Amy C Walters

Jesus Rejected at Nazareth – Luke 4:14-30

Jesus returns to his hometown of Nazareth. In the synagogue, he reads the job description of the Messiah from Isaiah 61. Through it, we see the good news that Jesus offers: spiritual riches, freedom, healing, and a fresh start.

After Jesus spends 40 days in the wilderness, he begins teaching in the region of Galilee, eventually coming to Nazareth, his hometown. It’s a homecoming–seeing classmates and relatives, people he grew up with and lived among for many years. 

On the Sabbath day (the day of rest and worship), Jesus goes to the synagogue (the Jewish place of worship), which was his normal routine. At the synagogue, Jesus stands up to read the Scripture. The synagogue attendant hands Jesus the scroll of Isaiah. Jesus reads Isaiah 61:1-2a, rolls up the scroll, hands it back to the attendant, and sits down to teach. 

Jesus begins by saying, “Today, this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” It’s possible that there’s more of this sermon but Luke does not record it. He only tells us the passage Jesus read and that it is now fulfilled. 

In another post, we’ll look at his audience’s reaction to this brief sermon but in this post, we’ll focus on the message from Isaiah which Jesus says is now fulfilled. 

First of all, the passage from Isaiah says, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.” How do we already see this being fulfilled?

The Holy Spirit has had a major role in the last several stories in the Book of Luke. We see him in Jesus’ baptism, how the Holy Spirit descends on Jesus like a dove. We know that in the wilderness temptation, it was the Spirit that led Jesus into the wilderness and was there with him, helping him fight that temptation. Even the beginning of this story tells us that Jesus came to Galilee “in the power of the Spirit.” 

The Isaiah passage also says that “the Lord has anointed me.” Anointed means to be set apart. In fact, Messiah means anointed one, one who is called for a specific purpose.

What anointing does Jesus have? What specific purpose has been set apart to do? The verbs in the Isaiah passage make it clear. 

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoner, recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

The main verbs for what the Messiah is sent to do are to preach, to proclaim, to release, and to proclaim. 

Preach, proclaim, release, proclaim.

That is a lot of preaching and proclaiming! That is the main emphasis in this, that the Messiah’s ministry is going to be teaching and telling people about God and his kingdom.

Often when we think about Jesus’ ministry, we focus on the healing and the feeding and the miraculous things. But this tells us that preaching and proclaiming are primary. 

In fact, we already see Jesus doing it. What was he doing as he was going throughout Galilee in the power of the Spirit (Luke 4:15)? He was teaching in the synagogues.

What did he do when he came to his hometown? He got up to read Scripture and teach in the synagogue. Jesus came to preach and proclaim.

Now let’s look at what he was preaching about and to whom. We are first told that he has come “to preach good news to the poor.” He has come “to proclaim freedom to the prisoner and recovery of sight to the blind and to release the oppressed.” 

It’s interesting that the job is to preach these things to the poor and the blind and the imprisoned. It does not say that Jesus was sent to give money to the poor or to lift them out of their poverty. It doesn’t say that Jesus was sent to break people out of physical prisons. 

Now, Jesus did physically heal some blind people as part of his ministry. But this is talking about more than that. Because preaching and proclaiming are presented as the solutions to the problem. 

Jesus instead has come to deal with the effects of sin, the spiritual poverty that sin traps us in, the spiritual imprisonment that we face when we are stuck in our sins and the consequences of it, the spiritual blindness that we have to the truth. This is what Jesus has come to deal with.

And Jesus is saying, “I’m already doing it. I am fulfilling this Scripture today in your hearing.” 

Notice, too, the types of people mentioned in the Isaiah passage: the blind, the imprisoned, the poor, the oppressed. What do these people have in common? They are stuck in a desperate situation and cannot help themselves. People who are blind can’t make themselves see. People who are imprisoned can’t just walk out. They need someone to release them and give them freedom.

Jesus has come to preach this good news to people who know that they need good news, to people who know that they are stuck in a desperate situation and cannot get their own way out.

There’s one more statement from the Isaiah passage that we need to look at. It says that the Messiah comes “to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 

This is a reference to the year of Jubilee, a celebration that happens once every 50 years, where all the debts are canceled, all the enslavement ends and people are freed, land that had been traded to others is returned to its owner (Leviticus 25). 

The year of Jubilee is a fresh start. And Jesus says, that is happening now. You can have that freedom and release and redemption now. Because Jesus has come, and today the Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. 

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I forget what good news Jesus is. I have grown up in the church, and I have heard this good news, this gospel, my whole life. Sometimes I take it for granted.

And sometimes I get used to people rejecting that message. Jesus himself is rejected by people in his own hometown, the people that he was closest to. And so it’s easy to forget that this really is good news. That’s why we need the reminder of this key truth today: Jesus brings good news.

The gospel is incredible! But sometimes we forget it. We need to remind ourselves regularly of its power. 

The good news of the gospel is spiritual riches and healing and freedom and a fresh start through Jesus.