Cat Goodrich
Faith Presbyterian Church of Baltimore
February 2, 2025
Homecoming
Luke 4
Charles Barkley is a basketball commentator now, but when I was a kid, I remember him as one of the greats – I remember watching him rule the court on Saturday afternoons with my dad, sneakers squeaking, as he played for the Phoenix Suns and the Houston Rockets. Barkley was drafted the same year as Michael Jordan to play for the Philadelphia76er’s, and they played together on Olympic dream teams in the 90’s, winning gold – that’s the extent of my basketball knowledge. What I didn’t know until I moved to Birmingham, is that Barkley is from there, from a little town called Leeds where my friend’s brother owned a BBQ restaurant – about 20 minutes from downtown. Barkley had played ball for Auburn, and for a few years toyed with the idea of running for governor of Alabama.
He didn’t.
I learned in Birmingham that Barkley is a major philanthropist. He’s given millions to HBCU’s Spelman, Jackson State, Miles College, Morehouse, and Tuskegee University. He’s funded parks and playgrounds, ALS research, paid for computers and internet access during the pandemic, and given to the teachers and alumni of his high school. He’s invested in ways he believes will foster economic opportunity and prosperity for poor people in his hometown. Barkley is known as a generous and caring person – far more than one might expect a famous ball player to be. He still insists – he’s not a role model. The likelihood of other kids from tiny towns in Alabama ending up with a career on the court is so small. He says he feels blessed, and he wants to share the blessing with others – especially with his hometown.
This morning we find Jesus in his hometown, too.
He’s just stood up in the temple, read the words of the prophet Isaiah – unrolling the scroll, standing in the assembly – and proclaimed them fulfilled. Taking on the mantle of messiah. And people are amazed by his teaching! Excited, and energized by his words, his presence, what he promises might be possible for them and their community. Healing, salvation, liberation! Debts forgiven, God’s favor for them!
But even in their excitement, can’t you see a few of them shaking their heads? Saying to one another, “Can you believe it? This is Joseph’s boy!” See, they remember what he was like as a kid, getting into trouble. Making his teachers crazy.
“remember that time Jesus and his cousins broke all the water jars outside the building, because they were playing ball too close to the entrance? Those boys were too much. Made Jesus do all the talking to fess up, too.”
“remember that time Jesus won the prize for memorizing the most passages from the Torah? When he was so nervous to read in front of the congregation, he got sick?”
Joseph’s boy, all grown up. They can’t quite square their memories of him with the person he’s become. Still, they can’t help but wonder… if he really is the messiah, the promised one, what will that mean for them? Will the hometown boy bring hometown benefits? Will he do for them what they’ve heard he’s done elsewhere? Will he heal their sick? Do miracles? Cast out evil? I mean, they put up with his antics as a kid, that’s gotta count for something!
All of this must be going through their heads as Jesus continues to teach. And Jesus, even though it’s early in his ministry, he knows it. Can see the gleam in their eyes and the expectations begin to form. So he decides to head them off. He reminds them of prophets who have gone before, who didn’t show preferential treatment to their hometowns, or to the people of Israel either. he makes it clear that he won’t perform on demand. He’s here for everyone, not just for them. And in fact, there are people who need him more than they do. So they get angry, and run him out of town.
Some commentators suggest they’re angry not just because they won’t get special treatment, but because he’s reaching out to Gentiles before offering help to his own Jewish community. And the stories he tells – a story about Elisha miraculously feeding a woman and her son in a time of famine – not just any woman, but a foreigner; and Elijah miraculously healing Naaman, a Syrian – Naaman, who wasn’t just the enemy, but the general of the enemy’s army – prove this point. It’s resentment that fuels the crowd’s fury, jealousy, and maybe even xenophobia. It’s hard to say. But, they get so angry, they take him to the top of a mountain and try to push him off.
Have you ever heard the saying, “Comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable?” I use the phrase in prayers, sometimes, and always thought it could be attributed to a leader of the reformation, to Martin Luther or John Calvin. Apparently, though, the phrase can be traced back to a newspaperman, back to the early 1900’s in the age of muckrakers. Finley Peter Dunne, a journalist who wrote for the Chicago Tribune, coined the phrase in describing the purpose of a newspaper… to comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable. And I think this may be what Jesus is doing here… challenging the people who raised him to see that God’s love, justice, and healing power reach across boundaries of race and cultural identity, even religion – to those who some faithful folks have discounted, and pushed out, as unworthy of God’s blessing. Christ came to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.
This has been a difficult week in our country. The new Administration has thrown a wrench into the wheels of government, stopping essential foreign aid, seeking to fire or furlough millions of civil servants, ending refugee resettlement programs, the list goes on and on and on. It is breathtaking in its cruelty and scope. It is difficult, if not impossible, to fully comprehend the implications and the long-term damage of this dismantling. And yet it brings to mind those folks in Jesus’ home congregation. The ones with the gleam in their eye and the wheels in their heads turning, thinking – what’s in this for me? With the firing of inspector generals, the installation of cronies and loyalists into top positions, and elon musk with his hand in the federal treasury – it’s clear that some people are hoping to benefit at the expense of all the rest.
There’s not a perfect parallel, there never is, but …
I can’t help but think about Jesus’ refusal to prioritize his hometown wants over the needs of the wider world. And his fearlessness, to tell the truth to his hometown folks about God’s concern for the poor and forgotten, for foreigners and strangers – even though it provoked their fury. I’m amazed by his courage in this story, his ability to find a way through their chaos, and their anger, to continue his ministry of love and justice, his work of compassion and healing.
We know Jesus would decry a kleptocracy – he said enough about the Roman empire for us to know that. But when I think about it – and I never thought I would say this – maybe I want him to be a little like Charles Barkley: investing in positive programs to help hometown folks. We want Jesus to be on our side, for us – not for them. Reflecting on this passage in the Christian Century a couple of years ago, Lutheran pastor Katie Hines-Shah says Jesus escapes the murderous mob because “he goes through the middle – he refuses to be caught in the binary trap… He won’t be contained…”as a supporter of one group over another, us verses them.”[1] Maybe our way through the chaos is to follow his lead… paying attention to the ways that we have grown comfortable in modern life, and having the courage to follow him to the places where people are suffering – to offer our hands and hearts for the work of healing. This is the life of Faith to which we are called. The world needs us now more than ever. We must not be afraid!
[1] Hines-Shah, Katie, “Reflections on the lectionary; January 30, Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany” The Christian Century, 1/12/22