From Samaria, Jesus returns in the power of the Spirit from Samaria to his home region of Galilee, on his way to his boyhood home of Nazareth. Throughout his home “state” he teaches in local synagogues and is glorified by everyone who hears him.
But hometowns can be different. I experienced a bit of this a couple years ago at my high school class fiftieth reunion. God has led me on this exciting journey called life far from my hometown; to all those “left behind” all these years, I was a stranger.
Now imagine if I had taken center stage at the reunion and tried to impress my classmates with what a success I had been – it would not have gone down well at all.
Jesus rises in the synagogue of Nazareth in front of all the people who knew him as a little boy, not to brag, but to declare from Isaiah 61:1-2 that good news has arrived:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor…to proclaim liberty to the captives…to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Lk 4:18-19).
It is one thing to read Scripture in church; it is quite another to claim to be the author of it:
“Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (4:21).
As the local people marvel at the gracious words Jesus speaks, he recognizes hypocrisy rumbling under the veneer of uneasy hospitality among the people:
“Is not this Joseph’s son” (4:22)?
In other words, “Who does this smart-aleck think he is?”
Jesus replies:
“Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Physician, heal yourself. What we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.’ … Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown…” (4:23-24).
Jesus goes on and gives them a warning:
“…in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up for three years and six months, and a great famine came over the land…Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to … a woman who was a widow…” (4:25-26).
This widow was in the enemy territory of Sidon, not among God’s chosen people. Jesus continues:
“And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed…” (4:27).
The one cleansed by Elisha was also an enemy, Naaman the Syrian.
His townsfolk now turn on him with a vengeance, driving him out of town to the brow of a hill, with intent to push him off a cliff and kill him:
“But passing through their midst, he went away” (4:30).
Although I am certainly not Jesus, nor can I be called a prophet, I can identify with this story whenever I bring up the subject of unity that Jesus prayed for in John 17. Just as the people in that synagogue did not believe Jesus was the fulfillment of Scripture unless he proved to them personally that he could heal and perform miracles, the response to raising awareness about the approaching need for perfect unity in advance of approaching persecution is, “Who does this guy think he is?”
The people of Nazareth would come to regret their initial response to Jesus.
Will we come to regret our disunity in contrast to the final prayer of Jesus for perfect unity before he is brutally murdered?
I hope and pray we will not.
There is still time to raise our eyes from local and personal issues to survey the stunning potential of churches joined in perfect unity against the growing forces of evil!
It is time to start imagining what this might look like!