Midweek Message – January 22

There are a couple of things that are weighing on my heart and mind today.

One is the amazing witness of Rt. Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, at the Washington National Cathedral yesterday. You can watch her entire sermon below, or if you just want to watch the part that stirred up such a storm, you can skip to 12:25 mark.

It fits so perfectly with the scripture reading for this week: Luke 4: 4-11:

Jesus is quoting from Isaiah in this passage from Luke and I was struck by the similarity between it and the middle part of A New Creed:

¹⁸ “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
    because he has anointed me
        to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
    and recovery of sight to the blind,
        to set free those who are oppressed,
¹⁹ to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

We are called to be the Church:
to celebrate God’s presence,
to live with respect in Creation,
to love and serve others,
to seek justice and resist evil,
to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,
our judge and our hope.

What does this passage mean to us? Both as individuals and as a community of faith? You may have heard the expression: the role of good preaching is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. Both are present in every congregation and each of us move from one to the other depending on circumstances.

We had a very lively discussion at Bible Study this morning about the passage, that included politics, fundamentalism, the desire of some just to be happy at church, preaching, how to engage with scripture and worship in a different way, guilt, privilege, extravagance! Who knows what I will come up with on Sunday!

It’s our second week in the series: The Abundance of Jesus. Six stone jars in which water was turned to wine at the beginning of his ministry was a sign and symbol of the transformation of the community into abundant life. But this takes understanding our purpose–not as those who simply take care of “our own,” but those who especially are called to alleviate suffering in this world, bringing the kin-dom on earth as it is in heaven. With Isaiah’s words, we hear Jesus lay out his purposeful plans clearly–the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy of freedom for the oppressed.