Scripture Reading: Luke 4:14-30 Page 727

14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. 15 He taught 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. And he stood up to read. 17 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 preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 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 and 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. "Isn't this Joseph's son?" they asked. 23 Jesus said to them, "Surely you will quote this proverb to me: 'Physician, heal yourself! Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.'" 24 "I tell you the truth," he continued, "no prophet is accepted in his hometown. 25 I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah's time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. 26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. 27 And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed-- only Naaman the Syrian." 28 All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. 29 They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff. 30 But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way. (NIV)

This has been a great week because I have felt that the Holy Spirit was carrying me along. I think I have felt what Epiphany is all about. I hope that each of you who were anointed with the Holy Spirit have been feeling that as well. I would like to preach this morning an “after-Epiphany” message. That is, what was it like for Jesus to be full of the Holy Spirit? Maybe we can learn something from his experience that will help us in our lives.

The first thing that happened to Jesus was that he was “led by the Spirit” into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Luke says, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the desert where for forty days he was tempted by the devil.”[1] In the wilderness Jesus was tempted to provide his own bread instead of relying upon the Father. He was tempted to act presumptuously by throwing himself off the temple to see if all God’s promises really worked. And, he was tempted to take the easy way out by worshiping the devil instead of going the hard road of the cross.

So, if you have been tempted by the devil to go exactly the wrong way last Sunday must have been great for you, just like it was for Jesus. These temptations for Jesus were not to destroy him but to prove what was in his heart, and to make a path for you to follow.

You can mark it down as a spiritual rule that virtually every step of spiritual advancement is going to be challenged. I’ve known people who found that every time something spiritual happened in their life, there was a strong challenge to it in some other area of their life. At times it seemed almost demonic. Can I suggest that this is not as abnormal as you might suppose.

There is almost a three-part sequence.” First there is anointing. Then there is a challenge. Thirdly, there is success by relying on the Spirit’s power.

We have another illustration of this from the life of Jesus. After the temptation in the wilderness, Jesus returned to his hometown of Nazareth. On the Sabbath he began the Scripture reading with the words, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me...”[2] At first, the people were going with Jesus, but all of a sudden they turned and tried to kill him. Luke says, “They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him down the cliff. But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.”[3]

Does this seem negative? Should it work this way that the life of the Spirit ought to be exhibited in such a hostile environment?

I like to pretend that I am a gardener. I find it encouraging to see something grow that I have nothing to do with. Last month I planted well over 2,000 bulbs in my yard. I’m either going to have a colorful spring or the fattest squirrels in the country. People will quit going to La Conner. They will come to my yard. Every chance I get I go check and see what is happening. It is really quite a miracle. I am seeing green shoots coming up. The daffodils have been up for three week and the early spring tulips just poked up a couple of days ago. The irony is, the green shoots are clean. Grant Gorc was out playing in the same dirt for a matters of moments, and he came in dirty. The bulbs have been laying in the dirt, even completely covered, and their shoots are coming up clean. More than that, they will take what is in that dirty water and mud and produce beautiful colors.

How can mud and manure produce beauty? It has to do with the nature of the life that is within the bulb. The life within the bulb makes the difference. Add mud and manure to the wrong kind of life and everything rots. Add it to the right kind of life and wonderful things appear.

God supplies the Spirit and we apply the Faith that he gives us. If I was unwilling to plant the bulbs, believing in God’s faithfulness to make something happen, there would only be mud. Even now there is only green and faith.

Let me illustrate this with something that happened this week. For me the Chapel of the Resurrection is fulfilling several dreams. I am happy to be serving this community by way of the Funeral Home and Mausoleum. To me, it is what churches have always done and I like being in the flow of Christian history. Secondly, “The Chapel at Cedar Park”, the new liturgical service out there is going to meet a huge need in this community and it will end up serving all sorts of people.

The other part of the chapel vision has to do with weddings. The sheer beauty of that chapel makes it a wonderful place for a wedding. That most important day for a couple in love should be celebrated in high style. I have felt that we should reach out to people who know that you get married in a church, as 85% of people do in this state, but they just don’t know why. Not long ago we bought advertising space in the bridal books to let those kind of people know about what we have here.

This week, I met with a young couple who wanted to get married. They were starting the counseling that begins with a session built around the Taylor Johnson Temperament Analysis Test. In the course of that I learned their story. Both their lives have really been sad in many ways. Tragic deaths, abandonment, being forced to struggle just to live were part of their history. I looked at that19 year-old who had to take over the raising of a brother and a sister and I felt the pain of sin. I told them both that they had been victims of sin. Not their own sins, but the sins of others.

In the course of the conversation I discovered that neither of them were church people. Their religious exposure was only a tiny sliver. He had gone to a Young Life Camp where he had learned a Scripture that he tried to recite for me. He got the main part, “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son…” but he couldn’t recall the rest. She looked at him and said I have never heard that before.

I spoke to them about what God would be in their lives. He would teach them. He would lead them in the decisions they needed to make. While they weren’t truly responsible for what condition they were in at that moment, within a decade they would have shaped their own lives. God would help them to do that successfully. Did they want God to lead their lives? They did. We prayed, and they opened their hearts to the Lord.

I was thrilled on several levels. I was thrilled that an outreach ministry was working the way it should. Even though the devil had tried to get them off track, the Holy Spirit prevailed. I was thrilled for a couple who will begin a marriage with faith in Jesus Christ. I was thrilled for broken people who now have hope. They will have their problems. We all do. The difference is, there is now something inside them that can turn the mud into flowers, beauty for ashes.

When Jesus was full of the Spirit he quoted Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, 2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, 3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion-- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor. 4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.”

With the anointing of the Spirit, you can put down roots into the mud of life and flourish. Faith makes that possible.