Fourth of Epiphany 2008

‘Aunt Ada Doom sat in her room upstairs…alone. When she was very small – so small that the lightest puff of breeze blew her little crinoline skirt over her head – she had seen something nasty in the woodshed’.

Baptized by John and steadfast in the face of Satan’s tempting, Jesus begins his public ministry. Matthew is in no doubt as to the significance of these days. They are full of prophecy, purpose and people: it is a beginning marked by prophecy, by purpose, and by people.

Hearing of John’s arrest Jesus relocates to Galilee and establishes a base for himself in Capernaum. Galilee had become known as ‘Galilee of the Nations’ or ‘Galilee of the Gentiles’ when, together with the rest of the Northern Kingdom of Israel it had fallen to foreign invaders in the early eighth century BC. That had changed. One hundred years before the birth of Jesus Galilee had been re-taken by the Jewish Hasmonean kings in the brief period of independence that they enjoyed before the Roman conquest. When Jesus went there he would have found a prosperous region of forty square kilometres, re-settled by cosmopolitan Jews, their faith re-established in the synagogues, many of which he was to visit.

But interesting as it may be to place Jesus into a historical context, what is more significant is the prophecy of Isaiah. This was that the Galilee of the Nations would be glorified; that the people who had walked in darkness would see a great light. Galilee was to be the springboard of the Messiah. So in going there Matthew wants us to understand that this is not just a matter of geography, it is a matter of history. Jesus is fulfilling the destiny outlined for the Christ. God is at work. When we relocate to the home counties we possibly realize some capital from an overpriced London residence, but when Jesus moves to Capernaum heaven holds its breath as divine power is on the move.

The exhilaration of these days is not confined to the skies, though. Jesus explodes into Galilee with single-minded purpose and unimaginable power. Finding two fishing families at work he calls them to follow him, and they do. Matthew uses the Greek adverb euqews, ‘immediately’, twice in almost as many sentences. Jesus calls and immediately the men obey. Jewish hearers would have detected another parallel with Israel’s glorious past. When the prophet Elijah calls Elisha to become his follower and successor Elisha too is hard at work, although he is ploughing with oxen. And it’s not just that his activities are agricultural rather than fishery-oriented. When Elijah calls him he asks to be allowed to kiss his parents and offer a sacrifice before coming. Simon, Andrew, James and John make no such requests. They leave their livelihoods, homes and families and follow the one who is calling. It seems that earth is in tune with heaven, caught up in common purpose. There is a palpable excitement at what is happening. A strange man is emerging into Galilee and other men are giving up everything to be with him.

Not do these days resonate with the prophecies of old; not only are they replete with purpose for the moment; they are also unequivocally people-centred. What is happening in Galilee is not a trend or a fashion. It is not what economists have devoted so much time to this week; it is not the sort of phantasm that can be conjured up by advertising executives to scare the gullible into buying a particular brand of deodorant. Real people are being swept along in a sudden tornado. Of course, the streets that surround us are not strangers to such events. In 193X Oswald Moseley paraded 500 Fascists in Eaton Square; forty years later the clean living Osmond brother rented a house here while their fans went wild with excitement. But the Galilean tornado brings healing and life rather than totalitarianism or best-forgotten teenage excess. With the new disciples at his side Jesus goes into Galilee, curing every disease and every sickness. This is not an idea. It is not what Aunt Ada thinks she saw in the woodshed all those years ago, the never-named thing which she has dwelt on and manipulated ever since. It is real, tangible, visible, effectual.

And its impact is such that when Paul reflects upon it a few years later in his letter to the Corinthians he is cautious about using words. Christ sent him to proclaim the Gospel, he writes ‘and not with eloquent wisdom, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its power’. Paul wants to utter aloud not words, but the cross. His gospel is not a message but an event, the earthly culmination of the tumultuous years begun in these tumultuous days in Galilee.

All this is encapsulated in the one phrase that the evangelists record Jesus uttering, the most effective sermon the world has ever heard, and probably the shortest (let the preacher understand): ‘the kingdom of heaven has come near’. There is no doctrine or exposition. It’s a simple claim that in the person of Jesus the divine has reconnected with the earthly; that those who stand in the presence of Jesus stand at the threshold of eternity; that those who look upon him look upon the author of all life and upon the one who will bring to perfection all life. Simon, Andrew, James and John knew it; the sick and diseased of Galilee knew it; years later Paul knew it. Do we, and in what way are we prepared to let it change us? Amen.


Sunday 27 January 2008,
Fourth of Epiphany,
Isaiah 9: 1-4;
1 Corinthians 1: 10-18;
Matthew 4: 12-23.