Alex Kim: Jesus' Mission Statement

Thanks be to God! This is the sort passage a preacher ends a sermon on that simply hushes the entire church. I speechless, but incredibly thankful to know that our God came into humanity in order "bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor." Jesus selects a passage of scripture that defines the rest of his human ministry. And now, our next Presiding Bishop has taken up a similar mission, and calls us all to join her. What inspiration!

What's also very interesting here is to compare Jesus' quotation of scripture (Isaiah 61) and the original text itself. They read virtually the same, but at the end, Isaiah says, "To proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God". Jesus omits the "vengeance" part, and I tend to trust the exegesis of the Word made flesh upon the Word. Self-righteousness, judgment, and vidication - when Jesus stopped short of "vengeance", he rejected these as part of his human ministry.

In light of last Sunday's gospel featuring Bartimaeus, Jesus' "mission statement" is even more powerful. When the gospel was being read in church, my mind went dumb at the line that said, "Take heart, get up, he is calling you." That's exactly it.This week, let's take heart and get up - Jesus calls us to the same mission for which he became one of us. What an amazing opportunity.

Alex Kim