Friday, January 18, 2019
Luke 4:28-30 . . . when they heard these things, were filled with wrath, and rose up and thrust Him out of the city; and they led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw Him down over the cliff. Then, passing through the midst of them, He went His way.
EXTREME LOVE
In the last few years "extreme sports" have become popular. People take a sport into an extreme situation for the thrill of it -- sky-diving off of skyscrapers, snowboarding off mountain cliffs, kayaking remote raging waters.
Preaching the gospel is not a sport and it's hard to imagine taking it into an extreme environment until we consider Jesus' preaching in hometown Nazareth and see Him being hustled to the edge of a 40 foot cliff by angry townspeople.
When the people of Nazareth refused to believe that they were the poor sinners of whom Isaiah spoke, and when they refused to believe that Jesus was the Chosen of God, Jesus did not give up on them. In extreme love He showed them that their rejection of Him was unbelief. And if they rejected Him, the Gospel would be proclaimed to others who would receive it, even Gentiles. He made His point by using two examples familiar to them. In the days of Elijah there was the Gentile Widow in Zarephath. In the days of Elisha there was the Gentile Naaman, the Syrian.
Jesus' message is crystal clear. God's grace is not bestowed based upon familiarity or outward connections. The people were filled with indignation. "They were unbelievers?! Why, they were in the synagogue! They were God's chosen people!"
They rose up and rushed him out of the synagogue and intended to throw Him off a cliff. Jesus' extreme love would not allow it. Jesus would not be thrown to His death in Nazareth, for He had an appointment far more extreme at a place called Golgotha, on the brow of a hill outside Jerusalem. There Jesus' extreme love moved him to lay down His life for the people of Nazareth and Jerusalem -- and even for you and me.
We also are not OK, but sinful. We have sinful hearts just like the people of Nazareth. There is the same potential in us to reject Jesus, were it not for His extreme love. So we sing:
"Lord, 'tis not that I did choose Thee; that I know could never be;
For this heart would still refuse Thee had Thy grace not chosen me.
Thou hast from the sin that stained me washed and cleansed and set me free And unto this end ordained me that I ever live to Thee."
(The Lutheran Hymnal, 37:1)
