Note: You can watch this teaching on CrossWalk’s YouTube channel.

Napa’s history was first remembered by indigenous people who lived in Napa Valley and beyond for thousands of years before they would be introduced to the advanced military of Mexico, and along with it the notion of land ownership.  Over time, the Mexican government would be subdued by the United States and those who were granted land.  Catholic missions were introduced as well, although the Good News they claimed to share often felt more like subjugation. Time passed, and so did the likes of General Vallejo and Chief Solano.  Eventually, nearly all of the indigenous peoples of Napa County were pushed north into Lake County, where they were far enough away to not cause the settlers any significant trouble.  As the California gold rush made headlines, people came to California from all over the United States and abroad – including China.  African Americans found their way to Napa by sea and land and settled.  Over time, however, they would find themselves leaving Napa Valley due to lack of opportunity – the color of their skin made it virtually impossible to run a business or hold a job with a future.  Chinese settlers experienced the same fate and moved away. Migrant workers were welcome for the most part, until some in politics deemed them a threat to American jobs. Even to this day, the majority of vineyard workers are Latinx.  Their standard of living is not yet equal to their Caucasian counterparts, but not because of any lack of effort on their part.  There is something deeper at work.  To learn more, watch an interview with Napa historian Alexandria Brown.

            The story of Napa raises questions for me: what were the causes of the inhospitable atmosphere in Napa toward people of color?  Why the hostility?  This reminds me of a story from Jesus’ life where he experienced severe hostility from a group that knew him his whole life – the fine folk from Nazareth:

Then Jesus returned to Galilee, filled with the Holy Spirit’s power. Reports about him spread quickly through the whole region. He taught regularly in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.

When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures. The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written:

“The Spirit of the LORD is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come.”

He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently. Then he began to speak to them. “The Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulfilled this very day!”

Everyone spoke well of him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”

Then he said, “You will undoubtedly quote me this proverb: ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum.’ But I tell you the truth, no prophet is accepted in his own hometown.

“Certainly there were many needy widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the heavens were closed for three and a half years, and a severe famine devastated the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them. He was sent instead to a foreigner—a widow of Zarephath in the land of Sidon. And many in Israel had leprosy in the time of the prophet Elisha, but the only one healed was Naaman, a Syrian.”

When they heard this, the people in the synagogue were furious. Jumping up, they mobbed him and forced him to the edge of the hill on which the town was built. They intended to push him over the cliff, but he passed right through the crowd and went on his way. – Luke 4:14-30 | NLT

            What the heck happened here?  They were willing to kill Jesus simply for reminding them of their own history and the fact that it might be repeating?  And then they fulfill his very words?  Jesus’ words triggered their not-too-covert prejudice and racism toward non-Jewish people. The hatred’s origin went back centuries, was apparently endorsed by God, and fueled by their multiple-centuries-long occupation by foreign oppressors.  They believed they were God’s chosen people dating back to Abraham.  They believed God was bigger than geographical boundaries – a novel idea in the ancient world.  They believed God called them to be special, instructing them to take by force the Promised Land (even if at the expense of incalculable numbers of innocents).  They believed that at times they failed to live up to their end of the covenant, but God always kept God’s side of the covenant.  Even though they wanted a king (which was against God’s direction), God worked with them for centuries anyway.  God, through the prophets, warned them against neglecting the practice of their faith as the beginning of their end, but Israel ignored the call.  Eventually and predictably, their actions caught up with them.  Their kingdom was divided in half, and eventually they would lose their Promised Land to foreign oppressors – three different empires over several centuries.  Yet they still believed that they were God’s chosen people, and that God would redeem them through an anointed leader (Messiah) at some point.  In the meantime, their disdain for non-Jewish people exponentially increased as they awaited redemption.

            Jesus’ hometown teaching pointed a spotlight on errant thinking held by his longtime friends, prejudice that grew over time, was enculturated, codified, and even celebrated among the Jews.  

            Could it be that a similar phenomenon has taken place in the United States that has shown up in our Nazareth?  I don’t know any white people who can identify the development of their own prejudice, if they will even recognize it.  Is it possible that realized racism exists, that what we are being told by the voices of people of color, our own history, our own legal battles, our own statistics, our own current areas of inequality and inequity – are true?  Will we have ears to hear, or will we make like the faithful in Nazareth and prefer to kill the messenger?