CLICK HERE for a worship video for January 26
Sermon for the Third Sunday after Epiphany – January 26, 2025
Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10, Psalm 19, Luke 4:14-21
Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ.
We often discount the power of words. We often say things like “talk is cheap.” Sometimes, of course, talk is cheap – but that doesn’t mean it always is! It doesn’t mean that words – whether written or spoken – aren’t powerful! Words have the power to create a new reality. They have the power to bring an entirely new life. Words have the power to heal and renew. They have the power to set people free.
Think of words like “I love you.” Those words are life changing! They pack a punch! Think of the words a couple exchange when they are married. Those vows establish a new reality, relationally, spiritually, and legally. Think of the words a judge declares when a child is adopted. With those words a new family is established. Think of words like, “I’m here for you.” These words have the power to bring comfort and peace in the most desperate and dire circumstances. Think of words like “I’m sorry,” and “I forgive you.” These words have the power to open up a new future. They have the power to set people free.
Many of you remember that I saw a Christian counselor for a time after my mother died. I came to this counselor with an overwhelming sense of grief and guilt, and some of the things she said to me continue to ring in my ears to this day. Her words brought perspective and healing and freedom from burdens I’d been carrying for decades.
Yes, words are incredibly powerful.
Words are powerful, and we have a God who uses them! We have a God who uses words! And if our human words are powerful, if our human words have the power to bring life, to create new realities, to set people free, how much more powerful are the words of our Almighty God! This is what most of our readings for today are about.
Our first reading from Nehemiah describes a dramatic scene in Jerusalem. The people of God had returned from exile. It had been a long and difficult time of rebuilding, full of disappointments and frustrations. They had finally rebuilt the temple, and now, at long last, their worship life was about to resume. The people of God gathered in the square. Ezra the priest brought the book of the law of Moses, the Torah, also known as “the teaching.” Ezra opened the book and read from it. He read the words of God from early morning until midday – and the people listened! “Amen, amen!” they said, lifting up their hands. They worshipped the Lord, weeping as they did so. These words convicted them. They grieved for their sins, for their disobedience. They repented for the ways they had failed to keep the covenant.
But Ezra wouldn’t let them wallow in their tears. He told them it was a holy day. It was a day of celebration. It was a day to not only be convicted of sin by the Word, but a day of remembering God’s faithfulness, God’s steadfast love, God’s deliverance, which was also recorded in the words of the Torah. It was a day of joy, he told them, for the Lord was their strength! And as Ezra spoke God’s words to them, their mourning gave way to rejoicing. A new reality was established. A new future opened up before them. They were free!
In our psalm for today, Psalm 19, we hear that the law of the Lord is perfect. We hear that it refreshes the soul and brings joy! Warnings are in the Lord’s words, it says, but also his promised reward. This psalm teaches us that God speaks to us in both law and gospel, with commands and promises. It teaches us that God’s Word cuts us down to size, but that in the same breath it raises us to new life. It refreshes the soul and brings joy. That’s the power of the Word!
In our gospel reading for today we heard how Jesus was the guest preacher in his home congregation. He took the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, found his place, and then read:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
Jesus read from a portion of Isaiah which was originally addressed to the people of Israel as they were being released from their captivity in Babylon. These were words which announced good news to these Israelites who had lost everything. These words announced that they were being set free from their captivity, that they would be able to see again after this period of darkness in their lives, that the burdens oppressing them would be lifted. A new year was beginning for them, a new season, a year of the Lord’s favor.
This is the immediate context of these words, but these words also pointed beyond their immediate circumstances to a day when the Messiah, the Anointed One, would come to bring a deeper restoration, a deeper healing. These words pointed to the coming of a Savior who would bring a new life, a new reality, a new relationship with God.
Jesus read these words. Then he rolled up the scroll and sat down. (Preachers sat down to preach in Jesus’ time.) The eyes of all were fixed on him, St. Luke tells us. And then Jesus gave a short, one-sentence sermon. It was a sermon only Jesus could give. He said, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
This might be the shortest sermon in history. It was only nine words – but they were powerful. The Anointed One, the promised Messiah, was now present and ready to fulfill those promises. Jesus was the one who had come to do all the things Isaiah said the Messiah would ultimately do. This was good news back then, and it is good news today too!
We gather for worship just as the people in Nehemiah’s day did. We come with our own disappointments and our frustrations. We come with the dust of our own disasters clinging to us. We come with our guilt. We come with our own sins and our struggles.
We gather for worship just as the people in the synagogue in Jesus’ time did too. We gather in the presence of the same Jesus they did. We hear the same words they did. Only now, they are addressed to us. The work Isaiah describes is sometimes thought of as a to-do list for us or for someone else to accomplish, but that’s not what it is. These words are a description of what the Messiah has come to do for us. It is a description of what the Anointed One has come to do for you!
Citing Isaiah, Jesus tells us he has come to bring good news to the poor. This certainly means those who are economically poor. It means the hungry and homeless. It means those on the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder. Jesus has come to lift them up. He has come to fill them up through the generosity of his followers. He has come to assure them that God loves them and that their lives have dignity.
But this good news is for people who are poor in other ways as well. This isn’t something you have to qualify for by proving a low income. This isn’t like Medicaid or Pell grants for college. It isn’t something that is doled out on a sliding scale. Jesus has also come to bring good news for the poor in spirit, for those who are in despair, for those who hunger and thirst for God’s love. Jesus has come to fill up every human heart which is empty and groaning for the presence and peace of God. Every heart, including yours.
Jesus has come to proclaim release to the captives. Just as God brought his people back home after being in captivity in Babylon, so too now God is working through his Son to bring all people out of every captivity – our captivity to death, our captivity to the devil, our captivity to our sinful selves, our captivity to fear and despair and to every force beyond our control. Jesus has come to deliver us out of our captivity so that we might be free and fearless as we make our way home to God.
Jesus has come to give sight to the blind. Jesus helps us to see what was hidden from us before. He has come to give us eyes of faith that can perceive God’s work in our lives, so that we can see God’s gifts given to us in Word and Sacrament, so that we can see the truth of who God is. Jesus has come so that we can all sing with joy, “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.”
Jesus has come to let the oppressed go free, to release us from the weight of sin and guilt, to release us from past trauma or failings, to lift the burdens we’ve been carrying on our shoulders and our hearts.
Jesus has come to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, a new season of hope and healing, a new season of forgiveness and new life.
Jesus doesn’t do all of this by words alone. He backed up his words with actions. He lived out his words by taking our sins upon himself on the cross. He has established a new reality for us by dying our death for us. He has opened up a new future for us by being bodily raised by the Father in a new and eternal life that he promises to share with us.
But our Lord Jesus delivers his saving work to us here and now through words. Listen to the verbs: He brings good news. He proclaims. Jesus speaks to us through the written words of the holy scriptures. He speaks to us through the scripture-soaked words of the liturgy. He speaks to us through the borrowed voice of a preacher. And today his precious, powerful words are fulfilled in your hearing.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Rev. Jeffrey R. Spencer
Oak Harbor Lutheran Church