Confrontation in Nazareth (13)

 

 

 

As I continue to ask myself why Jesus begins His ministry in His hometown of Nazareth with confrontation, I am drawn to John 2:13 – 25 and the beginning of His ministry in Jerusalem. Consider that in this passage He introduces Himself to Jerusalem by making a whip of cords and driving out those who are making merchandise of worship. “Take these things away; stop making My Father’s house a place of business.”

 

Then He says, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”  These are words that will be used against Jesus in His “trial” before Caiaphas, the priests, and the Council (Mt. 26:61).

 

In spite of Jesus’ words and actions in John 2, in the next chapter a Jewish ruler named Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night. Once again, Jesus begins with a challenge, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God” (Jn. 3:3). Why begin with a challenge, why not ease Nicodemus into things, into a relationship with Himself?

 

Unlike the crowds, unlike the group of religious leaders of which Nicodemus is a member, Nicodemus listens to Jesus, asks questions, and believes (John 7:50 – 52;19:39)

 

What else do we see in John’s Gospel? Consider this pattern:

 

In Chapter 4 Jesus challenges His disciples’ ingrained notions about people outside their racial, national, and religious identity, for He leads them to Sychar, a village in Samaria, and begins His ministry in Samaria with a woman and her village, remaining with them two days. It is unlikely that any of Jesus’ disciples ever contemplated having social or religious communication with Samaritans, they were unclean, they were despised, they were to be avoided.

 

Do you think that the disciples were going to write home and tell the folks of their own home synagogues of what they had done with Jesus? Do you think the first words out of their mouths on their return to Galilee was about the wonderful experience they had in Samaria?

 

Consider, when Jesus says that the “fields are ripe unto harvest” (Jn; 4:35) He is saying it while they are in Samaria!

 

Was this a great experience for the disciples, or did they reluctantly live with it since they wanted to be with Jesus? After all, you can hardly jettison a way of thinking and living that you’ve grown up with, that you’ve been religiously taught, in the course of one or two days. Ponder what Peter went through in Acts Chapter 10, in the council in Jerusalem of Acts 11, of the turmoil that he bought into in Galatians 2.

 

When Peter and John returned to Samaria in Acts Chapter 8, were their hearts and minds transported back to the events of John Chapter 4?

 

In John Chapter 5 Jesus heals in Jerusalem on the Sabbath, stirring up more opposition.

 

In John Chapter 6 He calls Himself the Bread of Life, teaching that we must eat His flesh and drink His blood. Jesus is the true Manna from heaven, giving food that is superior to what Moses gave. Not only does this teaching alienate the crowds, but many of His “disciples withdrew, and were not walking with Him anymore” (John 6:59 – 71).

 

John Chapter 7 shows us some in the crowd were accusing Jesus of having a demon, and the religious leaders sending officers to arrest Jesus.

 

In John Chapter 8 the religious leaders attempt to stone Jesus to death (we’ve explored this in a previous reflection).

 

John Chapter 9 shows Jesus healing on the Sabbath yet again and the religious leaders once again attacking Jesus.

 

In Chapter 10 the religious leaders accuse Jesus of having a demon and being insane, and they once again attempt to arrest Him.

 

We see a continuing conspiracy to murder Jesus in John 11:53.

 

Chapter 12 brings us to Holy Week, a week of escalating tensions leading to crucifixion.

 

I have preached through the Gospel of John in one morning with a focus on Jesus and His signs, with His revealing Himself to be the I AM; the Bread, the Light, the Life, the Resurrection. I could also preach through John with a focus on conflict, for from beginning to end there is conflict, indeed, we see the introduction to conflict in John 1:5, “The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”

 

For decades I have viewed the unrelenting conflict in John in the framework of Sonship; the issue is whether Jesus will confess His Father or cave into pressure and persecution and deny Him. This is our challenge as well, will we confess our Father, our Elder Brother, and the sonship we have in them? Will we maintain, by God’s grace, our testimony that our Father is bringing us to glory in Jesus Christ? (Hebrews 2:10 – 13; Rom. 8:29 – 30; and of course the Upper Room).

 

Simply put, will we confess that we are saints and no longer sinners? What will be our core identity in Jesus Christ? (Christians are termed “saints” in the Bible far far more often than any other term). Why do we insist on denying this glory of the Gospel?

 

Also, in the framework of John’s Gospel, this attack on Jesus Christ’s identity relentlessly comes from the religious leadership, just as it does in our own day. The Romans are not the enemy of Jesus in the Gospel, the world at large is not the enemy, it is the people who ought to know better that are the enemy to the confession of the Son and the Father. Of course the resistance and outright persecution will come from the greater world and from the Roman Empire as the Gospel spreads, but it begins in the realm of people who should know better – and once they begin their attack they will continue it, from Jesus to the Apostles, to Stephen, to Paul, and beyond. Furthermore, the attack will come from without and within the professing church – then as now.

 

But what I want to say is that I’ve never realized how Jesus could have avoided much of this opposition, whether in Jerusalem in John, or in His hometown of Nazareth (and elsewhere in Galilee), by not directly challenging and confronting religious culture, and racial and national identities. Jesus did not have a gradual approach to His revelation of grace and truth.

 

Jesus could have healed on days other than the Sabbath, and of course He did. Why heal in synagogues on the Sabbath? Jesus could have accepted the following of those who were believing in Him (in some measure) in John Chapter 8, rather than confronting them with not being free and then telling them that the devil was their father…not a method likely to retain followers.

 

In Luke Chapter 4, Jesus need not have introduced the widow of Sidon or Namaan the Syrian into His message, He knew it would not be well received!

 

I’m not really sure what this all means. It is challenging to me and I don’t fully understand it. It does make me wonder how many times I’ve taken the easy way out in teaching and preaching, and in interacting with other pastors, in parachurch small groups, and so forth. I wonder how many times my own witness to others has been watered down.

 

I am surprised to be going down this road in my exploration of the Confrontation in Nazareth, Luke 4:14 -30. I had no idea I’d be here. I began this with simply a sense that I wanted to explore this passage, and now here I am…with questions…plenty of questions.

 

Joseph - Reflections (8)

 

“And He called for a famine upon the land; He broke the whole staff of bead. He sent a man before them, Joseph, who was sold as a slave. They afflicted his feet with fetters, he himself [his soul] was laid in irons; until the time that his word came to pass, the word of the LORD tested him” (Psalm 105:16 – 19).

 

There is a sense in which we can speak of three Josephs when we read Genesis and Psalm 105. This may seem strange to us, it may even seem outrageous to some, but it is the truth. It would not have always been viewed strangely, certainly not, I think, in the early days of the Church, the Church which was seeing Christ throughout all Scripture, and in seeing Christ was seeing His Body, and in seeing His Body was seeing themselves.

 

In Joseph we see Jesus Christ. We see Jesus rejected by His brothers, sold into death, released from prison, exalted to the right hand of God. In Jospeh we see Jesus in that what men meant for evil, God meant for good. In Joseph we see Jesus in forgiveness. In Joseph we see the salvation of many through suffering, and thus we see Jesus. Joseph becomes a source of salvation, a refuge for many, a picture of Jesus the Christ. Just as Joseph’s brothers rejected the message of Joseph’s dreams, so Jesus’ brothers, Israel, along with mankind rejected the Word of Jesus. Just as the Word of the LORD was tried in Joseph, so the Word was tried within Jesus Christ. “Though He were a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8 – 9).

 

There are, of course, contrasts in the story of Joseph and Jesus. Jacob did not knowingly send Joseph down into Egypt; the Father knowingly, willingly, and lovingly gave His Only Begotten Son. Joseph did not understand that betrayal, slavery, and prison lay between his dreams and their fulfillment, Jesus knew that the Cross beckoned Him.

 

If then we see Jesus Christ in and through Joseph, we also see the Body of Christ in and through Joseph, for as Augustine says, “As with the Head, so with the Body.” That is, if we are the Body of Christ, then we participate with Christ in His story, in His calling, in His mission. This is a theme of the Bible and an explicit teaching of the New Testament. We love as He loves, we are in the Trinity in Him, we are sent as the Father sent Him, we are to live in the koinonia of His sufferings, we are even to “fill up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions” (Col. 1:24, whatever that may mean). We are, let us recall, to be conformed to His image (Romans 8:29).

 

This means that we suffer on behalf of others, that what others mean for evil, our God means for good. It means that we, as His Body, are tried in the fires of testing and obedience and persecution just as Joseph and Jesus were tried. It means that God’s Word is tested within us, as His Word was tested in Joseph and Jesus (1 Peter 1:3 – 9). It means that the calling of God the Father is within us, just as it is in Jesus Christ. It means that the Incarnation continues within us because Christ lives within us His Body.

 

This further means that when we read “they afflicted his feet with fetters” that we can read, “They afflicted His feet with fetters.” The feet of the Body of Christ were afflicted with fetters, they are being afflicted with fetters, they are bound, their movement is restricted, they are in prison.

 

Can we see “they afflicted His feet with fetters” in Romans 8:18 – 25? Can we see that “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18)? Just as the sufferings of Joseph were not worthy to be compared with his exaltation to Pharoah’s right hand and his feeding of the people and his family, just as the sufferings Jesus were not to be compared with the “joy set before Him” (Heb. 12:2), so our present sufferings pale in comparison to the coming glory of Christ in us and us in Christ. Indeed, Christ in us fully and completely is our “hope of glory” (Col. 1:27; see also 2 Thess. 1:10 – 12).

 

The culmination of the suffering of the saints in Revelation is the glory of God in His People and His People in God (Revelation chapters 21 – 22).

 

O dear friends, our hope is in Jesus and His Word, our hope is in the promises of our Father, through which we partake of His Nature (2 Peter 1:4). The temptation while we are in prison is to scheme our own way out rather than wait for God. We have pressure to build the House of God when only God can build His House (Psalm 127:1 – 2). Our Christianity is driven by a “make it happen” mentality which abandons abiding in the Vine (John 15:1ff).

 

We have left our first love, and we pride ourselves on our sparkling and entertaining and man-centered Christianity – we have no grain with which to feed the people, there is a famine for the Word of God (Amos 8:11 – 12). Let there be no mistake, we can know the Bible in the sense of knowing its informational content and not know the Word of God. The Word of God transforms us into the image of Jesus Christ. The Word of God results in radical obedience to Jesus. The Word of God emanates from the Cross of Christ. The Word of God bears the fruit of Matthew 25:34 – 40, a fruit which transcends political, economic, social, national, and cultural considerations – in fact, it puts the earthly to death.

 

I take great hope in Psalm105:16 – 22 and the story of Joseph. I believe that while our feet may be in fetters, that while the Word of God tries us, that Romans 8:18 – 25 awaits us. I believe that the manifestation of the sons of God not only awaits us, but that blessing awaits the peoples of the earth, for whatever we are experiencing is for the glory of God and the blessing of others.

 

Just as Joseph was able to say, just as Jesus has told us again and again, we also can say both now and in the consummation of the ages, “What you meant for evil. God meant for good.”

 

As the Father sent Joseph, as the Father sent Jesus, so Jesus sends us (John 17:18; 20:21).

 

 

 

 

The Four chaplains

Robert L. Withers

February 7, 2026

 

“I’ve got a conference call this afternoon at 2:00, it’s concerning a memorial foundation I’m associated with back in Philly. I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of it; it’s called The Four Chaplains.”

 

“Of course I know about the Four Chaplains, I was raised knowing about them,” I replied to my client Frank, who had lived in Philly before retiring to Richmond, VA.

 

When I was growing up in the D.C. area in the 50s and 60s, Washington City had a wax museum and among the exhibits were The Four Chaplains. I can still see the wax figures of Rev. George L. Fox (Methodist), Reform Rabbi Alexander D. Goode, Father John P. Washington (Roman Catholic), and Rev. Clark V. Poling (Reformed Church in America) standing together by the rail on the troop ship Dorchester, the water of the dark display lapping against the hull of the ship.

 

My mother made sure I knew the story, she made sure that I was not looking at entertainment but at sacrifice, at the way we were to live our lives. As I write this, I realize that all the trips we took to museums were about learning and exploring and understanding, understanding where we had come from and where we ought to be going. Understanding who we ought to be. To me, libraries and museums were sacred spaces, easily on par with the sanctuary of our Presbyterian church. The image of Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial, which I stood before in awe, was the image of God I had while being with Mom in church. I suppose Lincoln was an ikon to some degree.

 

The troopship was torpedoed on February 3, 1943, at 12:55 AM off Newfoundland. There were not enough life jackets for everyone, so these four young chaplains, from different backgrounds and traditions, gave their life vests to others. In the midst of confusion, chaos, and terror, these four men guided others to lifeboats, encouraging and comforting the frightened men around them…and then, having done all they could, linked arms together, stood together, prayed together and sang hymns…and died together.

 

Grady Clark, a survivor, wrote the following:

 

As I swam away from the ship, I looked back. The flares had lighted everything. The bow came up high and she slid under. The last thing I saw, the four chaplains were up there praying for the safety of the men. They had done everything they could. I did not see them again. They themselves did not have a chance without their life jackets.

 

William Bednar, a survivor said, "I could hear men crying, pleading, praying and swearing. I could also hear the chaplains preaching courage to the men. Their voices were probably the only things that kept me sane."

 

Having heard this story as a young boy, having seen it depicted in the wax museum as a lad, having a mother who emphasized the sacrificial nature of the story, and the fact that these men represented different traditions, it would be impossible to forget Fox, Goode, Washington, and Poling. It would be impossible to forget what unity in sacrifice can look like.

 

This past Tuesday I was thinking about the conversation with my former client, which took place about ten years ago. As I continued to think about the Four Chaplains on Wednesday, I decided to look up the foundation and refresh my memory. Then I saw that Tuesday, the day before when I had started thinking about them, February 3, was Four Chaplains Remembrance Day. I had no idea, no idea at all.

 

Dear friends, all around us is confusion and cursing and darkness, the question is not whether we have extra life vests to give to others, the question is whether we will give our own life jackets away.

 

“For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son…” (John 3:16).

 

“As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world” (John 17:18; 20:21).

 

“We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16).