Proclaiming the Gospel

Luke 4:14-30

 “Proclaiming the Gospel”

31 January 2016 St. Andrew’s Military Chapel Singapore

            One of the things I’ve adjusted to living out here is the lack of my interest in watching news on TV. Normally I’m a news junkie, especially local news channels. I watch Channel News Asia occasionally, but I’m used to watching the local news every day back in the States. This means I have to rely a bit more on the internet for learning about news, and as that can be quite an adventure in all things biased and conspiracy theory driven, I just don’t get as plugged in as I’m used to. So, when I was back home on leave it was refreshing to watch the local news from back in North Carolina.

            While I was there, one story really grabbed my attention. Not so much because of the topic of the story, rather the location. Poverty and the taking advantage of those without economic power is something endemic to all parts of the world, even those we consider first world. But, hearing about a city in an industrialized country having lack of access to clean and safe drinking water is not something we expect to hear on the news, especially when the cause is not related to a natural disaster.

            Right now, Flint, Michigan is suffering from a water crisis the likes of which I cannot ever recall for an American city in my lifetime. They are in the process of building a new water supply system. In order to save some money during this construction the city elected to switch their current water source from having it supplied by Detroit, to tapping directly off the Flint River. Unfortunately, the river is contaminated with super high levels of lead.

            To add insult to injury, it now seems as if those governing the city and the state knew of the problems and were taking some measures to protect certain people rather than fixing the problem and admitting their mistake. It was a group of researchers from Virginia Tech who have blown open the entire scandal and it looks like the lead scientist from that team will be the one to head the effort to fix the problem.

            Some people are trying to spin this as a race problem, but the more I look into this story, I think it is a class problem. Something where the poor have been taken advantage of in an effort to save money and those with the economic and, thus political power, have circled the wagons to protect themselves further compounding the problem.   

            As I keep hearing more and more bad news coming out of Flint, I have to ask where is the church in all of this? There are some churches doing great things there now. The United Methodist Committee on Relief is providing not just bottled water, but also water filtration equipment to help with the crisis. The Southern Baptist Convention Disaster Relief is providing bottled water and larger containers of water to aid in cooking and cleaning. Presbyterian Disaster Assistance is there providing water and is looking at ways to provide filtration units for showers. All great responses and in line with what Jesus spoke about in this passage to bring good news to the poor.

            However, where was the church to prevent this from becoming a crisis? Sadly, the church was there when it happened, let this develop and stood by as the crisis was developing. I’m not saying that individual congregations and denominations were turning their backs on the need. Christians made the decisions that put us in this situation. And I use the collective pronoun on purpose. We are part of this. We have a role, just like we have a role in every place the church has failed. We are one body of many parts that must work together to bring the Kingdom to those here on earth.

            We like to claim the US is a Christian nation, and the polls back that belief. According to the Pew Research Center’s Religious Landscape Study late last year, 71% of Americans claim to be Christian. This means that Christians are most likely the ones that not only made the decision to switch the water supply as well as to ignore the problem when it was discovered. The church was there, but not in the way Jesus commanded. Stephen Colbert once said, “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don't want to do it.”

 

            We can make a decision to be there in the aftermath of man-made disasters or we can follow our calling and stand up to prevent the disaster from occurring, or at least scream loud enough that one is coming. That’s the second part of this passage that we tend to overlook, that being a prophet will most likely make a few enemies because it will bring discomfort to the comfortable. In today’s passage, his first public sermon in Luke, Jesus proclaims good news for all such that everyone is surprised such keen theology came from such a place as a Nazarene carpenter’s son. But, then Jesus turns the tables and says they are complicit in the plight of the widows during the time of Elijah. He is calling out his own people and they try to kill him, for the first time.

 

            I always connect this story to that of Nathan looking at David telling him, he is the man stealing livestock. The same man David claimed should be killed for his crime. Jesus knew what he was getting ready to do. Right before he turned the tables on them he said, “No prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown.” Standing up and being a prophet is hard. It takes a courage we think we don’t have. But, when we do take a stand in the face of power to bring good news to the poor it does get noticed. (Barry Black Video)

 

             We as a universal church and as an individual worshipping community do a wonderful job responding to the crisis at hand. We just gave $10K to various organizations furthering the Kingdom around the world and we will add to that next week by our support of Willing Hearts as part of the Souper Bowl of Caring (the first time a group in Singapore has participate as best I can tell). And that is a vital part of our call as Christians. However, there are places we can find ourselves proclaiming good news as a situation develops, where we know we should stand up and speak a word of grace into a dark place.

 

I know I’ve missed this many times in my life and will probably miss a few more going forward. But, if we don’t try to speak into those situations, the status quo will always win. When we claim that through Christ all things are possible, we should back that up by speaking the prophetic word where warranted. It doesn’t always have to be done in public like the good Chaplain of the Senate, but it must be done to prevent a disaster like Flint from ever occurring. All it would have taken was one person to speak up early and this may have never happened. Sometimes we just need to be brave. (Play Brave).