Don’t Shoot The Messenger

Don’t Shoot the Messenger

Luke 4:13-30

Rabbi Rev. Dr. Michael H. Koplitz

14 And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district. 15 And He began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all. 16 And He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read. 17 And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. And He opened the 1book and found the place where it was written, 18 “THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED, 19 TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD.” 20 And He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him. 21 And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 And all were speaking well of Him, and wondering at the gracious words which were falling from His lips; and they were saying, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” 23 And He said to them, “No doubt you will quote this proverb to Me, ‘Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we heard was done at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.’” 24 And He said, “Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown. 25 “But I say to you in truth, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was shut up for three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land; 26 and yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. 27 “And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” 28 And all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things; 29 and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff. 30 But passing through their midst, He went His way.

I was in shock. I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior when I was 35 years old. At 37 years old, I was called by Jesus to preach the original meaning of the Bible. I had started seminary, and the Bishop sent me as a student pastor to a congregation. After two years, I was appointed to my first standalone church. It was a small family size church and had an average Sunday attendance of 80 people. I had taken my preaching class, and of course, the teacher said that we must preach the Bible even if people don’t like what we have to say.

So, I went to this new assignment and started preaching the Bible, as I understood it from my seminary experiences. As I still do today, I researched the passage and did an exegetical review so that I could understand what the passage was all about. Now today I do even more because I search for the original meaning of the Scripture. I want to know when Jesus spoke, what did people actually hear and not what the church likes to tell us today? I was a novice at that part of understanding the Scripture back in 2001 when I was assigned to this small family size church. At that time, I used only the exegetical and interpretation of research that I was taught in seminary.

You would think the people in the congregation would be happy about this because this was the things they had been hearing for years. Well, I was in shock, oh yeah, I already said that. Why was I in shock? About one year into that ministry, a member of the congregation came to me after the worship celebration and cornered me. He looked at me and said “we as the congregation are tired of hearing about what the Bible says. We don’t like being told what to do, so you need to stop.”

Are you shocked also? I was being told that people came to church, but they didn’t want to hear what the Bible had to say to them. Well, it turns out they didn’t want to hear any of the commandments or requirements of being a Christian that Jesus told us. Why would you go to church and not want to learn what the Bible is saying? After all, the Bible is our manual for living that was given to us by God and Jesus.