When church is over
OPINION
I suppose just about everyone can relate to the story of Jesus returning to his hometown of Nazareth (Luke 4:14ff), but especially those who have been away from the place where they grew up for a significant amount of time. Just as it’s hard for us not to think of our hometown in the way it used to be, I suppose it can be a challenge for the people in our hometown not to see us as who we used to be.
This is the backdrop for Jesus’ return to Nazareth. He came back to the synagogue where He grew up and spoke to the people there. The congregation’s response to His reading of Isaiah 61:1-2 and the application of it to Himself was initially kind and gracious. You can hear their words of praise about Joseph’s son and see the pats on His back. This was His home church acting like His home church.
But things were stirring below the surface. For all their positive responses some were wondering how He could possibly have been claiming to be the fulfillment of Isaiah’s words. They had known him since he was young, watched Him grow up — they were convinced they knew Him better than He knew Himself and that they could see things about Him that He couldn’t. And though they had always liked Him and His family, there was a limit to how much they could be asked to believe. Does He think He can just show up and claim this sort of thing? Who does He think He’s speaking to? They know Him. They know His family. If things really were different, then all He had to do was the kind of things they had heard about Him doing in Capernaum. Until then, He was just the son of Joseph who had forgotten where He came from.
Israel had a well-established record of rejecting the prophets God raised up from among them. The people of Nazareth (as self-unaware as they supposed Jesus to be), were simply repeating this pattern. This is why the great prophet Elijah went to the widow of Zarephath during the time of the drought. It wasn’t that there weren’t plenty of widows in Israel, but that Elijah’s message and mission were more likely to be embraced by a Gentile heart than a Jewish one. It is why his successor, Elisha, healed the commander of the Syrian army of his leprosy rather a leper in Israel (Luke 4:25-27).
It was a ringing indictment of Israel and absolute blasphemy to the people of Nazareth who were enraged by it. Their sense of spiritual entitlement was so ingrained that they couldn’t fathom such a reality. Yet they proved Jesus’ assessment to be true by the way they responded to His words. Church ended not with a closing song or prayer, but by with them driving Jesus out of the synagogue and to the edge of town where they tried to murder Him by throwing Him off a cliff (v. 28-29).
No matter what your religious tradition might be, no matter how far back faith goes in your family, no one has an inside track with God. He reigns now as He did then and as He always has—in the humble heart that is willing to be taught by Him.
What do we do with Jesus when church is over?
Find more of Bruce’s writings at his website: a-taste-of-grace-with-bruce-green.com
