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At the church where I serve, we have launched into a new year with a brand new sermon series entitled living on mission. During this series, our hope and our prayer is to equip and empower us as followers of Jesus to live our day to day lives on mission as a missionary that loves and serves those that God has already placed around us who are far from God in a way that reveals and reflects Jesus to them.

 

This week, I would like for us to look at a event from history that is recorded for us in a section of an account of Jesus life that is recorded for us in the Bible called the gospel of Luke. And it is in this event from history that we will see Jesus reveal for us a timeless and true principle when it comes to living on mission. So let’s look at this event from history together, beginning in Luke 4:14:

And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district. And He began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all.

Luke brings us into this event from history by providing for us the context for what is about to happen. After successfully resisting the temptations of the devil after spending 40 days in the wilderness, Luke tells us that Jesus returned to Galilee, which is located in what is today northern Israel, in the power of the Spirit. And here we see Luke reveal for us the reality that Jesus lived His earthly life by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus relied on the power and the strength of the Holy Spirit to live the life that we were created to live but refused to live in relationship with God and one another.

You see, Jesus shows us what it means to be truly human. Jesus provides for us the example of how we are to live our lives here on earth. As followers of Jesus our lives are to be controlled, influenced and empowered by the Holy Spirit so that we would reveal and reflect Jesus to others as we live in relationship with God and others.

Luke tells us that as Jesus taught in the synagogues of Galilee, news about Him spread throughout the surrounding district. News began to travel about Jesus doing the miraculous. And as Jesus showed up at Jewish religious gatherings throughout northern Israel, the sermons that He was preaching were powerful and word about His preaching spread throughout the region.

Now a natural question that arises here is “well what message was Jesus preaching and proclaiming. While Luke does not specifically tells us what message Jesus was proclaiming, in another account of Jesus life that is recorded for us in the Bible, called the gospel of Matthew, we see Matthew reveal Jesus message. So let’s look at Jesus message together, in Matthew 4:23:

From that time Jesus began to preach and say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

Now Jesus message, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded like this: “Repent, recognize and feel remorse for how you are living life. Change your attitude and your mind towards the trajectory of your life that is moving away from God back to God, because God has arrived. The kingdom of God has arrived and is at work among you.”

As you might imagine, this message would grab one’s attention. This message would have grabbed the attention of those listening because hundreds of years earlier, God had promised the Jewish people that He would send an redeemer, a rescuer, a deliverer who would deliver the Jewish people from oppression and bring them back to God and back to prominence in the world.

 

And as Jesus traveled from town to town in Northern Israel, news about His miracles and messages continued to spread. And as Jesus traveled, His travels led Him back to a town called Nazareth, which was His hometown. Luke records for us what happened when Jesus arrived in His hometown in verse 16:

He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read. And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. And He opened the book and found the place where it was written, "THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD IS UPON ME, BECAUSE HE ANOINTED ME TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO THE POOR. HE HAS SENT ME TO PROCLAIM RELEASE TO THE CAPTIVES, AND RECOVERY OF SIGHT TO THE BLIND, TO SET FREE THOSE WHO ARE OPPRESSED, TO PROCLAIM THE FAVORABLE YEAR OF THE LORD." And He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him.

Now to fully understand what is happening here, we first need to understand how Jewish people worshipped God in the first century. During the first century, there was only one church. And that church was located in Jerusalem. In the Jewish sacrificial system, there were two times every day that sacrifices were made to God for the sins of the people, one early in the morning and one in the in the late afternoon at 3 p.m. In addition, there were offerings that were expressions of worship and thanksgiving to God. So in order to offer up God acts of worship, one needed to travel to Jerusalem.

However, in addition to corporate worship at the Temple, Jewish people also gathered in synagogues throughout the nation of Israel. Synagogues functioned in a similar manner to how community groups function today. In synagogue, on the Sabbath, portions of the Old Testament were read and explained to the smaller gatherings of Jewish people that attended. 

With that in mind, Luke tells us that after arriving in His hometown of Nazareth, Jesus attended synagogue on the Sabbath. Notice that Luke uses the phrase “as was His custom” here. You see, Jesus made gathering together with followers of God a priority in His life. As part of that priority, as Jesus traveled, He found the local synagogue and attended on Sabbath.  And as part of that priority, Jesus actively engaged in what was happening in the synagogue by reading and explaining portions of the Old Testament to the crowds that were gathered for worship.

On this particular Sabbath, as Jesus volunteered to read during synagogue, one of the leaders handed Jesus a scroll that contained a letter that is recorded for us in the Old Testament of the Bible called the book of Isaiah. Jesus then opened the scroll to a section of the book of Isaiah that we know today as Isaiah 61.

In Isaiah 61:1, the prophet Isaiah predicted and proclaimed that when the Messiah arrived, He would live a life that was controlled, influenced and empowered by the Holy Spirit. And as He lived a Spirit filled life, the Messiah would preach the gospel to the poor. Now the word gospel literally means good news. And this good news would be proclaimed to the poor, which refers to those who were of low status that were viewed as outsiders who were far from God.

 In addition, the prophet predicted and proclaimed that the Messiah would proclaim release to the captives. In the Jewish culture of the day, this was a word picture of the release that comes from the forgiveness of sins. Isaiah also predicted and proclaimed that the Messiah would proclaim the recovery of sight to those who were blind. The Messiah would restore the sight of those who were physically blind and give sight to those who were spiritually blind.

And Isaiah predicted and proclaimed that the Messiah would set free those who are oppressed.  The Messiah would proclaim good news that would provide an opportunity for people to be released from the debts that surrounded and overwhelmed them.

Jesus continued to read the first part of Isaiah 61:2, where the prophet Isaiah predicted and proclaimed that when the Messiah arrived, He would proclaim the good news about God’s grace that the Messiah would extend towards humanity. And then, in the middle of Isaiah 61:2, Jesus abruptly stopped reading and sat back down. Luke then tells us that all eyes were fixed on Jesus. Everyone waited with anticipation to hear a great sermon from Jesus that they had already been hearing about.

Now a natural question that arises here, and probably arose at the time, was “why did Jesus stop there?” Tomorrow we will discover the answer to that question…