I figured I would share a little cool thing that helps explain one of the moments of Jesus’ ministry a little better.
I’ll give a little scripture, then comment as we go along.
So he came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read. And He was handed the book of the prophet Isiah. And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
To preach the gospel to the poor;
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
Luke 4:16-19
The first thing we notice is it was a custom of Jesus to go to the synagogue on the Sabbath and to read. Nothing of real revelation there, nor in him being handed the book of Isaiah, it is when He quotes from it that things get interesting.
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
Before I get to the point here, let us cross reference something. Philippians 2:5-8:
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
So we see from these that Christ came to us as a man, not as God. He removed all privileges He had as God. He needed to become as a man in order to take our place. To take stripes to take our sickness, to become sin on the cross so we would no longer be sinners, but saints and redeemed unto God. What we can see in John is that the Spirit of God filled Him and anointed Him, something He wouldn’t need to have happen if He was here as God. He was here as a man to go through stuff as we would go through them, to show us the way we can be ourselves, with the help of God.
Thanks to His sacrifice and suffering at the cross…. an aside is necessary here. His suffering wasn’t the beating, nor being hanged on the cross. None of that was the cup He asked to be taken away if possible. When He asked God to take the cup if possible, what He wanted to avoid was becoming sin, to become separated from God. He became sin, got separated from God to purchase for us redemption. So thanks to his sacrifice and suffering (becoming sin for us, being separated from God on our behalf) we are now reconciled and in right standing with God. We are no longer sinners. All we have to do is accept Christ as the Son of God and accept what He did for us.
I am glad I am no longer a sinner. Does this mean I no longer sin? Well, my spirit can not sin. Having accepted and believing in Christ, my spirit, the true me, is redeemed and in right standing. God sees me though the eyes of Christ, which sees me as perfect. Same for you if you have accepted Christ. However, we still have a flesh and a mind. The flesh and mind constantly want to rebel against God. It is the flesh and mind that can sin. This is why the Bible says we are to renew our mind and to crucify our flesh. We are not to literally crucify ourselves, but to bring our mind and body subject to our spirit, subject to the Word of God. So we still need to repent for any sins we may do in the flesh or mind, but our spirit man is sinless before God. Thank you Jesus for reconciling us to our Father, making us a true child of God, for making us an heir of God, and join heirs with You. (Romans 8:16-17)
Back to our bit from Luke 4:18
To preach the gospel to the poor;
To preach the good news to the poor. To preach to the poor they no longer need to be poor. I am not going to go off on a full prosperity message here and now. Needless to say God doesn’t want you to be poor. “For all the promises of God in Him are Yes and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us. (2 Corinthians 1:20)” Through Him, Christ, we receive all the promises of God. If you can find any promise God made to man, in Christ you can claim it. God is a good God, a good Father.
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
Brokenhearted is anyone hurt in emotions or feelings. Simple enough. If you have been hurt, Christ if for you.
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
We were caught in sin, separated from God. Christ has set us free, returned us to God. He has been anointed to heal the sick, lame, blind and the like. Jesus was healing people throughout His ministry.
To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
This is in reference to the year of Jubilee. Christ has given us a permanent state of Jubilee. Jubilee was the year when all debts were forgiven, where anything taken from you was returned to you.
All of the above most of us in Word Churchs should be failure enough with. What may be new is what follows in Luke 4:20-21
Then He closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all who were in the synagogue were fixed on Him. And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
When He sat down He did not return to His old seat. History tells us there were two seats at the front of the synagogue, one of which was kept empty at all times as it was the seat the messiah would sit in. This is the seat that Jesus sat in. He was demonstrating to them that He was the messiah. Isn’t that cool? The Word becomes so alive when you start learning some of the history behind some events and why some things happened the way they did.
EDIT: February 2022. As noted in the comments below. I haven’t been able to personally vet the above.
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