Then Jesus went to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and taught there in the synagogue every Sabbath day. There, too, the people were amazed at his teaching, for he spoke with authority. (Luke 4:31-32)One of the things that the religious leaders hated about Jesus was his audacity. He had the audacity to speak about the word of God as if he knew what he was talking about.
They knew what they were talking about, of course. They had been to accredited seminaries, they had advanced degrees, they were ordained by all the right organizations. They were qualified to mount the sacred desk and to speak on things divine.
Jesus, on the other hand, was an upstart. He came out of nowhere, the son of peasants, a carpenter who lived with his parents until he was 30. What in the world could he possibly know?
But these silly people listened to him as if he had something good to say. And worse of all, he spoke with authority.
Of course, the people liked that. He was one of them and yet he had the ability to explain scripture in such a way that they the great unwashed, could understand it.
That made those who felt it was their job to explain the scripture mad.
And then, to cap it all off, the ugly icing on the unholy cake, he had the absolute and unmitigated gall to tell then they were wrong in their interpretations. How could they possibly be wrong? They had the weight of hundreds of years of theological interpretation behind what they said. Is he calling the forefathers wrong? How can he go against tradition?
But these people followed him by the hundreds, sometimes thousands, lapping up all this stuff he said. If they had any brains at all, they would be following them, the leaders. They were the ones who were oracles of God, the ones who had been entrusted by Israel with the task of teaching.
But instead, they follow this guy from nowhere.
And the most irritating part about it all is that the guy is almost always right when he preaches. He almost always quotes the scripture right and brings up some of the most obscure quotes to show his point is right.
Of course, they disagree with him on a few technical points. And there is that one glaring point where he calls himself the Son of Man. But in general, he is right.
If he would just come to them and ask or their permission, they would be glad to give it. They would give him some advice and work over some problems they saw with his teaching. He was smart, but he was so rough in his delivery. Give him some polish, maybe teach him for a couple of years, let him have a lay preacher license.
But he not only hasn’t come to them, he expresses absolutely no interest in having anything to do with them. And they are important men.
They are going to have to do something about this.
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