Epiphany 3

Luke 4.14-21

Hymns: 79, 168, 313, 318

When Jesus performed his first public miracle and turned water to wine at a wedding in Cana, that miracle reinforced the disciples’ belief that he really was the Son of God. Mary, Jesus’ mother, had been convinced of that for 30 years. When she told Jesus that there was no more wine, and some servants to do whatever Jesus told them to do, it was with the personal conviction that Jesus, the Son of God, would do something to spare the bridal couple from em-barrassment and replenish the supply of wine. And he did...by turning water to wine.

Can you imagine the reaction of the guests at that wedding when word spread where this new supply of wine came from? Jesus had the opportunity to tell people that he was the long-promised Savior who had come to pay for the sins of the world and offer free salvation to everyone who believed in him.

The people of Nazareth whom we meet in our text this morning would have had a similar reaction. They knew Jesus as a boy and watched him grow up. To them he was Joseph’s son, an ordinary man. But he was more than an ordinary man; he was extraordinary; he was/is not Joseph’s son but God’s Son!

One Saturday after Jesus returned to Nazareth from Palestine he was asked to participate in the synagogue worship. He was given the opportunity to "make his case" that he was the Messiah, God’s promised Savior from sin. The people of Nazareth wanted to know more about his claim to be that Messiah and Jesus gladly seized the opportunity to oblige them.

And we today, 2000 years later, want to learn more about Jesus our Savior, too, from this extraordinary incident when JESUS RE-VEALED THE PURPOSE OF HIS MINISTRY: PROCLAIM SALVATION FROM SIN.

Visualize what was happening. Jesus, at the age of 30, was now for the first time telling people that he was the Messiah. And we are told (v 14,15). Jesus was gaining a reputation. Jesus’ claim to be the Messiah, and the power of his teaching and preaching, was enough to make the leaders of the synagogue ask him to lead the Sabbath worship. He read the Old Testament lesson appointed for that day, Isaiah, chapter 61...the same lesson I ready a few minutes ago (read Is 61.1,2). Listen again to this portion of Isaiah (v 18-21). Who is speaking these words...did you get it? It is the second person of the Trinity speaking...the Son of God...Jesus himself who, spoke those words penned by the prophet Isaiah and who would himself become the incarnate son of Mary. This is Joseph’s son speaking and he told them v 21b! "I am the one who spoke those words 600 years ago; I am the Messiah describing the work I would be doing as the world’s Savior...and here I am!

Can you see the members of that synagogue looking at each other and saying, "Did I hear what I thought I heard?" Then v 22
 

Let’s relate this incident to the ministry today. The people of Nazareth saw Joseph’s son standing in front of them leading the worship. Whom do you see standing in front of you? You see "Pastor Gabb." During my seminary years I preached in the con-gregation where I grew up in Milwaukee. When the members of Bethesda Lutheran Church looked at me in the pulpit they saw Ray and LaVerne’s son (my parents). To the people who saw me grow up in that congregation, the teachers in the Christian day school, my classmates and their parents, I was then and I still am Billy Gabb. In April when we celebrate our 25^th anniversary, Pastor Kevin Draper, Sleepy Eye, MN will preach in the morning service. To some of you he is "Kevin," a son of Atonement who used to work for IBM but now is a second-career pastor. He’s Jack and Judy’s son. To others of you he is Pastor Draper, a trained and or-dained pastor in our church body.

It is the sons and daughters of the members of our churches that serve in the ministry as pastors in our pulpits and teachers in the classrooms of our Christian day schools. I want to say to you sons and daughters of the members of Atonement, sons and daughters of Joseph and Mary or whatever the names of your parents are, as you think about what you’re going to do in your adult life, think about preparing yourselves to become a pastor or teacher having the privilege of sharing with others the message Jesus, proclaiming from pulpit and in the classroom the salvation from sin and death through faith in Jesus the Savior.

Jesus was more than a regular person...more than Joseph’s son. He is God’s Son. He created the world and made the rainbow...he made ants and elephants...he faced the temptations of Satan in the desert and drove him away with the power of the Word of God. He suffered the devil’s hate and his Father’s punishment while on the cross where he paid for your sins and mine. He descended to the devil’s domain in hell where he showed himself to be the victori-ous Messiah/Savior of the world who conquered death and hell itself by rising again from his grave. After his resurrection from the dead he appeared to his family and friends and to hundreds of people to prove that he is God’s Son and our Savior. Jesus is not an ordinary man; he is God, Redeemer of the world who proclaimed the message of salvation from sin.

And here is that message: (vs 18,19). You and I are poor. We are deep in debt due to the poverty of sin. We can’t bail ourselves out of this debt by working overtime to earn God’s forgiveness or by putting our good deeds/efforts into some kind of spiritual bank account where they can earn interest to pay for our sins. You and I are prisoners of our sinful nature; we are locked up in who and what we are by nature: sinful, lost and condemned souls.

We are spiritually blind. If someone drove their car through a stop sign and hit your car you would ask them, "Didn’t you see the stop sign?" When you are tempted to sin, you see Jesus standing before you with his hand up: STOP; don’t sin! What do you do? Plow right over him; run him down. Don’t you, with the eyes of faith, see Jesus? When you sin you don’t just disappoint Jesus, you run right over him!

Jesus brought you and me out of the debt of sin, freed from the poverty of sin because he paid the debt of sin for you. Jesus has freed you from being a prisoner to sin; you are free to say ‘no’ to sin because of the love and forgiveness of Jesus, the power of the Word of God itself that has been given us to use in our daily life. Use your faith and stop living as though you were a prisoner of war in Satan’s concentration camp. Jesus has removed your spiritual blindness so that you can see him as your Savior...his death on the cross...his empty grave enables you to see your salvation that lays before you in heaven.

The purpose of Jesus’ ministry was to pay for sin, to proclaim salvation to everyone who believes...the ministry of the church.