An Insightful Moment at Nazareth (Luke 4:16-30)
Wow! What a summary of Jesus' entire ministry! By that I mean, He declared Himself to be the Messiah, the Jews who were filled with rage proved they were unworthy of God's blessings, and so the gospel message would also then go to the Gentiles.
The passage of Scripture, Isaiah 61:1-2, is a messianic passage. He stops reading after "to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord." The next line talks about God's vengeance. Jesus was bold in His announcement proclaiming himself as the One who would bring this Good News to pass. He didn't repeat the rest of the verse because it was not time for that part to be revealed.
The people were fascinated at His teaching as evidenced by He "was praised by all," as well as, "and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him." Then He declared, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." The people marveled at His "gracious words" (lit. "words of grace") but then immediately began to question the authority on why He could say these things. And, once He mentions the two instances in which the prophets did miraculous acts of grace to Gentiles they went ballistic. It really irked the Jews that Christ said the Gentiles deserved God's blessing rather than the Jews. It irritated them so much they tried to kill Him.
Again, I feel Gire takes too much liberty in putting thoughts and human feelings into Christ when he writes. When Gire writes how "He didn't expect the leaders of the synagogue to denounce Him. Didn't expect His family to distance themselves from Him. Or His neighbors to turn on Him." My belief is He did expect those things. He knew He would be rejected by His own people and that He would go to the Cross. Now, did it sadden Him? Yes, I do think Gire has some excellent thoughts regarding His sadness.
Now, when Gire quotes Matthew 14:54-58, why Jesus "didn't do many miracles there because of their lack of faith," and Mark 6:4, Gire mentions Christ's restraint as being remarkable. He talks about how Christ was not resentful, or derogatory, nor did He correct their misconceptions. Now, to do so would have been sin. Don't you think that because He was "in the power of the Spirit" He wouldn't do those things? In verse 4:14, which is a few verses before where Gire begins, it states, "And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district." He had just returned from His 40 days in the wilderness where the Holy Spirit sustained Him and now He was returning to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. We are ourselves are able to not sin when we allow the Holy Spirit's power to enable us. Christ was so close to His Father and so in tuned to the Spirit, I can't really believe that He would have been too tempted to "retaliate" verbally here. That's my take on it.
But then, Gire moves to Matthew 11:20 where Christ begins denouncing the cities because they did not repent. I thought Gire's take on why Christ did not pronounce judgment on Nazareth was interesting. I had never thought of Gire's take on it, that is, Jesus not wanting that to happen to His hometown. It makes more sense to me that it was because He knew there were some people who would repent and be saved out of Nazareth, whereas, in the other cities He would have known if no one was going to repent.
I also struggled with Gire's statement of [speaking of Nazareth] "An omission made possible because Jesus was, above all a [emphasis mine] Savior. Christ is not one of many saviors, He is the Savior, the only One who has the power to resurrect from death to life. All others, Mohammed, Buddha, Gandhi, etc are still in the grave. Christ is the only one who has an empty grave.
The passage of Scripture, Isaiah 61:1-2, is a messianic passage. He stops reading after "to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord." The next line talks about God's vengeance. Jesus was bold in His announcement proclaiming himself as the One who would bring this Good News to pass. He didn't repeat the rest of the verse because it was not time for that part to be revealed.
The people were fascinated at His teaching as evidenced by He "was praised by all," as well as, "and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him." Then He declared, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." The people marveled at His "gracious words" (lit. "words of grace") but then immediately began to question the authority on why He could say these things. And, once He mentions the two instances in which the prophets did miraculous acts of grace to Gentiles they went ballistic. It really irked the Jews that Christ said the Gentiles deserved God's blessing rather than the Jews. It irritated them so much they tried to kill Him.
Again, I feel Gire takes too much liberty in putting thoughts and human feelings into Christ when he writes. When Gire writes how "He didn't expect the leaders of the synagogue to denounce Him. Didn't expect His family to distance themselves from Him. Or His neighbors to turn on Him." My belief is He did expect those things. He knew He would be rejected by His own people and that He would go to the Cross. Now, did it sadden Him? Yes, I do think Gire has some excellent thoughts regarding His sadness.
Now, when Gire quotes Matthew 14:54-58, why Jesus "didn't do many miracles there because of their lack of faith," and Mark 6:4, Gire mentions Christ's restraint as being remarkable. He talks about how Christ was not resentful, or derogatory, nor did He correct their misconceptions. Now, to do so would have been sin. Don't you think that because He was "in the power of the Spirit" He wouldn't do those things? In verse 4:14, which is a few verses before where Gire begins, it states, "And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district." He had just returned from His 40 days in the wilderness where the Holy Spirit sustained Him and now He was returning to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. We are ourselves are able to not sin when we allow the Holy Spirit's power to enable us. Christ was so close to His Father and so in tuned to the Spirit, I can't really believe that He would have been too tempted to "retaliate" verbally here. That's my take on it.
But then, Gire moves to Matthew 11:20 where Christ begins denouncing the cities because they did not repent. I thought Gire's take on why Christ did not pronounce judgment on Nazareth was interesting. I had never thought of Gire's take on it, that is, Jesus not wanting that to happen to His hometown. It makes more sense to me that it was because He knew there were some people who would repent and be saved out of Nazareth, whereas, in the other cities He would have known if no one was going to repent.
I also struggled with Gire's statement of [speaking of Nazareth] "An omission made possible because Jesus was, above all a [emphasis mine] Savior. Christ is not one of many saviors, He is the Savior, the only One who has the power to resurrect from death to life. All others, Mohammed, Buddha, Gandhi, etc are still in the grave. Christ is the only one who has an empty grave.
posted by Pilot Mom at
11:42 AM
2 Comments:
"When Gire writes how "He didn't expect the leaders of the synagogue to denounce Him. Didn't expect His family to distance themselves from Him. Or His neighbors to turn on Him." My belief is He did expect those things. He knew He would be rejected by His own people and that He would go to the Cross."
Claire, this really caught my eye. Just last week pastor and I were discussing how much Jesus knew about who he really was and when, exactly he knew it. He kept telling me, "pretend like you don't know how the story is going to end when you think of Jesus doing these things because he (obviously) didn't know how the story of his life would end until it did."
I now wonder if Jesus really knew any of who or what he truly was until he hosted the last supper and went to pray at the garden of Gethsemane. I think this is why I LIKE when Gire says things like this...makes me start to see Jesus as a man who believed he was the Savior but until it all came to pass - did he really "know" it to be true?
Great detail in your observations as always. I learn so much from each of you by reading these takes on scripture stories.
By
HeyJules, at 8:55 PM
Well, Jules, again, He knew in this chapter when He quoted Psalm 61...that's why He didn't finish the text. He knew...otherwise, He wouldn't have been praying so much... Like the last lesson or so when He said, "I do the work of my Father." And if you read Matthew 16:21 (also Mark 8:31-9:1; Luke 9:21-27), this is the first time He predicts His death the first time. He knew Who He was from very early on. And, He knew exactly what His purpose was...He knew that He was God. There is no way He didn't fully realize that He was God, in the flesh.
By
Pilot Mom, at 9:37 PM
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