JOB
DESCRIPTION
Eighth
of twelve in Jesus’ Earthly Life & Ministry Parallel Series
Isaiah 61:1-2, Luke 4:18-19
Isaiah
61:1-2: “The Spirit of the Sovereign
Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the
poor. He has sent me to bind up the
broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness
for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of
vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn,”
One
Sabbath, Jesus went to the synagogue in Nazareth. He opened the scroll to read. Luke 4:18-19:
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon Me,
because the Lord has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim freedom for the
prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to
proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
Then Jesus rolled up the scroll and
sat down. All eyes bored on Him. How uncomfortable! So He stood up to announce to His fellow
Jews, his hometown, “Today this scripture is fulfilled
in your hearing."
The
people moved to the end of their seats, brows furrowed. Isn’t
He Joseph’s son? We can almost hear
them murmur. Jesus typically got in
trouble when He spoke truth. (People often
can’t handle the truth). “I tell you the truth,” He continued, “no prophet is accepted in His hometown.” (Luke 4:24).
Go ahead, rub it in Jesus! Haha.
But no one was laughing.
God’s Spirit was upon Jesus. We
would say today that Jesus was on a roll.
God had anointed Him to preach good news. God’s anointing is why Jesus is called “the
Christ.” The “year of the Lord’s favor” does
not mean a calendar year, but rather Jesus’ ushering in “the Messianic
age.” Jesus came to offer people freedom,
forgiveness of sins and eternal life. But
people can’t handle that.
The people heard about the miracles
Jesus had performed in Capernaum, and all they wanted was to see a show. The more Jesus explained, (see the lesson
linked below), the angrier they became.
They intended to shove Jesus off a cliff! (Luke 4:29).
Workers’ job performance is often evaluated yearly (for pay raise). Jesus still fulfills His job
description. How would you rate His
performance?
Take Home Nugget
Isaiah’s
parallel Scripture was prophesying Israel’s freedom from being exiled to and
held captive in Babylon. This passage
also refers to the Jewish custom of freeing people from slavery and cancelling all
debt during the “Year of Jubilee”—which came every fifty years (Leviticus
25:8-55).
Thank
You, Father, for sending Jesus to earth so that we don’t have to wait fifty
years for our Jubilee!
J.D.
Griffith
A
personal, private lesson experience with our staff
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