WHAT JESUS DECLARES AND DEFINES Luke 4:16-21 August 17, 2014 INTRODUCTION: Through the first 30 years of His life, Jesus had lived in obscurity in Nazareth. During those silent years we have record of His dialogue with the teachers in the temple when He was twelve. The next recorded event in Jesus life was His baptism at the Jordan. It is then followed by His temptation of 40 days in the wilderness being tempted by Satan. Luke 4 is preceded by Jesus carrying out a public ministry in Judea for about one year and then His ministry in Galilee. Jesus Judea ministry focused on revelations that Jesus is God. John the Baptist exclaimed in John 1:29: Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Nathaniel revealed His OMNISCIENCE as Jesus knew him before He met him. Jesus displayed His OMNIPOTENCE at the wedding held in the village of CANA. Later in John 2 Jesus cleanses the Temple displaying His HOLINESS. 1
In John 3 Jesus taught that salvation is appropriated through believing in Him. In John 4 at the Samaritan well the woman shared that Jesus came to be the Savior of the World. Now in Luke 4:31 we are told that Jesus began teaching in the synagogues introducing the pattern and priority of the Lord s ministry. Synagogues (240 cities and villages in Galilee) existed primarily for instruction in the Scriptures. A passage would be read from the Old Testament followed by a teacher s explanation of its meaning. This is where we begin today, Jesus in His hometown, reading the scriptures and then giving the exposition. If this passage declares Who He is and defines what He does, I d love to be found faithful to what I learn. I. A DEPICTION OF JESUS MINISTRY 18 The word depict has its origin in Latin that means to paint or more to paint. To show (someone or something) in a picture, painting, photograph. Also to describe (someone or something) using words, a story, etc. Verse 18 depicts the Lord s ministry. He uses 4 metaphors to depict the desperate condition of 2
needy sinners who God seeks to rescue from Hell. Jesus would often speak to the religious of His day that felt they were in good standing with God. They saw themselves as being rich, free, healthy, and unhindered. Yet Jesus told them they were poor, prisoners, blind, and oppressed. The language Jesus uses in this text depicts their utter lack of any spiritual resources to extricate themselves from their hopeless dilemma. Only through our Lord s work of salvation can they be rescued from eternal punishment. II. THE DECLARING OF JESUS MINISTRY 18-19 A. Preaching 18 To preach the gospel to the poor a message for the spiritually impoverished. Poor means to cringe, to shrink by or to cower. Conveys the idea of a beggar cringing in the shadows, cowering in shame. In spiritual terms, the poor are those who recognize that they have nothing by which to commend themselves to God. Matthew 5:3 Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 3
They acknowledge their moral bankruptcy that all their righteous deeds are nothing but filthy garments. The Lord can only bring salvation to those who acknowledge that they are spiritually destitute and that only God can supply their needs. SPECIAL NOTE: Pride is the major enemy of acknowledging our desperate need. The gospel has the power to bring the spiritually poor to be humble and contrite of spirit, brokenhearted and crushed in spirit. This leads to a genuine spirit of repentance. SPECIAL NOTE: While the economically poor are not in view here, such people are often fertile soil for the gospel. 1 Corinthians 1:26-29 For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things 4
which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. Their desperate circumstances drives them to a level of despair that those who are well off do not always experience. For that reason Jesus declared that, it is easier for a camell to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. (Luke 18:25). James 2:5 Listen, my beloved brethren: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? Those whose circumstances in life offer them little hope are often more open to receiving the good news of the gospel. B. Releasing 18 To proclaim liberty to the captives - lost sinners believe they are free and see Christianity as infringing on their right to be and do what they want to. This is tragic deception; sinners are not free. All sinners owe God an unpayable debt for violating His law and are in bondage to Him 5
who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell (Matthew 10:28). The lost are in bondage to Satan, held captive to him to do his will. They are slaves of sin since everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin (John 8:34). The good news of the gospel is that God has sent His Son to free those who are in spiritual bondage. Isaiah 42:5-7 Thus says God the Lord, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread forth the earth and that which comes from it, Who gives breath to the people on it, And spirit to those who walk on it: " I, the Lord, have called You in righteousness, And will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, As a light to the Gentiles, To open blind eyes, To bring out prisoners from the prison, Those who sit in darkness from the prison house. liberty (release) means forgiveness. Jesus will set the prisoners free by paying the penalty for 6
their violation of God s Law. Through His sacrificial death God has canceled out the certificate of debt against us, which was hostile to us, and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross (Colossians 2:14). Charles Wesley in O For A Thousand Tongues He breaks the power of canceled sin, He sets the prisoners free. C. RECOVERING 18 recovery of sight to the blind spiritual blindness is the natural condition of fallen men. John 3:19-20 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 2 Corinthians 4:4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. Paul in Ephesians 5:8 said, you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. 7
Colossians 1:13 He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, Paul s testimony of the Road to Damascus Acts 26:18 to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.' D. Freeing 18 To set at liberty those that are oppressed Those are people that are overwhelmed by life s painful circumstances, especially the wearying burdens of sin and the inability to keep God s law. God s Promise: Matthew 11:28-30 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light. " 8
Jesus had been ministering for a year in Judea and word had spread. Now the spiritually bankrupt, imprisoned by their sins and awaiting sentence by the Judge of all the earth, blind to the truth, and oppressed by the heavy burden of their sins, Jesus is proclaiming the acceptable year of the Lord. The day of salvation The year of redemption The favorable year of the Lord Note verses 20 and 21 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. " Salvation has come! 9