Jesus expects followers to complete his mission
Joe Miller Jr.

Luke 4:14-21

It seems appropriate for the hometown boy to preach his first recorded sermon where he grew up. From this starting point in the synagogue in which Jesus attended as first a boy, then a teenager, and finally a young adult, Jesus proclaims his mission.

He begins by reading the prophecy from the book of Isaiah, and then adopts that as his mission. By doing so, he not only proclaims the prophecy but fulfills it. He has come for the poor, the blind, the oppressed, and the captives; in short the marginalized of the society in which he lived.

In Galilee of the first century AD, it would not have been difficult to identify who those were. About 90 percent of the people were poor. There was no middle class. Those who were blind, deaf, mute, or suffered any disability had no safety net to catch them. They were imprisoned by the socioeconomics of the system.

In our day and time, society is much more complex. Who are the marginalized today? Many different groups claim to be the marginalized of our era. The marginalized could be single moms, those who have been abused, children from broken homes, various ethnic groups, various religious groups, veterans, disabled people, gays, unemployed, under-educated, and so on.

T w o b i l l i o n people in t h i s w o r l d live on less than $2 per day. One b i l l i o n p e o p l e live on less than $1 per day. People in some countries in Africa are dying of preventable diseases. Many countries and regions lack safe drinking water.

There is one marginalized group of people that has attracted a lot of attention recently. There are 47 million people living in America that lack any kind of medical coverage/insurance. Our government leaders have been wringing their hands over this issue for some years, but the problem still exists. There have been a number of proposals, but nothing substantive has happened. The issue is moving from the back to the front burner, and President Bush plans to address medical coverage in his state of the union address on Tuesday evening (you will read this after his address).

The issue of health care of each and every American is more than politics; it is a theological issue as well. If Jesus comes for those who need help the most (those who are marginalized), then taking care of each other is a Christian mandate.

Of course, we could go about this mandate many different ways, and there will be numerous solutions offered. Probably partisan politics will play a big role as well special interest groups such as the medical insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, health care providers, and so forth. Those of us (like Methodist preachers) who have good medical coverage may not even pay attention to the great debate.

While we can disagree on the solution, as Christians we cannot ignore the issue. Those who suffer needlessly are those Jesus came to set free, and you know whom he left in charge to finish the mission that he started… his followers… you and me.

Email me at newtonumc@ valornet.com with your thoughts.

Joe Miller Jr. is pastor of First United Methodist Church in Newton.