The Perils of Preaching

 Jesu Juva

St. Luke 4:16-30                                            

January 26, 2025

Epiphany 3C   

 Dear saints of our Savior~

        It’s not very often that a sermon makes the news.  What we preachers preach rarely grabs the headlines.  So my ears did perk up last week when a sermon preached at the National Cathedral in Washington suddenly became headline news.  What struck me as a preacher was how one sermon could generate such vastly different reactions.  Some hearers were inspired by that sermon—or at least by the soundbites—concluding that the preacher had courageously spoken “truth” to power (like the prophets of old).  Other hearers concluded that the sermon was political and not spiritual—heresy from the mouth of a heretic.

        A similar range of reactions can be found in today’s Holy Gospel, following a sermon preached by Jesus in His hometown.  The First Century Fox News Nazareth Bureau likely would have provided wall-to-wall coverage.  Jesus was a local boy now beginning to make a name for Himself.  You likely could have heard a pin drop in the synagogue as Jesus read from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah:  The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.  This is the Word of the Lord.  So far, so good.

        But then Jesus sat down and began the sermon:  Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.  Wait.  What did He say?  This Scripture—these words of Isaiah about the Messiah—this Scripture has been fulfilled in Jesus?!  Today?!  This is Joseph’s kid!  They were carpenters.  They built a deck in my backyard!  Who does this guy think he is?

        Jesus went on to point out Israel’s long history of rejecting and killing the prophets God sent to them—and how those people with genuine faith were often not even Jews, but Gentiles—like the widow of Zarephath and Naaman from Syria.  You name the prophet—Isaiah or Jeremiah, Elijah or Elisha—these prophets of God were rejected by the people of God.  And any eight-year-old Israelite could tell you that.  It’s in the Bible, after all. 

        Jesus was just pointing out the inconvenient truth that He Himself would be rejected, just like all those who came before Him.  Fast forward five minutes, and Jesus’ hearers were filled with wrath and rage, ready and willing to throw Jesus over a cliff.

        Jesus’ sermon at Nazareth shows that preaching can be perilous.  You probably don’t think of my line of work when you think of risky occupations.  We preachers don’t handle high voltage power lines, or engage in high speed chases, or wield scalpels or bone saws.  We simply handle the Word of God, which is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword.  And if preachers handle that Word of Truth properly, then there will be times when the Word will sting and hurt and even offend.  It hurts to hear the truth about our sin.  We would each prefer a thousand pats on the back to one word of correction or rebuke.

        It’s easy for any Christian to misuse the Word of God.  It’s tempting (especially for preachers) to use the Word as a tool in our hands—to achieve what we want—to manipulate and mobilize the masses.  Want to start a program?  We have a Bible verse for that.  Want to raise money?  There’s a Bible verse for that too.  Want to trumpet a righteous cause?  Just take something from Corinthians out of context.  We look for what the Word can do for us, rather than what the Word does to us.  Ask not what the Word can do for you!  Don’t become critics and connoisseurs of the Word.  Don’t measure the Word based solely on whether it achieves the results you desire.

        But the Word remains the Word of the Lord.  And when the Lord’s Word goes forth from mouth to ears, and into hearts and minds, it does things.  It kills and makes alive.  It kills the sinner and raises up the saint.  It drowns the Old Adam and absolves the New Man in Christ.  It knocks us right off of our thrones and lifts us up from our knees.

        The Catechism reminds us that we should fear and love God so that we do not despise preaching and His Word, but hold it sacred and gladly hear and learn it.  Today’s OT reading from Nehemiah shows what this looks like.  The returning exiles were glad and eager to hear the Word.  They listened in faith for six hours straight.  Ezra blessed the Lord and the people filled the air with their “amens.”

        Faith doesn’t look at the clock and say, “Is it time to go yet?”  Faith says, “Give us more from the Word.  We can’t get enough of it!”  The returning exiles stood on their feet in the hot sun with no shade, no padded pews or pipe organ.  They held the Word of God sacred.  They bowed their heads and bent their knees.  The joy of the Lord was their strength.

        The reaction to the Word was quite different that day In Nazareth when Jesus was the preacher.  It just goes to show how the Word allows no one to be neutral.  You either hear the Word in faith with joy—or, you try to throw Jesus off the cliff.  I’m not quite sure how our Lord managed to slip away from the wrath of those rioters; but I do know why:  His hour had not yet come.  This little episode was but a foretaste of the rejection to come.  Jesus was destined to be rejected by men—a man of sorrows, not success.  He came to His own but His own did not receive Him.  He is the rejected and rejectable Messiah who will not force His gifts on anyone.  Three years later they would lay hands on Jesus again—and He would allow it.  And He would be crucified.  And in that crucifixion He answers for our sin and for the death we poor sinners deserve.

        Though Jesus was rejected by His own; He stands ever ready to welcome you.  In Holy Baptism He places His Spirit upon you.  And by that Holy Spirit you now have a heart that responds in faith and repentance to the preaching of His holy Word.  No matter how terribly you have tampered and tinkered with God’s truth in your own life—no matter the shame and guilt that follows you around like your own shadow—Jesus Christ stands ready to forgive you and love you.  For He was rejected in your place—sacrificed as your substitute.  He now reigns and rules at the Father’s right hand—readying you for a resurrection life that has no end.  And He brings all of this to you personally through the foolishness of what we preachers preach.  How humbling to preach that.  God, have mercy on me, a preacher.

        So listen up, dear saints of our Savior.  Hear the Word of the Lord.  Today the Scriptures are fulfilled in your hearing.  Your sins are forgiven.  You stand justified before God in Jesus.  You have a place at His table.  The joy of the Lord is your strength.  Hear it and believe it.

        In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.