Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
“When the people in the synagogue heard this, they were all filled with fury.” Lk. 4:29
Rembrandt, the world-famous artist, was noted for drawing several different depictions of Jesus being tempted by the devil.
In fact, in one of them, the two are even presented as though they were the best of friends!
For example, in one case, Rembrandt paints a scene in which Jesus and Satan are ambling politely down a country road seemingly deep in conversation. While they walk and talk, according to this painting, the devil appears to be reasoning with Jesus, not menacing him. In fact, one of Satan’s wings is thrown over Jesus’ shoulder almost as though they were the best of buddies. Pals!
It’s a scene of striking intimacy!
Like most of our temptations.
Luke, however, opens his Gospel story about Jesus as an adult by presenting him in a way far different from Rembrandt’s depiction.
Admittedly, Luke describes a variety of temptations that Jesus went through. But, in today’s Gospel, he pictures Jesus as one who is “filled with the power of the Spirit” – so much so, in fact, that Jesus returns to his hometown and boldly presents himself to the people who knew him from the time he was a child.
The people are stunned.
“Is not this the carpenter’s son?” they ask.
What triggers this question is that Luke very carefully and intentionally demonstrates to the people of Nazareth “where he had been brought up” that Jesus is a powerfully changed person.
To the people’s alarm, in fact, Jesus boldly informs them of this whole new identity he has embraced by announcing publicly:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives … and recovery of sight to the blind … to let the oppressed go free.”
The people hearing this message from this man who they had known since he was a child were beyond shocked. In fact, “Filled with fury” is the way the Gospel puts it. So much so, in fact, that they then proceed to “drive him out of the town.”
A strong case could be made that we’re still “driving him out of town,” or, at the very least, out of our own hearts, out of our own desires, out of our own temptations, out of our own dreams of power and wealth and selfish concerns.
Let’s face it.
The townspeople in this story are not angry because Jesus claims to be the realization of God’s power. They are angry because he is not using that power the way they want him to use it: for the realization of their own hidden desires for wealth and fame.
Notice how the story ends.
Jesus is pursued by the angry crowd to the “brow of the hill on which their town was built, so they might hurl him off the cliff.”
Jesus, however, even amidst this murderous threat, refuses to work the miracles his listeners want; refuses to become buddies with Satan, as pictured by Rembrandt.
Instead, Jesus works another kind of miracle – one far beyond their imagination – and ours too.
He redefines who God is:
A God who wants in no way to be cozied up to Rembrandt’s vision of what the devil is seemingly doing. Jesus makes it clear that God is not interested in whispering into our ears the means of enriching ourselves while the poor and the powerless are neglected. Instead, Jesus presents a God who is not willing to shower us with the ability to gain access to all our hidden dreams of adulation, and excessive wealth, and power over others.
Instead, the God Jesus is calling them – and us – to become like is One who is challenging those very people who wanted to throw Jesus off the cliff.
The God of Jesus is interested only in beckoning each of us to become like Jesus – the very One who is calling us to do the hard work of bringing “glad tidings to the poor,” of recovering sight to the blind, of letting the oppressed go free.”
Jesus’ goal, and by extension the goal of each of us who are his followers, is to announce by both words and actions, that our lives are dedicated to tell those who live on the margins of society, those who are considered nobodies and outcasts, those who are oppressed by the weight of hunger and poverty and sickness, those who are held captive by addiction and other mental health disorders – that we are committed to proclaiming to these people that they are loved and cherished and passionately embraced by the God that Jesus called Abba.
Jesus was promoting a revolution – one that involved a depth of faith that would bring about a conversion of heart to such an extent that a whole new value system would begin to dominate the lives of people – a value system that would no longer emphasize wealth and the acquisition of power and violence and self-glorification.
Today’s Gospel reading gives each of us a clear choice.
And it’s a tough one – one that fully repudiates the one we so frequently find whispering in our ears like Rembrandt’s Satan in his; or the one Jesus so loudly promotes with these words:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free.”
Ted Wolgamot, Psy.D.
