Gospel Reflection – 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle C – Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21  

Is there anyone among us who does not long to have been in the synagogue and heard Jesus read from Scripture? This event, recorded by St Luke, is delightful to ponder. We may even place ourselves there in prayer, and listen to those words being spoken by the Son of God, the One who was to fulfill all of Scripture.

The Gospel says that his reputation spread throughout Galilee, that all eyes were upon him. The time in which Jesus lived was different to ours. It was an age of wonder workers; they were on every street corner, they were prophesying from town to town. There were even a number of people who had their own disciples. One of them was John the Baptist. No, Jesus was not alone as a prophet, as a wonder worker. So, for Jesus’s name to remain on everyone’s lips, for their eyes to be upon him so attentively, we were talking about a charism that was extremely special, thought-provoking and powerful. This is one of the things that makes the Gospels so special: that they were written following a 30-year ‘aural period’ after Christ’s death, even in a time when so many others thought that they were prophets or messiahs.

In today’s Gospel account, Jesus sets out that he is the one of which it is written:

‘The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for he has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor,
to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight,
to set the downtrodden free,
to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour.’

That was a daring thing to do. Blasphemy was punishable by death, and people had very strong views, not least the powerful religious leaders. None of this stopped him. Jesus came to do the will of his Father, and he ploughed on, using his amazing skills to engage people, to invite them to listen in a new way to old text, to bring it alive and help them to be part of it, to be invested in it.

How invested are we in the Gospel, in Christ’s message? Are our eyes on Jesus, following and emulating his actions and words, taking in his message? Just as Jesus’s reputation spread throughout the land, has his Word spread through our hearts, even into those dark corners that we tend to shut off from the outside world?

You see, Just as Jesus had the crowd before him and read the Scripture to them so intimately, so we have that same grace. Through the Gospel message and the Sacrifice of the Mass, we are in such a privileged position to digest not only the Word of God, but his Body and Blood. Those who sat around Jesus in today’s Gospel account were never so close to him as we are, today. Perhaps the time has come, then, for us to listen to Jesus as attentively as that crowd did, to let his reputation and his influence pervade our lives, as by the Father’s will, to let our eyes and our ears, our thoughts and our words, be moulded by the word of God.

GOSPEL

A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21

Seeing that many others have undertaken to draw up accounts of the events that have taken place among us, exactly as these were handed down to us by those who from the outset were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word, I in my turn, after carefully going over the whole story from the beginning, have decided to write an ordered account for you, Theophilus, so that your Excellency may learn how well founded the teaching is that you have received.

Jesus, with the power of the Spirit in him, returned to Galilee; and his reputation spread throughout the countryside. He taught in their synagogues and everyone praised him.

He came to Nazara, where he had been brought up, and went into the synagogue on the sabbath day as he usually did. He stood up to read and they handed him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll he found the place where it is written:

The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for he has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor,
to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight,
to set the downtrodden free,
to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour.

He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the assistant and sat down. And all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to speak to them,
‘This text is being fulfilled today even as you listen’

The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.