Prepare for Easter

Monday, March 9, 2020

About My Father’s Business:

A Lenten Devotional Guide

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me….” And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” And they rose up and drove him out…. Luke 4:16-21, 29 ESV

Maybe we love to read about Jesus’ bravery because in the secret places of our hearts we imagine ourselves to be brave. Like Peter, we boldly proclaim that we would defend Jesus to the death, yet when the first person challenges us, we shy away from not only life-threatening encounters but from the least little confrontation. Not Jesus!

The desert time alone with his Father and the terrible temptations of Satan were behind. He knew who he was, and he went home to tell the people he knew best, even though he knew they would not receive his message well. (Look at verse 24: And he said, “Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown.”) He went to the synagogue in his own town and stood up to read. He knew the text. He read and then declared himself the promised Messiah. Everybody in the synagogue was furious! They made derisive remarks about him as being just a local boy and certainly not their expected Messiah. They would have harmed him had he not miraculously left them.

They had a preconceived idea of who he was, and they were unwilling to hear anything else. Aren’t we like that? We want him to come but only as we expect him to be – and we’d like him not to change too much. We welcome him to church, but we want to be through in an hour. We want him to teach us to praise, but not with guitars or drums or electric keyboards in our beautiful sanctuary. He can teach the preacher to pray out loud but not us. We want him to come, but not to do anything outlandish.

Father, help us to recognize you when you come, though you do not come as we expect, and to joyfully accept your new revelation. Amen

About My Father’s Business:

A Lenten Devotional Guide
prepared for First United Methodist Church of Homosassa, Florida
Spring 2010
by Patience Nave, Christian Education Coordinator