Fulfilling The Scripture

Luke 4: 14-22a

Jesus Reads from Isaiah

¹⁴ Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. ¹⁵ He was teaching in their synagogues, and everyone praised him.

¹⁶ He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, ¹⁷ and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

¹⁸ “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
¹⁹     to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

²⁰ Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. ²¹ He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

²² All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips.

After recovering from his 40 retreat in the desert, Jesus appears in the synagogue in Nazareth, reads from Isaiah to the amazement of the crowd, who later want to throw him off a cliff.  Jesus experienced his "ups and downs' as we do, but never loses sight of his mission, so clearly delineated by Isaiah. Reports of him had already been circulating as stories of his healings spread like wildfire.  Here he was, the carpenter's son, who had probably done work for some of them, now speaking boldly of his call to bring good news to the poor, freedom to prisoners, sight to the blind, and freedom to the oppressed.  His hearers welcomed his message but a few verses later after hearing him elaborate on it, turned against him.

Don't we wish to make a positive impact on others by our words and actions, by putting Isaiah's words into our lives,  but even after some success, we might find ourselves ignored, misunderstood or rejected?.We might not be brought to the brink of a cliff, but the going can be rough...May we set our course steadfast as Jesus did, and bear the rejection as well as the applause.

Bro. Rene