Finding Jesus (Luke 4: 14-30)

Read this passage in The Message translation
In a world brimming with hate, poverty, dissension, fighting, and fear I sometimes find it difficult to find Jesus in my everyday life. It takes a lot of work to constantly be thinking about Jesus and praying that he will find some way to find me each day. However, there are other times when Jesus throws himself out in the open and practically stands right in front of our eyes only to be ignored by those of us surrounding him. In this passage from Luke Jesus essentially goes to the front of the Synagogue and announces that he is the Savoir of us all! But how do the Nazarenes in attendance respond to what should be this powerful and uplifting revelation? They immediately start to think about questioning him with a surprisingly 21st century mindset.

Jesus however interrupts this thought process to answer their questions even before they are asked, continuing to quote scripture. Jesus provides a short, rational argument saying that both Elijah and Elisha before him did great things but they were not able to be so directly and concretely great to everyone around them. While he doesn't say this here, I believe this is a point when Jesus is alluding to the fact that he is undeniably different from the prophets of the past. He is different because he actually can do something great for everyone.

Regardless of what I believe Jesus was implying, the people don't take too kindly to this rational appeal. In fact, they decide that Jesus deserves to be thrown off of a cliff (Luke 4:29), which I admit doesn't seem like the most logical course of action for many of us today. However, I also challenge you to think about how you would react if someone were to make the same declaration today. I know that I would probably feel very similar to the people sitting in that synagogue 2000 years ago. I would want to ask why so many people in His Father's world are allowed to suffer. He might respond with the same two examples, and I don't think that answer would be good enough for me. It sounds like a cop out almost. It sounds at first like Jesus is saying that He might not be healing every single one of us. It would be so frustrating to sit there and here those words come out of the mouth of someone who just declared himself Messiah. I might have gone with that very crowd to throw the confusing and frustrating newly appointed Savior right off the top of the hill the town was built on. I imagine many of you might feel the same way, and I realize that it isn't so surprising when we claim that we can't find Jesus at work in our lives.

So what can we do to starting fixing our problem? Well, we pray. We pray, and we keep reading. We pray, we read, and we have faith that when Jesus is standing right in front of us that we will have the courage to stay, listen, and not throw him off of a cliff. I think we can start off on the right foot with a prayer.

Awesome God,
I admit that it often isn't easy to be Christian today. It gets to be even harder when I tend to have so much trouble finding your Son and your Spirit at work in my life. God, I know that there are times when you try so hard to reveal yourself in all of your glory only to have me push you away. I pray that next time we meet, you will grant me the faith to pay attention. I pray that I would simply be able to find you today.

Amen.