A Poem a Sunday

Epiphany 4 – C

February 3, 2019

St. Luke 4:21-30 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

21 Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” 22 All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” 23 He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say, ‘Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.’” 24 And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown. 25 But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land; 26 yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. 27 There were also many lepers[a] in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.” 28 When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. 29 They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. 30 But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

Footnotes:

1. Luke 4:27 The terms leper and leprosy can refer to several diseases

A Poem a Sunday

Epiphany 4 – C

Precipice

So it comes to this:

pleasing the locals

or telling the Truth.

Truth-tellers are not welcome

into a dysfunctional faith.

Parochial Christians

bathe in pat answers

and love spiritual fast food.

“Do not take us any further,

Young Prophet.

We enjoy our binary world:

- black/white

- dogma right

- no questions asked

- doubt defeated

- no price to pay.

Change?  Open up?

Be transformed?

Follow Jubilee?

No! Heal us now not outsiders.

We need to take care of our own.

Widow of Sidon,

soldier of Syria,

children in Yemen,

seekers of asylum –

wall them off

or we’ll throw you off this cliff.”

Copyright @2019 by Kenn Storck

May be used with permission

kennstorck@gmail.com