The Spirit is Upon Me

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When our children grow up and first leave home, perhaps to go to university, or to go to work, it’s lovely when they come home for the weekend, or for the holidays, isn’t it? And often they will come to church with us, and see all their old friends, and talk about how they are getting on. And it has been known for the minister or preacher to ask them to come up and talk about what they’ve been doing, especially if they’ve been away on some kind of mission work.

Our reading is set very near the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. He has been baptised by John, and then led into the desert to be tempted, and basically to come to terms with who he is and what his mission is. He has been wandering around Galilee, collecting disciples, healing the sick, and proclaiming the Kingdom of God. And now he has come home to Nazareth and, of course, goes to his home synagogue on the Sabbath. And he is asked to read a passage of scripture, which was the norm – Jewish men were, and I believe still are – and, of course, women in some Jewish traditions, but not all – apt to be dropped on to read at a moment’s notice.

And what Jesus reads is the very passage we had for our first reading this evening, from Isaiah:
“The Sovereign Lord has filled me with his Spirit.
He has chosen me and sent me
To bring good news to the poor,
To heal the broken-hearted,
To announce release to captives
And freedom to those in prison.
He has sent me to proclaim
That the time has come
When the Lord will save his people
And defeat their enemies.”

So far, so very good. It’s lovely, isn’t it, to think that we have just read a passage of Scripture that we know that Jesus himself read, allowing for differences in translation!

The tradition was that if you read the Scripture, you could comment on it, but having stood to read – much as in some churches we stand to read the Gospel – you then sat down. And Jesus sat down, and they all looked at him attentively, wondering what he was going to say.

After all, they’d known him since he was a very small boy, when the family had moved to Nazareth after King Herod died. And he’d grown up with them, gone to school with them, worked with his father – until suddenly he’d gone off, some months ago now, with barely a word of farewell. You can hear the aunties in the gallery, can’t you: “Hmph, don’t know what he thought he was doing, leaving his Mum in the lurch like that. I did hear he’s been doing miracles and healings and so on, out in the back country, but I don’t believe a word of it, do you? Well, he’s home now. Let’s see what he’s got to say for himself!”

What he said was the last thing anybody expected:
“This passage of scripture has come true today, as you heard it being read.”

“This passage of scripture has come true today, as you heard it being read.”

I can’t help wondering whether he knew he was going to say that, or whether it just came out. It’s so unclear how much Jesus knew about Who he was, and what he had been sent to do. He had been coming to terms with it a bit in the desert, of course, but it’s clear from Scripture that he gradually appreciates things more and more as time goes on. I do hope he was able to grow up as an ordinary boy, learning and playing with his friends, without any special knowledge hanging over hime. Anyway, at this stage, he does know that he has been sent to heal people, to minister to the sick, to proclaim the Kingdom of God, and, above all, to follow the promptings of God’s spirit. And maybe, when he read the bit from Isaiah, it suddenly spoke to him, and showed him that it was he to whom it applied.

We didn’t go on to read the rest of the story, but it’s rather sad. They were impressed by his authority – but – but – this was Joseph’s son, surely? How could the Isaiah passage apply to him?

And Jesus says, probably slightly annoyed, “Well, they do say a prophet is without honour in his own country!” which, of course, infuriates them, and they drag him up to the cliff edge with some thought of throwing him over, but he escapes and goes away.

You see, it’s very difficult when God doesn’t do what you expect. And nobody in Nazareth expected God to come in the person of the carpenter’s son! Not Mary’s eldest, who’d gone off so suddenly like that!

Sometimes, when we call upon God for help, we expect him to come in some kind of miraculous way. My father used to tell of a man whose house was menaced by floods, and who was on the roof, praying for God to save him. He really expected God to sweep him away in a whirlwind or something, so when the fire services came along in a rowing-boat, he refused to get in, saying “God will save me!” A little later, another boat came along, but again he refused. The waters continued to rise, and a coast guard helicopter came to try to persuade him to come to safety but no, “God will save me.” And, inevitably, he was swept away and drowned.

So, in Heaven, he seeks the throne of grace, and demands, “How could you let me down like that? I prayed for you to save me, and you didn’t!”
But God answered, “My dear son, I sent you two boats and a helicopter – what more could you want?”

The man didn’t recognise God’s hand in the boats and the helicopter, and the people of Nazareth didn’t recognise it in Jesus.

But for Jesus, this passage, and similar ones from Isaiah, were the touchstone of his ministry. You remember, some time later, how his cousin John was imprisoned and suddenly had a crisis of faith. He sent his disciples to Jesus to ask “Are you the one John said was going to come, or should we expect someone else?” and Jesus replied, “Go back and tell John what you are hearing and seeing: the blind can see, the lame can walk, those who suffer from dreaded skin diseases are made clean, the deaf hear, the dead are brought back to life, and the Good News is preached to the poor.”

Jesus became more and more certain that he was the Messiah, the chosen one. Even if his childhood friends didn’t recognise this. His disciples did, most of the time, but even they had moments….

But why does this matter? What does this passage have to say to us tonight?

Well, on Thursday it was Ascension Day, the day when we remember Jesus’ final parting from his disciples. The Book of Acts tells us that he was “taken from their sight”, and it is certainly clear to them, in some way, that he will not now return as the Jesus they knew and loved. But they have been told to wait in Jerusalem until the Spirit comes. Which, as we know, happened on the Day of Pentecost, which we will be celebrating next Sunday.

And when the Spirit came, of course, what had happened was instantly recognisable. It wasn’t just the tongues of fire, or the rushing mighty wind. It wasn’t just the way the disciples were enabled to speak in tongues, and the listeners to understand what was being said. It wasn’t just the way that Peter was able to preach so powerfully that three thousand people were added to the church that day.

It was all that, and then it was the fact that they were able, in Jesus’ name, to heal the sick, to perform miracles, and, perhaps especially, to
“bring good news to the poor,
To heal the broken-hearted,
To announce release to captives
And freedom to those in prison.
. . . . to proclaim
That the time has come
When the Lord will save his people
And defeat their enemies.”

And again, that is not just something that happened long ago in history; it is something that can, and should, happen to all believers today. To you, and to me.

We can be, and should be, filled with the Holy Spirit; I’m sure we can all remember times when we know this is what has happened. Some believers talk of being “baptized with the Holy Spirit”, from John the Baptist’s pointing out that he, John, can only baptize with water, but Jesus can and will baptize with the Holy Spirit. And maybe you have experienced something you can describe as such.

But the problem with being filled with the Holy Spirit is that we tend to leak! It’s not, I find, a once-and-for-all experience; it’s something that we need to ask God to do daily, sometimes even hourly! The Spirit comes to burn out that which is not of God in us – what St Paul would probably call “the flesh”; to enable us to speak God’s word, whether we know we’ve done so or not, and above all, to help us become the people God created us to be, the ones we have been designed to be.

My friends, right now this minute we may be full of the Holy Spirit, or we may feel empty and forlorn. Or somewhere in between. So let’s ask God to fill us anew, using the lovely song “Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me.” Let’s sing it through twice.