Sidonian Widow at Zarepath Elijah in Luke 4

[atassina]

Luke 4: 21-30

One moment Jesus wins the approval of all because of the gracious words that came from his lips. Jesus is on a roll building up steam. He then brings in the comparison of God sending Elijah to the Sidonian Widow. Good by steam roll and hello -"We’re going to toss you off a cliff to your death.

What is the integrated meaning among Elijah, Widow, Zarepath and Sidonian town.

a
Enjoy some cake with your morning coffee.
It’s still fresh.

 

[Gorgias]

The clue is in the fact that this week’s Gospel continues last week’s.

Last week, Jesus identifies that in Him, the fulfillment to the prophecies in Isaiah are found. We’ve finally made it! We’re here! The Messiah has arrived!

And yet, we see the reaction of Jesus’ own people – the folks in Nazareth, the folks among whom Jesus grew up… the folks who should understand Jesus better than those in Capernaum who have just witnessed a miracle or two and a sermon or two.

But, we see what the folks in Nazareth ask for: not salvation, not the Messiah – just a miracle, please. Just like the show you put on in Capernaum – yeah, that’s all we really want from you; and then, you and your traveling circus can move along.

The meaning of Jesus’ words is simple: the goal isn’t the miracle. Not the miracle during the drought, or the miracle of the healing of leprosy; not a miracle He might work in Nazareth! The goal back then was the fulfillment of God’s will among His people (the miracles, in fact, were just incidental to the story of God’s plan). And now the goal, as it were, is the coming of the Messiah and the Kingdom of God!

The meaning is that the people of Nazareth (like everyone else in the Gospel of Mark) can’t see Jesus and His mission for what it is – rather, they only want a teacher or a miracle worker. The meaning is that there’s more here than meets the eye…

 

[Neofight]

A, be sure to read all accounts of Jesus’s rejection in his hometown in the synoptic Gospels, because if you read Luke alone, there are problems.

Luke, despite the resounding Good News of his message, often has problems with chronology and geography.

The problem is apparent in this reading, when he refers those in Nazareth demanding he do in his hometown what he had done in Capernaum. The trouble is this rejection at Nazareth is at the onset of his Galilean Ministry, and he does not teach, preach, or heal in Capernaum until later.

Complicating issues, Luke has Jesus calling his first disciples later than the other Gospels.

Again, this is not to take away from the message of Luke, but to show the importance of considering parallel readings of the gospels.

 

[JB_Brother_4446]

Luke 4: 21-30

One moment Jesus wins the approval of all because of the gracious words that came from his lips. Jesus is on a roll building up steam. He then brings in the comparison of God sending Elijah to the Sidonian Widow. Good by steam roll and hello -"We’re going to toss you off a cliff to your death.

What is the integrated meaning among Elijah, Widow, Zarepath and Sidonian town.

a
Enjoy some cake with your morning coffee.
It’s still fresh.

When he was refering to the Sidonian widow and the Syrian general, Jesus was saying that Genitles were also included in salvation and would accept him even more than the people in his own hometown. Of course they would want to kill him!

 

[kkollwitz]

From 6th grade-

But then Jesus says, “I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, when there came a great famine over all the land; and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.” Tell me that story, we’ve had it in class. *She was starving but let him have some of her food so he made a miracle and she never ran out. *Yes. God had Elijah miraculously help a pagan woman, not one of the starving Chosen People in Israel.

And Jesus went on: “And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” Tell it please. *He washed in the river 7 times and he wasn’t a leper anymore. *Yes, so even though “there were many lepers in Israel,” God saw fit to have Elisha miraculously heal a pagan.

“When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and put him out of the city, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw him down headlong. But passing through the midst of them he went away.” (all from Luke 4) One minute Jesus is the hometown boy, the next minute they’re gonna throw him off a cliff! Why’s that? No guesses? That’s ok, even grownups don’t always figure this out. Jesus is telling them that the good news he’s proclaiming about liberation from oppression and so forth may not apply to them even though they’re “Sons of Abraham,” as John the Baptist would say. Jesus is saying that in the past, sometimes God gave miracles to pagans instead of Jews. Jesus is reminding everyone that God rewards people not because of who they are, their status, but by…what they do! * Yes. Isaiah used to say this same thing; he aggravated people, too. And both Jesus and John would tell people a tree is judged good or bad by the fruits it produces: “for the tree is known by its fruit.” Of course they’re talking about…people*, and the fruits are*…what you do.* Yes. We’re made of a.*…body’n’soul, *uh-huh, and so we must act in faith, body’n’soul together.

 

[Gorgias]

One minute Jesus is the hometown boy, the next minute they’re gonna throw him off a cliff! Why’s that? No guesses? That’s ok, even grownups don’t always figure this out. Jesus is telling them that the good news he’s proclaiming about liberation from oppression and so forth may not apply to them even though they’re “Sons of Abraham,”

uch: :nope:

The message, I’d assert, isn’t “you might not be saved”, but instead, “stop focusing on ‘miracle’ and start focusing on ‘Messiah’”…

Jesus is reminding everyone that God rewards people not because of who they are, their status, but by…*what they do! * Yes.

Umm… no?

Maybe you’re not trying to say ‘salvation by works’, but it seems like it. Yeah, “who you’re related to” isn’t the measuring stick – belief in Jesus is – but unless ‘belief’ is “what they do”, then I think that teaching this to 6th graders runs the risk of giving the wrong impression…

we must act in faith, body’n’soul together.

True. But acts – that is, ‘fruit’ – doesn’t save; it just identifies the tree we belong to.

 

[JB_Brother_4446]

uch: :nope:

The message, I’d assert, isn’t “you might not be saved”, but instead, “stop focusing on ‘miracle’ and start focusing on ‘Messiah’”…

Umm… no?

Maybe you’re not trying to say ‘salvation by works’, but it seems like it. Yeah, “who you’re related to” isn’t the measuring stick – belief in Jesus is – but unless ‘belief’ is “what they do”, then I think that teaching this to 6th graders runs the risk of giving the wrong impression…

True. But acts – that is, ‘fruit’ – doesn’t save; it just identifies the tree we belong to.

Jesus was refering to the salvation of the Gentiles over those who knew Him, or at least thought they did.