Perilous Preaching

Jesus’s Sermon in Nazareth, Lithograph, circa 1900, click on image to link to source.

Jeremiah 1:4-10, Gospel of Luke 4:21-30

When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. –Luke 4:28

Jesus came preaching to his home congregation. It was a kind of candidating sermon in the sense that everyone was checking him out, wondering what it meant that a hometown boy was becoming famous as a rabbi.  They were measuring him to see whether they would accept his leadership, too. 

His experience reminds me of Michael Lindvall’s story about having lunch with a minister friend, who had just been called to serve as pastor of Old First Church in Huntington, on Long Island. He had been through the standard process of presenting a sermon, followed by a congregational meeting and election.  “What was the vote?” Lindvall asked over coffee.  “Two hundred and something for, six against,” he answered.  “Six against!” Lindvall exclaimed.  “How did that make you feel?”  “Well,” said his friend, “It was good to know that at least six people understood the sermon.” [1] In Nazareth, everyone understood the sermon, and everyone rejected it.

Before the day went bad, it had started out good. Jesus had chosen a Bible text that seemed right for the context. His listeners lived in a world in which the wealthy and politically well-connected had conspired for extravagant profit. Various taxes were levied for real-estate ownership, production of crops, census counts, and transportation of goods. Those who could not pay were forced to surrender their family’s land, and perhaps work as tenant farmers or servants to the new landowners. In a community feeling oppressed, Jesus’ reading from the scroll of Isaiah fell on eager ears: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me 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 favor.

When the congregation heard this, all spoke well of him. Why, then, did this happy occasion so quickly degenerate into a riot?  One simple answer: Jesus didn’t stop with the scripture reading; he went on to preach a sermon. 

Jesus raised tension by the way he approached two stories from scripture: Elijah’s encounter with the Widow of Zaraphath (1 Kings 17:8-24), and Elisha’s ministry to Naaman the Syrian (2 Kings 5:1-14).  Jesus’ interpretive twist came not in proclaiming God’s ministry to the widow and Naaman. Rather, it came in suggesting that while God was ministering to these foreigners, he was purposely not ministering to some in Israel.  He points out that there were many widows in Israel, yet Elijah was sent not to them, but to the Widow of Zaraphath. There were many lepers in Israel, yet Elisha was called to provide healing not for them but for Naaman.

To state this another way: What gets Jesus into trouble is his assertion that God’s grace is for those outside their traditional cultural boundaries.  Jesus recognizes the desire of his listeners to keep God to themselves, to possess a local god who preserves a hierarchy that would benefit only our clan and tribe. Jesus challenges their assumptions about the world, and how God is working in it.

Many of you saw the headlines about a recent sermon that sparked national controversy. The sermon was delivered by the Rev. Dr. Mariann Edgar Budde during a service of prayer for the nation at the Washington National Cathedral. If you want to feel the group dynamics reflected in today’s gospel text, then I can think of no better contemporary case study than watching and listening to a recording of this sermon.[2] 

What got Budde into trouble was her plea that the president be merciful, particularly to those in vulnerable minority segments of the population who feel threatened and afraid. Some say it would have been better for the bishop to avoid a direct address to the new president. Others say that preachers commonly address individuals in special services, such as weddings, baptisms and ordinations.[3] From my limited perspective, a newly elected president at a post-inaugural prayer service is as much the focus of attention as a marriage partner at a wedding, or the deceased loved one at a funeral. A preacher might just as likely be criticized for not offering a few personalized remarks about the pathway into the future.

Hypothetically, if I held an office with authority to order the arrest and deportation of foreign nationals engaged in the production and distribution of illegal drugs, then I would pursue that course with vigor, convinced of its moral correctness. But, in the implementation of that order, what if individuals were detained who are, for example, children, or surrogates threatened, intimidated, and forced into service? Isn’t it possible that some distinctions would need to be made about relative guilt and innocence? If I held an elected office with such power, and listened to such a sermon, isn’t it possible that a call to mercy might be just the right thing to hear?

A detailed analysis of Budde’s sermon is better left to another time and place. I will say a plea to be merciful falls within the range of moral and ethical advice historically offered by clergy to those with political or military authority. I find nothing hateful or ungracious about it.

If we look at the history of preaching, then we would discover many other challenging sermons between Jesus’ long-ago sermon and Budde’s recent sermon.  We might analyze the controversy they have generated through the interpretive lens of Stanley Hauerwas, a relatively well-known Christian ethicist. Hauerwas says that many “People come to church to have confirmed what they think they already know. It is almost impossible, therefore, to resist making the sermon serve to confirm our experience rather than to challenge the presumption ….”[4]

But, as Jesus demonstrates, the good news is not about reinforcing one dogmatic worldview to the exclusion of all others. It’s not about satisfying the emotional needs of only one particular tribal constituency. It has something to do with adopting a value system that prioritizes love, justice, and mercy for others as well as ourselves. It has something do with being able to adopt that value system because the Holy Spirit instills compassion within us to open our hearts to a larger world.

In commenting on the gospel lesson, preacher and scholar Fred Craddock once wrote, “It is interesting that in Luke’s Gospel, the first public word of Jesus as an adult, apart from reading Scripture, is ‘today.’”[5]  As I reflect upon that observation, I confess that I find it at one and the same time troubling and comforting. It is troubling to me after January we’ve experienced. The daily news has moved from terrible fires, through governing chaos, to airplane disasters. This is “the year of the Lord’s favor”?  But it is comforting, if I take Jesus at his word, to remember that God’s reign isn’t in some distant future, but now. It’s not here fully, but it’s here is part. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, compassion is present in this gathering of God’s people. By the grace of God, we are the voice, hands, and feet of Christ, Christ for the world – today. So may it continue to be!

 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN.

NOTES

[1] Michael Lindvall, notes on a sermon delivered June 1, 2006, at the “Reclaiming the Text” preaching conference, Montreat, NC.

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwwaEuDeqM8

[3] Ruthanna Hooke, professor of homiletics, quoted in “As Trump demands apology, Episcopal bishop explains her call for mercy toward those living in fear,”  The Christian Century, 23 January 2025, https://www.christiancentury.org/news/trump-demands-apology-episcopal-bishop-explains-her-call-mercy-toward-those-living-fear accessed 29 Jan. 2025.

[4] Stanley Hauerwas has said something like this more than once, including, I believe, in Clergy Journal, Nov/Dec 1996, pg. 18.

[5] Fred Craddock, “Luke: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching,” “Interpretation Commentary Series, Louisville: John Knox Press, 1990, p. 62.

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