Bid the Mob Good Day

When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath.  And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff.  But passing through their midst, he went away.  — Luke 4:28-30

This is a rather intriguing passage that sounds more like a scene from a Chuck Norris movie than from the Gospel.  There is no mention of arm-bars or round-house kicks so we are left to wonder exactly how it was that Jesus "passed" through the middle of a hostile crowd and walked off. 

Keep in mind that this occurred in Nazareth, the boyhood home of Jesus.  These were people who had known Him most of His life.  His mother, brothers and sisters (or cousins if you are Catholic) still lived there. 

What had Jesus done to stir up so much animosity?  He had declared His destiny.  After reading from what we know as Isaiah 61, Jesus said, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." 

The Bible can be studied as literature and as history.  It can be discussed and examined as a basis for establishing a good and equitable and even a free society.  God is not opposed to our using His book in ways that make the world a better and more beautiful place.  At its highest level, though, the Bible is more than a record; it is a revelation.  It is the means for unveiling the Divine to us and ultimately in us.  Consequently, by the grace of God and the power of the Cross,  we may become living epistles for those around us, which would be, we might think, wonderful.  Except that a lot of people, even religious people, are rather offended by God if He is other than what they have come to understand Him as or what they want Him to be. 

As long as religious people can make their god into an image or in some other way clearly define the boundaries of what this god might be or be allowed to do, they are perfectly content.  The ones who attacked Jesus were accepting of a fully transcendent God, of One who Could Not Be Named.  And that God is very real and very much Reality.  Those good Jews were in no way common idolators.  The immanent — you might even say, invasive God, present in the universe, in Christ was simply too much for them to comprehend.  This manifestation of God's presence shattered their understanding.  Instead of accepting the Unveiling, they attacked it.

Hostility toward the immanent God did not end with the Crucifixion.  As Jesus told His disciples, "Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours."  When we become earthen vessels filled with the Light, when we are truly invaders behind enemy lines and not collaborators, we, too, are likely to be attacked.  There is no need to be taken by surprise if we find, on occasion, that "... a person's enemies will be those of his own household.".  It happens.  Our families, our friends, those who have supported us and assisted us in the past may turn away if not become outright antagonistic. 

The answer to this kind of antagonism is not to kick the mother-in-law in the head (as temporarily satisfying as that might be from time to time) or put a submission hold on the next-door neighbor.  It is, instead, to be so secure in our peace and our purpose and our confidence in Christ that the violence of the resistance has no hold on us.  We, like Jesus, are well able to "pass through" the objections that would hem us in on the precipice.  The world and even worldly religion will try to cast us down, but the mob and the press of public opinion or "consensus" can never control us or contain us.  We may have to face rage and walk in the middle of it, but it is, ultimately, the hopeless, helpless rage of impotence.  

The Man from Snowy River