On Balance in the Faith
Sermon for Sunday, January 24, 2010 (Year C, Epiphany 3)
Then Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee… He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone. (Luke 4:14-15)
Some of you may have read The Last Temptation of Christ, a novel by the Greek writer and philosopher Nikos Kazantzakis. This work was published in English in 1960, three years after the author’s death. It portrays Jesus as a profoundly passionate figure torn between his mission, which he struggles to understand, and his own human need for love, family, and the joy of life.
If you didn’t read the book you may have seen Martin Scorsese’s film adaptation, which caused a rather nasty kerfuffle with the Catholic Church and several conservative Protestant groups. These good folks were offended by a Jesus who was not in control. But what really left them sputtering was the scene at the end of the film which shows Jesus and Mary Magdalene making love, and then an elderly, contented Jesus sitting in the door of his house, surrounded by his wife and children. For some Christians, the idea that Jesus even knew about sex is a scandal. Unfortunately, these critics failed to understand that in Kazantkazis’ novel the blessing of love and family — and the opportunity to be just an average 1st century Jew — is the last and greatest temptation of the Christ, the devil’s final effort to entice Jesus into throwing aside God’s mission. Nor, apparently, did these good Christian folk notice that Jesus refuses to take the devil’s bait, and remains faithful to the work God gave him.
For me, one of the most captivating elements in the novel is the Holy Spirit. Matthew, Mark, and Luke agree that at his baptism the Spirit descended upon Jesus in the form of a dove. That figure of a dove leads us to think of the Spirit as a small, gentle thing, cooing quietly from a nearby tree branch. However, in Kazantzakis’ novel the Spirit is an invisible but powerful bird of prey which digs its talons into Jesus and drives him forward in his mission. That is not just literary license. St. Mark says that after Jesus was baptized, “…the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.” (Mark 1:12-13) There’s nothing gentle here: the Spirit literally throws Jesus out into the wilderness and into his confrontation with the enemy.
Thus, when Luke says that Jesus returned to Galilee “full of the Holy Spirit,” we ought to see a man who arrives in his home town of Nazareth not just deeply committed to his work, but also possessed by the Spirit and ready to proclaim both God’s will and his own role in fulfilling God’s will. This was not the carpenter they had known since his boyhood. No wonder the people of Nazareth were offended!
Jesus may well have had his moments of doubt, as Kazantzakis suggests — consider, for example, the Jesus of the Garden of Gethsemane. It would be very human of him to wonder if he had heard God’s call correctly. But the person who enters the synagogue at Nazareth is not wallowing in doubt. Rather, he is absolutely confident that God is working through him. Moreover, when he reads from Isaiah, declaring that “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor,” Jesus is not just reading a scripture lesson — he is reading his own job description:
to bring good news to the poor;
to proclaim release to the captives;
to proclaim recovery of sight to the blind;
to let the oppressed go free; and
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. (Luke 4:16-18)
Jesus clearly sees himself standing in deepest sympathy with the classical prophets of Judaism, who were the social critics of their day. For those Christians who give priority to the so-called “social gospel,” which looks to the reform of both individuals and society as a whole by the application of Christian principles, this scene in the synagogue at Nazareth is their own job description, as well as that of Jesus.
Now, there are other Christians, people we might describe as “charismatic,” who have a different view. Working with St. Paul’s idea about the variety of gifts, they emphasize certain gifts of the Holy Spirit, most especially the gift of tongues, that mysterious ability to speak in unknown languages. These gifts are regarded as evidence that one has been “baptized by the Holy Spirit.” Charismatics may feel that if one lacks such gifts, one’s faith is defective. And they may declare that the “social gospel” only covers up a lack of genuine faith in Jesus as the Christ.
Thus we have two rather different visions of what it means to be a faithful Christian. One, working from Jesus in the synagogue, prioritizes service with the marginalized. The other, working from Paul’s emphasis on faith and spiritual gifts, prioritizes belief in Jesus as the Christ. In our Anglican family of churches, these two groups have often been at loggerheads, sometimes regarding each other with open hostility and believing that those in the other group have lost their way, if not their minds. But it may be more accurate to say that each has only half the truth. As one commentator puts it:
“The advocates of a social gospel are correct in seeing this text [our reading today from Luke] as central to Christian commitment. Luke makes this event a coming out party (as it were) — the… equivalent of John’s account of changing water into wine. Jesus defines himself by his association with the dispossessed. The implication is clear: a Christian faith without a social dimension is a wimpish impostor.”
In my experience, a faith which emphasizes believing to the exclusion of just about everything else results in a faith which consists mainly of believing! It seems to say, “If you believe — if you have faith — then you’ve done it all!” But clearly that is not what Paul preached. Himself a Pharisee by training, Paul objected to a faith which says you can be justified before God simply by following the rules, regardless of what you believe or how you treat your brothers and sisters. We are not saved by works. However, faith brings forth works, because (as we read in Ephesians) we have been “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.” (Eph. 2:10) And as the author of the Letter of James puts it, “So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.” (James 2:17)
However, the same commentator also says: “The charismatics see another equally valid truth. Those who enter into a prophetic ministry without proper motivation — speakers who have no sense of being anointed by a persistent, nagging Power — can damage the faith as much as those who avoid the prophetic altogether.” In other words, a prophetic faith which is not grounded in prayer, meditation, scripture study, and other gifts of the Holy Spirit is, in the end, a secular, not religious, activity. This work may be very helpful to the people it benefits, but it does not build up the Body of Christ.
I would say, then, that as Christians we are called to seek a balance of these two important elements of the faith. On the one hand, we must embrace the job description Jesus put before us on that day in Nazareth when he read from the scroll of Isaiah. Like our Lord, we are called to bring good news to the poor, the oppressed, and blind, and all who suffer. But we must also build a strong foundation for that work. That foundation is our faith in Jesus, our commitment to follow where he leads, and our willingness to use the gifts God has given us through his Spirit. As Paul tells the Corinthians, these gifts include prophecy, teaching, healing, forms of assistance, leadership, and much else.
So, for example, when our kitchen renovation is finished and we can again feed those in need through our Loving Spoonfuls ministry — for which early April is now the target date — how will we approach this work? Will it be for us simply an act of charity for those in our community who lack enough food? Or will it be an expression of our faith in the Lord and a sharing of his ministry by making use of the gifts the Spirit has given us?
In this, and in so many other areas of our personal and common ministries, how do we know if we’re on the right path, doing what God wants us to do? One sign may be that we feel the sharp, sometimes even painful grip of the Holy Spirit, and the beat of her wings as that Spirit drives us forward, more deeply into our faith and more resolutely into our service with those in need. May that Spirit fill us as it filled our Lord. Amen.
— The Rev. John E. Laycock, Interim Pastor
Readings for Year C, Epiphany 3: Lesson — Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10 • Gradual — Psalm 19 • Epistle — 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a • Gospel — Luke 4:14-21
Collect for Epiphany 3:
Give us grace, O Lord, to answer readily the call of our Savior Jesus Christ and proclaim to all people the Good News of his salvation, that we and the whole world may perceive the glory of his marvelous works; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.