This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 8.15am (lay-reading), and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 9am.
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: 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. 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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