Epiphany 6, Year C | Luke 6:17-26
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
February 16, 2025
the Rev. Jonathan Hanneman
To watch the full service, please visit this page.
This year I’ve been trying to keep my sermons in line with the focus of the liturgical season, which in Epiphany is that of light and revelation as found in the figure of Jesus, but this week’s Gospel hasn’t really connected with me on that front. The best I can work out is that, maybe since we’re turning toward Lent and have already spent a good amount of time looking at Jesus, now it’s time for us to pay attention to what exactly this light has been shining on. And I’m afraid to say it isn’t a very comforting sight.
After a brief scene of healings, Luke brings us into his version of the Beatitudes. Preachers will tell you that the word behind “blessed” means something like “happy” or “joyful,” but it’s a little more complex than that. Most authors used the term to speak about the honored dead, so the thought is really more along the line of “at peace” or “at rest.” The closest words I’ve been able to think of in English are “blissful” and “venerable,” but it’s really something of a mashup between those two, both a description of the person’s state and a reverent title all tied up in one.
But moving on, this passage is probably the most obvious contrast we have between the first and third Gospels.[1] Where we as a modern American audience can take Matthew’s words and find ways of inserting ourselves into the text so as to sit among those “blessed,” Luke makes that a lot harder. His first beatitude is simply, “Blessed are the poor.” Not a lot of wiggle room there—no way to “spiritualize” what Jesus says or squeeze ourselves in by proclaiming, “Oh, but I’M humble—that puts me among the ‘poor in spirit,’ so Jesus actually is talking about me.” Sorry, but no. He really does just say—and mean—“Blessed are the poor.” Full stop.
And these people are really poor—worse off even than what we would term the working poor. The word literally means “cringing” and more or less referred to the lowest type of beggar. When I lived in China, I remember seeing a boy—maybe twelve or thirteen years old—who was one of these “cringing” poor. His ratty clothes were that sort of color fabric becomes when it’s always exposed to the elements and never washed by anything other than rain. His legs, folded up on what looked like a badly damaged furniture dolly, were so deformed they had to have been broken repeatedly and never treated or set. He dragged himself down the street by his knuckles and desperately accepted even the smallest of coins—ones that make our pennies look valuable. The sight of him was both instinctually repulsive and utterly heartbreaking all at the same time.
That’s the kind of “poor” Jesus is talking about.[2] Those who “hunger” and those who “weep” also carry more extreme connotations than we might expect—things closer to starvation and inconsolable lament. The descriptions in verse 22 are equally intense: banishment and lambast and throwing out garbage. Not many of us could genuinely fit ourselves into these categories, nor would—or should—anyone actually want to.
Yet Jesus calls these people “blissful,” honorable—even to be revered. It doesn’t make sense on any sort of level—physical, emotional, spiritual. There’s no way for a human to see these people through a respectable or enviable lens. Yet that’s exactly how Jesus describes them—and immediately goes on to flip our other expectations on their heads.
In English, it’s easy to read “woe” as a statement of judgment or condemnation: “Woe to you, sinners! The pits of hell await you!” But that isn’t really the case here. This is an onomatopoeia—a word that sounds like what it means, which is a wail of despondence. Pronounced out loud, it would have been something like, “Ouai!”
Ouai for you, the wealthy!
Ouai for you who have glutted yourselves!
Ouai for you who are snorting with laughter!
Ouai when people speak highly of you!
Ouai! Ouai! Ouai!
Again, this simply doesn’t make sense. These are the people any of us would love to be—the ones we actually hope to be—the billionaires and other powerful figures who do whatever they want while the rest of society just stands by.[3] Yet Jesus is despairing over them.
The last time we encountered this passage,[4] I speculated that maybe what Jesus is doing is shining a light on our corrupt and often selfish ideas about God’s Kingdom. We’ve imagined this fantasy of exaggerated overflow—all the food we want, all the stuff we want, all the leisure we want, so much joy and happiness that it almost becomes boring. Sadly, our concept of Heaven is generally just gross and everlasting gluttony. And while that might be perfectly in line with the American Dream, I suspect it has little or nothing to do with God’s dream.
A few weeks ago I defined the Gospel as being about God—a declaration of God’s character and desires for Creation. God is, on a foundational level, the source of and for all being—one that creates and provides, one that brings into existence and tends and nurtures and carries and maintains and then brings back to rest in itself. But what if God’s nature isn’t to offer excess? What if God’s Kingdom actually has nothing to do with overindulgence or waste or mass consumption? What if God’s aim is to provide enough—enough for everyone to thrive, but not so much that we can just squander any of it? What if God truly does provide everything we all need but not necessarily everything we all want? What if God’s generosity and provision is rooted in an expectation that God’s children—God’s Image—will reflect that same generosity, that we’ll care for one another and provide for one another and offer others the things that they also need?
And just to be clear, I’m not talking about any form of governmental practice or theory. When we explored this text three years ago, a couple left the church because they said I was promoting Socialism. So let’s be honest, Socialism does indeed sound similar to these ideas, but that’s because that form of governance is actually drawn from a particular interpretation of what Jesus says here and elsewhere in the Gospels. The difference between Socialism and what I’m talking about is the difference between Empire and God’s Kingdom. Socialism and its offshoots force participation and impose equality. God’s Kingdom—God’s dream of “enough”—is genuinely voluntary. We share and provide for one another not because we must—not because any law or powerful figure or even shame is forcing us to—but because we naturally and willingly reflect who and how God is. We choose to be generous and creative with our resources. We choose to provide.
If the basis of God’s Kingdom is “enough,” Luke’s Beatitudes and “woes” begin to make more sense. For those who lack now, “enough” may be genuinely blissful! If you’re starving, “enough” feels like a feast. If your life has been nothing but poverty or sorrow, “enough” can become a source of joy. When your very existence is a struggle to be seen as human, “enough”—expressed as equality or even simple acceptance—is a manifestation of God’s love, a true experience of heaven itself.
But for those of us used to luxury, people who’ve soaked ourselves in overflow and become accustomed to greed, we who expect to receive special treatment, “enough” (or equality) may just be a nightmare—a literal taste of hell and all the fear that surrounds it. And watching others enjoying themselves while you feel like you’re wasting away makes them enviable indeed.
Thus shines Jesus’ light in this passage, and thus he exposes one of the greatest challenges and struggles of our day and culture. So what will we do? How will we respond? What can be done to prepare for this Divine reality? Are there ways each of us can better reflect God’s attributes in a world that celebrates presumption and greed? Can we treat others with dignity and respect, even those whose state we might find disgusting or abhorrent? Are we willing to train ourselves to take on the identity of our Father, to become a resource for life and love, a people of peace and generosity and kindness?
What can we do to ready ourselves to recognize—and even rejoice!—when “enough” truly is enough?
[1] See Matthew 5 for the alternate version.
[2] In both Luke and Matthew, to be honest. Taken out of our tendency to mysticize Jesus’ words, “poor in spirit” probably means something closer to “starving for air.”
[3] Ones who somehow convince us that the poor people are to blame for overconsumption of resources.
[4] https://www.slouchingdog.com/sermons/year-c-february-13-2022-epiphany06