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“The
Lord’s Favor”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: Luke 4:16-30
“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.”
We have read, before, in the Scriptures that for God one day is like a
thousand years and a thousand years is like one day.
Obviously, the way we experience and understand time is not what
time is to God. Therefore,
it is true that we are still within the year of the Lord’s favor.
Yes, according to Western Civilization we are now in the year
2007; but, according to God’s proclamation this is truly the year of
the Lord’s favor.
And, one aspect of the favor of the Lord that I want to talk about is
that when God does favors for us, when God does apply His favor toward
us, it may very well be quite different from what our present desires
are. In a real sense, God
showing us favor is very often God giving us new desires within our
hearts.
Sometimes it may very well be somewhat difficult for us to accept what
God is showing us and telling us.
One Sunday, after church—not in our church, but in another church in
which I had a ministry—two different members of the church called me
and asked if they could meet with me the next day.
So, I set up appointments with each one of them.
The first parishioner came into the office, sat down, looked me in the
eyes and said, “Yesterday’s sermon was the greatest sermon I have
ever heard in my life.” And
then we sat down for about half an hour and talked about what was being
said in the sermon and what that may mean in our lives.
After this first meeting, in about an hour, the next person came into
the office, sat down, looked me in the eyes and said, “How dare you
say such things as what you said in yesterday’s sermon.”
And then we sat there for a while and talked, but this time I did
not talk so much, but tried to be polite enough to listen to what I was
being told.
I’ve always liked to ask about this experience: “Which person do you
think I believed?” Everyone
smiles and knows the answer to that.
But, then after time, I hope I have been able to really take what
was said to me in both conversations with serious contemplation.
There was some truth in what both had to say.
It is not always an easy situation for us to receive what God has
for us.
In the passage we just read from Luke, when Jesus went into the
synagogue, stood up, read a passage of Scripture from the Prophet Isaiah
and said such words as “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in
your hearing,” the people in there were amazed.
The words Luke uses to describe the situation were that all their
eyes were upon him and they were speaking well of him, but then in a few
minutes, after Jesus shared some more thoughts with them they were
filled with rage. They went
from saying in their heart “YES! AMEN!” to being so angry that they
got up, ran him out of the synagogue and then chased him out of town,
threatening him and wanting to hurt him.
What are we to learn from this about ourselves, about God, and about our
relationship with God to-day, in this year, in this time of our lives?
The synagogue was the church, the people of God, in the days of Jesus’
life before the cross. Jewish
people of faith were keeping the Sabbath, and they gathered together,
like we do, in a building, for spiritual and religious involvement on
the day of rest. Their time
together was a little less formal and liturgical than what we do.
They simply came in and sat down.
Anyone was free to stand up.
When the someone stood up, he would be handed and then read a
passage of Scripture from whatever scrolls they had, sit back down, and
then they would simply talk about it—like we do in Sunday school.
At the end of their time together they would pray together and
that was their synagogue type worship.
It was informal and very opinion oriented.
So, in my own contemplation I can imagine how they, over time,
came to be a group of religious people who had the same opinions about
their faith. That is still
alive in a lot of churches today. “If
you don’t believe the way I do, I will either leave this church, or
run you out of this church.”
I believe one of the spiritual gifts that we have in the Presbyterian
Church, to share with God in giving favors to the world and inviting
people to come into the church of Christ, is that God’s love for us in
Jesus Christ and the faith in Christ given to us by the Holy Spirit is
much deeper than whether we have the same views over certain theological
issues. We may have
differences in terms of opinions, but we know our love for each other in
Christ is at a deeper level. One
person in the church may believe this, another person in the church may
believe what may almost seems the opposite of that, but when both
persons know the true love of Christ, their different opinions do not
separate them in their relationships with each other.
That is a true aspect of what the Presbyterian Church sees.
The people who were in the synagogue with Jesus became so upset because
Jesus implied by what he taught them that what they were believing about
God needed to be taken to a new level.
When they realized that Jesus was showing them that their
religion was not to be all about serving themselves and getting their
worldly desires fulfilled, then they got angry.
They were not condemned by God because of how they reacted.
When Jesus died on the cross, He died for them.
But, they are for us an example of how we may learn more about
who God is to us, and what our relationship with God truly is.
We are the church after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
So, our timing is a little but more gifted by the favor of God
than those we just read about. We
are the poor to whom Jesus has brought the good news.
We are the captives who have been released from the prison of the
devil in this world. We are
the blind who have been given new sight.
We are the oppressed who have been set free.
We are converted, regenerated, made new in Jesus Christ. As I said last Sunday, we were water, but now we are heavenly
wine for God to drink. All
this has already been accomplished for us.
God has done His biggest favor for us.
And now the favor that God is doing for us is educating us to
what all this means in our lives.
And here is one way that God does it.
As we read about these people in the synagogue who at first were
so pleased and happy with Jesus, but then became so angry at him, we can
see that Jesus was actually showing them that though they were being
religious in terms of their Sabbath worship and many other aspects of
their life built in the Jewish community, they were still being selfish
in expecting God to serve them by giving them what they want.
In Psalm 37, verse 4, it reads, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will
give you the desires of your heart.”
Let’s take what we have just heard and apply it to this verse.
“Take delight in the Lord.”
We are to take delight in the truth that we have already been
reconciled to God in Jesus Christ.
The greatest truth of our lives is that we are now brothers and
sisters of Jesus Christ and we have been adopted into the very
relationship Jesus has with God the Father.
God the Holy Spirit leads us to see this.
We are not blind anymore.
And as we take delight in this, God’s favor to us is that he will give
us the desires of our heart. That
does not first mean that he is going to give us what we want in self
serving worldly terms. It means that God is going to give us our very desires.
This delight in the Lord will give us new desires.
Before God gives us the object of our desires, one of the
greatest favors God does for us is He actually gives new desires
themselves.
This doesn’t always come easy. We
have to listen to that within us that we say yes too, but we have to
listen to that which, in some way, may make us angry, and ask what God
is showing us that we may even learn from this?
“Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your
heart.” This is the Lord’s favor.
Let us pray…
Amen |