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Grace, mercy and
peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
A
prophet is not without honour, except in his hometown and among his relatives
and in his own household.
Prayer: Dear Lord
Jesus, breathe out upon us all your Holy Spirit, to me that I may preach well,
and to all of us that we may hear well. May the words of my mouth and the
meditations of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and
our Redeemer. Amen.
Today in our Gospel
reading, Jesus goes to his hometown of Nazareth, where he grew up as a boy, and
he is goes to the synagogue and he preaches there. And instead of being
welcomed with open arms as their local boy, he is rejected and kicked out. We
read: They took offense at him.
And Jesus says: A prophet is not without honour, except in his hometown
and among his relatives and in his own household.
And we read also: [Jesus] could do no mighty work there, except that he
laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marvelled because
of their unbelief.
I’d like to focus
first of all on what Jesus says: A prophet is not
without honour, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own
household. What’s Jesus talking about? Well, obviously, he’s
talking about himself, in that here he is, as a prophet, coming to his own
hometown, but he is not honoured at all. Jesus is also hinting that when a
prophet comes from a faraway place, people receive the prophet well. Maybe they
think, “Here’s someone from a faraway country, and they’ve got something new
and exotic to say.”
It’s strange how
someone from a faraway place often has more authority than a local person. If
someone came and said something wise to us, and they happened to be from an
exotic, ancient culture with all kinds of strange customs, we might listen. But
for a lot of us, if it were our mums that said the same thing, we might not
take any notice.
And so, what Jesus
says is true: often someone from another place holds more weight or more
authority. But this is not exactly what he is talking about. He says: A prophet is not without honour, except in his hometown. Here Jesus is speaking about prophets, and he refers to himself as
a prophet.
So what exactly is
a prophet? Well, Jesus is often referred to as a prophet. But of course, he is
much more than simply a prophet, like Isaiah or Jeremiah or Daniel. He is also
the Son of God and the Saviour of the world. Even so, Jesus is called a
prophet. When John the Baptist was preaching and baptising, there were some
Jews that went up to him and asked him, “Are you the prophet?” And John
says: No. They didn’t
ask John if he was a prophet, any old prophet, but the prophet. They
were looking forward to a particular prophet.
Now, to work out
what they were talking about here, we have to go back to Deuteronomy chapter
18. Here we find Moses giving a sermon to the people and he says: The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me
from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen… I will raise
up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my
words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. And
whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself
will require it of him. And so from this passage, we
see that the Jewish people were looking for a particular prophet, who could
come from their people. God says that they must listen to him. And God is going
to put his own words in the mouth of this particular prophet, and if people
don’t listen to him, they will be cut off from God’s people. You can see that
whoever this particular prophet is going to be, it is going to be very
important that people recognise him when he comes and listen to him.
In the New
Testament, in the book of Acts, in two different places, we read that this
prophet was actually Jesus. This is preached by Peter in a sermon, and also by
Stephen in a sermon. We know then that this prophet is Jesus himself, it is to
him we should listen. The words that Jesus speaks are God’s words, and whoever
does not listen to him will be answerable to God. Moses says: It is to him you shall listen. We read in the Gospels about that event in Jesus’ life, called the
Transfiguration, where he is standing on the top of a mountain together with
Moses and Elijah, and the face of Jesus shines with bright radiant light. We
read that on that occasion a voice came from heaven in a cloud. And what did he
say? This is beloved Son. Listen to him. Do you hear that? Listen to him. Here God the Father himself is telling us that this Jesus, His only Son,
is the prophet that Moses spoke about in Deuteronomy where he said: It is to him you shall listen. Even God Himself confirms this and says: Listen
to him.
And so, back to our
reading, here is Jesus, and he is in his own hometown. He is with his friends
and family and relatives. Moses said this would happen: The Lord God will raise up a prophet from among you, from
your brothers. And yet the people are so blind, that they can’t
recognise Jesus as the person who fulfils the prophecy of Moses. And they take
offense at him. Now this is a frightening thing, because Moses also says that
if they don’t listen to this prophet, it will
be required of them of the Lord. And so Jesus gives
a testimony about what is going on. He says: A
prophet is not without honour, except in his hometown. What a sad day this must have been for Jesus, that he should be rejected
in his own town. And yet, the people are too busy remembering his childhood.
They say: Where did this man get these things?
What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands?
Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and
Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us? You can almost hear an old lady in the crowd saying: “I changed his
nappies.”
On the other hand,
Jesus’ words are so full of grace and power. One word from Jesus has the power
to forgive each one of our sins and promise us eternal life and an open door of
heaven. And he actually does promise each of us this. He baptises us and writes
his name on us, and puts his cross on each of us. We belong to him and we are
his. And he writes our names in his book of life. And week after week, and day
after day as Christians, we learn more about this wonderful Saviour that we
have—and the more we learn about him, the more we learn about how much he
forgives us and loves us. Jesus is the Son of God, the Saviour of the world,
and he is so much greater than any prophet who has ever lived, that every word
that he speaks is full of grace, full of love, full of joy, full of hope. Listen
to the prophecy he speaks to you: Everyone who lives
and believes in me shall never die. Or what about the
prophecy he speaks to the thief on the cross: Today,
you shall be with me in Paradise. Who would want to
reject such a wonderful prophet like that?
Today, people often
misunderstand what a prophet is, though. People often think that it is the same
thing as a fortune-teller. People think, “a prophet tells things about the
future”, and so does a fortune-teller, so they must be the same thing. Jesus
speaks life-giving words—he doesn’t read palms. And then, many people don’t
really believe in fortune-tellers, so they don’t really believe in prophets
either. But there’s a great difference between a prophet and a fortune-teller,
and we have to know the difference. In the chapter from Deuteronomy which we
read from before, where Moses prophesies that there will be another prophet,
Moses talks about a whole lot of forbidden practices: interpreting omens,
sorcery, mediums, and this also includes fortune-telling. Moses says: These nations which you are about to dispossess, listen
to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the Lord your God has not
allowed you to do this. You can see here that
fortune-telling is completely forbidden. But instead, what does Moses call us
to listen to? He says: The Lord your God
will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it
is to him you shall listen. We should listen to
Christ, not a fortune-teller. And Moses here plays off these fortune-tellers
directly with Christ. They are in direct opposition to each other.
Now this is
important for us too, because sometimes in the church we might encounter
someone who claims to be a prophet, and they claim to bring a word from God. Or
sometimes, even Christians get involved in some New Age stuff, and go and visit
someone who they think can tell them the future. We need be discerning and to
ask the question: Is this from the Holy Spirit?
Well, in the book
of Acts, we read an example about this. In Acts 16:16, we read: As we [that is, Paul and Silas and Luke] were going to
the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination
and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling. She followed Paul and us,
crying out, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you
the way of salvation.” Do you see, here is a girl who
is a fortune-teller, possibly like some kind of New Age person in our time. And
we read here that she actually tells the truth about who Paul is. It’s true: These men really are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the
way of salvation. But then we read: Paul,
having become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in
the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.
So you can see here
that even though this fortune-teller was telling the truth about Paul and
Silas, Paul told the spirit to come out of her, and rejected her. You can see
here that this is not prophecy of the Holy Spirit, and this kind of occult
stuff cannot be used in the service of Christ and of his kingdom. It is
forbidden, and God rejects it.
This is so
important for us—because often when we look at a situation like this, like
fortune-telling, two different opinions will come about. Some will say: That’s
a load of rubbish! Fortune-telling doesn’t really work. And on the other hand,
some will say: Maybe it does it work. But the important thing for us as
Christians, is not whether it works or not, but where the power is from. This also
applies to all kinds of spiritual stuff, and pseudo-spiritual stuff. The
question is not whether it works, but where the power is from. Even if it
works, it may still be from the devil. A fortune-teller is not sent by God—a
prophet is sent by God and speaks with all the power of the Holy Spirit.
It is not to fortune-tellers
we should listen. But it is to the true prophet, to Christ, to Jesus, that we
should listen. He is even better than all the prophets put together, because he
promises to you the forgiveness of sins. He has paid for all of your sin with
his own suffering, with his own death, with his own blood. And now he is risen
from the dead, he is seated at God’s right hand and he now brings all of his
power and all of his promises right here to you. And he even breathes out upon
you the Holy Spirit so that you can hide yourself in his wounds, so that you
can place your body and soul into his arms, and so that you can rest him until
that time when he draws you to himself in eternity.
We receive all the
wonderful gifts of our prophet Jesus, simply by trusting in him, and believing
in his word. We know that his words never lie. They are completely reliable and
trustworthy. We read in our reading that when the people were offended by
Jesus, that Jesus could do not no
mighty work there… and he marvelled because of their unbelief. He only performed a few healings for some individuals, but not for the
benefit of the whole town. On the other hand, when we hear God’s word, we
should pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit so that He will create a living
faith in us, so that we trust in Jesus’ words. Who knows what wonderful work
Jesus can perform among us when we simply trust in his living, prophetic word?
Jesus is the one who gives the gifts, faith is simply the hand which he puts
them in.
Now, even today
here in the church, we join Jesus in bringing his prophetic ministry to the
world by testifying about him, and speaking his words. We read in the book of
Revelation: The testimony of
Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. When we speak about
Jesus, either I as a pastor in sermons and in pastoral work, or you wherever
you happen to be among your friends and family, you speak with the spirit of prophecy
when you speak the truth and testify to Jesus. And isn’t it so often the case
that prophets are not welcome in their own hometown? There are so many parents
that worry about their children falling away from the faith, and if we parents
spoke to our children about Jesus, their hearts only get harder—of course, they
know too much about us! Often I’ve seen this at funerals, where an old Christian
person has died, and then all the children are organising the funeral, and
they’re not Christian, except for one. And the burden of trying to arrange a
church funeral for their Christian mother or father seems to lie on this one
person, and the rest of the family just comes up with one silly idea after
another. There’s the old expression: You can choose your friends, but you can’t
choose your family! Well, Jesus wants to encourage us by his words and by his
example here in our reading. He says: I know what it’s like. I had an earthly
family too. I grew up on a certain street, in a certain town, in a certain
place—and then when I spoke the truth to them, they rejected me. And Jesus
says: Do you think it was my fault they didn’t listen? Of course not! So be
encouraged. We are living in a time where so many people don’t want to hear the
truth, and don’t want to change their mind about anything. And then we think,
if we speak too loudly, or speak out of place, we’re just going to get our
heads chopped off, and have some angry person come at us and ram it down our
throats. Think about how Christians in the Middle East must have felt in the
last year or so! Be encouraged! Jesus came to his own
people, and his own people did not receive him. They threw him out of town, he suffered, he died. And Jesus says: Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you
and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be
glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted… (who?) the prophets
– (the prophets!) – who
were before you.
Being a faithful
Christian can be a lonely walk sometimes, a lonely way. But Jesus always walks
it with you, and he wants to encourage you. He will open your mouth at the
right time, and when it is the time to close it, he will keep it closed. But in
the meantime, he will send you the Holy Spirit, and he will teach you his word,
and he will build up your faith.
Even now, Jesus has
placed us under his authority, and has spoken to us the forgiveness of all our
sins—our sins of speaking when we shouldn’t have and giving the faith a bad
name, our sins of not speaking when we should have spoken. Jesus walks with us,
he takes us with him. We read in our reading: Jesus
went about among the villages teaching.
Let’s thank Jesus
for also coming to our church today and teaching us his word! Amen.
Dear Lord Jesus, we
have so often not given you the honour you deserve, and we have taken offense
at you, and hardened our hearts. We ask that you would send us your Holy
Spirit, forgive us, and we ask that you would take charge of our spirits and
place them under your authority. We commit ourselves into your hands for your
service and as you would use us for your kingdom. Amen.
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