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This Sunday might well be called Prophet Sunday. In the first reading we hear how the people were overwhelmed, were moved to tears by Ezra’s reading of God’s law and its interpretation by Nehemiah and the Levites. In the Gospel we hear Jesus proclaiming Isaiah’s announcement of his prophetic mission to bring freedom to the oppressed; this followed by the astonishing statement: “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.” And framed by these two incidents we have the prophetic Paul announcing the good news that we are all, no matter our position in life or our individual character, members of Christ’s body and joined to him and to one another; a foundational Christian message. Prophetic cries all of these, meant for inspiration, meant for response.
These early Sundays of ordinary time form the foundation for the public life of Jesus and his message. Today’s follows the Lucan version which puts this statement of Jesus at the beginning of his ministry, unlike Matthew and Mark. Clearly Luke is setting the stage for declaring Jesus the fulfillment of the Isaiah promise of freedom for all who are oppressed. And that, of course, includes ourselves.
How are we “the oppressed” then? Where are we imprisoned? What glad tidings do we need to hear today? Of course, there is in this proclamation of Jesus a call to us as his followers to bring about his Good News in our own times. We need to do what we can to bring liberty, which has so many faces for so many people, to those we encounter, whether nearby in our immediate environment, in our city and country or throughout the world. The prophetic mission of Jesus is for us; it also depends on our acceptance of his prophetic role for our world this 2010. But it’s true that, if we ourselves are unfree, any participation in his mission becomes at least harder, if not impossible, to carry out. And so I return to those questions as they speak to us. Where are we oppressed and imprisoned? Where do we need to hear glad tidings? What is Jesus saying to this assembled congregation? Where are we meant to be affected, as Nehemiah’s hearers were, by Jesus’ words?
There are, I would imagine, as many answers as there are people assembled here today. We vary in the ways we are enslaved, depending on the way we look at life and the experiences that have brought us to this moment. I imagine most of us are aware of our enslavements and their effect on our living. I’m also quite sure that we want to be more free, not only for ourselves, but for those around us as well who are affected by our unfreedom. What’s more, I’m confident that we do what we can to loosen the bonds of our character deficiencies and our history in some consistent manner.
But there’s always a way to go; we haven’t fully arrived. Of ourselves we can’t make freedom come about. The more we try, the more we fail, and that’s not a bad thing. It helps us realize that we, indeed, are not God, actually the first lesson of the spiritual life as Benedict tells us. Jesus reminds us that he is the one who will destroy our oppression. This is the gift he came to bring us, the reason for his incarnation and the message of his public life.At a December Oblate meeting we got into a discussion on the meaning of the word “grace.” Since then, I’ve noticed in the liturgies and readings around Advent and Christmas just how often that word occurs. Its basic meaning, as my research revealed, is gift, and gift coupled with power. Especially is that its meaning in the Gospel of Luke. Freedom is what Jesus tells us today that he is all about. It’s his gift, his grace, and it empowers us to join in his prophetic mission. Margaret Silf tells a story that, for me, captures the experience of grace, of the empowerment Jesus offers us today.
She talks about a newly-trained long-distance truck driver ready to face his first run on the job. He has to travel a thousand miles across Canada. It’s a dark night as he climbs into the cab of the truck to begin his journey; he switches on the engine and then the headlights. He realizes that these lights only penetrate a few hundred yards into the darkness, and he asks himself how he can possibly set off on a journey of a thousand miles when his lights reach only a hundred yards. He could possibly allow his fears to overwhelm him and turn off the lights and the engine and give up the whole idea of making this trip. Or maybe he starts to move forward. If he does the latter, he finds that the light travels with him.
Jesus promises to offer us a gift today, As a matter of fact, he promises a gift to our entire dark world. Caroline Myss, a writer who works at putting traditional ideas into contemporary terms, describes grace as a constant illumination for our life. She calls it a mystical energy that is real, one we know in what she calls our spiritual gut. If you’re like me, you sometimes wonder whether your personal liberty as well as liberty for this planet are possible. But like the truck driver, if we set out, we’ll find that Jesus our Light is with us and enough for each mile of our journey through time.
Today the Scripture passage is fulfilled in our presence. The prophecy is proclaimed to us the hearers. And as Nehemiah said, rejoicing in that message must be our strength.