Luke 4:14-21
Jesus was in his hometown—his small hometown—which means that everybody there knew him. They knew Mary and Joseph and all his cousins. Many of them probably were his cousins. The older folks remembered watching him grow up, remembered how clumsy he was when he was ten, how his voice cracked when he was fourteen. The younger people remembered playing games with him, remembered whether he was picked first or last for the team. They knew Jesus. And although I’m sure he was a nice Jewish boy, he was always a bit odd. He went away for a while, started gathering a following, and then came back with some wild ideas. He read from the prophet Isaiah in the synagogue—nothing unusual about that—but then he said “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
This scripture? The one about good news for the poor? The one about releasing captives and letting the oppressed go free? How had that possibly been fulfilled? “That particular chapter in Isaiah is loaded with transformative imagery. If even half of the salvation and restoration Isaiah talked about there were to come to fulfillment, no one could possibly miss seeing it!”[1] And they definitely weren’t seeing it. There was hardship all around them. The oppressed were still being oppressed. The poor hadn’t heard good news in decades. What in the world was Jesus talking about?
Imagine something similar happening today. Imagine someone predicting that the day would come “when every unemployed person would find meaningful and fulfilling work, when every crack addict would recover from his addiction, and when every broken down inner-city tenement would get an ‘extreme makeover’ such that every such hovel would shine and gleam like some multi-million-dollar New York City penthouse overlooking Central Park. Now those are the kind of grand promises that, if ever they were fulfilled, no one could miss seeing it…. Probably people had similar views of Isaiah 61. So how could Jesus sit down quietly and make the wild claim that it was fulfilled? Right then. Right there. Fulfilled. Really, Jesus? How? Where?”[2]
But Jesus didn’t say that the achievement of these glorious things had been accomplished. He only said that he had come to declare them, to proclaim them. The fulfillment was a process. Sometimes we don’t get set free all at once.
About ten years ago I attended a workshop in New York City on preaching delivery. Karen, the primary instructor, was a Broadway acting coach. Karen told us that she had worked with some of the top names in the theater and quite a few in the world of television and movies as well. There were only six students in this class, four men and two women. Two of us were United Church of Christ, plus we had two United Methodist, one Episcopal, and one Baptist. Each of us brought our own skills and gifts … and idiosyncrasies and problems and concerns.
First there was “Mark.” (I’ve changed their names to protect confidentiality and because, frankly, I no longer remember their names! But I do remember their stories.) I remember that Mark wanted a clear, resonant voice, what he called a sports announcers’ voice. He thought he’d be a better preacher if he had a better voice. “Charles” was also worried about his voice. He’d had surgery for sleep apnea, and the changes to his soft palette gave him a vocal quality he thought interfered with the message. “Peter,” who was from India, was worried about his accent. He served a well-educated, high-income, high-expectation congregation, and he feared that his accent and his occasional grammar mistakes were alienating his congregation. “Betsy” thought maybe her laid-back preaching style might be communicating a lack of passion for the Gospel.
And then there was “Bart.” Bart didn’t seem worried about much of anything. He came across, frankly, as someone who was not particularly open to learning and was only there for the continuing education credits and to show off his skills. The other woman in the group and I took an immediate dislike to him. No, that’s a bit harsh. We didn’t dislike him—we just didn’t trust him. He came in late and jumped into the middle of a conversation he didn’t understand, without taking the time or effort to size up the situation or his place in the group. In the process, he made an insensitive joke that hurt one man’s feelings. Bart just didn’t quite fit in the group. The rest of us seemed willing to be open and vulnerable. Bart did not. He called himself a people-pleaser, but I didn’t believe it for a minute. I pegged him immediately as a Lone Ranger Pastor—the kind who does just fine on his own, thank you very much, and doesn’t need community to help him along. I pictured him going to clergy gatherings, but only to share his wealth of knowledge with others.
After we all talked about our goals for the workshop and our concerns about our delivery, we took turns giving a four minute excerpt of a sermon. Then we were the focus of instruction and correction for the next 40 minutes. As you might expect from a group of preachers, most of us preached more than 4 minutes! But no matter how long we preached, we still were on the hot seat for the next 40. It was scary. It felt so vulnerable, sitting in front of friends and strangers, having your weaknesses pointed out to everybody in the room.
The biggest surprise was how wrong everybody was in their own perceptions. Mark, who wanted a clearer, more resonant voice, had a wonderful voice for preaching. Charles, who feared that the damage to his mouth and throat interfered with the message told us a story that made me feel like Christ came right into our midst. Peter, who worried about his accent, was quite easy to understand and so very likeable that even I, as a former editor, didn’t mind his mistakes. Betsy’s laid-back style was actually comforting and challenging at the same time. Oh, each of us had plenty of issues to work on, areas in need of improvement. And, after building us up, she didn’t pull any punches about our problems. But our fears and concerns were all misplaced, and were holding us back.
Karen set us free. Karen, who told us stories about working with Kevin Kline and Denzel Washington, set these preachers free from the bondage of our own anxiety, our own misplaced expectations. And because we knew she knew her stuff, we believed her. We knew that if she said it, it had to be true. The captives were released; the blind were given sight; the oppressed were set free.
And then there was Bart. I expected a little bit of cockiness in the pulpit. I expected a bombastic voice and a look-at-me attitude. I was wrong. He looked so uncomfortable in the pulpit. He walked out from behind it as he gave an example, and we connected with him momentarily. But then he went back behind the pulpit and read from his notes with his head down and his throat closed off, seldom making eye contact. I just knew Karen would call him on that. I knew she would point out his strengths, build him up, like she’d done with all of us, but then I thought she would point out this annoying vocal habit of his.
Karen did nothing of the sort. Karen saw through the act that I didn’t see through. She saw a man who said he wanted to speak up for those who had no voice but who was so afraid of his own voice that he constricted it. She saw a man who was so afraid of being viewed as a Bible-thumping Baptist that he squelched any passion he might feel. She never mentioned the mechanics of reading and speaking. She didn’t work on improving eye contact. Instead she made him stand up there and be the kind of preacher he detested. She made him pick a preacher whose style he couldn’t stand—he chose Jimmy Swaggert, if I recall correctly—and preach a sermon in Jimmy’s style but on behalf of the poor and the hungry. He couldn’t do it. So Karen made the rest of us get up beside him and try to out-yell and out-preach him. He was supposed to make himself the center of attention. We all started preaching at the top of our lungs, and once Bart got going, too, she waved us off, one by one. As soon as the last person was silent and Bart truly was the center of attention, he fell silent, too. He couldn’t do it. He was miserable. We were miserable for him. When he finally said he couldn’t take any more, Karen let him off the hot seat, although I’m guessing he went home still feeling very much on the hot seat, because I am certain that experience did not quickly fade away.
Karen tried to set him free. She tried to bring good news to the poor in spirit. She tried to proclaim release to the captive. But I guess some people are harder to set free than others. It took me a long time to realize how much I needed to be set free, too—free from the bondage of my critical attitudes toward people like Bart. I didn’t recognize his need because I spent too much time judging him to see him. Great pastoral move there, huh? The acting coach showed more of a pastor’s heart that day than I did.
We all need to be set free. Some of us are bound by inaccurate views of ourselves, some of us by inaccurate views of others. Some of us are bound by shame, others of us by our habit of placing blame. Some of us are oppressed and some of us are oppressors and most of us are both. We all need to be set free.
It is not a little thing … because it’s not about improvement. It’s about transformation. Jesus doesn’t say “God has anointed me to bring OK news to the poor.” Jesus doesn’t say “God has sent me to proclaim softer handcuffs to the captives or to give the oppressed better living conditions in jail.” Jesus pronounces deliverance. Recovery. Freedom. Transformation. Too often we settle for improvement instead of change, progress instead of transformation. And we settle for ourselves and for others.
You may have noticed that when I told you about the preaching delivery workshop, I didn’t tell you about my own issues and concerns. And I didn’t tell you what she said to me. Karen helped me see some practical things I needed to do better, some bad habits I had fallen into—like smiling too much, even when it’s not appropriate to what I’m saying. I said I was trying to soften the message; she said I was, at best, diluting it, and at worst, contradicting it. She helped me see that it was more about people liking me than about delivering the message. Then came the hard part. She told me that I wasn’t preaching in my authentic voice. She said, “You may not know when you lost your authentic voice as a person, but you haven’t found it again–at least not as a preacher—and until you do, your impact will be limited.” Those words did not set me free. But they did help me see how very bound I was.
I don’t know if I have truly found my authentic voice in all its fullness. I’d love to hear what Karen would say now if she heard me, ten years later. (Well, I think I would love to. I’m not sure!) I do know that I am a lot closer than I was then, because I am more authentic now … which is important if I am going to stand here and read, “The spirit of the Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor and to proclaim release of the captives.” And I’m not the only one who is supposed to say this. The Spirit of the Lord is upon all of us. So turn back to Luke 4 with me. Look again at verses 18 and 19. Now read them out loud with me.
“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.”
It’s my job and it’s your job, too. So find your voice. Discover your courage. Claim your freedom. The Spirit of the Lord is upon you. Amen.
[1] Hoezee, Scott. Epiphany 3C, The Lectionary Gospel, Center for Excellence in Preaching.
[2] Ibid.