in all of my 42 years as a Christian, I have never heard a sermon on the year of Jubilee. I've never heard it taught in any Sunday school class where I've been a part of, and nor do I have a book on the year of Jubilee. I have one on order. The year of Jubilee is in some obscure text in the book of Leviticus. Here are a couple of quotes that I was able to acquire from one of my sources. This author says, it's putting it mildly to say that if they had actually been observed, the collection of Jubilee laws would have had a sweeping impact on the social and political life of on any community governed by them. Here's another quote, the legislation associated with the year of Jubilee presents the most radical program for continuous social reform to be found in the Old Testament. And a third quote, this Jubilee idea and the laws for Jubilee presents a vision of social and economic reform surpassed in all the ancient Near East. And the author who collected all these quotes brings this to a conclusion. He said, there is, however, no account in the Old Testament of the year of Jubilee ever having been observed. It's a great idea, but never done before. And Jesus uses this idea of Jubilee as the defining element of his earthly ministry. He used this language here in the Gospel of Luke. The year of Jubilee was never observed in the history of Israel until Jesus says today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. Let me ask you to just read along with me as I read this text from your bulletin. Luke chapter 4 beginning in verse 14. Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee and a report about him went out throughout all the surrounding country and he taught in their synagogues being glorified by all. And he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up And as was his custom, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and he stood up to read. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him and he unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And all the eyes of all in this synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth and said, is this not Joseph's son? And he said to them, doubtless, you will quote to me this proverb, physician, heal yourself. What we have heard you did in Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well. And he said, truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown. But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up for three years and six months, and a great famine came over the land. And Elijah was sent to none of them but to Zarephath in the land of Sidon, to a widow, a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them were cleansed but only Naaman the Syrian. And when they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so they could throw him off down the cliff, But passing through their midst, he went away." Well, we have all had to face debt in one way or another. Most of us have financed something at some point, financed either our college education or graduate education. Perhaps we have also financed our own children's higher education or perhaps planned to attempt to do that. We've gone into debt when we have bought a house. We've gone into debt when we have purchased a car or other things the family might need in which you thought it necessary to go and get a loan or to maybe put it on credit cards because this particular need was urgent and you went ahead and did that and maybe many months, maybe many years later, you're still attempting to pay off that debt. When an Israelite fell on financial hard times, there was no bankruptcy policy in Israel. The Israelite would solve his severe debt problems by having to sell his own self into slavery to the Israelite who had loaned him the money in the first place. If a person couldn't pay his debts, he would sell the land that he had to attempt to write it, and if that was not enough, he would end up selling himself until he worked to pay off his debts in that way. Now, we have to be careful whenever the language of selling oneself into slavery is used. We ourselves cannot hear that language without being reminded of our own American history. The American experience with slavery in the 1800s was not the same kind of slavery mentioned Here in the Bible, not mentioned in Israel, the American slavery experience was an evil race-based form of human debasement. It involved kidnapping and violence. It involved oppression and suppression. It involved unwarranted and insidious theological justification, which should always be opposed wherever it is found. But slavery in the Old Covenant wasn't that kind of slavery. It was largely economic. Slavery of one Israelite who fell into financial hardship would attempt to make it right by selling his property and even selling himself into slavery so that he could work off the debt that he had incurred. But then there was the year of Jubilee, that year in which all debts were canceled, that year in which all properties that had been exchanged to pay off debts were returned to the clan or the family of origin, free and clear. Jubilee was to take place in the 50th year, seven years times seven. So I read some that the 49th year was actually after the 49th year. It was to be understood as the year of God's favor in which all of this blessedness, this economic freedom of release was granted. to the people of God, but of course, as I mentioned, it was never observed. Jesus uses this idea of jubilee as a way to launch his kingdom manifesto. And I have to confess, I never actually knew this to be the case, and every commentator I've read makes reference to jubilee as they work through the verses in Luke. I'm very, very excited to be able to now read through Luke with this lens, but let's look at just some lessons that I have for us from these verses together for worship today. The first one is Jesus' proclamation power, the anointing of the Holy Spirit. As I mentioned, this was his inaugural sermon, and we have some preachers in this room. I wonder if you can remember what your first sermon was. My first sermon was on Mother's Day, May the 10th, 1998, I preached on John 3.16. You know, inaugural sermon is a foundational sermon. It's a seminal sermon. It would be analogous to an acorn. And in the acorn is everything that will happen. An entire grove of oak trees will come out of this single seed. And that's what's happening here. Jesus says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me. It begins with the Spirit. Jesus here makes certainly one of the most self-centered statements in the Bible. I use that word self-centered on purpose. Because Jesus is the only person that can make a self-centered statement and not be bad. He makes self-centered statements in a way that are utterly good. John Stott says this, this self-centeredness in the teaching of Jesus immediately sets him apart from other great religious teachers of the world. They tend to be self-effacing, he self-advancing. They point away from themselves saying, that is the truth as far as I understand it, follow that. Jesus says, I am the truth, follow me. No other religious founder who dared to say such a thing would be taken seriously, the personal pronouns force itself repeatedly on our attention as we read his words. He says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. In fact, in the original language, it reads like this. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me. The emphasis is on the personal pronoun. The emphasis is on the me. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord, to preach what is this never before done, this blessing of jubilee. He says here, today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. What is that verse? That's what, seven or eight verses, seven or eight words, the shortest sermon ever preached. I wonder whether or not any of you are thinking, yeah, you're preaching a little long today, Rick. Why don't you cut it short like this sermon? You know, Jesus made a lot of omissions when he was making reference to this Isaiah passage. He omitted the last part of verse two. He omitted, omitted the day of vengeance of our God. He omitted that. He replaced, he swapped out a verse. He left the verse that says, he sent me to bind up the brokenhearted and he added a verse from Isaiah 58 to the recovery of sight of the blind. But the Spirit's anointing is the key thing here. It was a Spirit who came upon Jesus at His baptism. It was a Spirit who thrust Jesus out into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. It was the same Spirit that with which He received when He came in power back to Galilee. The Spirit is pivotal because when the Spirit ever comes into the scene in the Bible, it's a new pivotal era of history. It was in the very beginning, Genesis chapter 1 verse 2. It was predicted in Ezekiel when Ezekiel predicted the the recreation of Israel with the valley of the dry bones, the flesh would be put onto these bones or this heart of stone would be removed and the heart of flesh would be transplanted. Of course, the exile didn't actually produce that kind of spirituality. It had to happen here. He says today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. Let's get practical. You know, this series is called, He Preached Jesus to Him, as you recall. from Acts chapter 8 where the Ethiopian high official happened upon this road and he was in a chariot reading the text of Isaiah and Philip the deacon was there right next to him and he overheard the words of Isaiah being read and he then engaged him and the text of Acts says he preached Jesus to him and he was converted. You know, I have to imagine that if we think about this time of the year in which, you know, Jesus is kind of going to be after Thanksgiving, he's going to be front and center. At least Christmas is going to be front and center. You'll see nativity scenes here and there. You might hear some, even some Christian Christmas carols being played at Target or other places. And you might even have an opportunity to engage somebody about what Christmas really is about. I want to suggest to you, that you ask somebody to say something like, have you actually read the words of Jesus? He claims this fantastic promise for himself. I mean, it's incredible that he would claim this for himself. He's actually claiming that the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 61 is referring to himself. Now either he is the most delusional person who has ever walked the face of the earth, if this is not true, or he's a son of God if it is true. And what do you think about that? And let Jesus speak for himself. He's able to speak for himself. If it is true, this indeed is one of the most groundbreaking statements he has ever made. If we're going to preach Jesus, it's best that we let Jesus speak up and let people deal with Him, the beauty of Him, the complexity of Him, the challenging words that He often attributes to Himself. The Jubilee in Leviticus 25 pointed out is pointing to something beyond merely economic reversal. Jubilee pointed to something beyond Jubilee. Like the Lamb of the Passover was pointing to something beyond the Lamb. to a final lamb, so also jubilee pointed to something beyond jubilee, to the final jubilee in Jesus. Today, this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. Well, let me give you another lesson here. Jesus' proclamation to the poor, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. Jubilee was a way of God letting his people start over. Jubilee was a great gift to people who fell on hard times. Jubilee was to take place in the 50th year in which all debts were canceled and money or property was returned to the owner of the property, the family, the clan, but it was never done. You might wanna ask why, why was it never done? Why was Jubilee never observed? My guess is that the people of Israel thought about Jubilee in the same way we might now be thinking about Jubilee. Jubilee, you know, might seem to create more problems than it solves. I mean, think about it this way. What about if you're a banker, your business is banking, and you make it your business to loan money, and it's getting closer to the 49th year? You might be disinclined to help people. You might be tempted not to help people. You might be tempted to not be open for business for quite a number of days lest somebody comes in, borrows money with the knowledge that even next year, it's all going to be canceled. Or what about people who might be seeking to deliberately borrow lots of money in the 48th year, maxing out their Israeli credit card with the knowledge that in a little bit of time, those debts are going to be canceled. A lot of people think about God's grace that way. If God's grace is free, then aren't people gonna sin? Shouldn't we put restrictions and say you really need to earn God's grace? Because if we give people free grace, they're going to take advantage of that free grace and do whatever they want, sin however they want with the knowledge it's all forgiven anyway. Or if God wants me to treat people graciously, will they not take advantage of me if I'm kind and sympathetic and merciful? Won't I be walked on? Well, the Jubilee is about grace, but the basis for God's grace is that everything belongs to the Lord in the first place. You don't even belong to yourself. The land belonged to the Lord. The redeemed Israelite and herself or himself belonged to the Lord. None of anything that you had in your home was actually yours. We're all children of God by the free grace of God in adoption. But jubilee was never done. Until it resurfaces here, the prophet says the anointed one is going to bring the true and final jubilee to the poor. Jesus loved the poor. He gathered himself to the poor. He ate with the poor. He loved the poor. But who exactly are the poor? Luke is particularly interested in the poor. The poor in the Gospels and Acts are not just persons without money, although the poor are those without money. In Luke, there are actually six lists, I'm going to mention just five of them, in which the poor, the name the poor starts the list, or in one of them, the poor ends the list in such a way that Luke is defining who the poor are. In fact, in our text, 4 verse 18, the poor are the captive, the blind, and the oppressed. In Luke 6 verse 20, the poor are the hungry, the mournful, and the persecuted. In 14 verse 13, the poor are the maimed, the lame, and the blind. You recall Luke 16, the story of the parable of Lazarus, He was considered poor and Lazarus was hungry and he had ulcerated skin, he had boils all over his skin. Luke 7 verse 22, the poor are mentioned as the blind, the lame, the leper, and the deaf are all the poor. Yes, the poor were the financially destitute, but the poor also were a larger class of outsiders. The poor were those who had no status and therefore they had no access to the mainstream Israelite life and community. In this respect Matthew was poor even though he was very wealthy because he was an outsider and nobody wanted to associate with Matthew. Women were considered among the poor because they had no status. They had no access. Children were also considered among the poor because they were brushed aside especially the Samaritan in Luke are especially those who are on the outside, and certainly they rank among the poorest in this respect in Israel. The poor were not necessarily the most financially impoverished as much as they were persons who are on the outside, persons who are on the margins. Persons who were regarded as the chaff and the riffraff. They were the tax collectors, the infirmed. They were those who the leaders of Israel really did not like and really did not want to associate themselves with. They were afraid of being tainted by the poor. In fact, it was the experience of the poor in Israel. In Luke chapter 15 verse 1, Luke writes, now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to him. The Pharisees and scribes grumbled, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them. This grumbling expresses scorn. The poor were scorned. They were despised. They were disdained. They were spurned. They were belittled. This additive contempt is the attitude and the label the poor had to carry. There was no room for the poor sinners near them. They were never, ever, ever invited over for dinner among Israel's leadership. But Jesus changed all that. Jesus sought them out. He went to them. He had dinner in their homes. He laughed at their humor and touched them. He welcomed them. He draw them near. He asked them their names. He reached and touched their children. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. Imagine what this message did to them. The very Messiah of God, the very one about whom all the promises reside, come and he actually is looking for those on the margins who actually goes and leaves these power brokers behind and goes and finds them and asks them, what is your name? Where are you from? Tell me about your family. and they are, I'm sure, put off by it initially until they realize he was actually being sincere and genuine. He actually loved the poor. The very Messiah of God has come to bring these poor to himself. He has come to befriend them, to companion them, to make them one of his own, especially the demonized, the Samaritans. You know, I think there is a sense in which We all can gain something from this. I mean, I think, you know, in every Christian community, there are the insiders and there are the outsiders. You know, we live in a church. We're not that big of a church. Probably have insiders and outsiders. I've been at this church, like I mentioned, since 1998. And if there are insiders and outsiders, I don't really see them because I'm on the inside. The insiders don't have a problem with seeing outsiders because they're on the inside. It's the outsiders that are not on the inside that they notice that they're outsiders. And I think it's helpful for us that have been here for a while to know that there's probably that feeling going on among us. And it's important to know that this happened then. It can happen in every body among the people of God. And we have to be sensitive to that. We should be asking ourselves, you know, to what degree are we making this a more inclusive? Now that has loaded political terms and connotations in our time. But there's a sense in which being inclusive is a good thing. That we aren't, there isn't an insider, you know, kind of a holy huddle type thing, but that we're all part of one and that we go out of our way to make sure that there isn't anyone who ought to make, who ought to feel like he is not on the inside with us. The gospel requires that. The gospel, that would be how the gospel is to be lived out. He went out, he broke the barriers to reach people who were on the outside to establish them with him on the in. Well, let's notice the next point that I have. Jesus' proclamation of good news as release and reversal. He had sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed. Jesus, the final jubilee has come. His proclamation of liberty and recovery, liberty or release. You know, the year of jubilee was the year in which all debts would be forgiven. The year of Jubilee was the year in which all captives, those who had made themselves slaves because of debt, were returned and set free, free and clear. But the Jubilee promise in Leviticus went beyond merely financial reordering. And the reason why I say that is because even in the text itself, this also is the case with Matthew's text and Mark's text, but here in Luke chapter 4, verse 31, The very first instance, and the very first instance took place in Matthew after Matthew introduced Jesus, and Mark after he introduced Jesus, is an exorcism. He went about down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, verse 31, and he was teaching them on the Sabbath. And they were astonished at his teaching, for his word possessed authority. And in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon. And he cried out with a loud voice, ha, what have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God. And he rebuked them, saying, be silent and come out of him. And when the demon had thrown him on the ground in their midst, he came out of him, having done him no harm. What is this? Well, this is a release. Now, there is a far greater oppression recorded here than financial oppression. There is a far greater danger than not being able to pay your bills to your creditor. The most oppressive oppressor in the Bible is the devil. The most significant oppression in the Bible is sin. The word liberty here in the ESV is the same word used in the New Testament for forgiveness, forgiveness of debt, But you can see the spiritual connotation of this. If the first example of release given in the Gospels is the release from the devil, you can know that Jubilee is not only talking about economic equalization. The true Jubilee is talking about something much more. Talking about being released from the tyranny of the devil. It's talking about being released from the tyranny of sin. Perhaps some of you know what this is like. to have to have a lot of debt, maybe credit card debt, or maybe you're still paying off your school loans. And you think about, OK, I want to buy a house. And you have to think in terms, OK, in order to pay for the mortgage, I have the mortgage here. But then I have this debt. And that means my monthly outgoing payment just for that is going to be much higher. And so you realize, I can't afford it. And so you're limited. You know, when you really can't get ahead because of debt. Any discretionary money you have goes to debt repayment. You think about, okay, I'm getting to be in my maybe late 30s, early 40s, and I still have debt. I'd like to start saving for retirement, but how can I do that if I have this outstanding debt? You can already get the experience how limiting it is. You don't have the ability to do what you want to do, to plan the way you want to plan because this debt is following you around everywhere you go. This passage saying that there is a debt that's worse than that. Jesus has come to release you from a greater debt for which there is no human remedy. That's what this is about, this jubilee privilege. He will later say in the Gospel of Luke, I have come not to be served, but to serve and to give myself as a ransom, a debt repayment for many. Of course, he's making reference to his debt, our debt being paid by him on the cross. Well, let's wrap this sermon up. Let me, last point here, Jesus' proclamation to you. What about you? You know, when Jesus preached this sermon in his hometown, verse 22 says, all spoke well of him. They marveled at the gracious words coming out of his mouth. And they said, is this not Joseph's son? There were some commentators who tried to figure out, is this like a put down on Jesus, on the one hand, or is it a, where they're really proud of this homegrown boy speaking so well? What were the gracious words about? What was that about? Did they love the way? He spoke, did he have sort of a Nazareth drawl? Did he speak kind of with an accent that made them feel like this preacher, this great preacher, this very powerful preacher was one of us? Well, Jesus knew what they were saying. And when he said, when they said, is this not Joseph's son? He knew that they had totally missed it. And he felt the need to set the record straight. These people of Nazareth, Nazareth think, this son of Nazareth, this is one of our own and therefore we are with him even as he's with us. But Jesus then says this, are you hearing me? What this is? This, in your hearing, are you hearing me right? He says, doubtless you will quote me this proverb, physician heal yourself. and scratch their head. What's this? What we have heard you do in Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well. Do us one of your things here. We heard about this thing. Do one of these things here so we could see another hometown great. Great thing has come out of Nazareth. Jesus says, let me tell you who are the people that are close to me, the people that I love, the people that are in my family. He would be a humble Sidonian widow and a humble Syrian leper. Elijah was sent to none of the widows of Israel, as many as there were, but only to Zarephath in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And then there were many lepers in Israel at the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them were cleansed, but only one, Naaman the Syrian. And the people of Nazareth, they, did they get it? and they are absolutely infuriated. Well, who is Jesus? Do you view him merely as a son of David, as a son of Joseph? You know, if he's merely the son of Joseph, then we don't really have to pay attention to him. Son of Joseph, I mean, he's got a lot of sons. Who is he? He's just one of them. Or is he the son of God? Who would be the insiders to the Lord, the promised Messiah? The answer is God's people are the ones who are willing to take the offense of Jesus to heart. These people were not willing to be offended by Jesus. Nazareth was already considered the low-rent district in Israel. These people have a high-brow attitude toward being offended by Jesus. Well, how was your attitude toward being offended by Jesus? Are you willing to be offended by him? Are you willing to take his offensiveness to heart? Are you willing to receive his offense? Are you willing to be offended by his words? Or do you generally get defensive when you're being called out, either by Jesus or by somebody who represents him to you? When Jesus presses on your idols, how do you respond? You know, one of the ways when he presses on your idols is you respond is you get angry. And notice this, this idol of the insider, they got very, very, very mad. And when they heard these things, all the synagogue was filled with wrath. When you get angry, what are you inclined to do? Get defensive? You know, I realized, you know, one of the things that fathers have to do, that pastors have to do, is you have to confront people. And I've learned over the time how to confront people. I've learned how to, you know, to start, you know, kind of tentatively hint at it and see if they pick up on me. And if they don't, you have to kind of up the ante a little bit. You know, when you have young little kids, sometimes you just go for the jugular right off the bat rather than, okay, let me go slow here. Let me see if he gets it. Let me ask you who are on the receiving end of a very imperfect rebuke, what do you do? You know, maybe you have the kind of father that you don't ever dare cross your father, but in your mind you're crossing him. Maybe you have the kind of attitude where I'm never going to let you know that I am defying your authority, but in my mind I'm defying you. What about if Jesus is the one who is calling you to account? Are you going to get defensive? Do you get angry? What happens if I just were to say to you that every time this happens to you, to think about the gift of jubilee, the gift of the release that Jesus is offering to you, that the people who are on the inside are people that are the humble, the people that are the repentant. People are going to say, okay, You know, my pastor or my father or my mother or my brother or my sister surely could have said that better. But what they had to say was true. I need to hear that. Or do you immediately dismiss them out of hand because of the tone of voice or because they got maybe 60% of it wrong? I'm not willing to look at the 40. Jesus is offering to all jubilee, and only the humble who hear and accept him are able to enter into it. When? Today. Today. Receive him today. Receive his words today. Let him mess with you. I guess that's another way of saying it. Let him say to you, you know, this very imperfect preacher behind this thing here is kind of comical, but, you know, the Holy Spirit brought something in my mind. You know, today you need to go into your private room and say, okay, I need to deal with that. I need to ask him, okay, tell me more. Help me out. Draw it out of me. I know this was your voice speaking. Today is the day. Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you for the absolute beauty and wonderment of your word, and especially of your son. How great a privilege it is to know this great Messiah, this great anointed one. His words sometimes are very painful to us to hear. When he calls us out, when he says to us, this is an area that you can no longer ignore. And we would love to be able to get away from his penetrating index finger. And yet, Lord, he's offering us jubilee. He's offering us release. He's offering us joy. He's offering us the way forward. He's offering us to be finally set free from our own selves, to walk in the way of all the liberty he has achieved for us. Would you be pleased to help us to get over our pride? and to receive His very kind offer, even if it comes very, very poorly, but to receive it, to hear it, and to hear it today. Thank you for your grace to us, and I pray for all of us. We all need to be brought to the point where, you know, do we want, you know, But we've always been experiencing the entanglement of our sins. Or do we want to be set free? Help us to choose the latter as we choose Jesus. We thank you in his name. Amen.