"August 24 Sunday Sermon Manuscript"

Luke 13:10–17

Finding What Is Important

1. The children are going back to school, and the young adults are once again coming back for school, spending time in such ways. The beginning of the fall semester carries both new expectations and hopes, as well as worries and various situations that require new adjustments, creating a sense of anticipation about what kind of life they might live.

2. During this time, the church has also been busy preparing for various events. Starting tomorrow until Wednesday, the young adults will be tabling, and in the last week, they will have a retreat at church.

3. On Saturday, September 6, for the first time, our church will host the annual Mission Dinner organized by the Northern California Caucus. Every year, this Mission Dinner raises about $20,000 to be used for church planting. It is a long-standing and meaningful tradition. Since we have relocated the church and now have a parking lot, it has become possible.

4. On Saturday, September 20, there will be a fall concert by a Korean group in this neighborhood called “Ari Ensemble.” Although it is an event renting our church building, it is expected to be a high-quality concert.

5. Immediately following that, on September 27, the “Meeting Choir,” directed by our church’s Deacon Kyungtae Lee, will hold a fall performance at our church. It is not only a concert, but also a partnership with our church in preparation for the event to support missions.

6. As I mentioned in a previous sermon, we are preparing to support the “Jina School” in Nepal. It would be good if we could add just a bit more strength to this effort, and because it is meaningful, we want to walk together in it.

7. It seems like there is so much going on, but through this busyness, the church is built. So, do not take any of these things lightly, but join together, and I assure you: for those sending their children far away to school, the emptiness will be filled; for young adults starting anew in a new place, courage will rise; and for the members of Yeolin Church, the fall will be filled with a richness we have not yet experienced.

8. In August, the passages we are reading together come from the Gospel of Luke, and they are full of quite burdensome messages. Regarding material things, and for those who are considered rich or powerful, the passages are full of difficult teachings, and today’s text delivers a similar message to us.

9. As we go through life, being noticed and receiving attention is quite fascinating. Everywhere we go, the desire to be noticed and the craving for attention exist within all of us. That is why, when we look at social media, YouTube shorts, or reels, it seems that people’s great desire is to make themselves known to the world through special content.

10. Conversely, living a life in which one is alienated or unknown wherever they go can be misunderstood as living a failed life.

11. I remember when a senior I met in the military tried to look me up from the school I had attended but said, “I couldn’t really find anything! I guess you’re not that famous?” People may evaluate a person’s ability or popularity based on how well-known they are, but we must remember that there are actually more people who live in this world without being noticed.

12. The Gospel of Luke continually highlights how Jesus intentionally called and spoke to those who were unnoticed or invisible.

13. In today’s passage, we encounter a woman who had suffered from sickness for eighteen years. Coincidentally, while Jesus was teaching in the synagogue on the Sabbath, He called this woman and healed her. And we see that this event angered the synagogue leader.

14. There are a few key words: the Sabbath, the synagogue leader, the woman who suffered for eighteen years, and Jesus who healed her.

15. First of all, this woman likely lived the typical life of one who was unnoticed, somewhere near the synagogue. Within Jewish religion, sickness was interpreted in connection with sin. If not the person’s own sin, it was believed to have come from the sin of the parents.

16. For this woman, her illness could be seen as the weight of sin she carried for eighteen years. And her identity as a woman further magnified that sin, making her feel like an outcast in the community. At that time, women were considered unclean by their very existence and were not allowed to enter the central areas of the synagogue or temple.

17. This woman’s life was, in itself, a prime example of a life marked by neglect, alienation, and indifference.

18. There is a theologian named James Edwards, who is quite well known for his studies on the Gospels. He described this woman who appears in Luke 13:10 and following in this way:

19. “People with physical deformities had to live in such a way that they were socially unnoticed. Especially if it was a woman, this was even more so. Women almost never approached a rabbi, and rabbis, as a rule, did not converse with women.”

20. We can imagine that this woman always lived a life that was visible but unnoticed, a life where no one spoke to her, where she was alive but had to live as if she did not exist.

21. Yet in verse 12 we read: “When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said to her, ‘Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.’” In this single verse, three verbs appear: “saw,” “called,” and “set free.”

22. The verb “saw” uses the word ἰδών (idōn). This word does not simply mean “to see,” but “to perceive,” “to recognize,” or “to pay attention to with deep awareness.” The meaning of “Jesus saw her” is not that He merely glanced at her in passing, but that He looked at her intently, giving her His attention.

23. The second verb, “called,” uses the word προσεφώνησεν (prosephōnēsen). This word does not mean quietly calling someone, but calling loudly enough for everyone around to hear and to draw their attention.

24. So when Jesus called this woman, it means He called her in a loud voice so that everyone else would notice her.

25. “Woman! You are set free from your infirmity.” With this one simple sentence, He declared her healing. But He did not say, “You are healed,” but rather, “You are set free from your infirmity.” The word ἀπολέλυσαι (apolelysai) means “to be freed” — freed from what? Freed from sin or sickness.

26. These three verbs show the process of being freed from a life long crushed under illness and unnoticed by others.

27. He saw, He called, and He set free. These three verbs are the way Jesus carried out His ministry, and we can also confess: Jesus “saw us, called us, and set us free!”

28. As always, the story does not end there. The synagogue leader, watching this, “was indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath,” the Bible tells us.

29. The phrase “was indignant” means he was displeased or angry. Then he said: “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

30. The reason for the synagogue leader’s anger was that Jesus healed this woman on the Sabbath, thereby, in his view, violating the command to keep the Sabbath.

31. For the Jews, the command not to work on the Sabbath comes from Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. No specific details are given there, only the instruction not to work (work, מלאכה melakhah). But in rabbinic tradition, the Mishnah and the Talmud listed thirty-nine categories of melakhot (מְלָאכוֹת), such as “farming, cooking, using fire, writing, carrying loads,” forbidding creative and productive labor.

32. The synagogue leader was angry about Jesus healing this woman because he regarded the healing itself as “work.”

33. In verse 15, Jesus responded again, saying “You hypocrites!” and rebuked the synagogue leader’s double standard, what we might call “hypocrisy” or a “double standard” today. Jesus, in fact, used a form of reasoning commonly used by rabbis called Qal wahomer.

34. Qal wahomer is an argument that goes from the lighter to the heavier. For example, Matthew 7:11: “If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”

35. This reasoning appears in verses 15 and 16: “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?”

36. At these words, “all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing,” and thus the passage concludes.

37. Today’s passage may often be remembered simply as the story of Jesus healing a woman who had lived bent over for eighteen years.

38. However, here we can recognize something even more important.

39. Everywhere in the world there are those who, intentionally or not, are marginalized and live as outsiders. And often when people look at them, the hidden thought that arises is: “At least I’m glad I don’t have to live like that person.”

40. In today’s world, there may be people who feel relieved that they don’t live like immigrants. Some may even feel relieved that they do not belong to a certain race.

41. The passage reveals those hidden groups of people — represented by the synagogue leader — who hold such common thoughts, and Jesus overturns their assumptions.

42. Jesus saw, called, and set free the woman whom no one else paid attention to. Through this, she was freed from sickness, freed from social perception, and freed from prejudice of any kind.

43. Yet there were those who were uncomfortable with her freedom. Most were people stuck in the inertia of their thinking, unable to discern what was truly important, simply living in self-satisfaction.

44. Obsessed with the idea that the Sabbath must not be broken, they could not understand the true meaning of what Jesus had done. They even poured out their anger. But in response to this conviction of being right, Jesus treated such foolishness with firm clarity.

45. He rebuked them as hypocrites — those who would care for their own livestock even on the Sabbath but showed no mercy toward a woman bound in sickness for eighteen years.

46. Today, as we read this passage, we too must consider whether we are living bound by some habitual and unproductive inertia, without questions or reflection. And yet, Jesus saw us, called us, and set us free. In this, we see that our thoughts and judgments have been expanded.

47. The confession “I have been saved! I have been set free through the gospel!” now means that we no longer live bound by inertia, but like Jesus, we dare to take courage for what others do not notice or care about, to call out, and to set free. This responsibility has also been entrusted to us.

48. We are not simply existing, but called to see what others avoid, to be called or to call with courage, and to set free — living a life that glorifies God.

49. Remember this, and may you and I live in this world firmly holding the freedom the Lord gives us.

50. I sincerely hope that you and I will discern what unproductive, habitual bindings are holding us, and respond to the call of Jesus who sets us free.