Welcome, I have had quite a few days as the binding on my Bible finally broke and I’ve had to research how to salvage it as it has all of my notes in it from the past years. Luckily I figured it out and it is still usable. Our text for this Sunday is a continuation of last Sunday. We pick right up where we left off.
V22 This verse is misleading in our bibles as we think they are thinking he is amazing in a good way. The Greek means they didn’t think so well of him and were surprised that he spoke words of mercy about the Gentiles. Remember I had you look up the verse he left out, it says “and the day of vengeance of our God”. It was about taking vengeance against the Gentiles and all of their hope lay in this. They start to question his authority to say these things by bringing up doubt. Don’t we know this man, he is Josephs’ son. He has no authority from God.
V23-24 Jesus replies to their questioning of his authority by telling them the proverbs they will use against him. They will ask for a sign to verify his authority to say these things and make these claims. He knows that no matter what he does it won’t convince them as they are too familiar with him and his background. They can’t see past who he was while growing up.
V25-26 He instructs them from the Old Testament that in the time of their great prophet Elijah when there was a famine God sent Elijah to a gentile widow to be saved and fed. A gentile widow had saved Elijah from the famine with the help of God, not an Israelite widow. 1 Kings 17:8
V27 Jesus continues with the story from the Old Testament about a Syrian (Gentile) general in the army with leprosy who was sent to the prophet Elisha to be cured of his disease, not any Israelites. 2 Kings 5.
V28 The crowd is now in a rage. He has picked from the Old Testament stories about God showing mercy and ministering to the Gentiles as an explanation as to why he left out the statement about vengeance. They will be shown mercy now too. If the Jewish people reject Jesus’ message now he too will go to the Gentiles.
V29 The crowd wants to kill him. They drive him out of town to toss him off a cliff but he is able to pass through the midst of them as it isn’t his time yet to die.
V31-32 He travels to Capernaum which will be his Galilean home after his rejection at Nazareth. He is teaching in their synagogue and they are amazed at the authority he teaches with. Others taught by quoting famous previous rabbinical teachings, not as if they themselves had originated the ideas. Jesus’ teachings originated with him, he quoted no one else for authority.
V33-34 There is in the synagogue a man with a demon. The demon knows who Jesus is and calls him by name and title. The demon does this to show Jesus he knows who he is and has authority over him. In that time it was thought that whoever knew the name of the other had power and authority over them. By the demon saying Jesus’ name he is asserting authority.
V35 Jesus rebukes the demon saying “come out” and the demon obeys. This is a demonstration of the power and authority of Jesus. Apparently he has so much power that he can control the demons.
V36-37 The crowd is shocked. They’ve never seen anything like this before. Usually when trying to excise a demon, ritual and incantations had to be performed. Jesus just commands it to leave and it does. Now people start spreading the word about him.
Jesus gave them a message they didn’t want to hear. How often does he give us a message we don’t want to hear? If we refuse to hear him he will move on to others that are open to his message just as he told the people of Nazareth he would.
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