Luke 4:14-21
“The Uncomfortable Jesus”
By: Ken Sauer, Pastor of East Ridge United Methodist Church, Chattanooga, TN
People want to see persons who are living Christianity in the world.
They are hungry to see the Body of Christ at work and involved.
Study after study and survey after survey brings us to the same results: The people of the world have a strong passion, perhaps more now than ever, to be involved in something important!!!...
…something bigger than themselves!
Perhaps that is one reason we see so many people becoming so passionate about global warming or universal healthcare.
Perhaps that is why, during the 1960’s there was a powerful anti-establishment movement, rallied by young people—hippies—as they came to be called.
People want to be passionately involved in something that makes a difference.
They know this world is broken.
They know things aren’t quite right.
So what to do?
Where to turn with all this energy?
Certainly, as we see in our Gospel Lesson for this evening, Jesus was passionate—BIG TIME!!!
His mission was huge!!!
And when He told the “powers that be” that there were many widows who had not been taken care of, and that “there were many in Israel with leprosy” yet none of them was cleansed…
…and that it was basically the fault of the “establishment”…
…well, that made the people mad…
…really, really mad!!!
And what else could they do?
As we just read, “All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. They got up, drove him out of town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff.”
But this didn’t stop Jesus.
“he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.”
He wasn’t going to allow these persons to ruin or stop His mission—the Most Important Mission in the world!!!
I remember my mom telling me about a young preacher—fresh out of seminary—who had become convicted of some injustice, and decided to take it upon himself to do what he felt God was calling him to do.
He went around knocking on doors, trying to engage the people about whatever atrocity he was trying to get persons to rally around.
One day, he knocked on my mother’s door, and she was impressed!
When my mother mentioned this to her Senior Pastor, he simply said with a sigh and a waving of the hand, “He’s young; he’ll learn.”
And pretty soon, I guess he did.
Before long, he had fallen in line and given up on the radical Christianity Christ was calling him too.
Jesus’ mission was not easy.
Jesus was the most radical revolutionary to ever walk this earth.
The things He said and did…got people mad, really, really mad.
But thanks be to God, Jesus had very thick skin!!!
And as disciples of Christ, we too are called to a radical life.
We are called, as well, to “preach good news to the poor. To proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And this might sound wonderful on paper, as it did to those who listened to Jesus at first “speaking well of him…amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips.”
But when it comes to putting Jesus’ words into practice, well, that’s another story all together!!!
But isn’t that what it means to be the Body of Christ living out our faith in this world?
It’s messy business.
I have a dear friend who lives in Newport News, Virginia.
He is the pastor of First United Methodist Church, Newport News.
We became friends through a weekly prayer and theology group which met at his church each week.
And very early on, probably about 9 years ago, we started to email our sermons to each other for review and insight.
We still do this today, even though we live about 10 hours apart.
It is part of my weekly regiment, as well as his.
As soon as we finish the rough draft of our sermons we send them to one another, and make comments.
We both do this every week, without fail.
This week John sent me a sermon, of which I would like to share a part.
It spoke to me a bit, and I think many of us might be able to relate and get something out of what he wrote.
Now keep in mind that John is a good 20 or so years older than I…
John began his sermon like this, “I never saw Jesus in my growing up years going to Sunday school the way I see Him today in my life.
I guess that wasn’t in the lesson plans.
None of the poster pics they had that came with the lessons showed me a Jesus that disrupted things, like Temple money changers, or cursing fig trees, or calling Pharisees ‘white washed tombs,’ or saying to disciples, ‘If they don’t like us here let’s get outta town and knock the dust off our sandals.’
I never remembered Jesus talking to the ‘Woman’ by the well who’d had many husbands and Jesus commenting, ‘Go and sin no more.’
And I don’t remember this Jesus we have here Who went to speak in His home town synagogue and saying, ‘filled with the Spirit,’ that the ‘Spirit of God is upon me to bring good news to the POOR!, proclaim release to the captives, (slaves, etc., perhaps women), recovery of sight to the blind, and to letting the oppressed go free’…
…perhaps this would include, women, slaves, even men, sexual deviants, the mentally ill, lepers, you make the whole list.
And then I think about it, ‘What kind of Jesus did I learn to know!!!?’
Well, I’d quickly say He was homogenized, pious-ized, Sunday schoolized, de-sexed, and painted over as the One to be worshipped and adored, but never questioned or even viewed as in any way revolutionary in His talk or His style.
When I was told He was crucified, I thought it was really all about God’s ‘plan,’—don’t ask questions!”
John continues, “When I started to really delve into the New Testament I found He was crucified for blasphemy by those who thought He’d come to dismantle their Jewish religion.
I never saw any of that.
And the thing is when I think about it, I ‘graduated’ from those childhood, adolescent Sunday school years with a Jesus that wasn’t worth much in a way of a life’s pattern.
For me, Jesus was trapped in a kind of Sunday school regalia.
When the protest years came in the 1960’s, I didn’t see Jesus playing a part.
I just couldn’t see where He’d fit in.
When the Vietnam War and our participation was questioned by many, I didn’t see my Sunday school Jesus anywhere around.
How would He fit in anyway?
To coin a phrase, ‘This Jesus didn’t compute for me,’ He was way behind me and also that era.
And then I began to read the New Testament again, slowly, carefully, thoughtfully—at least I tried.
I began to think about a Jesus I had NEVER known.
I saw Him moving toward the poor.
I admitted I didn’t know any poor—that was wrong as I think on it.
I saw Him moving toward people who had an active theology of God and War, and Poverty, and suffering, and oppression.
I saw people risking their lives, their reputations, and their safe secure lives for their Christian faith…
…because they saw a Jesus I had never known existed!
What was the matter with me?
I continued to read and hear a NEW GOSPEL that I had not heard before.
And I might say I got rather angry too.
Why didn’t they tell us of this Jesus in Sunday school or from the Pulpit?
I’d gone to church all my life since before I could remember.
What had these teachers and preachers been talking about for God’s sake!!!?”
John continues a bit later in his sermon, “An obituary appeared in last week’s paper I happened to read—not knowing the person at all, it said, ‘She loved to watch soap operas, shop and have lunch with her friends.’”
John writes, “What a pitiful expenditure of a life, watch soap operas, shop and eat lunch with her friends, and that was it?”
Jesus’ life was short and to the point…
…it was about helping free, and enable all who really wanted Him in their lives.
And Jesus’ life can help you see, hear, know and be liberated in your present oppression—whatever it may be!
Yes, our Christ calls us to more than soap operas, shopping and lunch with friends.
God called Him to more than a carpentry shop in Nazareth!”
John ends his sermon with this, “Let Jesus’ Words challenge our lives, our prejudices, our racism, our exclusivist-ism…our narrow and unbending ideas.
It may in many cases lead to people calling us blasphemous, or whatever they choose to name-call!
No matter—‘Let me be more like Jesus day by day.’”
That’s some pretty heavy stuff!
People have a passion to change the world!
John Lennon sang, “I’d like to change the world, but I don’t know what to do. So I leave it up to you.”
We want to put our energy to positive use, but how do we do it?
To whom shall we turn?
The answer, my friends, is Jesus!!!
Jesus is not only our Lord and Savior; Jesus is our example!!!
And we have been anointed by the same Spirit of the Lord!
I think that some of what John is saying in his sermon answers a bit of the question as to why the Church basically lost his generation, and then the generations to follow.
The Jesus they had learned about didn’t apply to their daily problems.
They had been taught a different Gospel, which is, as Paul would put it, “No gospel at all!”
East Ridge United Methodist Church is engaged in the world’s struggle around us!
This Church cares!
I couldn’t be more delighted!
Let’s continue to learn from Jesus Who was crucified for doing what was right—no matter what some folks thought or said.
Let’s become even more involved in showing the world, the REAL JESUS and a Body of Christ that puts their money where their mouth is!!!
For in the end, the consequences will be—eternal!!!
Thanks be to God!
Amen.
