Third Sunday after the Epiphany Sermon

In the first few chapters of Luke, we see Jesus doing life from, actually birth, through youth, and then early adulthood, increasingly living into this sense of ministry, of mission, of vocation, if you will.

Luke tells us that even at twelve he was sitting among the teachers, perhaps at midrash during Passover, listening, discussing, asking and answering questions with a natural knowledge, a natural wisdom.

Luke says all who heard him were amazed at his understanding. At twelve. Maybe he’d been taught well; or maybe, maybe he just had wisdom beyond his years, as some children do. But story goes on, saying even his parents were astonished.

And his reply is ‘did you not know I must be in my father’s house?’ He is a boy who knew he had a calling.

And so, he goes about collecting disciples, followers, sharing this understanding, this wisdom. And there’s this interaction with his cousin John, who’s a bit strange, but John’s own teaching is calling people to repentance and baptism, and a turning back to God, to the ways of God. And Jesus himself is baptized, and there’s this thing with the dove, and the voice, a profound affirmation.

And then, Luke tells us, Jesus goes through some really, really, tough times. But now he’s a young man, and his head is rather on straight. There’s some humility there following a very real struggle with temptation, but also a deep, deep sense of the filling of the Spirit.

And so, he and his buddies are invited to a wedding. You remember that from last week. The one in Cana, where his mother gets pushy, and essentially embarrasses him into performing that miracle with the wine. The gallons and gallons of really nice, heady wine.

Well, what I want to consider is: that this was actually, even though Luke doesn’t record it, this was the turning point. Scholars agree, this was the first miracle, the water mysteriously turned to wine. Yet because Mary, Luke says, had gathered into her heart, what happened in Jerusalem at the Passover with the teachers (for three days!), and no doubt there had been other such mysterious things happening, and so, she puts Jesus to the test: “It’s time Son. It’s time.”

At any rate, Jesus, and his followers are going throughout the surrounding country, teaching in the synagogues, and he eventually ends up back in Nazareth, where he grew up. He’s the assigned lector (I imagine!) and he reads.

He reads from the scroll of Isaiah, which was handed to him, and which was in fact written hundreds of years before; and this is what he reads:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives

And recovery of sight to the blind,

To let the oppressed go free,

And to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

And He sits.

And all eyes turn to him, looking for understanding, interpretation, just like in Nehemiah, and just like he did with his deep understanding when he was twelve, and he says:

“…this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” Today. Now. In me.

What follows, friends, is a life of sacrifice, and teaching, and healing, and miracles, and betrayal, and ultimate suffering, even to death.

This was the Word of the Lord to him. It was the new covenant in his blood, which we celebrate each week in the Eucharist. The new covenant which expands on the book of Moses, the Torah, read by Ezra under Nehemiah, the Law and the Prophets, which Jesus sums up in ‘Loving God, and Loving your neighbor as yourself.’

Jesus’ life gets very specific about what this new way is:

It is this:

Releasing the captives

Giving new sight to the blinded

Freeing, freeing, the oppressed.

His mother Mary, the story goes, foretold it in her song when she was pregnant with him, with every knowledge of struggle under the Roman occupation, which eventually saw his death:

She speaks of oppression, of hunger, of poverty, of pride, and ultimately of mercy.

Now if you are here, perhaps even for the first time, and if you like millions of others watched, or listened, or read all of the Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde’s sermon at the National Cathedral on Tuesday; a day of prayer for our nation following a presidential election, which is a day of Prayers for Unity of our many faiths, you will have heard her plea, directly to our president. A plea for mercy.

I will say her request to the president to show mercy resounds with this text in Luke:

To attend to those in poverty

To release those who are trapped, and bound and captive,

perhaps through no fault of their own,

To help the blinded see and understand

To let those who are oppressed, be freed of the weight of that oppression, and shame, often placed on them by others.

Sure, these are my words, but in all of scripture it is the intent of the words that matter, and this is the intent of the “good news” Jesus brought to the poor. In fact, he turned suffering like this on its head.

You might remember his Sermon on the Mount:

To the poor in spirit, a vision of the kingdom of heaven

To those who mourn, comfort

To the meek, inheritance

To those who desperately seek righteousness, a deep filling

To the merciful, mercy on their own behalf

To the pure, the very face of God.

To the peacemakers, well to the peacemakers:

they are the very children of God.

And on, and on, and on.

And so, I ask you, St. John’s, in these difficult and polarized times:

What is the gospel of Christ?

What is the good news of Jesus, as we seek to be like him?

As Christians, what are we asked to be and to do in our own Baptismal Covenant?

Help me out…

Will you proclaim by word and example this Good News of God in Christ?

(I will with God’s help)

Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?

(I will with God’s help)

Will you strive for justice, for peace among all people?

(I will with God’s help)

And finally, will you respect the dignity of every human being?

(I will with God’s help)

As a side note, I just want to point out that following the will of a Good God, discerning and interpreting for understanding the law, ANY law, that takes into account the oppression, and the poverty, and lack of human dignity placed on people trying to find their way in the world; Well, it takes striving.

As privileged people, living in a nation generally at peace; there hasn’t been all out war in our land since the mid 1800s. We expect our laws to continue to create a safe haven, a way of life, for us. In fact, we are known for that, which is why so many across the world seek that safety and opportunity to also be at peace within our borders.

But I tell you, it will not remain, as history through the ages have shown, that a document, cold and hard on a shelf, can keep it that way. We must get off our laurels and strive for truth, honesty, justice. These are high, moral values at the very base of human existence. And we must remember in the inimitable words of Stevie Wonder, ‘if one of us is chained, all of us are chained.’

The passage we read this morning in the First Testament, the Hebrew Prophets, give us a picture of (and I paraphrase):

All the people, gathered together:

“Ezra, bring the book of the Law of Moses” [the Torah]

… all the people were attentive to the law.

With interpretation they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading… “this, even this day is holy to the Lord your God. Do not mourn or weep…. “eat the fat and drink the sweet wine; and send portions to them for whom nothing is prepared, …. For the joy of the Lord is your strength.

It makes me wonder how we feel about the rule of law… This was the law of Moses, and in fact the law of the land of the Jewish people. It is true that the law of the lands and nations may, or may not, be faithful to a God of justice AND mercy, who created in dignity, and instilled dignity in all people, all things, but this concept of law, or rule, or canon… what do we, people attempting to follow God, to live as Jesus did, in fact to try to be like him… what do we think of the rule of law?

May we strive, really strive, to understand and to uphold the law, for all. For rich and poor alike, and for the powerful as well as the weak.

And may I remind you of this simple paradox in the Corinthians reading:

The lesser, weaker, less honorable members of the body, receive more honor, so that there is no dissention within the body… so strive for the greater gifts, and (wait for it, the last part of that final verse)… “I will show you a still more excellent way…”

Indeed.

Give us Grace, O Lord, to answer readily the call of our Savior Jesus Christ and proclaim to all people the Good News of his salvation, that we and the whole world may perceive the glory of his marvelous works.

Amen.