Until the wine was gone, no one looked for or noticed Jesus. There is nothing here to suggest that he was somehow a special or honored guest. He just came along with his mother. No one acknowledged his presence until the wine ran out. There’s no surprise here. That old wine was still wine, and the old wine was enough to keep them from seeking Jesus. Sometimes it is the old, not the empty that gets in the way of seeking the Lord. Old attitudes, old ways, old habits and hurts, old information, old rituals and rules create a very dry religion. Many people never think of Jesus or look for him until something runs out.
But the issue here is not really about being empty or running out. The issue is whether or not we go to Jesus to be filled. His mother knew where to go. Pay attention to her. She has no idea how Jesus will respond, what he will need, or when he will act. She doesn’t know how, what, where, or when. But, she knows who. She is perfectly confident that he will do something because she asks. And why not? She raised him.
There is much being revealed to us through John’s Gospel today. He reminds us that if we want the Lord to move in our lives, we must be willing and prepared to do what he says. Sometimes it makes no sense. They have no wine, and he’s talking about water! Yet, those servants do what he says. Compliance or Obedience to uncommon commands often yields uncommon results.
He takes the water they have and makes the wine they need. For me this says: “Quit looking at what you do not have and put what you do have in his hands.” What we have may not be what we think we need. Maybe it’s just water. But, if we bring that to Jesus something miraculous might happen.
In John’s Gospel, there are no miracles. There are only signs. This is not just a word switch. These signs show us some aspect of his identity. He raises the dead and says, “I am the resurrection and the life.” He gives sight to a blind man and says, “I am the light of the world.” He feeds five thousand, and he says: “I am the bread of life.” In the end, as John concludes this sign, he says it’s all about glory leaving us to ask just what is “glory” anyway? What Jesus revealed as glory was not the earthly glory of a king or even the heavenly glory of his ascension. John uses this story of a wedding at Cana to illustrate what he means by glory. The glory we see at Cana is a glimpse into what God is like. That’s glory. God cares for us when we run short. God gives us Jesus Christ who can and always will give us what we need when we need it. Not necessarily the way we want it and when. Yet, if go to him and are obedient in what he asks of us, all will be well; and God’s glory will break into our lives leaving us to continue celebrating this life.
With First Sunday in Advent, December 1, we have begun listening to Luke’s Gospel more or less continuously until the Feast of Christ the King on November 23, 2025. November. As before with these “Listening Talks,” some long held ideas and pious images may and should get shaken up. So, I always feel a bit cautious at the beginning for fear that some may get upset and call my Bishop to report me. To save time, his number is: 405-721-5651. It is not likely he will remember who I am, but you can try it anyway. About 100 years ago, I got in a lot of trouble for telling my little sister that there was no Santa Clause. I felt it my duty to tell her because I had just come to realize that the Santa sitting in our living room was one of my aunts. Her perfume was the giveaway. As the family story goes, one of my uncles was supposed to take on the annual role which was passed around from year to year among the four brothers. That uncle got drunk, and failed to show up. My aunt, in her usual “take charge” mode promptly ran to the garage and put on the outfit and came to the door. My caution comes from the fact that tonight and maybe in the following talks, I’m going to upset some long-held beliefs, some treasured images, and who knows what else.
So, let’s get into what we know and admit what we don’t know adding the truth that sometimes when we don’t know something, we make up stuff to cover that lack of knowledge. There is a set of questions that ought to guide us whenever we begin to explore something: Who, When, What, Where, and How.
So, who wrote this Gospel? Luke is the name used consistently from the second century. He was a companion of Paul, a native of Antioch in Syria. That information comes from the Epistle of Paul to the Colossians and the Epistle to Timothy. There is no contrary information anywhere, so we can let that be. He was not an apostle or an eye-witness. He simply suddenly appears at Paul’s side during Paul’s second Mission. We can say that, because in Luke’s second part which we call “Acts of the Apostles” chapter 16, he suddenly switches to the first-person plural. He says, “We.”
When: The years 80 to 85 are generally accepted as the time. However, from the fact that Luke’s writing stops while Paul is still in custody around the year 63 and the fall of Jerusalem in about 70 would push it a little earlier. Here is an example of contrary data that leaves us to simply say: “We don’t really know exactly.”
It is fairly certain that Luke had at hand a copy of Mark’s account. Sixty-percent of Mark is incorporated into Luke. Probably another collection of quotations from Jesus was probably available and these would have been written in Aramaic. There were certainly some oral sources available from John, the deacon Philip, and Mary.
Luke’s Gospel, when it comes to literature is a masterpiece. He is very observant of mannerisms, psychological reactions, and hidden motivations. He favors minorities, segregated groups, and the underprivileged. Watch how often Samaritan, lepers, publicans, soldiers, public sinners, ignorant shepherds and poor show up. All of these people get special encouragement from this Gospel. He is writing for Gentiles. We know that because of the way he omits Semitic words and finds substitutes for them. For instance, he explains in his Gospel the meaning of “Abba”, “Rabbi”, “Ephphata”. He seldom quotes the Old Testament. This Gospel was written in Greek, and it was good Greek, not easy street language. Luke is educated, and he writes to people who speak good Greek.
Finally, you must keep in mind all the way through. This is not History. It is theology. They are not the same. Luke makes no claim to have been an eyewitness. He tells us that he is giving us a well-ordered narrative so that we may know the truth. He says he is writing to Theophilus. He calls him “excellent”. That adjective/title was reserved for Roman Procurators. It was also a very common name, so there is no point in making a lot out of it.
At the time of Luke, there were two problems or “crises” that may have prompted his writing. The first was the Gentiles, and their concepts or ideas about God. The whole Mediterranean world was very parochial, and there were as many ideas about God as there were communities, and with that, there were different cults. That’s hard for us to understand, but it was a great challenge at the time. Rome made it even more difficult with Emperor Worship. As Rome spread across the region, this parochialism was overcome. With this came an overwhelming sense loyalty and security that drove people to side with the powerful. If you understand that world, then you can see why the message of humility and the ideas expressed in Mary’s Magnificat are seen as a revolutionary threat. Themes of Greek plays at the time would have thought humility to be silly. The nobility of persons was the theme of their plays captivating theatergoers. Meanwhile the Christian community expected the world to believe the story of a man who died the death of a rebellious slave.
The second crisis was over the Jews. The descendants of Abraham even earned the respect of Rome as Rome recognized that in the history of these chosen people no power could shake their fidelity to the law of their fathers. This people, reared with a profound respect for the law, their traditions, the experts would find shocking the stories of Jesus who flaunted the accepted ways and seemed so arrogant toward his religious superiors. Jesus seemed to be encouraging social, economic, and religious sedition.
Originally, the Gospel began with Chapter 3. The Infancy Narrative was added after Acts of the Apostles was finished. The presence of the genealogy in the third chapter is a clue that suggests this. Listen how Chapter 3 begins and see if you don’t think is the beginning. “In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea and Herod was ruler of Galilee and Philip his brother ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
With the way it opens now, Luke has a formal prologue, a literary convention common among historians and other writers of his time. He is the only New Testament evangelist to do so. Matthew begins with a genealogy that stakes a claim for Jesus as the royal Davidic Messiah. Mark begins with a one-line heading that launches a tale told with thunder, John. Luke mentions his predecessors, alludes to his sources, touts his credentials as a longtime observer of events, acknowledges his patron, Theophilus and states his basic purpose in writing. We are in the hands of a confident author who invites us, gently, into his narrative world.
In his address to Theophilus, he reveals that what has transpired – what he will narrate is the fulfillment of God’s promises to Israel. He understands the events he will narrate in a biblical mode – in other words, what is to come is a biblical narrative held together by a progression of prophecies and fulfillments. He revers Jewish scriptures, makes use of quotations from it, and often writes in the style of the Septuagint.
With the birth and infancy narratives we enter an enchanted world. It is replete with angels, heavenly signs, startling prophecies, unlikely pregnancies, improbable births, temple rituals, religious functionaries, pious laypeople, isolated shepherds, a child prodigy, and with it all an abundance of echoes from Israel’s Scriptures. It’s almost like Harry Potter when you start to think about it. This is the religious imagination at its best, an outpouring of legend and imagery fitting for a turning point in human history. It the momentous coming of a Savior who is Christ the Lord.
Think for a minute how Luke organizes Chapters 1 & 2. There are seven episodes or scenes if you want to think in drama terms, and it is dramatic.
Annunciation of John the Baptist
Annunciation of Jesus
Visitation
Birth and Circumcision of John
Birth and Circumcision of Jesus
Presentation in the Temple
Finding in the Temple
There are obviously two parallels 1 & 2 and 3 & 4. Three hymns fill in the narration: the Canticle of Zechariah, the Magnificat, and the Gloria. Scholars believe that they were added later. Episode 7 serves as a transition or story/passage.
I cannot emphasize this enough.
The Infancy Narrative is a Dramatization of Theology.It is NOT history!
It all begins with the story of the conception of John the Baptist by Divine plan.
Now we get down to business with Zechariah. Luke tells us he is a good man married to a good woman. Yet, in spite of that they have no children, and in that time and culture, something is not quite right. God is about to intervene to make right what that culture believe is not right. So, Zechariah enters the Temple to perform the privileged and familiar duty of lighting an incense offering to God. An angel scares him with good news. What we see here is God confronting the highest of temple officialdom. Zechariah does not believe this good news, and Gabriel strikes him mute. There is no room or time for doubt. There is no blessing outside the Temple that day either. A world of religious devotion has been disrupted. There is also an important detail. Zechariah does not name his son, God as done that, and the same thing occurs with the second Annunciation story.
There is a struggle in Luke to fit John the Baptist into the schema of salvation and persuade unconverted disciples of John. You can sense that as the Gospel unfolds. With the birth of John, it is likely that Luke is trying to establish a connection with the Old Testament rather than writing intimate family history, because there is a parallel between the parents of Samuel as told in the Book of Samuel, and the parents of John. They are old. The career of John the Baptist caused problems for the early church. He was a prophet in his own right, founder of a Palestinian reform movement that would eventually find adherents as far away as modern Turkey. An inconvenient truth is that for a time Jesus of Nazareth was part of it. He was baptized by John. Luke will work hard through his gospel to make it clear that John was not superior to Jesus. Scholars believe that the legends of John’s birth originated in the circles of believers John attracted to himself. Luke incorporates this into his narrative. In this first story, Luke stirs imaginations. He paints a picture of a world of religious devotion about to be disrupted and enriched in ways no one could have foreseen He invites us to make it own.
Right after the birth of John comes the second annunciation. Having entered this enchanted world through John the Baptist and his parents. Few scenes in all the Gospels rival the annunciation to Mary for its capacity to fire up the imagination. I think that is why so many artists have been and still do try to capture this moment on canvas. They are countless. The Louvre has 20,000 of them!
The second annunciation story is linked to the first in two ways: it is dated to the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, and it is constructed out of similar components, the appearance of the angel Gabriel, the perplexity he causes and the assurance not to fear, the announcement of an unlikely pregnancy, the divine naming of the child and the reference to a legitimating sign.
Gabriel shows up. The only other time in the Bible that we hear of Gabriel is in the eighth chapter of the Book of Daniel. There, Gabriel is sent to explain a vision Daniel has, and Gabriel scares him so much that he fell to the ground. The Book or Prophecy of Daniel proclaims the coming of everlasting justice – the final time.
In the Annunciations scene there are five steps:
The appearance
The fear
The message
The objection
The giving of a sign
The central figure is a young girl in a man’s world. Perhaps younger than 15, she is an impoverished girl with nothing of importance to say. Her question to the angel is much like the question of Zechariah. The main burden of this text is to establish Jesus as a Davidic Messiah and Son of God. The whole concept of a Virgin Birth is unheard of in the Old Testament. So, when it springs up in the Gospel two times, it is an entirely new idea that brings with it the sense of a “New Creation”. The language and the images are rich in symbolism. Being “overshadowed” reminds is all of the cloud in the desert that hid God but yet was a sign of God’s presence and action. This is the introduction of the message and identity of Jesus as God’s Son. child the character of a Messiah from David’s line.
Remember what I said about departures being a way to end of scene. The Angel departs, and a new scene begins that is an otherwise unremarkable meeting of relatives that takes a dramatic turn when the child in Elizabeth’s womb leaps at the sound of Mary’ voice. It is not the first time for such gymnastics to be recorded in the Bible. In two places in Genesis, Jacob and Esau do the same. It is a jump for Joy and it all happens because of the Holy Spirit. More than fifty times in Luke’s Gospel the action and consequences of the Holy Spirit will be recorded. So, with the Visitation story, the scene of the Annunciation is complete. The Visitation itself is a bridge passage that brings together two characters of this drama: John and Jesus. As I said earlier,
We get two birth stories. One is of lesser importance than the other obviously by the details. John’s birth only takes two verses. In Chapter 3 Luke describes the whole career of John including his imprisonment by Herod before he narrates how John Baptized Jesus. Do you see something odd here? The Baptism of Jesus had to have happened before John was imprisoned. Again – no history here, so do not expect things to “add up”. This is Luke’s way of shifting all the focus onto Jesus. Another example is that Luke describes the growth of John into manhood before he describes the birth of Jesus which, if this was history, should have taken place only a few month later. Again, a shift of attention.
Now, that Census. The census seems to be a way of explaining the presence of Joseph and Mary in Bethlehem. Was there a census? There is no historical evidence of that. It is probably a literary device that provides a solemn beginning. I find great irony is the way Luke uses the mightiest figure in the world, the Roman Emperor, to serve God’s plan by issuing this edict for a census. Caesar Augustus is the peaceful ruler, the one who pacified the world. Greek cities of Asia Minor (perhaps not far from where Luke was writing) adopted September 23, the birthday of Augustus as the first day of a new year, calling him a “savior.” It is hardly accidental that Luke’s description of the birth of Jesus presents a challenge to this imperial propaganda.
The birth, Swaddling & a Manger. Luke is more interested in the details than in the birth itself. Swaddling and manger are more important any anything else if you just look at the information. The manger has nothing to do with poverty, but an odd location caused by circumstances. There is a reversal going on here. In the first chapter of Isaiah it says: “The ox knows its owner, and the donkey knows the manger of its lord; but Israel has not known me. My people have not understood me.” Luke is saying that this is repealed. The shepherds have been sent to the manger to find the Lord who is the source of joy for all people of Israel.
Like the manger, the swaddling is far from a sign of poverty. It is a sign that Israel’s Messiah is not an outcast among his people but is properly cared for. In Luke, Jesus is not born like an alien in an Inn, but in a manger where God sustains and feeds his people. This is Theology. The details lead us deep into the mystery of what God is doing.
The Annunciation to the Shepherds. There is nothing sentimental intended here nor any effort on Luke’s part to identify with the common man.
This episode is tied to the Jewish idea that is much more deeply involved. It is drawing heavily from images in the Prophet Micah which anticipates and for-sees the triumph of Jerusalem by a ruler from David’s place of origin. Remember what David was? This detail ties in with a King descended from a shepherd image: David the King.
This Annunciation follows the pattern for the most part.
The core message is written in the style of an Imperial Proclamation. I like to think that this is Luke’s counter-propaganda that Jesus, not Augustus was the Savior and source of peace whose birthday marked the beginning of new time. Probably however, Isaiah 9: 5 seems to be the source: “For the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. For a child has been born for us, a son given us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
Then Luke gives us the final hymn: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among those whom he favors”. Like the other hymns, added later, it was probably composed by a community of Jewish Christians using the same kind of poetry. It is used to hail Jesus as the Messiah at the end of his ministry, something the angles knew at the beginning of his life. Luke is telling us that the angels of heaven recognized at the beginning of life for Jesus what the disciples came to know only at the end; namely, the presence of the Messiah King comes in the name of the Lord.
And then, after their visit, Luke says: “The shepherds returned glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them.” With that, they depart, and what does a departure mean in Luke? End of the scene.
Luke was a pastor and he wrote to comfort, encourage, and renew a community that was stumbling, disconnected from its roots and facing new challenges. The purpose was not so much to speak new things, but to present old things in a new way, old things which the readers knew from the very sources and traditions Luke used in his work. He chose a familiar form, “narrative.” This form is to literature what story telling is to the spoken word. It communicates in such a way that the readers enter the story and discover that it is their own. Gifted with knowledge, the readers little by little learn how the characters in the story arrive at the knowledge which they already have but what that truth really means.
The whole thing is an invitation to keep these things in our hearts, to wonder at them as their meaning is gradually unfold in the story. So, what do we learns from Luke here?
Luke is writing to people, as I said at the beginning, who have differing ideas about God in the midst of a Roman occupation as Rome has its own idea about God with a divine Emperor. Luke is going to straighten that out.
What do we learn?
Jesus is a human, born of a woman.
Jesus is Divine, born of God.
Jesus would return to God, and Christians must accept the end of his life and his absence from history as an individual figure or person.
The Narrative is like a painting with two panels. In the first panel has Zachariah and Elizabeth. We are like them. We believe yet we doubt, and what does God do? God does not need our perfect belief to fulfill the promise of biblical history which reveals again and again that the barren past can become fruitful. In the second panel the scene shifts from Jerusalem (Temple and Zachariah) to Nazareth. Luke is concerned to show that the origins of Jesus are much more significant than those of John. Nazareth is a no-place. Jerusalem is power.
The role of Zachariah and Mary are parallel, but it is Mary, not Joseph who names, who receives a message and brings things to pass. John’s birth is about overcoming the inability to conceive. The birth of Jesus introduces a whole new order, and we are pulled into the realm of creation by the working of the Spirit which is a powerful theme in Luke’s Gospel as we will see in the next talks.
The visitation story invites us to see the New Testament, Mary reaching out and transforming the Old Testament, Elizabeth.
Joseph and Mary lived in Nazareth of Galilee. This is clearly held by Christian tradition without contest. At the same time, a clear theological tradition held that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Matthew handled it one way, by beginning at Bethlehem. Luke another way by beginning in Nazareth. Luke had a problem of getting them to Bethlehem. The whole issue of showing the Church and Jesus as being just and legitimate when it comes to Roman Law begins here and is a concern all through Luke.
It’s all a journey, a long pilgrimage to Jerusalem in Luke’s Gospel just as it is for us. As we conclude this, remember the story of Jesus being lost for three days only to be found again. It’s all part of Luke’s plan. The loss of Jesus creates confusion and consternation and Jesus explains the divine necessity which called for his absence; the Father’s business. He must be with the Father. This is his ultimate destiny, and we, the church through him, and with him, and in him are on the same journey to the New Jerusalem.
We believe that all four Gospels have two major sources.
1) An Oral Tradition, which is the stories passed on by memory from one place to the next and from one generation to the next. This tradition came first.
2) Then, a collection of the Miracle Stories seems to have been passed around from one community to the next.
From these two sources, Mark assembles a Gospel which may have depended upon Peter as one of his sources. It would have been oral. The writers of both Matthew and Luke both seem to have had all three of these sources at their disposal, and blended them together depending upon their focus, the audience, and the circumstances for which they presented the Gospel.
As I said in the first of this series, except for John’s Gospel, the other three are anonymous. This is quite different from the writings of Paul whose name appears throughout his writing. We can tell from the Gospel that the writer was not an eyewitness. He depends on the testimony of others. He is a second or third generation Christian, and he is not a native Palestinian. His knowledge of the geography and customs is faulty suggesting he did not live there. This Gospel avoids the use of Semitic words, and it omits controversies over the Law about what is clean and unclean. He is a well-educated person, a good writer acquainted with the Greeks. The Luke of this Gospel is probably not an apostle. He is an apostolic evangelist.
By the latter half of the 2nd century this book we all know as the Gospel of Luke was
being attributed to a Luke who was a companion of Paul. Three references speak of him as a fellow worker and beloved physician who was faithful to Paul in a final imprisonment. Many scholars believe that when Paul speaks of “we” implying that he was not travelling alone, it was Luke who was to be included in that “we.” At the same time, there are things in Luke’s Gospel that do not match with things in Paul’s writings which would suggest that Luke and Paul were not together all the time. In the fourth chapter of Colossians, Paul mentions Luke in a list of those who are with him, and Paul divides the group into those “who have come over from the Circumcision” from others implying that Luke is not a Jew. Tradition says he was a physician because he pays great attention to the medical matters that occur in the Gospel. The Good Samaritan story is an example of this as well as the comment about many physicians unable to cure the woman with a hemorrhage. As a sometime companion of Paul, a disciple who had not witnessed the ministry of Jesus, he wrote his Gospel for Gentile converts after the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, and began his work with Chapter Three later adding the Infancy Narrative as I said in the previous talk.
We do not know where he was from, but his language (Greek) and some other clues suggest he was a native of Antioch in Syria. That does not mean the Gospel was assembled there. Scholars agree that it was not written in Palestine. Those same scholars believe it was written after the year 70. His constant pessimism about the fate of Jewish leaders and Jerusalem makes it likely that Jerusalem has already been destroyed. At the same time, it was before the year 100 because he writes in the second part (Acts of the Apostles) about the Church in Ephesus because he seems to know about that church’s structure of presbyters.
It is commonly believed that he was writing for Gentile Christians in a Gentile setting. There are all sorts of indications that support this. He eliminates materials that are predominantly Jewish preoccupations from what may be his source, Mark. He substitutes Greek names for Aramaic names. He traces the genealogy back to Adam and God not to David or Abraham as in Matthew. When he quotes the Old Testament, he uses the Greek version.
With Chapter Three we read what scholars believe to be the original beginning of Luke’s Gospel. Read aloud, the first six verses have the character of an Imperial Edict. The chapter establishes the identity of Jesus with his unique emphasis on the Holy Spirit. Of all the Gospels, this is the one that brings the Holy Spirit into the tradition and faith of the Christian Community. The Spirit is there at the moment of Baptism when the voice says: “This is My Beloved Son.” Then right after his revelation of divinity of Jesus as God’s Son, Luke inserts that genealogy and lists the ancestors of Jesus to affirm his humanity.
There is no going forward without this distinct affirmation of the Incarnation. And the divine/human nature of Jesus. Then, as the fourth chapter opens, Luke tells us that Jesus was led by the Spirit to the wilderness where he is tempted by the devil. The temptations themselves are each worth a lot of prayerful reflection, but that’s not for today. Luke moves on as Jesus begins his ministry in Galilee. He goes home. Now remember what Luke said at the very beginning: this is an orderly account of events. That does not mean it is historical. This is theological, and so the “order” has to do with theological order or perhaps theological priorities. THIS IS NOT HISTORY!
Jesus would not remain alone in the Gospel Mission, and his mission does not cease with his death and resurrection. Having presented the identity of Jesus, the message, and the mission of Jesus, Luke focuses on the disciples and shows how their own life, work, and mission is rooted in a special call. This part opens (again Luke’s dramatic style) by the lake of Gennesaret where Jesus calls Simon Peter and his companions to missionary discipleship. Then, the scene shifts from the lake to a city where Jesus demonstrates his healing power, a power exercised with due respect for the law and religious legal authority (5:15 “Go show yourself to the priests). This event reveals the basis for the developing conflict between Jesus and the Scribes and Pharisees.
Through this whole section, the focus is on the identity of Jesus (Who is this?). Yet this provides the bases for the identity of disciples. Once you know who Jesus is, you know who you are. Once you know what Jesus does, you know what you must do. The work of reconciliation is our work. It is the work of the Church. As the identity is focused, the whole issue of a new way of life begins to surface.
From Chapter 3 till Chapter 6, incident by incident, Luke develops the hostility of the scribes and Pharisees. Conflict develops in that home cure, in the meal, and finally over the sabbath observance. They are watching, and gradually, they begin to pick up a pattern they don’t like. Fasting is called into question. The Sabbath is not observed the way they like. Meals are shared with tax Collectors, and Jesus is in the company of sinful women and even a Roman Centurion The last straw comes for them when he begins to speak of and proclaim the forgiveness of sins. Furious at being completely undone and unwilling to change, the scribes and the Pharisees have no alternative. They must find a way to rid themselves of Jesus. Then, in the 11th verse of Chapter 6, Luke says: “They were filled with fury and discussed with one another what they might do to Jesus.” Now, for the first time in just six chapters, Luke uses one of his dramatic techniques to change the scene. He has Jesus withdraw “to the mountain to pray.”
Now, Jesus begins to establish the new Israel whose leaders would later be formed and actually sent on the mission. This new Israel will have twelve tribes just like the old Israel. Peter has already been on the scene, but now it’s time for the others. It is Luke’s way of emphasizing the primacy of place held by Peter. Instead of tribes there will be Apostles, and he calls them from among the disciples. Then comes a description of life in the New Israel. The Lukan Beatitudes, an instruction on love, a warning against judging others, the need to bear good fruit, and the importance of a solid foundation. Then Jesus responds to the plea of a Roman Centurion and raises the son of a woman form Nain, making it clear that the new Israel will be very inclusive. A resolution of the relationship with John the Baptist ends this section with more examples of this inclusiveness as several incident with women are included.
From the very beginning the status of Peter is affirmed. With that by way of introduction, Jesus calls the twelve (Chapter 9) and gives them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases, and he sends them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal. When they return with the glowing report, Luke, almost as an aside or maybe a warning, inserts the news that Herod was perplexed and asks the question; “Who is this?” Meanwhile, Jesus has taken the apostles aside for some talk, and a huge crowd found them. At the end of the day, the crowd is hungry. The disciples recognize this, and Jesus tells them to feed the crowd. When the don’t know what to do, Luke resolves the matter with what can only be described as a preview of the Last Supper and the Holy Eucharist quoting Jesus, he took, blessed, broke, and gave. Then, the scene closes as Jesus goes off to pray alone.
This time the disciples are near. Jesus asks about his identity. If Luke were writing stage directions as well as a dialogue, there would be a drum roll as Peter proclaims Jesus to be the Messiah of God! Trumpets would sound, lights would flash. Then, Jesus tells them what lies ahead: suffering and death. Lest they be discouraged, he takes them up a high mountain and the Transfiguration occurs. Again, a voice from heaven speaks to the witnesses: “This is my Son, my chosen one; listen to him.” They come down and again he warns of his betrayal. With verse 51 now in Chapter 9, it says: “He set his face to go to Jerusalem.” With that the Journey narrative takes off.
It begins in Galilee and it moves toward Jerusalem. That movement is constant in Luke’s Gospel, and it is easy to call the middle of Luke’s Gospel between the Infancy Narrative and the Passion, “The Journey Narrative.” Jesus is now on the move, and as he begins, he picks up those we call, “Apostles.” Everywhere he goes, he stops at the Synagogue. Luke is always anxious to give us a Jesus who is faithful in prayer and observant of his traditions. Think how many incidents occur in that context from the Presentation of the infant in the temple by Mary and Joseph to the final observance of the Passover. Jesus prays there, and a lot of things happen there.
It is clear early in the journey that he is gaining favor and a reputation that brings great crowds not only following him, but looking for him. One by one, the miracles or cures that he works get listed: an unclean spirit is cast out, and in the episode, even the unclean spirit proclaims who Jesus is, “I know who you are, the Holy One of God” says the demon. While the unclean spirits seem to know, the people just wonder. At Simon’s house, sick are brought to him and they are cured. In another town a leper is cleansed. Then a paralytic. As Luke presents each of these individual cures, the signs that prophets said would point to the Messiah are checked off While we know what’s happening and who Jesus is, the people in the Gospel drama still are wondering.
Through this first section with the focus on the crowd, three major groups of people seem to emerge: the crowd, the disciples, and the apostles. What now becomes clear is that Luke is sensitive to the distinct historical phases of the life of the Church. There is the crowd of the curious and the needy, there is the Church (Disciples) and among them are apostles. Luke is already, even before Pentecost and Acts of the Apostles shaping the Church.
By the sixth chapter the disciples are all accounted for, and the mission begins. Luke affirms again and again that the Gospel is for everyone. So, once the Twelve have been sent out on a successful mission, and once the identity of Jesus is confirmed by Peter, the example of the twelve motivates the sending of the Seventy lest the “Disciples” think that evangelization or the work of Jesus is only the work of the twelve. So, what’s up with the number? Two pieces of history probably shaped this detail. Moses chose seventy elders to be his helpers (Numbers 11: 16-15). Scholars suggest that more likely a stronger influence is the report of seventy nations in Genesis 10. With this Luke, anticipates the mission to all the nations beginning at Pentecost. Luke is anxious for us to see how the Church originated in the life and work of Jesus.
Now comes the great journey to Jerusalem, a journey that would lead Jesus out of history into the heavens. This is also the journey of the church which accompanies Jesus on his way to God. The idea, the whole concept of Journey recalls the Exodus during which time the disorganized, tribal people led by Moses gradually by trial and error finally become God’s people and reach the promise. This kind of journey story is nothing new. It is a theme used in ancient myths, and finally it is one made holy by the Word of God. The Journey has four stages:
Villages of Galilee from which the group of apostles is drawn and expanded.
From Galilee the setting shifts to Jerusalem
In the Temple of Jerusalem where Jesus teaches various groups that either rejected or struggle with his challenge
From Jerusalem to the Father – the Passion, Death, and Resurrection.
At this point, it is that first and second stage that we are focused on.
Again, this is not history. You cannot trace the journey on a map. There is no sense of organization for the route because it is not geographical. The destination is the Ascension, not really the city of Jerusalem. In fact, as you may notice, the narrative never says that Jesus got to Jerusalem. It simply says he entered the Temple. It never says anything about Jerusalem. The point is the Ascension not some place.
In the summer of 2001 I was at the Cathedral of Our Lady in Oklahoma City. I had been through the Gospel of Luke five times during that assignment of fifteen years. I was not looking forward to the summer preaching once again for the sixth time with the Gospel of Luke. One of the great benefits of staying in one parish for a while and of being the only priest there is the opportunity to really teach consistently and progressively with the Word of God. I miss that in retirement, and sometimes I am frustrated that I never get to be in the same place and the same time with the same people two Sundays in a row. It is my opinion that for the congregation, that’s a loss because there is no way to develop and really explore consistently the Word of God. In other words, none of us priests here can ever say: “As I said last week…” Or “As we heard in the Gospel last week…” At any rate it was 2001 and I was dreading the summer months simply because I had been through those summertime gospels five times and was feeling out of ideas. One evening, I speaking with Father Stephen Happel, a life-long friend and priest companion. We were comparing notes about the summer preaching when he called my attention to the obvious fact that these chapters from nine to nineteen of Luke’s Gospel are actually a unit that ought to be treated as a whole. With that, the Holy Spirit which is so prominent in Luke’s Gospel turned on the lights. Some might think of tongues of fire, but fire always brings some light.
Beginning with verse 51 in the 9th Chapter, it begins. What we have here is a course in discipleship. What the Lukan Jesus is doing as he wanders around taking a long time to get where he is going is teaching and proposing a set of virtues that are essential for discipleship and must be at the heart of the Church Luke is forming.
The first is Poverty. Those who would follow Jesus and the Church (people) that continue his mission must be poor. The poverty Jesus commends to his followers is a mystery to be lived, not a problem to be solved. It is not some ill to be solved, cured, and wiped out by an economic system. That kind of poverty is an issue of justice. One kind of poverty comes from injustice. This virtue of poverty comes from a life style with a new way of relating to things. It has to do with what can be shared. If anything you have cannot be shared, you are in Gospel trouble. If your computer is too delicate or your car too expensive, you are not poor. God is poor. God share the sun and the rain on the good and the bad. God even shares God’s only Son.
Then moving into Chapter 10, Jesus teaches his disciples about joy. We shall have joy as disciples because we are free of anxious concerns and worries that have nothing to do with us. In the Gospel, Jesus sent out the disciples instructing them to take nothing – to be poor. Then with nothing to worry about, nothing to lose, nothing to pack, carry, or slow them down, they are free. That quality of freedom from worry and possessive concerns that seems to weigh down the rich whose stuff is too good to loan or share is called Joy.
Next, in the same chapter Jesus reveals that Mercy is a virtue of discipleship with the story of the Good Samaritan. This is a quality of generosity and compassion not just at exceptional moments or a response to disasters, but a quality that is consistent and present all the time.
As the chapter continues, so does the formation, and hospitality becomes the next virtue. The story of Martha and Mary develops this virtue, and there is a way of looking at those two as really one person, the disciple whose life is in balance between being and doing. It is a call to keep work and prayer in balance, and being hospitable is characteristic of God reminding us to be good guests and gracious hosts in the spirit of Abraham and Jesus.
Chapter 11 begins in a different place where Jesus teaches disciples about Perseverance which is the real secret to effective prayer because it preserves the relationship no matter how things are going. After teaching them about prayer, Jesus teaches disciples about worthy priorities as a challenge to greed. It is way of relating to things that is independent and free. This makes disciples rich in wisdom, purpose, and usefulness.
In the 12th chapter, there is a lesson on fear, with the assurance that we are never alone. The fear of abandonment is probably the greatest of all fears; and with it, the fear that there is not going to be enough of everything leads to thinking that we had better take care of ourselves because no one else will. Having the gift of freedom also means being free from fear which allows the disciple to look ahead not for something bad to happen, but for the master’s return and treat us like friends not as servants. Later in that same chapter, zeal is proposed by Jesus as a quality of discipleship. Those who have zeal in their lives are people who have a clear purpose, who know who they are, where they are going, and what they have to work with. This gives them a vibrant quality that is eager, and expectant, vigilant and ready for the Lord’s coming.
Chapter 13 raises a question to which Jesus does not respond. He never answers the question about how many or who will be saved. He simply launches into that talk about entering through the narrow door which we immediately decide means admission to heaven. The whole question comes from a world which saw reality as limited. For most people of the first century there was only so much to go around including salvation. Competition was endemic to the religious as well as the economic sphere. In the end, Jesus instructs that disciples are saved, and saved disciples live at home in the present because they have been given bread. They know the comfort of forgiveness because they have forgiven each other.
In the 14th chapter, the protocol for the Banquet of Heaven is being set, and the way Jesus sees it, there is to be a radical departure from the system used in the ancient world not entirely out of use in our own. It’s about Humility, a virtue rooted in truth. This virtue does not mean being a doormat. It means know one’s rightful place in the reign of God, and it means knowing that it is a gift. The humble find their sense of self and their identity in God, not in comparison with others. As the chapter moves on, the Lukan Jesus speaks of prudence for disciples. This a quality of life rather than behavior. Remember, first discipleship is about being something, then, from that come the doing of something. The disciple always asks what kind of person shall I be, not what shall I do. Some think that Prudence means being cautious, timid, frightened or mediocre. These are not the qualities of Prudence. In fact, they are just the opposite. Prudence seeks the best way to do the right thing. The point is the Doing. It is a virtue of action not of passive caution.
The journey and the lessons continue on with Chapter 15 when Jesus insists that a disciple is watchful. It’s those three stories about a woman sweeping the house looking for something, about a shepherd leaving 99 behind to look for just one sheep, and ridiculous father who does not go back to “business as usual” when his son takes off, never giving up hope, never living with that final and self-justifying attitude about a another that says: “They’ll just always be that way.”
The next chapter finds Jesus insisting that his disciples will be wise, that they will have a quality of Wisdom seen in faithful attention to frequent and familiar tasks of each day not matter how small and insignificant they may seem. What Luke suggests is that life consists of a series of what seem to be small opportunities like a cup of water. “Whoever is faithful in little things is faithful in bigger ones” is the way he puts it. Wise disciples will know what is of lasting value and what is fleeting. They will also know that they can only serve one master. Further into the chapter there is a story we could all tell without the book. It is the story of the rich man and the poor man who has a name, Lazarus. What Jesus reveals is that awareness must be a quality of his disciples. It is about an awareness of others. Never listening to the prophets, that rich man found himself in unending misery. Never listening to Jesus, we can run the same risk. Disciples of Jesus hear the master’s words. Aware of His presence and his Gospel, they become aware of injustice.
In Chapter 17 an interesting parable raises another virtue, Duty, and the parable tells the story of someone giving what is due, which is the meaning of the word, “duty.” The parable is a somewhat “back-door” way to remind disciples that they are servants. Fidelity to the duties of discipleship provides no grounds for feeling superior, and it should not bring ideas of honor or appreciation. In discipleship there is no “look what I have don” attitude. In fact, there is no time for that because there is always more to do. When the apostles cry: “Increase our faith” which begins this section, they are aware of the great task that lies ahead and what Jesus asks of them. What we learn in this section is that it is not the quantity or extent of a person’s faith that is at issue. It is not a matter of more faith, but a life consistent with the faith we already have.
As an example of how Luke’s work is not factual history, in this chapter, he has Jesus headed to Jerusalem through the region between Samaria and Galilee. That would be like going to Miami through Tallahassee. None the less, along the way, Jesus gets to another profoundly important virtue for disciples: Gratitude. In Luke’s thought the grateful recognition of God’s initiative that brings healing and salvation is the surest sign of faith. Gratefulness confirms one’s faith. Disciples recognize what God has done for them. It’s the story of the 10 lepers that unfolds this virtue. Disciples return again and again to the feet of the master speaking his praises. This is not a passing emotion, but a way of life. It is not private either. It is public, and real gratitude is contagious.
In the 18th Chapter Luke pulls a switch with another parable about a nagging woman who comes before a judge. Probably when Jesus used this parable, it was, like all his parables, about God his Father. In which case, the focus of the story was the judge, and the listener would be drawn into a reflection upon the surprising figure who is moved by this persistent widow to provide the justice for which she pleads. When Luke tells the story, it is not so clearly about the judge. The widow emerges as the story’s focus. She is the focus not because she is a widow, not because she is alone, not because she is an uneducated outcast without a name, wealth, land, or power. She emerges because, unlike others of her kind, she is persistent, constant, steady, and unbending in the face of any obstacle. Her strength of persistent prayer is the virtue that must be found in a disciple.
In this chapter another parable is told that we know very well about two men who go to the Temple to pray. With that parable disciples are brought to recognize that they are justified. However, this is not because of what they say or what they do, who they know or where they are, but that they are justified by God. In the parable, there is nothing wrong with the prayer of either man. They are both reciting psalms: the Pharisee is using Psalm 15 and the Tax Collector is using Psalm 34. The problem is not the prayer, the problems is the focus. All the Pharisee can do is recite what he has done. His prayer is all about him. What the tax Collector does is make God the center of his prayer. One has no room for God because he so filled with his own accomplishments. The other acknowledges God as the source and ground of his life and hope. He is justified, not the other one. Disciples of Jesus are justified, not because God owes them something but because the stood in truth before God and acknowledged their need and how useless their own deed are to save them.
The new order Jesus came to inaugurate is an era of salvation and justification experienced as a gift, not as a right. In such disciples then, righteousness is never about self, but always about the God who saves with mercy, forgiveness and love.
Chapter 19 begins with these words: “He entered Jericho and was passing through it.” He is now near Jerusalem, and before the chapter ends, he enters the city and with that his Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension are about to take place. Armed with the virtues he has presented along the way, disciples, his church, will be ready to move forward without him because of him by the power of the Holy Spirit as the second part of Luke’s work, Acts of the Apostles will reveal.
When Lent begins, we can get together again and explore the third part of Luke’s Gospel: The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.
January 12, 2025 at St. Agnes & St. Peter Churches in Naples, FL
Isaiah 40: 1-5,9-11 + Psalm + Titus 2: 11-14, 3:4-7 + Luke 3: 15-16, 21-22
The fact that Jesus was Baptized by John was a problem for the earliest church as followers of John may well have outnumbered the followers of Jesus at first. We know that they were certainly wide-spread throughout the region before the Gospel of Jesus Christ made its way around the sea. All of the Gospel writers focus some effort to affirm that Jesus was greater than John.
The fact that Jesus was Baptized by John ought to be a bit of a problem for us too, at least at some point, if you think about it at all. How could and why would the sinless Jesus Christ come to John for Baptism? What would he have to repent about? Again, as I say to you often, “This is not history.” Do not ask if it really happened? Ask what it means, what is God saying to us? This Gospel passage is not telling us something that happened a long time ago. It is revealing something important to us – important enough for God to speak out loud. We might get the clue that the actual baptism is not really what this is about from the fact that Luke, who is always interested in details, says nothing about the actual baptism. In fact, if you know your grammar, Luke puts this verb in the “past simple passive” voice, “had been baptized.”
A stronger clue about what it means comes as Luke tells us about all the people being baptized including Jesus. This is a powerful Incarnational message. Jesus is not pretending to be one of us. Jesus is one of us. God, through Jesus Christ has really and truly come to share life with us from Baptism to death. That voice and the message it speaks is for all of us who are baptized. “You are my child. I love you” is the message. The very loving Spirit of God descends upon this man who chooses to be one of us in all things sharing his privileged place as a child of God. It is a humble man that comes forward in the crowd, and we might even try to imagine how John inspired Jesus with his preaching calling his faithful to bear fruit with mercy and justice.
What is it that pleased God so much at that moment except the humility and willingness of Jesus Christ to set aside all entitlement and privilege and embrace the Will of the Father becoming one with us sharing with us his live-giving, forgiving, and merciful Spirit. What is it that draws us here and then sends us forth with hope, with courage, and with joy except this wonderful news we have been told in many ways since Christmas. We are a baptized, chosen, and a much-loved people by a God whose very Spirit has been poured out.
This Feast of the Baptism of the Lord invites us to dig deeper into the meaning of our own Baptism, to wonder how we might live more consistently as children of God, and how might truly be pleasing in God’s sight.
There were many at the time who saw Jesus as rule-breaking eccentric, and “eccentric” is exactly what he was and what we might become. Eccentric means “off center,” unusual, centered in something different. Jesus was not centered in himself. If we have any hope of pleasing God, we cannot be centered on ourselves. Baptism ought to make us eccentric like Jesus, people who get noticed because their behavior, their ideas, their hopes and dreams fall outside the norm, or what this world would call, “normal.”
Go ahead this week. Let’s try it. Get a little eccentric. Start thinking about pleasing God instead of pleasing ourselves or others for that matter. What is there to lose? Nothing, except eternal life.
The easy way to hear this story unique to Matthew’s Gospel is to focus on those visitors from the East. At the time Matthew wrote this Gospel, they were the message he wanted to give to the predominantly Jewish/Christians who were to receive this Gospel. The first Jewish people who accepted the Way of Christ were very uncomfortable when Gentiles began to seek Baptism and share in Communion. They thought anyone coming to Christ should first become a Jew, and Matthew’s story leads them to think otherwise by telling this story of foreigners coming to adore the Christ child.
While we might ponder Matthew’s message fruitfully with reflections about how we look upon immigrants who challenge our exclusive way of life, there is another piece of this story that we might well need to hear and embrace first. Herod and these visitors seem to be commanding center stage, but there is another set of characters who may cause us some discomfort, and I think Matthew intends it to be so.
It is those chief priests and scribes we might pay more attention to rather than those magi. They knew their scriptures. They knew exactly where and how the Messiah was to come, and they did nothing. So comfortable with their lives around Herod’s court, so sure of themselves and their privileged position, they were completely uninterested in joining those pilgrims. Why leave the power and give up the influence they enjoyed there in Jerusalem to go out to that no-place called Bethlehem. The only people hanging around there were those low-life shepherds. They were not about to be seen around that kind of people.
Those holy people hanging around Herod had no curiosity and no desire to change or discover something new. They were threatened by this new revelation that came from foreigners, and they wanted nothing to do with it. They just wanted things to stay the same.
When Matthew tells us that those magi when home by a different way, there is the possibility of understanding that to mean more than using a different route. It may also mean that they went home differently than they came. People who come to adore the Christ must be changed. They must be different for having made the journey, for having seen the Christ and doing him homage.
This Gospel speaks to us who know very well our scriptures and the promise that has been fulfilled. We also know how easy it is to stay just the way we are in spite of what we know. Those who do homage, those who seek Christ and find him in all the little unpleasant and unimportant places and people who have nothing to offer us will never be the same. Prestige and privilege hold great power over us just like Herod and his Court so blinded those chief priests and scribes leaving them to dismiss with complete disinterest what might have set them free.
As we tell their sad story we might hear an invitation to be humble enough to see and seek something new always knowing that there is more to discover in God’s mysteries if we are willing to venture into the unknown where it might be possible see the face of God.
When I was in the final years of grade school, our pastor at the time, whose homilies would rival a Cricket Match for their length and interest for 12-year-old had the custom of not preaching any sermon on January1. This was before the days of “Vigil Masses” and that “Let’s get it over with and go on Saturday” mentality began. He observed to me once that he thought most of the people had been out at New Year’s Eve parties the night before and would not be capable of listening to anything with attention.
I have been tempted on occasion to preserve Father MacDonald’s memory by keeping up his venerable tradition. But today, by Noon, most are over whatever we did last night, and I did make a promise at ordination to pray for the church and preach the Gospel.
There is a compromise possible, and that is to offer one brief thoughtful reflection on these verses from Luke’s Gospel and then sit down. This is not because I was out late last night. After all, I’m 82-years-old and still keep my father’s advice: “Act your age.”
Notice that Luke says these Shepherds went in haste to find Mary, Joseph, and the infant. There are still occasions for us all to act in haste. There are also occasions for stopping to ponder things in our hearts. Both are occasions for wonder. I really think that wonder is a good thing because it can make us curious, and curiosity can lead to understanding. If there was just a little more wonder, curiosity, and understanding in this world, there might be a realistic hope for peace. We might slow down a bit in the year to come, and like the woman whose memory draws us here today, learn to ponder without judgement or fear and come to understand one another a bit better.
We assemble here today with a challenge given to us by a Church that calls this “The Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.” Curiously, we heard an Old Testament reading right out of an ancient patriarchal family structure that offers some wisdom but would lead us to believe that this “son” being addressed is an only child without sister. It’s really all about the father and the son.
Then, after some verses from Paul’s Letter to the Colossians, we hear about a couple with a problem child. This 12-year-old has a mind of his own getting separated from his parents and their traveling companions. The consequence of his decision causes desperation and considerable worry on the part of his parents who must have searched frantically for three days. I doubt that they slept at all.
Neither one of these two readings give us much to admire much less imitate. It might just be that the focus here is not about some particular family unit. In these times when the whole idea of “family” is being re-defined we need to expand our notion of “family” and begin to see ourselves first as part of the human family – the family of God. If we could get that right, it might possibly help individual families find a way to holiness.
As a celibate priest I have always found it a bit short-sighted for people to suggest that I have no family or have given up having a family. I have been a member of several large families, and never felt alone or left out. Twenty-first century families are quite different from the family described in that first reading. Families today may well consist of single parents, same-sex parents, foster or adoptive parents, stepparents, or grandparents with custody. All that “wise” advice in the Book of Sirach makes me wonder about how “wise” that advise is for children suffering within harmful families where there is abuse or violence.
It’s at this point that St Paul makes a lot of sense, writing to the Colossians. He speaks up about what makes a family. He reminds us all that mutual love and respect are the foundation for all relationships. Without mutual love and without respect, there is no family, and this is what Luke shows us in this story about a 12-year-old growing up. He shows us wise parents who love a child that hurts them and still respects that child’s need to do what he believes he must do.
When all of God’s children see themselves as God’s family and look upon each other as brothers and sisters with love and respect, I sincerely believe that individual family units will be stronger and every one of them will be as close as we ever can be to holiness.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph are not the only Holy Family. The wisdom of the Church reminds us today that we are all called to learn the way of love, and that in this human family there are elders and those who are younger. The way of love leads elders to act respectfully, to share with the young wisdom gained form experience and to be open to the wisdom learned from the young as well. This calls for compassion as both the young and the elders bear with one another patiently and kindly. Both struggle with mistakes, and both know disappointment that deserves forgiveness when expectations are not met and feelings get hurt.
It is these things that will shape us all into a family that is truly holy.
December 25, 2024 at Saint Agnes and Saint Peter Churches in Naples, FL
Isaiah 9: 1-6 + Psalm 96 + Titus 2: 11-14 + Luke 2: 1-14
From the Square in front of Saint Peter in Rome to this church here in Naples, with precious statues fashioned by great artists to cardboard figures, in my home and probably in your home as well some image of a baby in a manger presents a great mystery that can stir hope in us and lead us to Joy. There is something almost magical and certainly mystical about that baby lying there far from home, powerless, poor, and helpless. It easy to simply look at that baby with romantic Christmas Carols going through our head and just continue to muddle through this season without a serious thought about why and what it means for there to be a baby at the center of it all. There is a question that must be asked as we look at that baby. Failing to do so reduces that baby to little more than a scene printed on a Christmas Card headed for the trash.
I have always wondered about those shepherds and what they saw when they looked at that baby. I want to believe that they asked, “What does this mean?” Something turned their fear into joy. Something sent them back to their fields with a different spirit. What I suspect is that they looked at that baby and saw themselves lying there vulnerable, helpless, poor, and powerless. I want to think that having heard Good News from those heavenly visitors, they understood that if their longed-for Messiah could look like them, homeless, helpless, and poor, they were no longer alone. Now God was with them just as they were.
It might be good for us to take long look at that baby and see what they saw asking what that baby means. When we do, its truth may break into our hearts, for we are all as helpless as that baby. In the face of our own suffering and the suffering all around us we are as powerless as that baby. We are homeless too because no matter where we are, it’s never quite right and never lasts for long. Like that baby, we live in times of oppression, trapped and oppressed by economic conditions or oppressed simply by the great demands on our time and resources, often leaving us feeling very much alone.
Those Shepherds looked at that baby and were filled with joyful hope not because everything was suddenly made right, but because they remembered the Good News they had heard. They realized that God had come to them and was intimately and physically sharing their existence.
That baby can mean something to any of us who look, wonder, and remember the Good News we have heard. We can discover what it means for God to be found as a baby. For anyone ever feeling alone, misunderstood or helpless, betrayed by friends, abandoned when most in need, or misjudged and accused of things we never did just like the man that baby became, there is something powerful to see in that baby when that question is asked. God is with us. God is Emmanuel.
Often with the Gospels, the message comes to us through details rather than words which means we have to pay attention to place and people. That could hardly be obvious than with the story of the Visitation. Like the Annunciation to Mary, this event has captured the imagination of artists for ages. There are countless paintings of the Visitation, and that event is still inspiring artists to this day. Some of them that I have enjoyed and studied really get the point of what Luke is saying here without any words. Remember, the Gospel is not history. It is theology. You have to ask, “What does this mean? What is God saying to us?”
In one painting that sticks in my mind, Mary arrives at the rather elegant home of Zechariah. Elizabeth has come down the steps and embraces the obviously younger woman. At the left edge is Zechariah in the shadows holding open the door. Remember, he can’t talk because he got sassy with an angel. At the right edge also in deep shadows is Joseph who is loaded down with luggage. While there is some humor there for any man who has travelled some distance with a wife, sister, or mother, you get that artist’s idea. However, the point is that the men are in the shadows at the edge of the action. Those two women are what matters. Those two women hold the promise of God, a promise being fulfilled.
While some may choose to interpret this as feminist liberation, I don’t think that is exactly the message. It is about women, but it is about what women stand for and their place at that time. The fact is, they stand for nothing. Yet, in God’s way of turning things upside down in order to get things right side up, It is women who are chosen to get things going, the lowly, the servant handmaids. In Luke’s way of writing, just in case we don’t get the message of how salvation is going to work, Mary begins to sing her Magnificat announcing that the mighty will be pulled down and the lowly lifted up. So, here we are right in the middle of a revelation of how God works – two unlikely people, an old lady and a young girl coming together in joy because they know that God’s promise is fulfilled. Pay attention to where they are too. Luke says it is the hill country of Judea. It doesn’t even have a name. Mary has come from another no-place, Nazareth. Nothing is happening in Jerusalem, that place of power and mighty power brokers. God does not work there. That place and what it stands for is finished.
There is one other detail that speaks to us, and that message is captured by a different artist who contrasts the ages of the two women. Mary is clearly a very young woman, and Elizabeth looks every bit her age. She is ancient. There’s been no “Botox” on that face. The shared celebration between Elizabeth and Mary shows how one generation can enrich and inspire the other. History has shown us that how one generation relates to the next generation often dictates the prosperity or the demise of the whole. A generation that clings to power and seeks to preserve its own well-being at the cost of the young creates a crisis for the future. The young who refuse to listen to those who have walked before them become isolated wanderers with no center point to their lives because of their distrust and rejection of traditions and institutions.
This is what the Visitation speaks of, and it is the Word of the Lord.