The Reverend Mike Riggins 1/23/22

The Acceptable Year

Psalm 19:1-6
Luke 4:14-21

In 2017 actress Bryony Hannah left the beloved BBC television series Call the

Midwife.  For six seasons she had played nurse Cynthia Miller, and then Sister Mary

Cynthia after becoming a nun.  That year, in the annual celebrities' popularity poll

conducted by the Guardian newspaper, Bryony Hannah checked in at number four on

the “Women of Great Britian” list, behind only the queen, singer Adele and world

champion heptathlete Jessica Ennis.  Unless you happen to be a fan of Call the

Midwife—and even if you are—you have probably never heard the name Bryony

Hannah.  Why did the British public love her so?

Her popularity had a lot to do with the character she played in the series. 

Cynthia Miller was tiny but indomitable, naive but brave, sweet and determined to

serve as an exemplary midwife.  She was the quintessential underdog who, when

knocked down by life, gets back up every time and rejoins the fray.  The British see

themselves in such a person; her appeal to them is irresistible.  In one early episode

Cynthia, fresh from her nurse's training, enters a classroom where she is to teach

expectant mothers about a new birthing technique.  These women, though Cynthia's

age, are far more worldly than she is.  As she stumbles through her talk, they start

making wisecracks.  She presses on, though she sees she is losing the room.  Finally,
one woman says, “She lives here, don't she, but she's not one of us, is she?”

The people of Nazareth must have felt that way about Jesus. He grew up there,

and now he's come back to town, but he's...different. Oh, things start well. Luke tells

us, “He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.” But in just

seven verses some will begin to question his authority. “Is not this Joseph's son?”

they ask. We ought to read this with our noses wrinkled. In effect these people are

saying, “We remember when Mary diapered him and now he presumes to tell us what

the Word of God really means?” Actually he goes farther than that. With characteristic

ambiguity he calls himself God. But we will get to that in due course.

Luke writes that after walking into Nazareth Jesus goes to the synagogue on the

sabbath and teaches, “as was his custom.” He is in the habit of doing this. This

means that as the weeks pass the people can take his measure. Not to use too

loaded a term, they can judge him, his thinking, his grasp of the scriptures. On the

day recorded in Luke 4 the synagogue attendant hands him a scroll containing the

early chapters of the book of Isaiah. Luke does not tell us whether Jesus requested

this particular scroll; to historians' knowledge the Jews then and there did not use a

lectionary, a list of passages used on particular days by all who wish to join in a

common study around the world. (The lectionary, by the way, led us to this passage

today.) Maybe Jesus wanted to read this passage, maybe the attendant or even the

rabbi wanted him to. Maybe it was coincidence—though when it comes to God's word

there may be no such thing as a coincidence.

words. He wants to read them. “The spirit of the Lord is upon me,” he begins. Isaiah

had written this some 525 years earlier, near the beginning of his illustrious prophetic

career. His formulation shows us that Isaiah understood that his prophecy came from

God. The words and images he felt compelled to share with the Hebrews came not,

he believed, from his own mind but from the mind of God. The spirit of the Lord

planted them in him expressly so he could proclaim them. We emphasize this so

greatly because Jesus by implication is claiming that same spirit motivates him. Also

by implication he is claiming greatness. If the great prophet Isaiah served as a

channel through which God communicated with the people of God, Jesus, by serving

in the same way, could stake his claim to being at least as great. Or greater, as that

spirit actually belongs to himself.

In a couple of decades the Apostle Paul would write to the Corinthian Christians,

“Test the spirit, to see whether it is worthy.” Think about what you hear the preacher

say. Turn it around in your mind. Does it conform with the general run of scripture?

Does it seem godly? Does it, as scripture says, edify? Does it teach? Does it build

up? In his great commentary on the book of Romans, Karl Barth wrote that one of the

best ways to test the authenticity of any person who claims to speak for God is to ask

how convenient is his or her message? For Barth, the more convenient the teaching

the less likely it is to be godly. So we ask, how convenient is the quote from Isaiah

that Jesus chooses to read? The answer is that it is terribly inconvenient.

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." The ruins of a two thousand year-old

synagogue have been unearthed in Nazareth. We cannot know whether it is the same

building in which Jesus spoke these words. Surely Nazareth, a small city on an important

crossroads, had more than one synagogue in his day. These ruins, however, contain an

elegant, richly appointed sanctuary, with finely carved columns and high seats (where the

rabbis sat to teach) made of marble quarried hundreds of miles away. Jesus likely defines his

impending ministry to the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed while speaking to

the rich. How inconvenient.

Later Luke will tell us of a rich young man who will ask Jesus what he must do to inherit

the kingdom of God. Jesus tells him to sell everything he has, give the proceeds to the poor,

and “come, follow me.” The rich young man, deflated, simply goes away. Watching his back

disappear Jesus will say, “How hard it will be for the rich to enter the kingdom of God.” We

had better take these episodes seriously, for every single one of us—including me—is rich by

comparison to the rest of the world. How can we receive the words and work of Jesus if he

aims them at the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed? A theme runs through the

whole of the Gospel of Luke that can give us hope. It may best be illustrated by the way Luke

phrases the Beatitudes. Whereas Matthew tells us Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor,” Luke

has it, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Luke himself, a physician the book of Acts tells us, is

neither a Jew nor is he materially poor. But he understands Jesus' purpose to be building the

spirit of every person who calls on his name.

Whew. We are not disqualified from inheriting the riches of Jesus. Yet we need
constantly to remind ourselves of two critical points: we must confess the poverty of our spirits

if we wish to follow Jesus, and we must minister to the poor, the captives, the blind and the

oppressed in his name. And now the time has finally come to speak of a rather large way we

might all be able to do both. Last summer, as I watched our precipitous withdrawal from

Afghanistan, I became appalled at what we left behind. Let me be clear. I agree with the

decision to leave. I disagree with the way in which we did it. We left behind billions of dollars'

worth of equipment and weaponry. Far more importantly to my heart and mind, we left behind

thousands of Afghans who had helped us during the decades we occupied their land. They

served us as guides, drivers, translators and more. Every Afghan who helped us did so at the

risk of putting a target on his or her back should the Taliban re-take power.

This, of course, happened at lightning speed. Our Afghan allies, seeing the Taliban

speeding their way, fled to the Kabul airport, the only piece of Afghan real estate still held by

Americans. They walked through a sewage canal to reach one guarded gate. They handed

their babies over the barbed wire fence. They did anything and everything they could imagine

to get out. They knew that if they did not they, their parents, brothers, sisters and children

would be tortured and possibly executed. The manner in which we left put their lives in

jeopardy. We did manage to get tens of thousands out. Without any sort of rational plan, we

improvised and planted them on military bases around the country, including Camp Atterbury

over by Columbus. Seeing all this, I felt a calling. I approached the Interfaith Council of the

Wabash Valley with the idea of resettling a few families of Afghan refugees here in Terre

Haute. The Council agreed in principle but did not want to take responsibility for organizing

such an effort.

So I used the Council's network of contacts in churches and academia to form a group
to bring Afghans here. We call ourselves Operation HEART. (The HEART acronym was

Andrew Conner's brainchild. It stands for Helping Afghans Resettle in Terre Haute.) We have

worked first with one agency tasked by the Department of State to place Afghan refugees and

then with another, Church World Services. Tomorrow our group plans to finalize its

application to serve as refugee sponsors. We expect to learn the details of four Afghan

families we hope to bring here by the end of February at latest. They will almost certainly not

be followers of Jesus. They will be Muslims. (Which, by the way, is why we have learned we

ought not publicize their arrival too broadly. Other communities ahead of us in this effort have

seen harassment of Afghans by xenophobic ignoramuses.) But these people have nothing

but the clothing they wore the day they blessedly climbed on board that airplane at the Kabul

airport, plus whatever American charity may have given them since. They are the poor.

When Jesus says, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing,” he says he

is the Messiah whom Isaiah understood his prophecies pointed to. He says he has brought in

the “year of the Lord's favor”. Elsewhere he says he brings in the “acceptable year”, code

language for the Jubilee, the year of freedom and blessing. But in Christ the Jubilee lasts

forever. It remains in place even to this day. To receive its blessings we must confess the

poverty of our spirits. We must turn to that same Spirit of God Isaiah and Jesus refer to in

search of spiritual riches. And we must join in Jesus' ministry to the poor. In the weeks to

come we will ask for help with our new Afghan neighbors. I have no doubt you will generously

respond. By so doing you will proclaim Jesus to people who do not believe in him as Lord

and Savior but who are therefore no less his children.

Jesus is the Messiah. In roundabout fashion he claims this identity in the Nazarene

synagogue. If you accept him as the Son of God you must also do his bidding. Confess your

poverty and serve the poor in his name.