Daily Bread

Jesus Rejected at Nazareth

¹⁴ Jesus returned to Galilee^(A) in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside.^{(B) 15} He was teaching in their synagogues,^(C) and everyone praised him.

¹⁶ He went to Nazareth,^(D) where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue,^(E) as was his custom. He stood up to read,^{(F) 17} and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

²⁰ Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down.^(J) The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. ²¹ He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled^(K) in your hearing.”

²² All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?” they asked.^(L)

²³ Jesus said to them, “Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ And you will tell me, ‘Do here in your hometown^(M) what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.’”^(N)

²⁴ “Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown.^{(O) 25} I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land.^{(P) 26} Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.^{(Q) 27} And there were many in Israel with leprosy^[b] in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.”^(R)

²⁸ All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. ²⁹ They got up, drove him out of the town,^(S) and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff. ³⁰ But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way.^(T)