Imagine with me for a minute this morning. You get a new job. It’s with a high profile company, and your new boss-to-be is a very high profile manager. She has been written up a number of times in newspaper articles and business magazines, and praised for her innovation and employee relations. She was involved in the interview process that landed you the job, so you do know her…you’ve been around her, and you’ve heard lots of people talk about her. But as you walk in the door for your first day of work, you still wonder. What will she really be like to work with? How does she respond to pressure, how will she receive your ideas? What is she like with other people around? You see, you know her…but now comes the real test. What is she like to work with everyday?

We started reading the gospel of Luke in September. Since then, we have slowly made our way (not in order!) through the first six chapters. The writer Luke has used them to set the stage, to give us hints of who Jesus is, where he came from, what he will do. A lot of important things are communicated in these opening chapters, some of them pretty spectacular:

• John the Baptist comes in a special way, pointing to God’s Messiah to come.

• Jesus comes in an even more profound way, through a virgin birth, fulfilling the prophecies of the Old Testament.

• Jesus’ birth is marked by angels, shepherds, by two old saints in the temple.

• The boy Jesus astounds the religious leaders at an early age.

• Jesus is baptized, the heavens open up and God’s own voice booms out,“This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

• Jesus is tempted mightily by Satan himself…and wins.

• He begins his ministry, calls some followers to himself, heals a couple of people…and then stops and gives his first significant teaching, the Sermon on the Plain.

Whew. Some really amazing things, and now the word is starting to spread out that God is doing something new, unique, powerful in this Jesus. But as we start chapter 7, all of these fireworks are done. And the story settles into Jesus’ ministry. We get to see not just what the prophecies said about him, not just who the angels announce him to be…but we get to see what he is like…in the everyday.

This morning there are two very short stories for us to hear, found in Luke 7:1-17. These two stories really go hand in hand. Each story has a strong tie to an Old Testament story and prophet: The healing of the centurion’s servant to a story of Elisha the prophet in 2 Kings 5. healing Naaman. And the raising of the widow’s son to a story of Elijah the prophet in 1 Kings 17, where he raises the son of the widow of Zarepath. The parallels continue: The people: a centurion in one, a widow in the next. The problem: a dying servant in one, a dead son in the other. Something significant demonstrated: The recognition of Jesus’ authority in the first, the recognition of him as God’s visitation to help them in the second. But what do they tell us Jesus is like in the everyday?

1) First, we must pay attention to the people Jesus pays attention to. In the first story, it is someone outside of the faith, outside of the Jewish people. The centurion has a good relationship with the Jewish folks in his town, but he’s a soldier, a foreigner, an outsider. He sends friends with his request to Jesus: his beloved servant is sick. Can Jesus come and heal him? And off Jesus goes towards the man’s house. Now, Jesus certainly knew that a Gentile’s house was unclean for someone like him. The convention of the day was to not mix with such folks in such places. A Gentile was an outsider. Jesus knew that, but he knew more. Here was someone in need, coming and asking in faith. And that was more important than social standing or ethnic membership. Increasingly in this gospel of Luke, we will hear that the good news is for the whole world. Pay attention to the people Jesus pays attention to.

Fifteen years ago, Anne and I were in “way south” Mexico, near Oaxaca. One day we toured some outlying villages, and as we pulled into one we drove by an old church. And just as we did, the doors of the church opened, and up the main street of the village came a long string of probably 50 people, heading for the church. It was a funeral procession, with a brass band with a 70-yr old tuba player as the leader, and wailing mourners and a family dressed in black and a coffin being carried in.

In the second story, Jesus stops just such a funeral procession in mid-step. A woman has already lost a husband. Now she has lost her only son. Besides the grief over the loss of her two loved ones, she is suddenly a person very much on the margins. In that day, in that place a son-less widow was in desperate straits. The only social security system in place for a woman was to be connected to a male wage-earner. She is now quite alone in the world. And out of all the pallbearers, family members, mourners, the band, the town officials, it is this woman that Jesus notices. Pay attention to who Jesus pays attention to.

Luke will show it to us again and again and again. Jesus sees the ones out on the margin, on the outside. The people Jesus notices are the ones who are the wrong race, in the wrong class. They are the ones who are lonely, and wondering why life has been so hard on them.
Who do you pay attention to? Honestly?

I used to travel to New York 4-5 times a year for business, and I found after a few years that my favorite parts of the trip were the taxi rides to and from LaGuardia Airport. Not for the ride itself. Actually, I was scared to death. So rather than look out the window, I would talk to the drivers. They always seemed a little shocked that I would ask their name, or the country they were from, or about their family. In 1989, I met a taxi driver from Ecuador named Alfredo. We had a half hour or so together. As we drove, he pointed out where he lived: one of the huge low-income highrise projects of New York. He told me about his family. Alfredo liked to talk. As we got closer to my hotel, I asked this question that had been burning inside me the whole time: “Alfredo, do you believe in Jesus?”

He looked in the rearview mirror to see if I was serious. Then he relaxed, and said “Oh, yes. Oh yes. I pray every day, all the time (sometimes for my own driving!)” To which I said a hearty “Amen!” But he continued, “Sometimes I get worried and think I am just a poor man…and then I remember Jesus, and I know he hears me…and knows me…and then I think, I am a rich man.” Alfredo knew it every day…Jesus paid attention to him.

2) There is immense power in Jesus’ Word. The centurion believed this. As far as we know here, he never does see Jesus. But he knows what a word of authority is. He receives authority from those above him in the military, and disburses it to those below him. And, he thinks, it must be the same with Jesus. Receiving power from above, and speaking it on to people on earth.

So…just say the word, Lord and it can happen. One scholar (Fred Craddock) says that this centurion anticipates all of those later believers, born in a different time and place after Jesus, people like you and me…who have not seen Jesus, but believe his word contains the power of his presence. And so we read the scriptures. And so we pray in Jesus’ name…the name that is above all names. And so God works in us.

When Jesus hears of the centurion’s request, Jesus marvels. We don’t know what he says after. When Jesus stops the funeral procession, he speaks:

“Do not weep.”

He speaks again:

“Young man, I say to you, rise!”

And his Word took effect. A servant is found to be healed. The woman’s son sits up and begins to speak. Jesus’ Word has effect. It still takes effect. Just say the Word, Lord, and it can happen. Jesus is present in his word. It has power. It’s why we gather around the scripture when we are together. Somehow, as we gather in Jesus’ name, as we pray in Jesus’ name, as we come to this scripture, God speaks. It’s why we hear the scripture. Nobody asks you to come and hear clever sermons, or come and let me tell you pleasing stories, or come and be entertained. We come to hear Jesus’ word, his voice…in prayer, in music, in scripture.

And so for the last six years, the person preaching has lit our scripture candle before our reading, just to mark out this time. And recently we ask you to stand for the reading of the gospel, to help remind us of this: there is power in God’s word. And so whenever we worship, God’s word goes out, and it does not return empty. There is power in Jesus’ word…everyday.

3) Jesus is moved by compassion. He feels. Knowing the horrible situation the widow will now be in, knowing her pain as well, as soon as he sees the funeral procession, it is HER that he sees. He is moved by her grief, “he had compassion for her.” “Do not weep,” he says.

This is by no means the only time Jesus is moved by compassion, nor the only time it is pictured in the gospels. When Jesus saw large crowds of people who had come to hear him but had no food, he was moved by compassion. When he met two blind men sitting by the roadside, he was moved with compassion. When a man with leprosy came to him, he felt compassion. Here in the gospel of Luke, two of Jesus’ most famous stories, The Good Samaritan (when the Samaritan saw the injured man he had compassion) and the Prodigal Son (when the wayward son returns to the father, the father is watching for him and is filled with compassion)

Jesus’ heart is wrenched, moved towards mercy beyond limits, filled with love and sympathy. But notice…Jesus’ compassion does not end with an emotion. His heart is moved, overflows, tugged on…then Jesus acts. Here he raises the boy. In the other stories, he sees that the people receive food. The blind men receive their sight. The leper is washed clean. The Samaritan takes the injured man in, and arranges for his current and future care. The father welcomes his son home with open arms. Compassion does not stop with a feeling. With Jesus, there is always an action attached.

A few weeks ago, I led the Bible study after the Wednesday Night Dinner. There were just two people there for it that night. One was someone I didn’t know well, but she talked about being a crack addict since she was thirteen years old, and I think she’s in her late twenties now. Recently she passed a year and a half of sobriety. She talked about how hard her life had been (and it had been hard), how she had felt numb for so many years, and was just beginning to thaw.

The other person was a friend of mine is in his late fifties, who now lives in his car. I met him down at the gas station later that night. His car is 25 years old. It had a bike strapped on top, pizza boxes, sleeping bags and clothes littered across the inside. The outside of the car would suggest it had been totaled (several times!), but it still runs…mostly. When we went to put gas in it, I discovered there was no gas cap at all. Not such a safe way to drive a car, but we managed to get him off and running.

When Anne picked me up a little later at the gas station, I climbed in the passenger seat and she said cheerfully “How was your evening?!” and I was quiet for a moment and then I just started to weep. Just weep.

“Why is life so very hard for so very many people?”

Later that week I shared the story of the car with another friend. The next day, he delivered a little box to me that rattled when you shook it. It was a gas cap to fit that old car.

My tears of compassion were real, and heartfelt. But so was the action of going out and buying the gas cap. Jesus’ compassion always seemed to have some action attached to it.

Last week I told you that a good friend of mine had ended up in a conversation that is pretty commonplace these days. Her friend was expressing that she had become interested in spirituality, and was choosing things from various philosophies and religions that she liked. And my friend said,

“I’m glad you are exploring your faith. But you need to know that Christianity is not part of such a mix. Because sooner or later you have to deal with the person of Jesus Christ.”

It’s true. Each one of us, sooner or later, has to deal with the person of Jesus. So what do we know about him? What these stories tell us is that Jesus lets no one slip off the radar screen, and he is particularly attentive to those on the outside looking in. They tell us that his Word is a word of power. After thousands of years, in the power of the Holy Spirit, Jesus is wonderfully present in his Word. And he is full of compassion. Jesus is moved when we weep, hurts when we suffer loss, and he acts. That’s what Jesus is like. Everyday. Every day. Thanks be to God.

Jesus’ compassion does not end with an emotion. His heart is moved, overflows, tugged on…then Jesus acts...