In Your Hearing: Luke 4:16-30 | The Messiah We Want vs. The Messiah We Need
Why did Jesus' own people reject Him? In Luke 4, Jesus returns to His hometown of Nazareth and proclaims the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy. At first, the crowd marvels at His words—until He challenges their assumptions about God’s grace. When Jesus declares that salvation extends beyond Israel to the Gentiles, their admiration turns to fury.
This passage forces us to examine our own hearts. Do we accept God’s Word even when it challenges us? Do we trust in His sovereign grace, even when it reaches those we might least expect? Jesus’ message is clear—the gospel is for all people. But will we hear and believe, or will we resist like the people of Nazareth?
📖 Sermon Points:
📌Jesus declares His mission in the synagogue (Luke 4:16-21)
📌Jesus challenges the people’s expectations (Luke 4:22-27)
📌Jesus is rejected by His own people (Luke 4:28-30)
💡 God’s grace is greater than our expectations! May we trust in His Word, recognizing that salvation is His to give, not ours to control.
Transcript:
When you hear the three word phrase “No offense but” it is usually the case that you are likely to be offended by what comes next. That statement is most likely a precursor for something that is either an issue they have with you or perhaps a flaw you are unable to see in yourself. In my experience, when those words are uttered you kind of have to brace yourself. At best, you get an opinion that you agree with. At worst, you find out that someone doesn’t think too fondly of something you believe in or disagrees with something you have done. Regardless of whether or not the words “No offense” are uttered we know that there can be issues when an unfiltered opinion is given. Even if that opinion is truthful the likelihood of a reaction of some kind is very high.
As we look at our passage this morning we find a moment where Jesus shares a truth without softening the blow for his audience and their response is a rather extreme one. While this truth was upsetting to his audience in the synagogue in Nazareth, it is good news for us as people who are outsiders. It shows us that God’s grace in Christ comes to all people regardless of ethnicity.
As we set off into these 15 verses this morning we are going to divide up the passage into three main points to help us stay on course this morning.
The first thing we are going to see is that Jesus is teaching from Isaiah in the synagogue. Last week we saw that Jesus had kept the commands of God in the temptation in the wilderness and that he started his public ministry. Now we start to see what that looks like. He is not just an preacher roaming around given sermons off the side of hills. He also goes into the synagogue and is a part of the Sabbath day worship. When given the opportunity to read he chooses to read a prophetic word from Isaiah and says that what is being spoken of has been fulfilled.
Secondly, we see Jesus tell these people that Gentiles will be among the people of God. This comes about because the people can’t believe that someone whose father they know is so skilled in teaching the word. From this Jesus lines out those outside the people of Israel who had faith in the Old Testament.
Finally, we see that this upsets the people and they try to kill him. When you and I read what Jesus had to say we don’t see what the big deal is but the idea of what he is saying causes the people to reject him and ultimately it proves his point.
So, let’s dive into this passage by starting off with our first point in verses 16-21.
Luke 4:16–21
ESV
And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
As we start off here we see that Jesus rolls into his old stomping grounds. We saw in the previous two verses leading up to this passage that Jesus was out and about teaching. Led by the Spirit his fame was increasing wherever he went but now he is headed back to his home region.
You can sort of imagine how this would go. You’d have some people who were excited to that they knew someone so well known. You would have others who would go off on how he’s not that great and have some issue with his family or something. Others would be talking about how they always knew he was going to be something special and probably a whole lot of people bragging about how they were really good friends with him from before anyone knew who he was. That’s just kind of how it goes when anyone from a small region gets any kind of notoriety.
And when Jesus gets there he did what he always does. He goes into the synagogue. This account is rather interesting for us because it is the oldest record we know of on how worship was ordered in a service in a synagogue. There was a reading of scripture, usually a passage from the law and then another reading from the prophets. Then there would have been commentary and application on the passage that was read. Hmmmmm......does that sound familiar. Back when we were in the book of Hebrews you might recall me mentioning that the temple was not a place where the people gathered for corporate worship like we do here. The temple itself was a place where sacrifices were offered and only the priests could go in. Our worship more closely resembles what happened in the synagogue. They would have sung or recited a Psalm and had different readings from different parts of the Old Testament and then have something similar to a sermon.
As we look at what Jesus is doing here there is something interesting to note. They had the scroll of the prophet Isaiah to him and Jesus finds what he is going to read. Stop and think for a minute how difficult finding a passage would be. For us, it’s easy. We open the Bible, check at the top of the page and see how close we are to the book we are looking for. Once we find ourselves in the book we look at the chapter numbers and then we can whittle down even further to the verse number or even specific words in the verse.
Now, I’m guessing most of you don’t know how Hebrew works. Maybe the only time you’ve ever seen Hebrew was someone who had a cool looking Bible word made into a tattoo. I have a small sample up for you to take a look at but this is a more modern version of Hebrew than would have been on the scrolls in Jesus day. You can see the little dots at the bottom and top of the letters. Those are vowel points. Those weren’t added until about 600 AD. So, I’m going to help you imagine what a page of Hebrew would have looked like on that scroll Jesus dug through. Just the big chunky characters you see here. You’ll notice there are no spaces and there is no punctuation. Now, also remember that there were no chapter or verse numbers. To find what you are looking for would have been difficult and very time consuming and would have required that you really know the text well. In other words, Jesus really knew what he was looking for because, he found it and read it. We can’t tell from the text whether Jesus chose this passage because he wanted to read it or if, in the providence of God, it was a passage that was assigned in a reading schedule. Regardless, it speaks of the work of the messiah.
Luke 4:18–19
ESV
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And we see that the passage states that the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. We have seen this to idea with Jesus already, haven’t we. He was led out by the Spirit. He returns by the Spirit to Galilee to preach and teach. Luke is driving home the point that Jesus is the one. The Spirit has been upon Jesus and now we see that was foretold from the writing of Isaiah. And we see that Isaiah also uses an important term. This one the Spirit is upon is anointed. That is a messianic designation. The word messiah and the word Christ mean anointed one. The one that God chosen and appointed to be the one who brings salvation to his people.
And so what does this this anointed one do. He proclaims good news to the poor. Liberty to the captives. Blind recover their sight. The oppressed are liberated. In other words, the effects of the curse are being reversed. Oppression, blindness, poverty, and imprisonment are all clear signs that we live in a fallen world and the messiah comes to proclaim good news to them. This is the work of the messiah to proclaim that the curse is going to be undone.
And the last sentence we see from Isaiah is the proclamation of the year of the Lord’s favor. What is in view here is the idea of the year of Jubilee. In the old covenant there was year of jubilee that happened every 50 years. During this year the people were relieved of their debts and financial obligations and lost property was given back to its rightful owners. What Isaiah is driving at is a year of jubilee that is the ultimate righting of wrongs and clearing of debts. The year of jubilee is great but this anointed one of God is going to do something even greater.
And so Jesus reads this passage and then we read that he rolls the scroll back up and gives it back to the attendant and he sits down.
Luke 4:20–21
ESV
And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
And that might seem strange to you. Imagine if I got done reading scripture passage this morning and then I sat down. That just isn’t how we do things but in their synagogue worship this is what was done. The rabbi would read the passages and then sit down to teach. And so, imagine with me this scene. Chances are there is a buzz around Jesus as he returns to Nazareth. He has been out and about teaching and their probably is a bit of excitement around this Jesus, you know, Mary and Joseph’s son from down the way. You’ve heard he can preach quite the sermon and so you go to see what he has to say. This moment that he sits down is what you came to see. What will his commentary be on what was read?
And then he speaks “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” This is an amazing statement. They know this is a messianic prophecy and now Jesus is saying that this proclamation has come to pass. I can only imagine the buzz in the room when Jesus makes this claim. And this buzz is what leads us to our second point as Jesus draws out that Gentiles will be among the people of God.
Luke 4:22–27
ESV
And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth. And they said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” And he said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘ “Physician, heal yourself.” What we have heard you did at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.’ ” And he said, “Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown. But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land, and Elijah was sent to none of them but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.”
The people are initially enamored with what Jesus has to say but then people start to ask think about who is in front of them making this claim. This guy can’t be that great. He can’t be the messiah. I mean we know who his family is. Sure he’s a great teacher and preacher but he can’t be the child we’ve been waiting for since the fall into sin. He’s just a guy like one of us. I remember when his dad did some carpentry work on my parents house a few years back.
Well, we see that Jesus either hears the complaints or he feels the buzz of the room and he replies to this line of thinking.
He knows they are going to be looking for some kind of a sign. They have heard of miracles he did in Capernaum and he figures they want to see this type of thing so they can be sure that he is who he is claiming to be.
You and I can understand that. I think we would be asking for the same thing. If someone comes to us making even the tiniest claim we want them to prove it. A friend comes home from a fishing trip bragging about his catch, we want to see it with our own eyes. Pull out your phone and pull up the picture for me. I want to proof.
And, I would think, we would probably have desired the same thing here. If you heard that Jesus was doing miracles and now he is making claims that he is fulfilling a messianic prophecy you’d be saying prove it. You would want some evidence that what you’ve heard about the miracles is not just exaggeration.
But Jesus isn’t going to give them what they desire. He doesn’t just heal on demand to prove who he is. He knows that even if they were to see they would still doubt because a prophet is never acceptable in his home town. As I said earlier, he’s someone they know. He can’t be that guy. I knew him when he was a nobody.
Now this doesn’t seem like a particularly offensive idea. I think we can all grasp the truth of it but Jesus doesn’t just leave it there. He is taking this deeper. He’s going back to examples of the truth of this in the Old Testament.
During the drought and famine in the time of Elijah there were likely many widows who were in need but who did God send Elijah to. Someone in Sidon, an outsider. Someone who was not an Israelite.
The same was the case with Elisha and Naaman. This Naaman wasn’t of Hebrew lineage. He was a Syrian. Leprosy was not just a disease that affected those outside Israel. We don’t have a story of Elisha be used by God to heal any Israelites. We only have the story of this unclean, Gentile Syrian being healed.
What is Jesus saying here? Those in his home town are likely to reject him but even those who are outsiders will hear and believe. To really get at what is being said here we have to go back to the start of the book of Luke and remember who he is writing to. Theophilus is who the book is addressed to. He is a Greek and not of Hebrew ethnicity. By telling us this story Luke is drawing out that the gospel is going to go to all people of every tribe, tongue, and nation. The gospel isn’t going to just be for Israel, it will be for the Gentiles as well.
And we know that this is the big idea because of the way the people react to what Jesus is saying as we move on to our third and final point.
Luke 4:28–30
ESV
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.
You can tell by what happens here that they are more than just upset about Jesus saying that he can’t get respect in his home town. This is more than a people thinking Jesus is a little rude about them not believing his statement about his fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah.
They know what he is saying. The implication is that the promised messiah is more likely to believed on by the Gentiles than by the people in Nazareth. He is saying that unclean will believe before those who have been set apart by God to be a holy nation.
This is why we read that all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. That really lets you know how things are, doesn’t it? It isn’t the people that day left upset and went home to eat their Sunday dinner grumbling about what Jesus had said. It also lets us know that they weren’t conspiring around the tables afterwards while they drank their coffee. They were filled with wrath lets us know how they really felt. To suggest that Gentiles were more likely to believe or that the message of the messiah would be believed on by the Gentiles first is outrageous to them.
Now, I can perhaps understand the anger about a statement like this but I’m guessing you are like me and you are wondering how this gets out of hand so quickly. They don’t like something he says and now they are going to throw him off a cliff. This is like the definition of well, that escalated quickly.
Well, this is usually what a stoning often looked like. You could throw stones at them or you could go the easier route and push them down onto the rocks below the cliff. Regardless of methodology, they are trying to kill Jesus for blasphemy.
You see, they’ve been upset on two levels. They are upset from an ethnic standpoint and a religious one. They believe they have been wronged personally and that Jesus has spoken against what God would do. He is suggesting that unclean outsiders are going to receive the grace of God before them and this is ridiculously offensive to their sensibilities. Why would God save those who were not his chosen people? How could Jesus suggest that those unclean Gentiles would be the ones who would be saved by the messiah? It’s blasphemy to them, even though Jesus made his point from scripture, they still don’t believe.
But despite their unbelief and rage this is not the time for his death to come. It is not the wrath of the people of Nazareth that he will bear on the rocks outside town. Instead, he is to bear the wrath of God for sin on a cross on a hill outside Jerusalem. It is not that time and so Jesus just passes through their midst and went away from them.
I just have to say this is on my top five things in the life of Jesus I would have loved to have seen. I imagine him just walking through with confidence and their is nothing the people can do about it. His death will not come until it is his hour.
And so, this is an interesting passage but what do we do with it in our time. I think there is one very important application from this passage for us as we take it into the world this week.
We need to trust the Word of God. Look at the blessing that the people of Nazareth had set before them. Jesus had come to proclaim that the captives would be set free and instead of hearing and believing they wanted signs. They didn’t trust in the proclamation of the word that Jesus had brought. And it was to their detriment. They couldn’t see the glory of what Jesus was saying. They had their earthly ideas of what this should look like and it didn’t fit with what Jesus was saying. How amazing was it that the good news would go to all people? What a blessing that more than just their group of people would be set free.
These folks liked hearing what Jesus had to say until it didn’t fit with their preconceived notions of what the messiah should do. It is easy for us to fall into that same trap, isn’t it? To take certain parts of God’s word seriously but see others teachings or commands of God as less important for us to hold to. This is a struggle for us and it is so important that we hear and believe what is taught in the Bible and strive to understand and hold to the whole council of God. This starts with understanding the authority that scripture has in our lives and a trust that God has actually spoken to us clearly in his word. May we not put ourselves over the word of God but sit under it and that we might be faithful servants who proclaim the good news that in Christ, those who were captive in sin have been set free. Those who were blind in their sin and unbelief have been given sight. And those oppressed by sin and the devil have been given liberty. All of these things are true, for they come to us from the word of God. Hear and believe the good news. Amen.
