… and He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” All spoke well of Him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from His lips. “Isn't this Joseph's son?” they asked. Jesus said to them, “Surely you will quote this proverb to Me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum. I tell you the truth,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah's time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed - only Naaman the Syrian.” All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. They got up, drove Him out of the 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 He walked right through the crowd and went on His way.

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     “…  and He began by saying to them, ‘Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.’” If those words sound a bit familiar, then I commend you for paying attention last week, because they were the last verse of last week’s Scripture reading, just as they are the opening verse of today’s Scripture reading. In a way, then, these words serve as the “hinge” between what happened to Jesus in the previous passage, and what happens to Him in this passage. To be a bit more specific, and to look at the passage in its entirety, it’s about ministry. In the first part (which we read last week) Jesus identified what His ministry was, while in the second part (which we just read a moment ago) Jesus specified who His ministry would be directed to. It all sounds like a very reasonable piece of business, and yet, by the end of the events depicted in today’s reading, the response of the people of Nazareth was rather dramatic: “They got up, drove Him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw Him down the cliff.” One wonders what it was that got the crowd so riled up that they were prepared to kick Jesus right out of town – and even to go beyond that!

     This is not the end result that would have been expected after what we heard last week. Jesus had returned to His hometown – to the place where He should have been the most welcome; a place where He could stand among family and friends and in a familiar environment – home, sweet, home in other words. And so it was – for a while. Jesus in fact was welcomed back to Nazareth quite warmly it would appear. The people were happy to have him there. The leaders of the local synagogue welcomed Him back by giving Him the opportunity to share in their Sabbath worship, handing Him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah so that He could choose a passage to share with His friends and neighbours. The passage, of course, was that part of the Book of Isaiah that described the ministry of the Messiah, and, upon closing the reading, Jesus dramatically declared “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” The first thing we need to understand is that this dramatic revelation – in which Jesus essentially declared Himself to be the Messiah – is not what led to the dramatic events in today’s passage. There’s a kind of gut reaction that makes us think that the people’s rejection of Jesus was linked to His declaration that He was the Messiah. Sort of “how dare this kid who grew up among us declare Himself to be our Messiah!” That isn’t really what happened, though. Instead, immediately after Jesus made His dramatic announcement, we’re told that “all spoke well of Him.” No one seems to have been upset with Jesus at this point. Whether they believed Him or not is an open question, but they weren’t upset with Him, and it seems that they were at least willing to entertain the possibility that Jesus just might be the Messiah. So, what happened? What led them to evolve from this friendly, accepting group of family and friend who “spoke well of Him” into a frantic, out of control mob that sought to “throw Him down the cliff”? It would seem to me that it had nothing to do with what Jesus said about Himself or what He was going to do, but that it had to do with what Jesus said about them and what He expected them to do. In other words, Jesus challenged this people with a message they didn’t want to hear. The question for us, then, is a simple one: how similar (or how different) are we from that group of people in Nazareth. Are we the warm and friendly group or are we the angry and out of control mob? The truth is that we’re probably somewhere between the two extremes, but to which group do we best relate?

     We “speak well” of Jesus, I would say. Our congregational statement of purpose is “To Know Christ and Make Him Known.” If we take that seriously, we want to speak well of Him. In the most general terms, we don’t really have any difficulty accepting Jesus as the fulfilment of prophecy, as the Messiah, as the saviour or as the Lord. Or – at the very least – we’ll willingly entertain the possibly that He might be those things. That’s why we’re here isn’t it? To be challenged to think more and more highly of Jesus each week? To simply be asked to entertain possibilities about who or what Jesus might be is pretty comfortable for us. It doesn’t require any great commitment – just as it required no great commitment for the people of Nazareth to entertain that same possibility. But the people of Nazareth turned on Him. Why? The passage suggests that it’s because Jesus challenged them with a message they didn’t like. He compared Himself to prophets like Elijah and Elisha – who went not to the people of Israel but to others. The people of Nazareth seemed willing enough to entertain the possibility of Jesus being the Messiah – as long as He was their Messiah. “Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum,” was how Jesus summed up their attitude. In modern parlance, one might say that their attitude was “it’s all about us,” and when Jesus insisted that it wasn’t all about them, they turned on Him. Doesn’t this foreshadow a bigger problem in Jesus’ future ministry? Ultimately, Israel rejects Him because He declares that He’s come for the world rather than simply to help them with their own local issues.

     This, it seems to me, is one of the great problems in the Christian faith still today: a desire to keep the blessings to ourselves, or – at least – to share the blessings of our faith only with those who choose to become like us. Jesus set the example: He went out from His hometown and He engaged all those whom He encountered – not on His terms, but on their terms: journeying to Samaria, eating with prostitutes, tax collectors and other sinners, saving an adulteress from being stoned, offering ministry to the families of Roman soldiers. Jesus went out – and now the Holy Spirit pushes us out to engage the world and all those whom we encounter – not on our terms, but on their terms: to meet the people where they are. And that’s hard. It’s hard to be truly accepting of those who are different than we are; of those whose lifestyles we don’t approve of; of those whose customs seem strange to us; of those whose beliefs we disagree with. Jesus said flat out that He was going to do that, just as Elijah and Elisha had done that – because all of them knew that such was the work of God. Jesus accepted all – do we accept all? The people of Nazareth couldn’t accept that. They wanted to keep the blessing to themselves. So, let me ask you – are we accepting of all? Do we accept those who are different – in whatever way the differences show themselves? Are all welcome here? Today is our Annual Meeting – a time to look back to what was but also a time to look ahead to what could be. As we fashion the life of our congregation, let’s ensure that we welcome others in, rather than kicking Jesus out.