Tag: Jesus

Lent 2: The Chicken & The Fox

Beth Bathe ‘Mamma Hen’

16/3/25
Lent 2

Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18
Philippians 3:17-4:1
Luke 13:31-35

As it is Lent, I need to start with a confession. Sermon writing this week was a challenge! I have never preached on this short passage of Luke so it was daunting and refreshing to start with a blank page. There are threads from last week: God’s response to the vulnerability of Jesus and us and faithfulness to his promises which he fulfills.

The First Sunday of Lent always has the set Gospel of the temptation of Jesus. The first temptation was to turn a stone into bread. Jesus had been fasting for forty days and could have easily satisfied his own hunger. The cost of this temptation was denying his own humanity. When hungry we are too lean into God for our lasting fulfilment.

The second temptation was for Jesus to bow down to the devil and all the kingdoms of the earth would be His. This was to tempt the ego into believing that we can have all the power and be worshipped.

The third temptation to throw himself off the top of the temple speaks to vulnerability. To be vulnerable is to be easily physically or mentally hurt, influenced, or attacked. This is the language used around safeguarding vulnerable adults and children. The suggestion of this temptation is that God’s beloved will be kept safe from every harm, frailty, disease and ultimately death.
In his temptations we see something of Jesus’ character; he will not take the easy choices and opportunities for glory nor will he test God for His own gain. Jesus chooses to believe that God will be faithful and is worthy of worship regardless of circumstances. Jesus is living within the boundaries of his humanity by showing his strength of knowledge and character. I like this vision of a strong Jesus.

This week’s Gospel reading has been more of a challenge. If you were to draw a picture of Jesus, what would you draw? A lion? A lamb? A door? Bread and a cup?
Would you draw a chicken? I know that a few of you have or have had chickens. Think of that noble bird for a moment; the beady eyes, easily flappable, not able to soar like the eagles, or run like the ostrich. Sure they have beaks that can be fierce but even those are a little pathetic. They are still pretty defenceless.

Yet it is the chicken that Jesus uses as a self-description. Can you picture Jesus as the mother hen? This is not the maternal metaphor I would have gone for. Luke invites us to consider Jesus as the mother hen whose chicks do not want her. To hold the definition of being vulnerable as to be easily physically or mentally hurt, influenced, or attacked, chickens would come out as a safeguarding risk. Especially against a fox but hold that thought.

This Jesus-chicken has been rejected by their own children; her arms are open and empty. You do not need to be a parent to experience rejection. We have all likely experienced rejection in some form during our lifetimes. It is one of the worst feelings. Jesus understands rejection; he received it from his followers who turned away, the disciples who could not cope with the cross and even felt rejected by God on the cross.

In the first verses, a group of Pharisees warn Jesus to leave as Herod wants to kill him. When it came to Jesus, the Pharisees were looking for reasons to hand him over to the authorities, to Herod. This is the Herod who had John the Baptist killed, everyone knows that he is dangerous. In previous encounters, Jesus rebukes or challenges the Pharisees but not this time. He must have believed the sincerity of their warning.

Jesus tells the Pharisees to tell that fox Herod that he still has work to do. The chicken is not done yet! Referring to Herod as a fox almost raises some questions. Why a fox? We would think of them as cunning or prowling around, waiting for an opportunity to take out a chicken or other unsuspecting victim. Urban foxes are a problem in many cities, they kill pets and eat garbage.
Being an opportunist is not always a bad thing but can become negative when taking advantage of others.

There is no Old Testament evidence of foxes being symbols of willingness or cunning, strength. Apart from this passage, references to foxes imply weakness, feebleness and skulking which are morally different. Jesus’ reference to Herod as a fox indicates that he is a light-weight, powerless. Herod was seen as a puppet-king with no real authority and he is still dangerous.

Jesus has set his sights on Jerusalem, the city that rejects God’s messengers and kills its prophets. Jesus knows what is coming, his death, and He will not change his course. A course that will lead him into Jerusalem and Herod’s court where the chicken and the fox will meet.

Luke ends this passage with lament. How often I have desired to gather you. Jesus longs and grieves for his lost and wandering children. For the little ones who will not come home. For the city that will not welcome its saviour. For the endangered multitudes of people who refuse to recognise the danger that awaits them.

How might you be called to lamentation during this holy season? What do you yearn for that eludes you? What missed chances, failed efforts, or broken dreams tug at your heart and call you into mourning? How might we, the Church, lament with Jesus over our homes, our cities, our countries, our planet? How might we stand with him in the Jerusalems of our lives, and weep our sorrow into new hope?

We are called to return. Return to the wings of the mother hen, to find strength and comfort, relief and consolation. Paul reminds the Philippians that citizenship is in heaven, it is there we will wait for our transformation into his likeness. We need to stand firm and hold fast to the promises of faithfulness as Abraham did while waiting for his offspring as numerous as the stars.
Jesus is both loving and lamenting. In this Lent may we know his love for us and take our lamenting to him. He is the way home.

Lent 1: Beloved and Bedevilled

Paolo Veronese – Baptism & Temptation of Christ (Milan)

Lent 1
9/3/25
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Romans 10:8-13
Luke 4:1-13

Welcome to Lent. I wish you all a holy one. As a reminder of what this season should and could look like, I start with the words from the Introduction to the Ash Wednesday service and invite you to observe it faithfully.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, since early days Christians have observed with great devotion the time of our Lord’s passion and resurrection and prepared for this by a season of penitence and fasting.

By carefully keeping these days, Christians take to heart the call to repentance and the assurance of forgiveness proclaimed in the gospel, and so grow in faith and in devotion to our Lord.

I invite you, therefore, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy word.

Lent is not about being miserable or forsaking the delicacies of life in and of themselves. It is meant to bring us closer to God, to build up our relationships with Jesus and to deepen our understanding of our Christian faith. Take the opportunity; we all need to.

The Gospel reading on the first Sunday of Lent is always the temptation of Jesus. This event happened immediately after Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist. The focus is often on the temptation by the devil, however in our study group on Wednesday, it was pointed out that Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. God the Spirit was with Jesus in his temptation.

God was also with Moses and the Israelites as they stood on the cusp of the land that was being given as their inheritance to possess. It was not going to be easy, the travelling had been long; punishment for disobedience had made the journey even longer. Temptation to go their own way had plagued the travellers; Moses kept them going and was the bridge between the people and God. The land would flow with milk and honey because God had promised and is faithful.

In Paul’s letter to the Romans, we are told with great passion that all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved. God is generous to those who confess with their lips and believe with the heart. We will be saved for all eternity to be with God. God is faithful. This is what we need to hang on to every moment of every day; Lent is an opportunity to deepen our understanding of God’s faithfulness.

This is how Jesus was able to resist temptation and Moses got those rebellious Israelites into the promised land. It is how we will be saved and spared from an eternity apart from God (also known as hell).

Whatever our attitude towards Lent might be, I strongly encourage all of us to invest, pay attention, do some work, and do things differently over these next few weeks. I suspect you will surprise yourselves. We are to set our minds on things above. The idea behind fasting for Lent is rooted in this Gospel story; Jesus was able to resist temptation at his weakest points. We give up things in Lent to remind ourselves of the sacrifices that Jesus made

At his baptism, the bottom-line truth of Jesus is revealed: He is God’s son, precious and beloved. When Jesus is led into the wilderness, he is faced with various assaults on this truth. Jesus has to work out God’s presence in a harsh and lonely world. The lesson is that he and we have to learn that we can be beloved and go without, precious and vulnerable.

I want to briefly look at the temptations that Jesus faced and what they might say to us today.

Tell This Stone to Become Bread

This temptation suggests that God’s beloved should not hunger. There should not be any doubt that Jesus could not have done that. He was, after all, hungry. He had been fasting for forty days! Taking a stone and turning it into something it was not meant to be would be cheating, denying the reality of Jesus’ humanity. By paying attention to hunger, we are to lean into God for our lasting fulfilment. The devil wanted Jesus and us to disrespect and manipulate creation for our own satisfaction.

Many of us have the power to look after ourselves, provide for ourselves to a standard that we see fit. I can do it myself, thank you very much!

By doing things for ourselves all the time, we too can stop exercising trust in God to provide for us. His provision is always better, remember we too are his beloved and precious children. Lent should teach us that we can be loved and hungry at the same time.

If You Worship Me, It Will All Be Yours

The second temptation targets the ego. Power is the root of many evils. People crave power and Satan knows this. We want to be in control of our own lives, destinies, plans. It started with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden; they were tempted by the prospect of power. They believed, with no proof at all, that eating the apple would make them like God.

The temptation suggests God’s beloved do not need to labour in obscurity; we can do it all on stage with the applause and admiration we desire. Surely God does not want us to live in modesty and insignificance by the world’s standards or Charlwoods/Sidlow Bridge standards?!

Do we trust God sees us when those with power do not? Are we able to live as God’s beloved in quiet places in humble service?

Throw Yourself Down From Here

The third temptation targets Jesus’ vulnerability. To be vulnerable is to be easily physically or mentally hurt, influenced, or attacked. This is the language used around safeguarding vulnerable adults and children. The suggestion of this temptation is that God’s beloved will be kept safe by God. Safe from all physical and emotional harm, frailty and disease, accidents and ultimately death.

This is an attractive lie as it targets our deepest fears about what it is to be human in a dangerous world. We can get God to guarantee a perfect rescue if we believe hard enough.

Jesus’ reply is that we are not to put God to the test. The cross teaches us that God’s beloved ones still bleed and ache and die. We are loved in our vulnerable states, not out of them. God accompanies us, as he did Moses and the Israelites, in our suffering.

This is good news because we are the beloved of a God who resurrects. There is no suffering that God will not redeem. Our story is not one that ends in despair; it ends with an empty tomb, in a kingdom of hope and love, consolation and joy.

Jesus does not choose to enter the wilderness; the Spirit led him there. The time of temptation was to establish that Jesus had choices and desires of his own, like all humans do. We do not voluntarily choose to enter the wilderness but it still happens; maybe in a hospital waiting room, a difficult relationship, a troubled child or sudden death. Does this mean that God wants us to suffer? I do not believe that.

It does mean that by following the example of Jesus, we must choose to make God’s will our own will. We choose through our temptations and wilderness times what kind of Christian, what kind of person we will be. The wilderness can be redeemed and become holy if we stay and pay attention.

There is hope in the wilderness; God does not abandon Jesus there. Jesus was ministered to by the angels. When we find ourselves in the wilderness we are not abandoned as it is Jesus who tends to us.

Lent can be a wilderness season of sorts as we make time (or should make time) to examine where we are at with God. Jesus was able to answer Satan at each turn with scripture from Deuteronomy. Maybe we need to brush up on what the bible says (or doesn’t)!

A wilderness season, however challenging, will never be wasted if we believe and know that God is with us. Those who call on the name of the Lord will be saved. Our identity lies in being His beloved son or daughter. If we can hang on to that, then whatever the wilderness throws at us, we can make it through.

Third Sunday Before Lent: Between the Blessing & Woes (Exeter College Evensong)

Exeter College Evensong
16/2/25
3rd Before Lent

Psalm 66
Jeremiah 17:5-10
Luke 6:17-26

‘There is always Love’

On this weekend that celebrates the Feasts of St Methodius & St Cyril – and of course St Valentine, I hope you have experienced more blessings of love than woes of the world.

At the start of a new week and especially Week 5, I hope there are more love and blessings than woes. At some point the realisation may come that all of life is lived between the blessings and the woes. Jeremiah contrasts life in the uninhabited desert to being planted next to the streams of living water. Luke plainly speaks about actual hunger, thirst and poverty; material issues over spiritual ones. Ahead of Lent we can be preparing to reflect, repent and reconcile ourselves to the love (the blessing) poured out for us in the suffering and death (the woe) of Christ.

In my role as Lead Chaplain of Gatwick Airport, blessings and woes are shared with me daily. At their core, airports carry out the mundane task of moving people and cargo from one place to another as safely and efficiently as possible while aiming for profit maximisation. This is achieved through charging the airlines various fees and clever marketing so passengers part with their holiday cash before they leave this fair isle. Fortunately it is the people, passengers and staff, who bring life and their blessings and woes to the airport.

The chaplains are the repositories and the memory, as I am sure Andrew is here, of shared blessings and woes.

Jesus had his own lists; blessed are you who are poor, hungry, sad, and expendable. Woe to you who are rich, full, happy, and popular. This week’s Gospel in a nutshell. What are we supposed to do with this?!

Those of us who are comfortable and privileged might want to question what Jesus means, maybe edit or rationalise until we can tolerate what is being said. We may prefer Matthew’s Beatitudes; they are a little less gritty than Luke’s. However, if we want to know where God’s heart is and who receives blessing then we need to to look to the poor, the wretched and reviled.

Jesus prefaces this teaching with the alleviation of suffering as he healed a man with a withered hand in the synagogue. He also called his twelve disciples to follow Him; those whom he loved the most yet let him down so badly.

It is helpful to hold that we are not being told how to behave or think; Jesus is telling his audience simply how it is going to be. Every blessing and every woe is addressed to every person. This is very much a human pattern of where we live: between woes and blessings. We invite blessing when we are hungry and weak and mourning. We invite woe when we are prideful, forgetful and distance ourselves from God.

Through the prophet Jeremiah, God’s message to his people was to trust Him alone. So determined is God to have their trust he is prepared to curse those who trust in mere mortals and make human strength their only strength. Over time the Jewish people had gradually come to trust in other things: in themselves, in novel religious rituals, small ‘g’ gods and idols and in their own wealth. Basically anything but God and they are paying a terrible price.

People like these live, according to God, ‘like heath (shrub) in the desert.’ There is no water, nothing to nourish them. They will not be able to see relief when it comes. Think for a moment about when you are hungry or thirsty to the point of distraction. This can be expanded from the physical to the emotional, spiritual and psychological. Can you think clearly? Living like this results in constant worry, anxiety and inability to focus on anything other than survival.

Jeremiah uses water as the image of God. God is as essential to life as water is, and to choose to live without him is as dumb as it would be to choose to live without water. Instead of being cursed, those who ‘trust in the Lord are blessed, like trees planted by water, sending out roots by the stream.’ These people are constantly being fed and watered by the stream that is God. They do not have to fear and be anxious when things get difficult; they bear fruit always. They knew where their roots are; by the stream, planted by the water that is God.

If the roots are a little shallow, the woes are weighing down and blessings seem far off. Fear not, there is always love. Showing love to others invites blessing and it really does not take much effort. Receive love when it comes to you.
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The message of the Gospel and teachings of Jesus are difficult at times. The hard messages often require us to change, to live beyond our natural conveniences and desires. First and foremost they are about love. The love between God the Father, Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit – all equal parts. This is the love that we are invited into, that we were created for.

Jesus is standing with people who are hungry to benefit from the power that streams from him, and he announces through his healings and his words that God cares for the poor, the hungry and the suffering. The power of God is a power that is used to comfort and renew. It is the power of love in the cross and resurrection.

Ever so fortunately, God’s power and love is not contingent on how we might be feeling in a particular moment. There is no better alternative to his power. Until we are powerless ourselves; we cannot truly understand his power. Find your roots again today and stay close to the waters where fear and anxiety are taken away.

Blessings will come and the woes will follow you; no need to run up to them. I offer some of the blessings and woes that I experience at least weekly at Gatwick.

Blessed are those who delight in love of reunions and reconnection at arrivals. Blessed are those who weep at impending disconnection at departures. Blessed are those being deported or removed for reasons within and beyond their control; they shalt be comforted.

Blessed are the emotionally dysregulated children and adults as they lose their minds at the sensory overload of being in the liminal space of an airport; they shalt find peace. Blessed are the colleagues who support each other with genuine care and compassion when it all goes wrong; laughter wilt be restoreth unto them.

Woe to those who forget their passports at home, fail to check expiration dates, or grasp the complexities of transit visas, ETA’s and ESTA’s. Woe to those who leave their phones in the Uber. Woe to those whose luggage is over the weight limit or wrong dimension; mercy shalt be withheld from them. Woe to those who arrive late regardless of the reason; computer saith no. Woe to those who leave their bags unattended or ‘joke’ about what is inside their luggage; no good will cometh unto them.

Those who are poor, hungry, sad, and expendable have everything to look forward to. Because the Kingdom of God is theirs and yours. Because Jesus came, and comes still, to fill the empty-handed with good things. May the God who gives and takes away, offers comfort and challenge, grant us the grace to sit with woe, and learn the meaning of blessing.

Feast of Candlemas: Temples of Stone & Flesh

St Mary’s Langley – Evensong
2/2/25

Haggai 2:1-9
John 2:18-22

Today the Church has been celebrating the Feast of Candlemas. I explained in my Charlwood Family Service this morning that Candlemas marks a turning point in three ways. Within the Church it is the moment we take a last look at Christmas and the infant Jesus before turning towards the cross. In the northern hemisphere it marks the turning from winter towards spring which heralds the shift from darkness to light.

We see change and transition in our Gospel readings set for today. This morning was sweet baby Jesus carried into the temple by his young parents for the expected rituals required by their Jewish faith. This ordinary event transitioned to a divinely appointed meeting with Simeon and Anna. Jesus is revealed as the light of the world and an ominous warning was given to Mary. This evening grown-up Jesus returns to the same Temple and causes some havoc. The ominous warning follows as the rising and falling of many begins. Our account is the conversation that followed Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple.

The Temple was the beating heart of Judaism. Anyone who has been fortunate enough to visit Jerusalem can appreciate the size and scale of it as the centre point. The Temple was the home of worship, music, the focal point of politics and Jewish society, a place of national celebration and mourning. Westminster Abbey or St Paul’s Cathedral are somewhat a parallel in terms of significance to the people. The Temple was the place where YHWH, God had promised to live in the midst of his people.

Yet over time it became more of a market-place and one of corruption; and it is now under God’s judgement. Those who were selling the animals for sacrifice and the money-changers did need to be there. Jewish law required the right sacrifices to be offered. Unfortunately dodgy practices had infiltrated and corrupted the Temple. People were being cheated out of money by their own people. This is what Jesus was raging against.

We see Jesus on the side of those being cheated, devalued and treated badly. Jesus certainly had zeal; both for the Temple as his Father’s house and for the oppressed people. The Temple had been made into something it was never supposed to be. Jesus is correcting a serious wrong by showing that He will restore things to the way they should be.

The Jews in attendance ask for an explanation, a sign for why Jesus is tearing the place up. This is not unreasonable as they would likely not know who He was.

Who here does not like a sign? We will reflect on the significance of signs for a few minutes. There are the obvious signs that feature in everyday life; fire exits, stop signs, traffic signals, push/pull, open/closed enter/exit, etc. These signs provide practical information and direction, keep us safe, and bring order to the world around us.

There are also practical signs that we cannot see. This past week I got a lesson in infra-red technology in a fire truck on a Gatwick taxi-way. It was pouring rain and we were sitting behind a plane that had an engine fire warning light flashing in the cockpit. There was no outward sign of smoke or flames; but the attention of the fire crews was on the cameras that showed heat (within normal levels) coming from both engines. There was no sign of imminent danger but that did not mean there was not any. Anyway that plane was not going to be flying that day.

Then there are the signs from God. Many prayers have begun with, ‘God if you are real…give me a sign.’ These tend to be prayed in times of desperation and fear, when all control is lost and people come to the end of themselves. God in his infinite goodness answers these prayers. Often not as expected as the external conditions might not change and/or even get worse. The answer can be an internal sign or feeling of overwhelming peace and love, a change of perspective or defusing of intense emotion that can allow for clearer thinking.

There are wrong and dangerous places to look for signs: anything that is human-made like tarot cards, mediums, horoscopes, reading tea leaves. People can become so hungry for signs that they will consume anything that looks like it might give them what they seek.
We need to be people who can read the signs of the times correctly and it takes work.

Back to the Temple. It is useful to remember that the Temple was the second one that had been built. The First Temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians around 587/586 BCE as the Jews were sent into exile by King Nebuchadnezzar. This was a devastating event for the Jews that reverberated for centuries.

The rebuilding of The Second Temple began about 50 years after the first destruction. Then it stalled out for about 20 years. Two to three generations have now passed, the exile was over and they could return home to Jerusalem. This is what and who the prophet Haggai is speaking into.

Haggai is a tiny two chapter book towards the end of the Old Testament and is the tenth of the 12 minor prophets. Not much is known about Haggai: his name means ‘festal’ which is fitting for the prophet who called the Jewish people to rebuild the temple of God and to bring back worship in Jerusalem.

In Haggai’s second sermon, he is reminding the Jews of the exodus when God called the Hebrews out of Egypt. Jesus and the disciples arrived in Jerusalem at the time of the Passover. Passover is a time to remember what God had done in the past when he saved the Jewish people from Pharaoh in Egypt. It was also a celebration of liberation, freedom and rescue from slavery.

Haggai was a champion for the homeless as he called the Jewish community to action in the rebuilding of the Temple. He was also calling the Jewish people to wake up to their responsibilities, obligations, privileges and promises of their heritage.

Jesus did the same thing when he entered the temple. He is reminding the Jews of the Ten Commandment as they were breaking at least two of them: the making of idols (money) and stealing. Jesus was referring to himself in the remark about the destroyed Temple rising up in three days. Jesus is the true temple, the word made flesh and cannot be corrupted. Haggai proclaims that the true glory of the Second Temple will not be the gold and silver of the nations but of God himself.

Jesus appeared in the Temple as a six week old baby and was shown to be the light of the world. He returned at that Feast of Passover pointing to himself, the temple of his body. Jesus is the one we are to watch and wait for. It is not always easy waiting.

At least two or three generations passed before the rebuilding of the first temple began when Haggai appeared and time had come. Anna had waited for decades in the Temple for the arrival of the Messiah. Simeon had been promised that he would not see death before he saw the Lord’s Messiah.

For us, we are to watch for the signs when Jesus will come again. We are to take courage, in the words of Haggai, ‘take courage, all you people of the land, you people of Langley, for I am with you. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.’

Epiphany 3: One for the Home Crowd

Patrick Comerford

26/1/25
Epiphany 3

1 Corinthians 12:12-31a
Luke 4:14-21

O God, we give you thanks because, in the carnation of the Word, a new light has dawned upon the world, that all the nations and peoples may be brought out of darkness to see the radiance of your glory.

Today is the final Sunday of the Epiphany season. You may be relieved to know that there are still a few threads to pull! Over the last three Sundays we have been looking at some key moments in Jesus’ life: the arrival of the Wise Men with their gifts, his baptism as an adult in the Jordan River and the wedding in Cana where bath water became a Grand Cru. The meaning of each event remains significant; the Wise Men proved that the message of Jesus is for everyone (not only the Jews), in his baptism Jesus was revealed as the Son of God. The wedding in Cana that Jesus comes when no one is looking and provides more than enough.

What does Epiphany mean? ‘A moment of great or sudden revelation or realisation.’ Epiphany moments are not always dramatic affairs. They can happen in a quiet moment and you know that something has changed in your mind or heart. However they come to us, these moments are significant. The Epiphany experiences of the people we meet in our Bible readings are the stories of revelations and realisations of God the Father and Jesus the Son.

In our Gospel reading for today the whole synagogue in Nazareth has something of an epiphany when Jesus stands up to read the scroll from what we know as Isaiah 61. It could have been a normal sabbath day, worship as usual in the Nazareth synagogue. What is the big deal?

Luke has Jesus returning to Nazareth after being away for an unknown amount of time; maybe months or even years. Jesus returns differently to when He left. Jesus comes back after being baptised and tempted in the wilderness for 40 days and stands at the cusp of his ministry which boldly begins in the synagogue in front of the home side. A bold start that gets even bolder. Jesus is handed the scroll that not coincidentally was Isaiah, the Old Testament book containing more prophecy about him than any other. He is about to begin fulfilling some prophecy.

Like the guests at the wedding, the congregation in the synagogue was not looking for anything that day. The Jewish people had long been waiting for the Messiah to come; this is what the people being baptised with Jesus expecting. The good people in the relative backwater of Nazareth were waiting for Messiah too; but not expecting him that day in their midst. Not only that, how could Messiah be from the family of a local poor carpenter?!

But He was and is.

If you replace me in verses 18 and 19 with Jesus, it is difficult to see how anyone else in all of history fills this position.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me (Jesus),
Because he has anointed me (Jesus)
To bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me (Jesus) to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.

This is Jesus’ chosen description of his mission; this is what He came to do. When Jesus said, ‘today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing’, the meaning of ‘fulfilled’ here is ‘to fill a vessel or hollow place’. How many of us know what it is to have that hollow place? He wants to fill it now; not tomorrow or next year or when we feel better or life is back to normal. Jesus means now.

Preach the good news to the poor. This is not referring to the financially poor. These poor are those in ‘utter helplessness, complete destitution, the afflicted and distressed.’ This has wider implications than finances alone. Jesus does not want us only to subsist but thrive. Until we let Him fill our cups daily, we will only subsist.

To heal the broken-hearted. Broken-hearted means ‘to break, strike against something, to break the strength or power of someone’. This is more than a little romance gone wrong or love unrequited. This is a big break; when everything appears to be taken and hope is dwindling.

The Hebrew translation of heal ‘to mend by stitching, repair thoroughly, make whole’. Total breakage needs total healing. One stitch follows another, it takes time and can be painful.

To proclaim freedom for the captives. Notice that Jesus proclaims freedom, he did not impose it. The door of the cell may be opened but we have to walk through it. This is not just people in a physical prison; this is anything: addiction, behaviour, situation that prevents healing and captive to it.

Recovery of sight for the blind. There are many incidents of Jesus physically restoring the sight of many blind people. This is a different kind of blindness, a more serious kind of blindness. Blind here means ‘to envelop with smoke, be unable to see clearly.’ This is about clouded vision; not being able to see the light of gospel or the glory of God. Jesus came to clear our vision so we can see him clearly.

To release the oppressed. To be oppressed is to be treated harshly or unfairly by someone in authority. This release is about breaking the chains of unhealthy attachment.

To proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour. That day in that year and at that time, those gathered in the Nazareth synagogue witnessed the embodiment of the Lord’s favour. His blessed gift of grace and love, Jesus. Year here means ‘any definite time’ and not a calendar year.

Paul is also responding to the needs of now. The first letter of Corinthians is Paul’s reply to the letters sent to him from members of the Corinthian church. They are contending with things like: a church divided over its leaders, what it is to be an apostle, how to deal with incest, lawsuits among believers, sexual immorality, married life, food sacrificed to idols, how to conduct communion, spiritual gifts, love, worship and resurrection of the dead.

Paul is making an impassioned plea to get the church to think in a completely new way. Paul wants them to move from only thinking about themselves and their individual needs and rights to thinking of themselves as one entity, one body, whose health and life depends on cooperation and connection.

Paul is reminding us that we are the body of Christ and we have been called to take up our roles. We may have different gifts and calling but all are as important as the other. All are needed just as all parts of the body are needed. We are part of the one Spirit, one baptism and we all have gifts to share; things to strive for.

There is an urgency in both of these passages. The invitation to what God is offering is available now. Right now. As it is an invitation it can be refused. We might decide to wait until things get better by ourselves or we just need to try a bit harder. Maybe we like struggling under our own steam. Or we can go to him now. This applies to us as individuals but also to us as the church.

Maybe this is our epiphany moment this morning: we do not have to wait until things get better or the stars align. In the Nazareth synagogue of his childhood Jesus proved that was the fulfillment of the old scriptures. He came with the Spirit of the Lord upon him to bring the good news to the poor in spirit, proclaim release to the prisoners and freedom to the oppressed who want it, recovery of sight to those who had lost vision of God and to usher in the time of the Lord’s favour. Available to all until He comes again. This day is holy to the Lord. Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. May it be so.