In the Sermon on the Plain (Luke 6), Jesus tells us what we hoped we’d never hear: our world is upside down and we’re being called to flip it over.
blessing, curse, and the way of love in times of transformation
Epiphany 6C | Luke 6:17-26
A lot has taken place for Jesus and these first disciples since last week. They’ve crossed large chunks of land, sticking to the outskirts of civilization and not the usual places. Jesus has healed countless people and exercised countless demons in just one chapter.
We’re suddenly coming down from a mountain, Jesus suddenly has many disciples, and people are flocking to him like a rockstar. In a really short time, Jesus has become a huge celebrity. People want to be in his orbit. They want to be noticed, for sure, but they want something else more.
They want a piece of him. Almost literally. Like they could touch his arm or his clothes and get some Jesus juice; as if the power will transfer from him into them.
Of course, none of them wants to steal his power. They don’t want to be him. That would mean living a completely different life than their own. They can’t even say what they want from him… they just want to be in it.
This time Jesus isn’t trapped by the water; he’s not trying to get away. He already got away. He’s rested; had his Sabbath time on the mountain top. There, he called 12 of his disciples and named them apostles. Now, down here on the open plains, he’s engaging with all these people who want something from him.
Something he can give them (and does). It’s just not what God wants for them long term. God’s dream is for their lives, not just the moment.
The Disciples
Jesus turns to his disciples and preaches a difficult sermon. This morning we only get the beginning, but it once again upends their expectations.
As all these people try to get the attention of the celebrity preacher, or healed by him, called by him, freed by him, Jesus turns away from all of the wanting and toward those walking his walk as students. They anticipate he’ll give them new teaching about what they’re supposed to do or how they’re supposed to behave.
Instead, Jesus again preaches Jubilee — the intentional changing and restoring of the world.
Instead of giving them relationship advice or the way to get into heaven, Jesus tells them who is blessed. The poor. – Wait, what? – The kingdom is yours. The hungry. – Why? – You will be filled. Those who weep. – That doesn’t even make sense. – You will laugh. When people hate you because the people hated the prophets. – These are blessings? –
These little beatitudes are weird and not at all what the disciples should expect. Nor are they what we’re used to hearing from our teachers. We never hear a call to go hungry and weep at the world. When we encounter that, we tell each other to buck up and get over it.
He keeps going.
Woe to the rich, the full, the laughing, and the respected. You’ve got it good now. But in the Jubilee, when all returns to its original place, these riches will go away.
He is telling the disciples that all they know is already flipped. This isn’t what God made. We’ve engineered a
And God wants us to join in flipping it back.
Picturing the Flip
I was trying to come up with the perfect illustration for this, but they’re all so distracting. What I wanted to do was show a picture of a thing we think is the “real way.” And then flip it. But everything I thought of fell flat. They didn’t have the kind of power to help make all of the truth of this moment make sense.
Because what Jesus is asking us to help flip over feels like its right side up. This picture of blessing doesn’t sound like
It sounds like Jesus is trying to do something to the world rather than what he is actually doing: returning the world.
But the point isn’t only in the now, but also equally in the then we will be.
It isn’t only riches and poverty now, but also when the world is flipped.
Not only hunger and fullness, weeping and laughing, persecution and celebration now but also when the world is flipped upside down.
This teaching isn’t a life hack. It’s not a tip for living. This isn’t a prescription for how to be a “good Christian” or live a better “life of faith.” This isn’t about punishment and reward. Like he’ll reveal to the pious young ruler later, this isn’t about doing some things to earn your inheritance in heaven. You don’t get a ticket to that ride.
What Jesus is talking about isn’t that small and individualistic. It’s much bigger than that and at a whole different scale.
Widening the Circle
In the time since Jesus called his disciples at the beginning of chapter 5, he’s covered a lot of real estate and healed a bunch of people.
But just as important is what he’s teaching his followers and showing the world at the same time. Even through the healing. It isn’t just happy times. He violated a couple of serious rules. Stuff those people obsessed with doing “the right thing” would never think about trying.
After elevating these four fishermen to be his disciples, he calls a tax collector named Levi. A traitor to his own people. Then he takes it even further and has dinner with Levi and his friends. This isn’t just chilling with the wrong crowd. This is conspiring with the cast-out enemy of the people.
Then he lets his disciples break Sabbath law by picking wheat in the fields. And knowing some people would be royally cheesed if he even thought of healing somebody in the middle of the synagogue on the Sabbath, Jesus stands up and does it. Right there, right then. Knowing what they will think, he does it anyway.
And he addresses the elephant in the room by pointing out how focused they are on the rules and their individual purity. But they do this while also ignoring this man just because it’s the Sabbath. Jesus says you can’t have both personal piety and communal death. Ignoring the man is condemning him.
Jesus is widening the circle, expanding the kin-dom, restoring the Sabbath, and like he said back home in chapter 4, proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor.
Jesus came for the revolution and he stayed for the Jubilee.
The Good News
Jesus doesn’t just want our being nice, our following the rules, our making things a little better for our neighbors. He wants us to turn our hearts, to hear and feel and weep at the injustice our neighbors experience. We need to know the pain and feel it because often our privilege lets us avoid it.
This is the good news. This is why so many flocked to him, bringing their pain and confusion. Why his rebellious and challenging message drew such crowds and draws so many now. He is saying what leaders don’t normally say, healing what leaders normally don’t heal, and giving hope to the people leaders normally avoid.
And when the people surround him, begging for healing and curing of the demons inside,
“And all in the crowd were trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them.”
The power came out from him.
And healed all of them.
Restoring
This teaching for the disciples is the second half of this whole teaching. It’s a way of saying Look at what we’re doing. Look at how this works. There is so much need around us. God is restoring the world. We’re flipping it over right now!
All of these people, seeking and searching and hoping and needing someone to save them: these are who God has come to rescue!
All of these people standing in our way, rejecting the God in our midst, the very one who is remaking the world, the ones who like their power and privilege just as it is, these people are going to be extremely disappointed with what God has in store for all of us.
This is the Jubilee. All you’ve gained is lost. All that’s been taken from you, land and wealth and dignity, is returned. God isn’t declaring winners and losers: humans did that. God is returning status to everyone and the only losers are the ones who reject the Jubilee and fight against it.
The ones who sit in the synagogue and refuse to heal a man’s withered hand, claiming the rules prevent it.
We aren’t condemned by our individual sins: rejecting the mission of God to restore the world condemns us all already. Jesus invites the masses to subvert this broken relationship with God. To participate in its restoration!
Do not be afraid; this is Good News. Now may be full of all of this. But we will be living, loving, restoring a beautiful world together.