Posts
Then He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching them on the Sabbaths. And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority. Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon. And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, "Let us alone! What have we to do with You, Jesus of Nazareth? Did You come to destroy us? I know who You are -- the Holy One of God!" But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be quiet, and come out of him!" And when the demon had thrown him in their midst, it came out of him and did not hurt him. Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, "What a word this is! For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out." And the report about Him went out into every place in the surrounding region.
- Luke 4:31-37
Yesterday, we read that after His temptation by Satan in the wilderness, Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and the news of Him went out through all the surrounding region. And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all. So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read. And He was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written: "The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD." Then He closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all who were in the synagogue were fixed on Him. And He began to say to them, "Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing." So all bore witness to Him, and marveled at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth. And they said, "Is this not Joseph's son?" He said to them, "You will surely say this proverb to Me, 'Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in Your country.' Then He said, "Assuredly, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own country. But I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a great famine throughout the land; but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath, in the region to Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And many lepers were in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian." So all those in the synagogue, 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.
Then He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching them on the Sabbaths. My study bible quotes Ambrose of Milan: Christ begins preaching and healing on the Sabbaths to show that "the new creation began where the old creation ceased."
And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority. My study bible contrasts Jesus with the Old Testament prophets and the teachers of His own day, who taught in the third person ("the Lord says"). Christ taught in the first person: "I say to you." We can also reference the Sermon on the Mount, with its declarative quality in the Beatitudes: "Blessed are the poor in spirit . . ." as well as Jesus' own declarations about Himself: "Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill."
Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon. And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, "Let us alone! What have we to do with You, Jesus of Nazareth? Did You come to destroy us? I know who You are -- the Holy One of God!" But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be quiet, and come out of him!" And when the demon had thrown him in their midst, it came out of him and did not hurt him. Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, "What a word this is! For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out." And the report about Him went out into every place in the surrounding region. Jesus tells the demon to "be quiet" as the demon names Jesus as "the Holy One of God!" But Jesus will not fully disclose His identity; there is a pattern to what He is doing. He reveals truth and power with authority. But His ministry is not one of "proofs." He invites a voluntary faith, and doesn't identify Himself at this point as Messiah or Christ. My study bible cites reasons for this secrecy, and begins by referencing Isaiah (42:1-4) as foreseeing this need. Other reasons for secrecy are given as well: (1) the growing hostility of the religious leadership, (2) the people's misunderstanding of the Messiah as an earthly, political leader; and (3) Christ's desire to evoke genuine faith not based solely on marvelous signs. Instead, His ministry reflects a growing reputation in which it is His teaching that is in some sense exemplified or made manifest in the signs to the people. Without declaring Himself Christ, Jesus displays authority in His speaking and preaching, and power in the encounter with the demon.
It seems like things happen in Jesus' ministry that are meant, or perhaps function in some way, as revelations. There are certain things we accept as direct revelation, such as the appearance of the Father's voice, or the Holy Spirit's descent, at Jesus' baptism by John. That revelation gave us a manifestation of the Holy Trinity. Here in today's reading we have a different kind of revelation, one that is almost seemingly inadvertent, in the contact with the unclean demon. The demon speaks out, "I know who You are!" The demon speaks in fear of what is to happen; why is this Holy One of God present in the world? Jesus' response is to assert His spiritual authority: "Be quiet!" It is every bit as important to understand the power in this command as it is to understand Jesus' effect as He heals the man whom the demon has possessed. That which plagues and ails human beings seemingly has no choice but to obey Christ. It is another sense of the understanding that Christ is here to ransom human beings: the man held hostage to the demon is freed by Christ. But human beings are capable of grasping what is in their midst at face value. Jesus may simply be a powerful exorcist, a great -- if surprising or shocking -- teacher, a man who mysteriously speaks with a kind of authority that the people haven't seen before. Perhaps He's even a prophet (some will surmise later on in His ministry). But the idea that He is Christ or Messiah is hidden, elusive, and He will neither declare it nor allow the demons who try to rebel against His authority to reveal it. There are too many false expectations surrounding the notion of Messiah for the Jewish people. Jesus will first declare Himself in what He preaches and teaches, and what He does, before revealing Himself as Messiah. He is not going to be a political, nationalist liberator; He is here to reveal the things of God, to be a spiritual missionary who changes the qualities of all of our lives, and offers Himself as Christ to the world, not only to one nation. Things must unfold accordingly; there is a great deal of "worldly" understanding and expectation He is going to disrupt. It's ironic that the demon identifies Him, knows who He is. But in this appearance of the demon is revealed another thing: that there is a spiritual battleground present in this world. We may not see it nor understand it, but we do feel its effects, and Christ is here as a powerful ransomer meant to liberate human beings from one side in that battle, the demons who've sought to break from His authority and instead to assert their own. So far in Luke's Gospel, we've understood that Christ resists Satan and in that sense has shown more power and authority. Satan withdrew from that contest, awaiting a "more opportune time" for his temptations. Here, the demon is told to "be quiet" and must follow the command to come out of this man in the synagogue. But we are still in a battleground; our own interior lives may be a kind of mysterious battleground for all kinds of impulses, things that make slaves of us, and hold us hostage. Inside, we may be held hostage to all kinds of false beliefs, oppressive beliefs we don't understand about ourselves, things that cause us to be vulnerable to self-harm, giving a false picture of ourselves as unworthy of dignity, or too weak to stand in faith against all sorts of forms of temptation for self-destruction. What does it mean to walk as a human being with the dignity Christ gives us, and implies that we are meant for? What does it mean to see human beings in His sight: worthy of His sacrifice of His life, so that we are not held hostage to the things that keep us bound and enslaved to false notions? What is it, really, to understand that our very bodies are created for God's glory, our lives given in order to reflect God's light into the world? This is the liberation He offers us. We are surrounded by the effects of the things that hold us hostage, that teach us self-hatred and self-denigration, that mask true humility as some form of masochism, that keep us from understanding the value and worth we find as those who are faithful to God's love for us. We may be held hostage to a false egotism that supposedly offers us a good sense of ourselves, but masks our own need for change and healing, the weaknesses we need to address. Repentance is a way of being liberated from the things that enslave us in our interior, a way to be free and go forward. We shouldn't let modern problems persuade us that somehow times are different now -- there are just new forms of the same problems, and we still need the help and strength of our Ransomer. Let us call upon it at all times. Let Him lead us to the life He desires for us.
