“What do you expect from a sermon?” It is a question that Will Willimon has asked many people through the years, and he has gotten a lot of interesting answers. If you had asked the people in Jesus’ hometown synagogue in today’s passage from Luke 4:21-30 what they expected from a sermon, no one would have said they expected to be reminded that God is God, and that if God chooses to save others before God saves God’s own, that is God’s prerogative. Some sermons are not easy to hear. Some preachers know that and preach them anyway. Jesus was one of those preachers.
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Tags: Will Willimon, feelings, Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, 2019, Professor of the Practice of Christian Ministry, synagogue, enrich, Luke 4:21-30, expectations, anger, challenge, Duke Divinity School, "What Did They Expect?", Nazareth, God's news, Year C, conceptions, hometown, rearrange, Jesus