July 31: Community of the Spirit in Luke

Texts: Luke 3:21-22, 4:1-4, 4:14-30

Text 1: Luke 3:321-22

21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

The Presence of the Spirit

“When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying heaven opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove…” To be a prophet, to be a priest, to be a king one needed the anointing, the mesha from which we get the word ‘messiah’ of God’s Spirit. Moses had it. Samuel had it. David had it. Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Jeremiah and all manner of other of Israel’s leaders were given a portion of God’s presence, God’s Spirit. So, it comes as no surprise to read that right here, near the beginning of the gospel of Luke we read that the Holy Spirit descends upon Jesus after which we hear the voice from heaven say, “You are my son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

They say that timing is everything which is why I find the location of this statement from God so interesting. Had God said this of Jesus after the resurrection I’d have understood. Had God said this during the crucifixion, I’d not have batted an eye. Or if God’s voice had spoken these words of approval somewhere in the middle of Jesus 3 years of ministry it would have still made sense to me. But notice where these words are spoken. What has Jesus done up to this point? Nothing. No miracles. No healings. No teachings to speak of. And yet we hear God say that this is his son, whom he loves and is well pleased with.

On more than one occasion I’ve had discussions with folks about when someone receives the Holy Spirit and how one receives the Holy Spirit. Now, because Jesus says that God’s Spirit is like the wind and ‘blows where it pleases,’ (John 3:8), I am often cautious about making claims that might try to put a box around the Spirit. However, it was also Jesus himself who commissioned the disciples in Matthew 28 to “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, the son and the holy spirit…” (28:19) As Presbyterian Christians we believe that God’s Spirit is a gift affirmed in baptism. It is nothing we earn or deserve most often given, like Jesus, well before we have done anything.

Text 2: Luke 4:1-4

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert,
2 where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. 3 The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread." 4 Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone.'"

Practice with the Spirit

But like most every talent we inherit as a child, they work best when they are nurtured and nourished. We are born with the ability to see, but they must be taught to read. We are born with the ability to move our fingers, but must learn how to hold a spoon. We are born with the make noises, but we must listen to others speak to learn how to talk. God’s spirit is no different, it is a gift with limitless potential. Yet, if you follow any sport long enough you will hear some coach say that one of the most dangerous words in the world is ‘potential.’ The world is filled with people who at one time held ‘great potential.’ The difference between those who succeed and those who fail is very often not how much promise a person has, but of how much practice. And we see this, right here with Jesus.

What is it we read right after Jesus’ baptism? “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the desert where for forty days he was tempted by the devil.” Once again, notice the timing of Jesus’ retreat. He is 30 years old, he’s just been baptized in front of all of the people and so one might say to Jesus, ‘isn’t it about time you got to work.’ There are all manner of sick, blind, lame and lost in need of your help and what do you do? You go off into the desert for 40 days to be tempted by the devil. Why is this? In a word, practice.

If you are a football fan then you are likely feeling a bit relieved these days as they recently settled their labor agreement so that our Sunday afternoons will not be absent the Seahawks. And now all of the sports radio talk shows are started to get filled with accounts of what? Practice. Because football got started late, the teams missed a lot of practice time. I think the first game isn’t until the second Sunday in September. These players are all very talented. Why couldn’t they just wait til that Sunday to go out and play? Why mess with practice when you’ve got the game? Any coach who proposed such a thing would be fired in a second. Why is this? It is the same reason we have school, the same reason we have gyms and the same reason we have music instructors. For a person to reach their potential they need to practice. And such is the case with the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is not only led by the spirit into the desert, he is practicing with the Spirit in the desert. While back in Tennessee we spent a lot of time at the neighborhood pool one of the things the kids started doing was seeing how long they could hold their breath. Their first attempt was something like 10 seconds. Their second close to the same, about 11 seconds. I gave them a few pointers like not moving, taking 3 deep breaths and such and the next attempt led to a 24 second breath hold. What was going on here? We were training the lungs to retain air. I have no doubt that a full summer of this would have taught the kids to hold their breath for close to a minute.

Well, this is a bit like what Jesus was doing in the desert. He was training his lungs to work in concert with the Holy Spirit. He was doing this because he knew that there would be many times ahead when he would need to be able to hold his breath for 30 seconds, a minute, 2 minutes and perhaps even 3 days. Jesus was practicing with the spirit in the desert so that he might preach with through the spirit in the city.

How about us? Do we spend time practicing with the spirit in the desert? Jesus went for 40 days, but we don’t have to go that long. You can practice in the morning for 15 minutes, or at lunch or in the evening. Coming here today is a form of practice. Reading the Bible is a form of practice. Praying is a form of practice. All of these things are expanding our lung capacity that we might be prepared to work with the Spirit when needed. And oh how Jesus needed the Spirit right from the start. What happens after Jesus’ time in the desert? He heads to his hometown.

Text 3: Luke 4:14-30
14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. 15 He taught in their synagogues, and everyone praised him. 16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read. 17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written: 18 "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." 20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, 21 and he began by saying to them, "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing."
22 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.
23 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.'" 24 "I tell you the truth," he continued, "no prophet is accepted in his hometown. 25 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. 26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. 27 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."
28 All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. 29 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. 30 But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.

Proclaiming good news to the poor through the Spirit

“He went to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath he went to the synagogue…” Excited about the potential of their hometown boy, the elders invite Jesus to give the message that morning and so he takes the scroll and reads from the prophet Isaiah which says, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…” Okay, we’ve witnessed this at his baptism and we’ve seen how the Spirit led him into the desert to practice, but what now? What is the Spirit going to do now? “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.” Good news to the poor, that’s it. The Seahawks practice to win football games. The concert pianist trains to play beautiful music. And Jesus trains to ‘proclaim good news to the poor.’

A prophetic evangelical named Jim Wallis rightly asserts that helping and encouraging the poor is a biblical mandate. "During his seminary days in Chicago, he and few of his classmates decided to do a study to find every biblical reference on one particular subject--the poor and oppressed. Thousands of verses later, and to their astonishment, they discovered that those who are marginalized, mistreated, abandoned and forgotten by everyone else fill the Bible. In the Old Testament, poverty is second only to idolatry as the most prominent theme and the two are often linked. In the New Testament, one of every sixteen verses is about the poor. In the Gospels, the number is one out of every ten verses. In the Gospel of Luke, it’s one of every seven, and in the book of James, one of every five verses."

But what does this look like? Jesus through Isaiah goes on to say, ‘freedom for the prisoners, sight for the blind, release for the oppressed and the year of the Lord’s favor to all.” Rather than being prescriptive, I think these are descriptive statements by Isaiah. Good news to the blind is sight, to the prisoner is freedom, to the hungry is food, to the thirsty is drink, to the lonely is friendship. Poverty takes many forms, certainly physical, but also mental, emotional and spiritual as well. But there is a reason why Jesus starts the Sermon on the Mount by saying, “Blessed are the poor…” it is not because poverty is some happy situation. It is not. Rather it is because it is only in realizing our blindness that we ask for sight, in prison that we long for freedom, in hunger that we ask for food or thirsty that we seek water. Poverty awakens our awareness of our need. Jesus here proclaims that there is good news for those aware of their needs.

Baptism affirms the presence of God’s spirit, the desert is the place we practice with God’s spirit, but it is in everyday life where we, like Jesus are called to proclaim good news to the poor. Who do you know who could use some good news? Do you know someone struggling to meet the bills, perhaps our food bank is good news. Do you know someone who could use a summer break from their kids, perhaps our arts camp is good news. Do you know someone who is lonely, perhaps a visit from you might be good news? God’s Spirit propels us to find places of poverty and reflect the good news of God’s presence in its midst. But I must wrap this up with a warning. Some folks won’t like who you are giving the good news to.

Hometown Hero and Villain

On my first Thursday back home my Dad invited me to attend the Optimist Club which is a civic organization like Kiwanas or Lions Club. While in line to get my breakfast someone laid their hand on my shoulder and I turned to see Jerry Howell, the father of my best friend Mark. “Now, feel free to say no,’ he began, ‘but I have a favor to ask of you.” As long as it’s not a funeral, wedding or sermon I’m open to it. “Well, he said, I’m in charge of Sunday School and I wondered if you might come and just share about where you’ve been since you were a youth at 1^st Baptist.” That didn’t sound too bad, so I agreed.

That Sunday I attended the Sunday School Class for Adult men over the age of 60. Some of the men I knew well, Randall Kyker taught me in Sunday School. Others I was familiar with and others I’d never met. For the next 30 minutes I got to share a bit about where God had led me since leaving 1^st Baptist back in the 1994. Things went really well and I experienced the 1^st half of Jesus’ Nazareth experience as ‘people spoke well of me.’ Unlike Jesus, my experience remained positive.

After receiving numerous pats on the back and ‘atta boys’, Jesus quickly turns the tables on his hometown folks. As the people are getting excited about the good news that Jesus is going to bring them, he reminds them of others who need to hear the good news by reminding the people that Elijah brought good news to a widow in Sidon, a foreigner. And instead of curing Israelites with leprosy, Elisha healed the Naaman, the leader of the army of an enemy country. To us this may not sound like a big deal, but to the Israelites it was like telling 20^th century Jews that Jesus came to bring good news to the Nazis. Just like that, their praise turned to rage.

Sometimes the Spirit leads us to speak words of affirmation and other times the Spirit leads us to speak words of challenge. Unfortunately for the folks of Nazareth, they only wanted to hear the first and so they missed out on the fullness of Christ as they attempted to throw him off a cliff, but he just passed right through their midst and went on his way to share good news with the poor who were ready to listen.

The way out…

What about us, brothers and sisters? Are we only ready to receive the affirmations of the Holy Spirit or are we also ready to receive the challenges? How is your Spirit? Perhaps you need to be reminded of the good news that God’s spirit is upon you, with in you and around you. You need to hear the words, “This is my child, whom I love, with you I am well pleased.”

Or perhaps you’ve grown complacent in this gift and haven’t allowed the Spirit to grow. Is it time to start some desert disciplines; morning prayer, daily bible reading, Sunday School, etc? How is God calling you to practice with the Spirit?

And maybe, just maybe, there is someone who needs to hear good news. How is God calling you, calling us to proclaim good news?