When God Interrupts Your Plans--January 28, 2025

When God Interrupts Your Plans--January 28, 2025

"Jesus rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, 'Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing'." (Luke 4:20-21)

I have this hunch. Sort of a working theory that's being formulated in the back of my mind all the time.  I don't usually like to talk about it out loud.  But sometimes, like when I read these words from Luke's gospel that many of us heard on Sunday, I can't help it.  I have to say it out loud.

So here goes: I have a hunch that a lot of us church folks don't actually want ancient Scriptures to be fulfilled in our lives.  We aren't really all that eager to have God move in a definitive and clear way in the world, especially close to home in our daily routines, precisely because we are used to the routine and we don't want them up-ended or our priorities rearranged.  As long as God is silent, we don't have to respond to whatever God might say. As long as God is slumbering up in the sky and not moving, like a cat curled up at the end of the couch, we don't have to change.  And as long as God isn't stepping into history in some noticeable, non-ignorable way, I can just keep on doing whatever I am doing in my life without any nagging guilt or questions.  And I have a sneaking suspicion that a lot of us are just committed to keeping our lives on their current trajectories--making money, getting the kids (2.5 of them) off to good schools, having a nice place to vacation, piling up our investments, and then retiring somewhere sunny, where we'll live the good life sipping fancy drinks with tiny umbrellas, or whatever your version of it is.  We all have our personal goals and ambitions, and all too often, we want to use God to rubber-stamp them and bless our wish-lists to make them happen.  But we are rarely comfortable with the other way around, letting God step in and rearrange what we were aiming for and where we have directed our lives.

But if God steps into the story and some ancient Scripture is fulfilled in the course of your or my ordinary Tuesday, well, then all of a sudden it becomes clear we aren't in control of things.  Maybe even more uncomfortable, we realize that we never were.  Many of us, including faithfully attending church folks who sit in pews (or preach in pulpits) every Sunday, turn out to be what they call "practical atheists"--that is, people who might believe in our heads that God is real, but who conduct our lives by the assumption that God doesn't make a difference at all in how we live or what we do.  And it is easy--damnably easy--to decide that the close of the Dow Jones, the value of my 401(k), or the success of my favorite sports team are all more significant markers for how I face the day than the words of Jesus. And I can keep my life oriented on my money, my team, or my routines, so long as Jesus doesn't show up and disrupt everything with his different set of priorities.

That's my hunch: that if we had been there in the service with Jesus' neighbors in the Nazareth synagogue, a lot of us would have squirmed uncomfortably at the notion that God was fulfilling ancient words of the prophets right here and now.  That might just force us to consider that God is more significant than our bank accounts, or that Jesus might claim he makes a bigger difference in our lives than the GDP.  And a lot of us would just rather keep on aiming at our current target--more money, bigger house, and the rest of the life from the cover of the magazine.

So I warn you--and myself--that if we take this passage from Luke seriously, it will mean recognizing that the living God really does reserve the right to step into our lives and rearrange all of our neatly ordered values and choices.  God reserves the right to change our course or show us that the things we'd been living for before just weren't the things that really mattered.  God might just come among us, like Jesus in the synagogue, and say to us, "Here's what really counts, and here's what I think is worth spending a life on--good news for the poor, healing of the hurting, release of the oppressed, and jubilee forgiveness all around."  What would we do if that message interrupted your plans for this day?

That's exactly what happens in this scene. Jesus has basically told everyone in the room, "This is what I'm spending my life on," as he points to the list of items in his reading from Isaiah 61.  From there, we have to decide what we are going to do with this Jesus.  If we shrug Jesus off and dismiss him as just a random neighbor or an oddball rabbi who has no claim on us, then we are free to go back to chasing the dollar sign and perfecting our white-picket-fence lives.  But if we dare to believe that in this Jesus, we are encountering the living God, then we might just have to let him point us in a new direction, beyond our comfort zones, and into the path he is walking. And who knows where that might lead?

Well, that's the gamble.  Ignore God's moving in the world and keep on where we were already headed, or let God's interruption through Jesus point us on a new course.  I've got to tell you, as risky as it can feel, and as much as I know it will take me beyond what is easy and comfortable, I'm convinced it's worth it to go with Jesus.

Let's go together.

Lord Jesus, direct us as you will, even if it interrupts our familiar routines.