Luke 4:21-30
Epiphany 4 - Year C
—> Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.
Well, who asked scripture to have a bearing on life? If this is what we are being called to do, we are not willing to engage. We would be willing to pay for you to share with us gracious words that apply to those who are not present. We are not willing to have ourselves revealed to ourselves. As a result, after due consideration, it is apparent that the only appropriate response available to us is that of rage. So let us help you to the edge of town where you might accidentally be jostled over the platform edge and onto the third-rail of rocks below.
Such a technocratic response has and continues to go on. Self-justified rage and rational final-solutions are happening everyday. This emphasis upon advantage weakens our common bond, day-by-day, until there is nothing left but butter at the base of a tree.
—> Today your hearing fills scripture anew.
An alternative to dragging the past into the present and projecting it into the future as ordained for all time, is to listen again without the ears of accumulated prejudice. If we were to hear that prophets, categorically, are not accepted, we might begin to listen beyond the status quo. Prophets are by their nature of the people they wrestle with. And, even though of the people, stand beyond them as their vision is of a yet-hidden door or crack in a wall that is unguarded by the principalities that have risen to power. With this vision a choice needs to be made about willfully sitting in our own mess or moving on.
If you are interested in pondering this further it might be asked what will cut the Gordian knot found in Kafka’s Door of the Law or what kinetic force holds together the light and the dark, the being touched by the world or the touching of it. Both of these videos are too long for such a condensed blog as this, but so it is today.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2013/01/luke-421-30.html
No prophet is accepted/welcomed in their hometown/hometime.
Consider going back in time to inform yourself of what you now know following a moment of, "If I only knew then what I know now." How welcome would be in your own prior life?
The deal here is to be faithful to the latest insight. Jesus finally got Isaiah and immediately sets about living it. It didn't make any more sense to his past (all those marvelous birth and blessing stories from birth or youth temple story) than it did to his growing up neighbors.
We can play all we want with the confusion between father and Father, but it basically comes down to whether or not Jesus and you and I are faithful to what we now sense is a larger picture.
We can see this building on the past, temptations overcome clear space for the temptations posed by one's community rather than a specific desert spirit, but still something that needs to echo forward rather than backward.
If you and I come to this same place of echoing forward, even if our past isn't as hallowed as Jesus, it is as honorable and prophetic.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/february2004.html
The prophecy of old is coming true today that tomorrow may be better.
This is meddling of the highest order. Why should our generation and our town bear the brunt of having things set right. Can you imagine the upset in our fantasies when the increasing gap between have and have-nots is suddenly, without warning, done away with. How can we any longer measure the meaning of life? How will we behave with one another? All control would be gone, chaos would set in. There is a reason the Year of Jubilee was never put into action.
Jesus didn't leave a good idea alone. He had to go and try to do it. In this way he revealed, just like a sharp, two-edged sword, how far from community we are. We don't love G*D enough to reset our economics. We don't love our neighbor enough to meet them on a level playing field. We don't love ourselves enough to dismiss these barriers but live in fear that there are no built-in markers that will guarantee our present and eternal comfort and excuse our participation in the fullness of life.
Elijah, Elisha, Elisus all yank away our fantasy life and bring us to action that will reveal G*D's spirit that will bind us together in newer and better ways. Later they will be revered. But for the moment they insult us by opening G*D's goodness to strangers, foreigners, non-like-minded believers in what we believe in.
Let's not live for being revered, either now or later. Let's simply live to reset the basis on which we relate to one another, common ground and common vision.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/february2004.html
Everything was moving along swimmingly. Jesus claims an important past vision has come true. That which folks had been waiting for, need not be awaited any longer. Everyone spoke well of him. His state of the nation speech was a hit. It didn't require any change on anyone's part - it was already decided.
This guy really is one of us, no matter about some outstanding little details (after all he wasn't born here and there was that refugee time in his life and there have been a few grumblings about him). Pleased that they would be known as the deciding place, he was indeed Joseph's son, our son.
Then, instead of leaving well enough alone, Jesus had to go and push. He said, "Perhaps you are wondering why you got inspiring words from me, but there hasn't been any corroborating evidence of healing here? Well, you should wonder why this is all talk, the same old stuff, and no action. When your wondering leads you to understanding the implications for you and all, I'll move pretty quickly from being a favorite son to a meddling prophet. Crowds can rapidly move from Hosanna to Hang Him. Remember Elijah! Remember Elisha!"
Well, they caught on. They remembered and anticipated not being able to have pride of place. Not having a hanging tree at hand, they prepared to hurl him.
What are you remembering and anticipating this day?
- - -
today scripture is fulfilled
when else, pray tell
could it have been
and still been scripture
scripture lifted from the page
writing turned again to speaking
speaking engaged with hearing
heart heard to life lived
bone by bone
dried and alive
danced and threatening
we meet and go on
again and again
our image of home
fails to be home
drive on
filled full leaves no room
Bethlehem or Nazareth
America or Iraq
scripture passes by
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html
Yes, Jesus picked this particular fight with his hometown.
All was going swimmingly. Jesus reads Isaiah and claims it. Those in the synagogue were affirming. They marveled and remembered back to before Jesus saw John at the Jordan as well as stories of more recent exploits.
It would be interesting to get the back story of Jesus that led to his striking out at these close-to-adoring people. Does Jesus need some revisionist history instead of those who saw him scab his knee and run to Mary for a kiss on his boo-boo? Perhaps he is just tired from recent exploits and wanted to cut off requests for more. Whichever, whatever, Jesus is responsible for this event.
Can't you see the townspeople with their hooray, Jesus' response, and then the town folks angry response. How sad for all concerned. Hope, faith and love seem particularly absent in Jesus' attempt to leave his infancy behind.
While there is a tendency to equate this to Jesus' later entry into Jerusalem and the crowd changing from Hosanna to Hang-em, it is better to wrestle with this incident. What went wrong? Where do you see that same wrongness in these days?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010_01_01_archive.html