As we prepare our hearts for this coming Lord’s Day worship, let me encourage you to read Luke 4:14-22. In this section of Luke’s Gospel, we find our Lord in attendance at the synagogue in Nazareth, His boyhood home. This visit to the synagogue occurs during the Lord’s Galilean preaching tour, which is introduced to us in verses 14-15.

Perhaps a couple of years after His baptism and temptation (according to some New Testament scholars), Jesus goes back home to preach in the very synagogue that He attended as a boy. But far from a normal Sabbath day worship service, something most startling happened there!

While this same episode is also recorded by Matthew and Mark, Luke supplies us with significantly more detail of the events that transpired back then on that amazing Sabbath in the synagogue. Verse 22 provides us with a glimpse of the reaction of the worshippers when the service came to its conclusion:

And all spoke well of Him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from His mouth. And they said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?”

What made the crowd say such things? Why did they marvel that Jesus was the one they all knew as the son of Joseph? What part did this visit to his boyhood home and place of worship play in our Lord’s public ministry?

I can’t wait to find out with you as we gather before our Lord this coming Sunday!