said, “Is this really Joseph’s boy? Isn’t he doing well! ” Jesus said, “I know what you’re going to say, ‘He’s on to a good thing up there in Nahum-Town. How about doing something for the folks at home?’ I tell you, God’s speakers never get the backing they deserve from their nearest and dearest. There were many single mothers in our land in Elijah’s day, when there was a drought for three and half years, and nobody had much to eat. Yet God didn’t send Elijah to help any of them. Elijah went instead to the help of a single mother in Lebanon. Lots of our people had skin complaints in Elisha’s day. The only one attended to by Elisha was Norman from Syria.” These remarks drove them wild. They set on Jesus, rough-handled him, and took him to the top of the steep hill the village was built on. They were going to throw him over the edge, but he managed to get away.
Comment
Nazareth was a little town in the hills. It was inclined to be conservative. It did not enjoy the mixture of cultures that the towns of lake Galilee experienced. Nazareth did not like foreigners. When they heard the words about God’s Spirit bringing good news to the poor, they assumed it was Jewish poor the prophet was referring to. And Jewish broken hearted or in the prisons of the enemy occupier. Jesus had already made his congregation uncomfortable by reading an expurgated version of the scripture. But now he painted a picture with examples from their history of God bypassing the chosen race in order to help those of other lands and faiths. This was indeed to be his practice in his ministry according to Luke. Jesus healed the Roman Centurion’s boyfriend with the words “I have not found such great trust among my own people.” He healed a man with severe mental illness over on the eastern Gentile shore of Lake Galilee. He healed a Samaritan leper, and gave a parable about a Samaritan giving help to a man beaten up and lying on the road side, whereas the Jewish priest and Levite left him lying there. That was all to come. But the people of Nazareth heard Jesus’ message of tolerance and inclusion and didn’t like it. In their fury they very nearly succeeded in throwing Jesus over the cliff. Mercifully Jesus escaped their clutches. I’ve often wondered where the brothers of Jesus were. Were they absorbed by the mob mentality, or were they instrumental in assisting Jesus to escape? And where are we when people in our (Christian?) communities are being ostracised or cast out?
Luke 5: 1-11
One day Jesus was standing on the shore of Lake Galilee. The crowds around him were begging him to talk to them about God. He noticed two fishing boats moored on the beach. Their owners were nearby, washing their nets. One of the boats belonged to Simon. Jesus got into the boat, and asked Simon to push it a little way out from the shore. Then Jesus sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When Jesus had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Take the boat into deep water and let the nets down. See if you can catch anything.” Simon said, “Teacher, we’ve been fishing all night and caught nothing. But just to please you, I’ll give it a try.” Simon and his crew landed such a big catch of fish that the nets started to break. So they called out to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. Together they piled both boats so high with fish, they began to sink. Simon (or Rocky as Jesus was to call him) couldn’t believe his eyes. He fell down in front of Jesus, and said, “Sir, please go away. I’m no good!” The onlookers, like Rocky, couldn’t believe their eyes. They had never seen so many fish caught at one time. Neither had James and John Zebedee, Simon’s partners. Jesus said, “Stop worrying about your faults, Simon. I’ve got a new job for you- fishing for people!” As soon as they brought the boats back to shore, the friends gave up their fishing business to stay in the company of Jesus.
Comment
John’s Gospel (GOOD NEWS ‘Sources close to Jesus’) puts the story of the big catch of fish at the very end of the book, as the epilogue. The story may also have been included in the lost ending of Mark, because the women at the tomb had been told to tell the disciples to go back home to Galilee. But Luke, probably for theological reasons keeps the disciples in Jerusalem until the coming of The Spirit at Pentecost. Yes, dear friends there are discrepancies between one gospel and another as to where and when this or that took place. The message is the first priority for the gospel writers, not historical accuracy.
Luke thinks the story is too good to be left out. He may have copied it from a complete gospel of Mark, a copy which Mark may well have given to Luke, for we know that they were friends and spent some time together at Rome when Paul was in prison.
One sign that it was lifted from the end of the gospel story and put near the beginning is that the picture we get of Rocky (Peter) is not of the confident successful man of business portrayed in Mark, immediately without a word rising up and following Jesus (J.G. Whittier), but a man so dejectedly guilty that he asks Jesus to go away from him. This looks much more like the Rocky of John 21, where Rocky is burdened with the memory of his cowardly denial. As in John, and possibly in the lost chapter of Mark, Jesus calls or renews the calling of Rocky despite his past behaviour.
It is the same for us. Jesus solicits our help and companionship whatever our past performance. Unlike so many so-called evangelists, Jesus does not go on and on about our ‘sin’. He gives us a vote of confidence. Please take this to heart. God has a much higher opinion of you than you have of yourself.
Luke 6: 17-26
Jesus brought his band of helpers down from the mountains to a flat piece of ground, where he got together a big crowd of his followers, and many interested people from all over the country and from abroad. They wanted to hear Jesus and be made fully healthy. Those suffering from anxiety or depression, found peace of mind. Everyone tried to touch him. They all felt better just by being close to him. He spoke these words to his followers in particular:
“You’re the important ones now, those of you who haven’t got much.
You’re citizens of God’s New World.
You’re the important ones now, those of you who are hungry.
You’re going to have plenty to eat.
You’re the important ones now, those of you who are grieving.
You’ll soon be laughing.
Think yourselves privileged when people despise and reject you, and when they insult you and call you names for being true to the ideals of the Complete Person. Hold your heads high and keep your spirits up when that happens. Better things are on the way to you in the world to come. The ancestors of those who ill-treat you, treated God’s speakers in the past in the same way.
To the back of the queue, those who are loaded with money!
You’ve had your prizes!
To the back of the back of the queue, those who are over-fed!
There won’t be any food to spare for you!
To the back of the queue, those who laugh at others!
It’s your turn to feel hurt!
To the back of the queue, those who seek to be popular and famous!
People were taken in by posers like you in days gone by.”
Comment
We cannot deal with this account of the teaching of Jesus without tentatively doing a bit of scholarship. Scholars have talked about a document they call ‘Q’ a record of sayings of Jesus, from which both Luke and Matthew copied, giving their own spin on what ‘Q’ said. But it is just as possible that Matthew copied Luke or Luke copied Matthew, or that both of them depended on an oral tradition. Many had heard Jesus speak and recollected his words. Matthew’s version is very liturgical and ordered like the lesson being read from a rostrum in a service. Whereas Luke portrays Jesus as excited, passionately shouting his words. In Matthew Jesus only gives the teaching to the chosen few, the disciples, the priests to be. The venue is an out of the way place, a mountain top. Whereas Luke brings Jesus and his friends down to a level place where all are equal and all, whether bad or good, Jews or Gentiles, ardent nationalists or Roman soldiers could get the message. Rather like John the Dipper’s congregation in fact, described only in Luke. And Luke has not only Jesus praising certain categories but again like The Dipper giving vent to his condemnation of those who are the reverse of the congratulated. Matthew refers to the ‘Poor in Spirit’ which can be interpreted in many ways, where in Luke Jesus it is ‘The Poor’, yes those whom he spoke of in his sermon at Nazareth, the poor for whom the Good News has specially arrived and who are listed first.
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Prayers for ourselves and others ~
The Church of Scotland, Weekly Worship
Loving God,
You have called us to be a living community.
A people bound together as the body of Christ,
and a family united in love.
Yet Lord, in our broken world so many are suffering, so many are hurting.
Hear our prayers Lord
For those whose lives are ruled by hate and vengeance, rather than love and justice.
For those whose homes are not places of love or safety, but places of fear and violence.
For those who have no home to speak of and have become invisible on our streets.
For those who are stigmatised because of status, ill-health, ethnicity, religion.
Lord, You asked us to love our neighbours, all of them, not just the ones we choose.
Enable us and equip us to carry out Your command
and to make a positive difference in the lives of those who are our neighbours and are struggling.
Hear our prayers Lord
For all those in our congregations and communities who are ill at home or in hospital – bring Your healing hands and soothing balm upon them.
For all who are anxiously awaiting treatment, results, or appointments
due to the impact of COVID-19 and our overwhelmed health service.
For anxious relatives and carers who are exhausted and there is no rest, and no end in sight
while the much-needed care packages are few and far between.
Lord equip us, Your servants and disciples, to assist them in their time of need.
Enable us to be beacons of light in another dark day.
Hear our prayers Lord
For all our medical, public health, nursing and ancillary staff
and the difficulties they face and over-stretched work environments.
For the vaccinations to sustain us through Covid and for the variants in the virus to subside.
May we also play our part, Lord, in protecting others.
Lord, You tasked us to do good to those who hate You,
which can seem difficult and to some unfair.
It’s hard to love those who belittle, who shun, who exclude and who racially abuse.
When we feel we should get our own back, You ask us to turn the other cheek.
Inspire us to be willing advocates for truth, justice and reconciliation.
Hate does not lay a healthy soil that enables love to grow and flourish,
but walking in faith in the footsteps of Jesus,
You call us all to make a positive difference and to heal Your broken world of its hurt and its divisions.
For we can all make a positive difference in Jesus’ name and for His sake.
Amen