The Lutheran Hour
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"The Unexpected"
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Text: Luke 6: 17-20
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Eternal God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, grant us Your Holy Spirit who writes the preached Word into our hearts so that we may receive and believe it, and be gladdened and comforted by it for today and for eternity. Glorify Your Word in our hearts, Lord. Make it so bright and warm that we may find pleasure in it. And through Your inspiration, think what is right. By Your Holy Spirit’s power, fulfill the Word for the sake of Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord. Amen.
Well, dear listener, grace, mercy, and peace be multiplied to each and every one of you wherever you find yourself from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit. I’ve entitled the message for today’s meditation “The Unexpected.” It comes from Luke 6, and I’ll be reading verse 17 to 20. The Gospel reading for our meditation.
Jesus went down with them and stood on a level plain. A large crowd of His disciples was there and a great number of people from all over Judea, from Jerusalem and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon. They’d come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases. And those troubled by evil spirits were cured. And all the people all tried to touch Him because power was coming from Him and He healed them all. Looking at His disciples, He said, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.”
Here ends our text.
How are you holding up, dear listener? Well, that’s another way of asking the question, “How are you doing?” However, when you ask how are you holding up? It really takes a bit more reflection to answer. If you ask how are you doing? Well, people usually answer with “Okay” or “Fine.” But when you ask how are you holding up? You give them an opportunity to reflect and let them know that you really care. So how are you holding up?
I remember a testimony given by a young student from the country of Colombia who was given the privilege to come to Canada to study, and that’s where I heard his testimony. He told the story of how God rescued him. You see, he was born in Bogota, the capital of Colombia. And he came from a very poor family that lived in the worst slum in the city. He talked about the hardships his family faced, and yet his mother had this amazing faith and trust in God.
He told how the slum was filled with poverty and hopelessness. However, his mother always seemed to have hope, even in the midst of the pain and the poverty that she lived in. Two of his brothers were killed in the slum: one because of drugs and the other because of violence. And after their deaths, in his mourning he came to His mother and asked her “Mom, how are you holding up?” His mother looked at Him in tears and said, “I’m holding up because Jesus is holding me up.”
You see, even in the midst of this pain and poverty, this loss and destruction of life, mom had hope. She wasn’t happy in her circumstances. She was grieving, but she had joy because Jesus was holding her up and He was with her. He continued. I remember one of the old men of the slum being reviewed on TV. He was at the entrance of the slum, and the interviewer asked him, “You’ve lived in the slum all your life. Have you ever seen anyone leave the slum or how does that happen?” And he answered, “In all my years of living here, people leave the slum in one of two ways—either a coffin or Jesus.”
Behind him painted on the entrance wall to the slum where the words “Jesus Saves” in red letters. Today in our meditation on God’s Word, we read the historical account from St. Luke, where he records Jesus speaking and what is referred to as the “Sermon on the Plain.” Here, we’re told that Jesus went down with His disciples and then found a level place and stood there to teach, I guess. It was a good place so that He could be heard by all.
We were told that there was a large crowd of His followers, disciples, and that a great number of people from all over Judea and Jerusalem and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon. Wow! What a crowd! Now, if we take some time to look at this crowd, we see truly the unexpected. We see that there were not just Jewish people, and that was amazing in itself and unexpected. You see, there was terrible racism in Jesus’ day where the Jews and the non-Jews or the Gentiles didn’t speak or come in contact with each other. The Gentiles knew this and so did the Jews.
But with Jesus, everything changes. We see in this crowd people who had never come together before. They’re coming together now. Why? And notice why the crowd had come. They came because they wanted to hear Jesus. They wanted to be taught by Jesus. They came to hear His Word. Perhaps that’s why you’re listening today because you’ve come to hear His Word, too. Well, these people found something unexpected in Jesus. They found in Jesus words of hope and words of comfort, words of forgiveness in the midst of all sorts of cultural, racial, and gender barriers. It was as if there was a different kingdom and the kingdom where everybody was welcome. A kingdom where everybody was cared for and special and loved and received.
Yes, God’s Word tells us that with Jesus comes the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven, a new authority, a new way of looking at things. Jesus came to seek and save the lost. And it didn’t matter what group or gender or race or language or country or profession or political persuasion you had. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, enemies, the sick, the mentally challenged, the demon possessed. You see, all are welcomed by Jesus and so are you.
You didn’t have to have your act together. You didn’t have to be perfect or ritually pure as if you could. You just needed to be humble enough to know you needed help, that you couldn’t fix yourself and that you needed help from outside of yourself. And that’s why Jesus talks about when He says, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.”
Here’s what is called the “Beatitudes,” and these are recorded in Matthew’s Gospel as well, and they’re called the “Sermon on the Mount.” Jesus explains that the kingdom of God is very different than the kingdom of the world. In the Greek language in which the New Testament was written, the word for world is “cosmos.” And often it can be defined as humanity trying to organize society without God.
Well, the kingdom of God is very different. The authority is God. It’s like a new sheriff in town and He’s come to us in the Person of Jesus. Jesus is God in the flesh. That’s what Christmas is all about. And He comes to us as the perfect human who’s also perfect God. You want to know what a perfect human looks like, look at Jesus. Well, people noticed the great difference in Jesus. Remember they came from all over, from Judea and Jerusalem, the coast of Tyre and Sidon in that area that we know today as Lebanon.
And they came because they heard about Jesus and they wanted to hear and see Him themselves. Many of them came because they were sick and were looking for healing. Others came because they were troubled by evil spirits and they were looking to be cured, freed, but all were coming because they were looking for hope, for help. And all of them were healed. They saw power coming from Jesus our text says, and they wanted to touch Him; they wanted to be healed of whatever it was that was burdening them. And our text tells us all were healed.
Remember, maybe you don’t, but in Matthew 11:28, Jesus says, “Come to Me all you who are weary and burdened, and I’ll give you rest.” I remember how the Lord used this verse to bring a young Muslim Iranian man to faith. He had come to Romania and there someone gave him a Bible. He didn’t want to read it. He actually didn’t even want it, but the man insisted. And so he took it graciously and stuck it in his knapsack and forgot all about it.
Because of the many difficulties that he faced in the different circumstances, he had to end up going back to his small village in Iran. He was very depressed and felt like a failure because all that he tried to do and make, and all the success he tried to accomplish, it just fell apart and forced him back to his home. He found himself on the roof of the house in despair. And there as he reached to His backpack, he felt a book and remembered he received a Bible. He thought, “Well, what can it help?” But he took it out and opened it and began to read. And there his eyes fell upon Matthew 11:28. “Come to Me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I’ll give you rest.”
It was these words of Jesus in that verse that the Holy Spirit used to open his heart, and faith came pouring in as he wanted to learn more and more about this Jesus who comes to bring forgiveness and peace for his soul. You see, he saw his poverty of spirit. He saw his need for help. And God came to him through the very words of Jesus, just as He comes to us today. So in our lesson for today, as people from all people groups came to hear Jesus and as Jesus healed them all, Jesus began to teach them. And He said, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.”
In Matthew’s Gospel, it adds in chapter five, verse three of Matthew, “Blessed are you who are poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The poverty here is twofold, really. First of all, it’s a poverty of spirit. In other words, when you know that you can’t save yourself, when you know that all the self-help books and guidelines often make you feel more guilty and burdened, and don’t save you. It’s just an extra burden.
It’s when you understand that you can’t save yourself and that only God can rescue you, then you’re willing to accept God’s gift to you, His gift of forgiveness and salvation. And so you enter into the kingdom of God by recognizing your poverty of spirit and not rejecting God’s Word and His love. But second, it can also imply that the kingdom of God is not about earthly wealth. It doesn’t depend on how much money you have or how rich you are. Actually further down Jesus says, “But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort.”
Here Jesus is warning that if you have riches, how you are using them is very important. Is your materialism your God? Has it got control over you so that you think you don’t need God’s salvation in Christ, that you don’t need faith because you’ve got money or you can charge it to your credit card? Well, woe to you. Do you not know that the riches you have are the Lord’s? And you have the privilege to use those riches to serve the Lord in His kingdom to help get the word out that God cares and loves. To help use those riches to feed the hungry and cloth the poor. What a wonderful gift that is! But woe to you if you hoard that money that God has allowed you to have, rather than use it to help and care for others.
That’s why poverty is not a problem in God’s economy because it helps one not to place their hope in riches. Also, the kingdom of God’s economy is one where one is more concerned about what God thinks of you and what He sees than anybody else. That’s what really the word “blessed” is all about; that’s what it’s getting at. It’s a unique word that the English translated. The Greek word for it really is “Makarios.” Perhaps it’s better translated as “Congratulations” or “Approved,” or “You got it!”
You see, it has to do with God’s view of you. What He thinks is most important. When you see your poverty of spirit, when you know you can’t do it and you need God’s help in Christ, well then, you got it. You’re blessed. Congratulations. Now you understand that God is your rescuer and you need Him. Jesus is God’s rescue plan for all of humanity for those from Judea and Jerusalem, from Tyre and Sidon, for Greek and for the non-Greek, for the Jew and the non-Jew, for everyone in our world and that includes you. He doesn’t reject anyone. Others might reject you, but Jesus doesn’t.
You see, Jesus came into this world as God in the flesh as perfect Man. He came and took upon Himself our sin and all of those things that separate us from a holy and perfect God. Our wrong thoughts, our words, our actions, He took all of those and died on the cross. He paid the price for our wrongdoings. He took them all in exchange, He covers us in His righteousness. It’s His tremendous sacrifice He makes that makes us right with God. When we respond in faith and believe in what Christ has done, well, when we too come to Jesus and hear His words of forgiveness, then we too are healed.
And His power and sacrifice takes away our sin and makes us right with God. That changes everything. You see, in Christ, the kingdom of God is ours, is mine, is yours. Well, what do we bring? Well, our sin, our knowledge that we can’t fix ourselves and so we need God’s solution. Yeah, we need a Savior. That’s Jesus. He comes to us in the midst of our pain, in the midst of our failure, in the midst of our hurts, in the midst of disease and addictions. He’s not prejudiced. He isn’t racist. He takes us, you and me, just the way we are with all our faults and foibles, all our brokenness and pain, and then Christ Jesus pronounces us for forgiven, loved.
And He gives us life even when we don’t feel it. He gives us hope even when we feel hopeless. He gives us help even when we feel we are beyond help. Maybe that’s you today. Well, I’ve got good news for you is Jesus comes right to you, right into your heart, right into your life and says, “I love you. I forgive you. You’re mine.” You see, God in Christ Jesus hasn’t given up on you. Allow His forgiveness to forgive you. Allow His love to love you and receive all that He offers you.
The people tried to touch Jesus because power was coming from Him and healing them all. Well, Jesus comes to you today. The unexpected is yours. He comes to you so that you can receive that wonderful gift He gives. So, as they say in the slum, “What will it be?” A coffin or Jesus? Unexpected? “Mom, how are you holding up?” In tears, she says, “Jesus is holding me up. Just as He holds up her, He holds you up, too. In Christ, you and all who trust in Jesus are blessed, you got it. Not because of what we’ve done or not done, but because of what He has done. Now, that’s truly unexpected, and that’s yours in Christ Jesus-forgiveness and love. Amen.
Almighty Triune God, thank You for Your amazing love for us. Thank You that You have rescued us from ourselves and that You have made us Yours through Christ dying on the cross for our sin and rising again to give us eternal life. Thank You for Your Holy Spirit, which calls us and opens our eyes and minds and heart to respond in faith to Your message of salvation. And bless us this day as we cling to You and as You hold us up in the palm of Your hand, and in the grip of Your grace. We pray this in Jesus’ Name. Amen.
Now may the peace of God, to each of you that are listening, the peace of God that transcends all understanding, guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus as He holds you up. Amen.
Reflections for February 13, 2022
Title: The Unexpected
Mark Eischer: You’re listening to The Lutheran Hour. At lutheranhour.org, you’ll find FREE resources, archived audio, our mobile app, and more. Go to lutheranhour.org. Now here’s Lutheran Hour Speaker, Dr. Michael Zeigler.
Mike Zeigler: Thanks, Mark. Today, I’m visiting again with Dr. Jeff Kloha. Dr. Kloha serves on the leadership team at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC. He’s also served as a pastor in our church body, The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod. He’s been a seminary professor, is also an accomplished scholar in the history and interpretation of the New Testament of the Bible. Thanks again for visiting with us, Jeff.
Jeff Kloha: Well, thanks for having me back. It’s been a lot of fun.
Mike Zeigler: So last time we talked, we mentioned briefly how Christians have from the very beginning have worshiped Jesus as fully God and fully human, fully Man. How does this understanding of Jesus relate to the historic Christian understanding of the Bible as being both kind of God’s book and a human book?
Jeff Kloha: A word that the early Christian theologians all the way back to the third and fourth century used was that it’s the condescension of God to human form. And they talked the same way about the Bible that the Scriptures are similarly God’s condescending Himself to be understandable and relatable to humans. Very obvious things, Luke writes to Theophilus who just happens to speak Greek, and Luke has a way of crafting his story in ways that make sense to people living in the first century. And so God is in a sense making Himself understandable to very specific people. And so you can see both the divine at work and the human at work. Luke uses vocabulary that’s unique to Luke. He has his own style. It’s different from Mark. It’s different from John. But at the same time, it’s God speaking through Luke. And that’s just how God has chosen to work. It’s really remarkable that He has made Himself understandable to us rather than forcing us to try to figure Him out.
Mike Zeigler: I like that too, that He condescends to work within our frame of reference, our rules, so to speak. And so we can say things about the Bible that it is fully God’s book. That is it is without error. It’s accurate and factual and living and powerful and all those things. We are emphasizing those divine qualities that it’s truly God’s book. And you mentioned Luke writing to Theophilus. Say more about what that means for the Bible to be a fully human book as well, for God to condescend to us.
Jeff Kloha: Right. And again, it’s Luke and all the New Testament. Let’s take an example from say Romans or Philippians, right? When Paul writes the letter to the church of Philippi, he knows that church very well. You can tell there’s a personal connection there. There’s a bond. He mentions names, right? He talks about—what were their names?—two women, Euodia and Syntyche, who are having an argument, and he tells him to stop arguing. Right? I mean, imagine you in your sermon on Sunday morning saying, “Betty and Donna, stop arguing with—” You’re not going to do that, but Paul does, right? But that’s the point of how God communicates, right? He speaks to specific situations, into specific situations to bring that healing Gospel message.
To me, the significance of that is, again, that God chooses to make Himself known, not in His vague or abstract ways, right? Not in just sort of mere speculation, but he made Himself known in space and time and in very specific ways. And in working that way, it demonstrates that He knows creation and He knows people and He can speak into and has spoken into very specific situations and brought that good news. And if He did it once, the reason these writings have been preserved and passed on is because they keep doing it. They keep speaking into specific situations into the lives of everyday people and bringing that Good News message of healing and forgiveness in Christ.
Michael Zeigler: So rather than Him waiting for us to find Him, He comes, He goes the distance to find us, which means He takes, willingly takes on the constraints, the limitations of our context, not His, but ours, to communicate with us.
Jeff Kloha: Right. And the church has done this from the very beginning, right? It preached the Gospel in all kinds of languages. It used the technology of the day, whether it was papyrus or eventually parchment. They used codices to copy these for a thousand years. When the printing press came along, the first thing printed on the printing press was a Bible, right? Now, it was in Latin, okay, but then Luther and Tyndale come along and translate into German and English, and it goes all over the place. Right? Then you get television and radio. And what’s the church showing? It’s putting the message out there on television and radio. And then cassette tapes and eight-track tapes and all kinds of stuff. Right? And now it’s on your iPhone or your whatever phone you have. Right? So the Word continues to be accessible and made understandable for people wherever they are. That’s just how God has chosen a work, to come into people’s lives very directly through that Word in whatever means possible.
Mike Zeigler: So like you said, Jesus willingly takes on these constraints of a human nature for us and for our salvation. So He gets tired. He gets hungry. He’s subject to gravity. So also, the Bible as a physical book is subject to its own kind of limitations as a human book. Parchment deteriorates. Ink fades. Copiers make errors. What does that look like as we see the Bible or the manuscripts of the Bible today?
Jeff Kloha: Yeah. And that’s one thing I really love about what we do here at the museum, and it’s kind of my original interest academically is all these manuscripts, right? And you can look at these in Greek and in Hebrew and in Latin and eventually in Armenian and Coptic and all these languages. And you can tell immediately that, first of all, somebody with a great deal of skill and patience put the ink to the papyrus to make a copy, to pass this down. And you can see when they get tired, because like you said, they might make a mistake and they got to go back and correct it. And if you work with these manuscripts long enough, you start to almost know which mistakes the copyist is going to make because they’re people, right? And they tend to make the same kind of mistakes again and again. And you can see tangibly how the church, how people labored to pass this down generation to generation and make it widely available.
And in so doing, like you said, copies got lost. They got destroyed by war. They got destroyed by volcanoes. They got looted, whatever happened, whatever happens in human history. And they’re copied like any books. They get printed like any books. Even the 1611 King James has 37 typographic errors. I could tell you where about 15 of them are. But when you put together a book on movable type, you’re going to make mistakes. It’s going to happen, right? It’s not like this thing just dropped down out of the sky. But again, God uses His people to communicate His message and has done so generation after generation. And scholars can go back and look at these manuscripts, going back to the second, third century. They could figure out where these corrections have been made, why things got adapted. And it’s actually pretty remarkable, especially on the macro level, how kind of word by word, sentence by sentence, we really know what Luke wrote and what John wrote. There’s really not much question about that.
Mike Zeigler: As you were describing the effort that has been put forward by people for twenty centuries now to make the Bible accessible and understandable to people, and I see that’s exactly what you all are doing at the Museum of the Bible. You’re putting it out there. The next time you’re in Washington DC, go see Dr. Jeff Kloha and the Museum of the Bible, and be inspired by what the people of God have done so that you could hear from God personally.
Music Selections for this program:
“A Mighty Fortress” arranged by Chris Bergmann. Used by permission.
“Songs of Thankfulness and Praise” From The Concordia Organist (© 2009 Concordia Publishing House)