Dear Christian friends:

You will not be surprised when I say that we must fight against the enemies of Jesus Christ. Perhaps you will be surprised when I say that this means we must fight against ourselves. Are we enemies of Jesus? Yes and no! We Christians are friends of Jesus, that's true. But we still have our old evil nature which tempts us to be an enemy of Jesus. We must fight against the evil desires of our sinful nature, and not let them control our lives.

In our text we see some of the hostilities that try to control us. Let us learn about these enemies so we will not be deceived by them, but resist them and remain friends of Jesus.


The people of Nazareth seemed to be Jesus' friends. Nazareth was Jesus’ home town. He grew up there and lived there until He began His public ministry when He was 30 years old. So everyone in Nazareth knew Jesus and liked Him and respected Him.

When Jesus came back there after preaching and healing and doing miracles in neighboring towns, the people welcomed Him! When Jesus came to their synagogue (Jewish church) on the Sabbath Day, the ruler of the synagogue asked Jesus to read the lesson from the Old Testament Scriptures. After Jesus finished reading the lesson, we read in our text that "the people were surprised because of the beautiful words which He spoke." (verse 22)

Even when Jesus told them that Isaiah's prophecy about the Savior now happened exactly in Him, the people seemed to accept that a little. (verses 21-22) They said, “How can He be the Savior? Isn't He the son of Joseph?"

Then Jesus preached to them about Himself and after that the people became very angry and all the people in the church rushed at Him and grabbed Him and led Him out of town to the edge of a cliff and tried to push Him over the cliff.

Why did they become so angry and want to kill Jesus? First they seemed to be His friends, but later they became His enemies. Why? That is an important question, because the same can happen to you and me. We seem to be friends of Jesus, but then later we become His enemies. Why?

When Jesus saw that they doubted about Himself being the Savior God promised He knew why they doubted Him. They doubted Him because He was from their home town and they thought He was only a man, like themselves. Although they had heard about His miracles which He had done, (changing water to wine at the wedding in Cana and healing the sick and others), they still doubted Him. So Jesus said to them, “I think you want Me to do more miracles like I did in Capernaum. I tell you the truth, a prophet is not respected in his home town."

The people of Nazareth wanted to see some more miracles. They wanted something exciting to happen during their church service. They were bored when Jesus preached to them and showed them how the old prophecies about the Savior happened exactly in Him.

Are you like the people of Nazareth? Do you sometimes think the preaching is boring? Do you prefer to go to a church where they have "faith healers" and other exciting things? Do you prefer to watch church service on TV like Oral Roberts or Robert Schular or others. Often these TV churches are false. They offer an exciting show, but they do not really preach the Gospel. Beware of that feeling. That is an enemy of Jesus.

Jesus also told the people of Nazareth that God loved all nations and sent Him to be the Savior of all races. (verses 25-27) Jesus impressed on them that God loved other races, not only the Jews. That really made them angry. (verses 28-29) They were very proud. Thought themselves better than other nations. They despised other races. They thought God loved only the Jews. They thought God would send the Savior only for the Jewish people.

How about you? Do you and I have spiritual pride? Do we think God loves only ourselves and not others? Do we think we are better than others? Do we have racial prejudices: Whites hate Mexicans, Blacks, Koreans, Chinese and Japanese? Or the reverse: Mexicans hate whites? Black hate whites? I think you know the answer to those questions.

Are you interested in doing evangelism work? How many have you told about Jesus? Are you eager to learn how to do evangelism work? Maybe we don't care about others if they hear about Jesus or not.

What about supporting world missions. Are you interested in learning more about our Synod's world missions? Do you read the Deaf Lutheran and the Lutheran Witness and our Southern California District paper so you can learn about mission problems and successes? How many of our members are interested in world missions? If you are not interested in evangelism and world missions you are the same as the people of Nazareth. You are an enemy of Jesus. Jesus commands us to do evangelism work and world-wide mission work. Jesus is the Savior of all nations and races. Beware of that enmity and laziness in your heart!

Don't be an enemy of Jesus! Confess your enmity and receive His forgiveness. Fight against all spiritual pride and laziness. Be Jesus' friend and obey His wish and commands. If you are His friend and remain His friend, you will triumph with Him, because Jesus wins over all His enemies.

The enmity that began here at Nazareth grew and grew and spread over all the Jewish country. Three years later the Jews nailed Jesus on the cross. At Nazareth it was not yet Jesus' time to die, so we read that Jesus escaped walking away through the mob. God protected Jesus that day at Nazareth. Those angry people could not kill Him yet. It was not yet His time. Jesus told His disciples, "No man takes My life from Me. I lay it down (I give it). I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it up again." (John 10: 17-18)

When Jesus gave His life upon the cross He became the Savior of all nations. The Jews killed Jesus because they had hate in their hearts, but God wanted that to happen because He has love in His heart and forgiveness. (John 3:16) On the cross Jesus, like a magnet draws all nations to Himself. Sinners of all nations have been coming to His cross and accepting Him for their Savior.

You and I, too, can come to His cross and receive forgiveness and strength to fight against our natural pride and enmity, so that we can remain His true friends and triumph with Him.

Don't nurse your pride, your enmity and anger. Confess it: Fight against it and triumph with Jesus. If we nurse our pride and multiply our enmity we will reject Jesus and be lost forever in hell.

Today again we come to the Lord's Supper. Let us each one search our hearts and confess our spiritual pride and our natural enmity against Jesus and come to receive His body and blood which He gave and shed upon the cross for our forgiveness and new life of love and humble obedience.

Amen.