Sunday 27 January 2019

Psalm: Psalm 19

Background

In Luke’s Gospel, this passage marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry . Previously, Luke has told the story of Jesus’ birth, including Mary’s Magnificat speech in response to the angel’s news (1:46-55) praising the God who lifts up the lowly, followed by the story of Jesus as a child in the Temple in Jerusalem. Then Luke turns to the story of John the Baptist and Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. This passage follows immediately after. Luke’s decision to place this story at the start of Jesus’ ministry (unlike Mark) suggests he wants his readers to see it as crucial for understanding Jesus’ mission.

In this passage, Jesus returns to his home in Nazareth and is invited to read from the book of Isaiah. He reads verses from the beginning of Isaiah 61 and makes the claim in verse 21 that he understands the words to be fulfilled in his reading of them. We have here both a bold claim that Jesus is the anointed one of God, and a vision of what his coming means: good news for the poor, release for the captives, recovery of sight for the blind and freedom for the oppressed.

The “year of the Lord’s favour” refers to the Jubilee. Jewish law envisaged a fifty-year cycle in which people could do better or worse financially, land could be bought and sold, and people could even sell themselves into slavery if they were desperate. At the end of that period, however, at the Jubilee, there was an economic ‘reset’; all land returned to its original owners and equality was restored. This was good news for the poor indeed and Jesus associates his mission with this periodic dramatic act of social justice.

To Ponder:

•  What does Luke want us to understand about Jesus’ mission by beginning his ministry with this story?
• What does it mean for Christians that Jesus is here concerned with poverty, imprisonment, disability, oppression and economic justice?
• How does it affect your understanding of Jesus’ teaching in this passage that his message was rejected violently (v. 28-31)? What reaction would it get in churches today?