Epiphany III (Luke 4:14-21)  “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

Jesus fulfills the Law and the prophets.

Everything that Moses and the prophets observed about humanity, nature and God finds clarity of expression in the person of Jesus Christ.

People sometimes ask: where is God?  If God is real then why doesn’t God make his reality known explicitly and clearly? The answer to those questions is Jesus Christ. God makes himself known in person. He came to us at a moment of time in the particularity of a specific place and person to reveal universal truth. The particularity of God’s self- revelation is Jesus. The universality is infinite and eternal love that intersects uplifts and transforms the duality of human existence in the world of matter, energy, time and space.

Moses observes the tendency of human beings to wander away from God into superstition, fantasy and rigid inflexible uncompromising ideology. God gives Moses the Law to restrain evil and convict our species we are willfully and spitefully lost and in need of a savior.

The prophets observe the short term consequences society suffers when people violate the law. In union with God the prophets receive the insight to warn people of the long term consequences when people abandon the law. The true prophetic message consistently states: repent and prepare. Recognize the immediate and long term consequence of sin for yourself, your family and your descendants. Prepare to meet the One whom God is sending into the world to deal with this problem.

People tended to reject Moses and the prophets. They lived by the principle of self-will that refused to examine what Moses taught and the prophets observed. Jesus knew very well that if the people rejected Moses and the Prophets then they would also reject him. Jesus fulfills the very Law the people then, and now, reject. Jesus is the one whom the prophets declared would come into the world to save the world. Yet, as the people rejected both the prophetic message and the prophetic messengers, so they rejected the One whom the prophets looked forward to and rejoiced in.

Moses and the prophets had the difficult task of telling people the bad news. The bad news is that humanity has separated from God. The worse news is that in that separation we are lost and do not want to be found. The worst news is that we choose the path that leads to sin and death.

This was not the message people wanted to hear. This was not what they wanted to hear about human nature, personal responsibility or the consequence of human choice.

Jesus came as the Good News. The good news is that Jesus is God with us. We no longer have to speculate about whether or not God exists. We no longer have to develop theories about who God is and what God wants. Jesus is himself the answer to those questions. Jesus is God incarnate. As God incarnate Jesus is love incarnate.

At the beginning of his public ministry Jesus quotes the prophet Isaiah to clarity who he is and what he is about to do. He is anointed by God the Holy Spirit to bring the good news of God’s love to the poor. He proclaims freedom for slaves, sight for the blind, liberation for the oppressed and universal unconditional love for everyone.

Some hear this message with hope. Some hear this message with suspicion. And some hear the message with fear. Suddenly, everything that Moses and the prophets taught is present, is real, is personal. There is no longer any question who God is and what God wants. Very quickly, most people realize that as their ancestors rejected Moses’ and the prophets’  message of a personal God of unconditional love, so they are unwilling to hear the message, believe the message and receive the message.

God is real. God is personal. God is love. God is Jesus Christ. There is no other truth, there is no other reality, there is no other God. As then so now. Jesus is the One who alone fulfills the scriptural revelation and human aspiration to know and be known by God.