Christ the King-Epiphany, Wilbraham

The Rev. Martha S. Sipe

January 26, 2025 / Epiphany 3C

Luke 4:14-21

It was a Sabbath day like any other in Nazareth.  I imagine people filing in, greeting their friends and neighbors, and taking a seat in preparation for the weekly reading of scripture and the discussion which followed. I see the ruler of the synagogue handing a scroll to Jesus.  Did they hand it to him because he was becoming well known locally as a teacher?  Did he volunteer to read that day?  Or was it just his turn?  We don’t know.  For whatever reason, Jesus unrolled the scroll and began to read from Isaiah – the part that we know as Isaiah chapter 61.  The words were already about 500 years old when Jesus read them that day.  The others in the synagogue had doubtless heard them many times before.  They weren’t unusual or strikingly new.  When he finished, Jesus rolled the scroll back up, handed it to the attendant, and sat down.  It was a Sabbath like any other until Jesus began his sermon, saying, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing . . .” and everything changed.  As another translation renders Jesus’ words:  “You’ve just heard Scripture make history.  It came true just now in this place.”  By his presence, Jesus brought Isaiah’s passage to life that day in Nazareth.  It was his first sermon.  And the rest of the gospels show how he embodied the prophet’s words.  Jesus is good news for the poor.  He is release for the captives.  He does make the blind to see and the oppressed go free.  He is the Lord’s favor, God’s blessing on all the people.  God’s Word came to life through Jesus, the living and breathing Word of God.  And the people in the synagogue heard Isaiah’s old message with new ears.

Today is a Sunday like any other Sunday in Wilbraham.  I’ve seen you coming in, greeting friends and neighbors, taking a seat for the weekly reading of scripture and prayers, and maybe, just maybe, secretly grumbling to yourself just a little bit knowing that you’ll be in that seat longer than usual this morning because of the annual meeting.  If you’ve read the annual report (which I hope you have), you will have noticed that there’s nothing very unusual in its pages, nothing strikingly new.  It looks an awful lot like every other annual report you’ve ever seen.  It’s pretty much annual meeting day as usual. 

But it doesn’t have to be.  In fact, it shouldn’t be a ho-hum, business-as-usual day.  It’s a day to celebrate all we’ve done with God’s help and by God’s grace.  We have responded to Isaiah’s call to bring good news to the poor.  More than $31,000 of our budget was given away through our mission money and our support of the Episcopal Church and the ELCA.  Almost 3,200 pounds of food was contributed to the Survival Center plus over $4,000 of financial contributions.  And there’s no way we could count the impact of all the in-kind donations – warm clothes and hats and mittens and pet supplies and meals through Loaves and Fishes and Cathedral in the Night and holiday meals for the Survival Center and a meal train for a member in a time of need.  We have been busy bringing good news to those who are hurting.  In 2024, we brought release to those who held captive by sin through our worship ministries.  With our worship in this place, in local facilities, and in homes and hospitals, the sacrament of holy communion has been received 4,352 times.  Plus, 8 different healing services have offered further release.  That’s a lot of captives set free.  In the past year, we have worked to improve our sight through our faith formation ministries.  Education opens our eyes to the way God is working in our world, and we have sponsored 35 Bible study sessions, 19 gatherings for book discussions, and 9 second Sunday children’s classes.  Our sight is improved because, through our studying, we see God’s plan for us a little better than we used to.  When it comes to setting free those who are oppressed, 2024 saw greater engagement in advocacy work for the earth through our Creation Care Advocates and for LGBTQ+ people through our RIC Study Group.  And 2024 was all about proclaiming the Lord’s favor.  We have blessed one other by being God’s presence for each other through fellowship and prayer and compassion, as through the Listening Circle.  All this and more we have done by the grace of God through Jesus, the living Word, working through us.  This is a day for celebration.

And it’s also a day to open our ears to a renewed vision of what God’s world could be in the year of our Lord 2025.  Because now, perhaps more than ever in our lifetimes, we need to hold fast to Isaiah’s vision and Jesus’ embodiment of that vision.  There’s been a lot of talk this week about Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde’s sermon in the National Prayer Service for Unity.  (Even the guy who delivered our paper from Staples wanted to engage me in conversation about the sermon.)  Now I suspect that there are a variety of opinions represented in this room.  You may think that Bishop Budde was too political.  But her words went right to the core of what Jesus preached in his inaugural sermon on the prophet Isaiah.  And while her words were, in part, directed to the President, in a larger sense, they were directed to all the people in that worship service, and in fact, to all people of faith in this country.  For Jesus’ work is our work.  As people of faith, we follow Jesus by bringing good news to the poor and all the vulnerable, by regarding them with humility that comes from understanding that we, too, are weak and vulnerable without the grace of God.  We are called to follow Jesus by proclaiming release to all those who are held captive, not just in prisons but also those imprisoned by greed and prejudice and fear.  We are called to help people to recover their sight when they have become blinded to the truth, and to set free the oppressed, including our LGBTQ+ and immigrant neighbors who are threatened by government actions which do not respect their basic dignity as human beings.  As people of Jesus, we must everywhere and always proclaim the Lord’s favor – by spreading the message that God looks with mercy on all God’s children, and calls us to do the same.  God’s call – today as it was in Jesus’ day, as it was in the days of the prophet Isaiah – the call remains the same.  But it is time for us to renew our commitment to embody Jesus in this world.  And indeed, we can do it – because the Spirit of the Lord is upon us, given to us when we were anointed in our baptisms.

Jesus began to speak in the synagogue, began his public ministry by saying, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”  May we begin another year of our public ministry with similar words:  Today in this worship service, today in our annual meeting, today and every day of the year to come, may the prophet’s words be fulfilled by the way we embody Jesus Christ in our work, and by the way we show mercy.