LECTIONARY READINGS
First reading: Nehemiah 8:2-6, 8-10
Responsorial Psalm: 18(19):8-10, 15
Second reading: 1 Corinthians 12:12-30
Gospel: Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21.
Link to readings
Appropriately, the Lectionary begins the reading of Luke’s Gospel for the Sundays of this Year (C) with a Gospel reading made up of both the Prologue to the entire Gospel (1:1-4) and the sermon in the synagogue of Nazareth (4:14-21) with which Jesus launches his public ministry.
The Prologue (1:1-4) sets forth the aim of the work. ‘Theophilus’, to whom it is addressed, stands in for believers of non-Jewish background. Luke writes to confirm them in their identity as believers, knowing that nothing will so promote assurance and confidence in engaging with the outside, non-believing world as a firm sense of identity.
The forging of this identity begins for Luke way back with God’s promises of salvation recorded in the Scriptures of Israel, above all with God’s pledge to pour out the Spirit upon humankind in the messianic age (Joel 3:1-5; Acts 2:1-21). This time of promise might be called ‘Act 1’ of the drama of salvation. ‘Act 2’ gets under way as the promise begins to be fulfilled in the Spirit-filled ministry of Jesus, told in the Gospel of Luke. After his death, resurrection and ascension, the story continues (‘Act 3’) as the Acts of the Apostles tells how the Church, empowered by his Spirit, carries on his ministry of reconciliation and salvation beyond Israel to ‘the ends of the earth’ (Luke 24:47; Acts 1:8).
In this way Luke aims to show in his two-part work how God’s great vision for the rescue of humanity, originally promised in the scriptures of Israel, reaches out and grasps pagans such as Theophilus and brings them into the story. Theophilus and believers of all subsequent generations, right down to ourselves, are woven into it. It becomes our story as well.
JESUS’ INAUGURAL SERMON
In his inaugural sermon at Nazareth (4:12-21) Jesus announces that the divine action is now moving from promise to act. What is remarkable about the sermon is how short it actually is! Jesus reads a text from Isaiah 61:1-2, then simply proclaims: ‘Today, this text is being fulfilled even as you listen’. End of sermon! The text contains so much – in essence, God’s vision for humanity – that nothing more needs to be added. Enough simply to announce its realisation here and now: good news for the poor, release for captives, sight for the blind, the oppressed to be set free, a ‘year’ of the Lord’s favour (lit. ‘acceptance’).
There are echoes here of the provision in the Law of Moses for the sabbatical year of Release (Deuteronomy 15) when all debts and forms of bondage (slavery) in Israel were cancelled. As proclaimed by Jesus, the ‘release’ in question refers in first instance to God’s ‘release’ of human beings from the ‘debt’ of sin – though this does not mean that the original social justice sense is thereby excluded. It is interesting in fact to notice that one phrase in the text as quoted by Jesus – ‘to let the oppressed go free’ – is not from Isa 61:1-2 but from a related text, Isa 58:6. In the wider context (Isa 58:5-7) from which this phrase is taken the prophet is complaining in God’s name about Israel’s readiness to be scrupulous about the ritual requirement of fasting while neglecting the far more significant duties of hospitality and social justice. The phrase, then, would seem to imply that the messianic ministry of Jesus, to be continued in the Church, will fulfil the social justice program that God, according to Isaiah 58, required of Israel.
THE LORD’S ACCEPTANCE
The text as quoted by Jesus comes to a climax with the announcement of a ‘year of the Lord’s acceptance’: the unconditional ‘welcome’ or ‘acceptance’ into the hospitality of God, with all burden of sin simply cancelled. This unconditional offer of forgiveness stands behind all that Jesus will say and do throughout his ministry. The ‘year’ or ‘day’ (see ‘Today …’) of acceptance will become very long indeed, stretching beyond Jesus’ own life to extend, through the ministry of the Church, till the end of time. We still live within the scope of that great ‘Today’. Every Christian sermon, however well or badly, should continue the announcement we hear so briefly from Jesus today.
PEOPLE OF GOD
The Second Reading (1 Cor 12:12-30) relates to the Gospel in the sense that the gifts that flourish in a Christian community, in both their variety and their interdependence, manifest the Spirit in the Church continuing the great ‘Today’ of divine acceptance proclaimed by Jesus.
The First Reading, from Nehemiah (8:2-6, 8-10), sets off the Gospel in the sense that, like Jesus in Nazareth, Ezra the scribe reads out to the Israelites returned from Exile the Torah that confers identity upon them. They all end up in tears – a sign of conversion and ‘homecoming’ – not just to their land but to their identity as People of God.