Your Jubilee
Leviticus 25
This morning I want to speak with you from the Word of God about one of the most profound concepts in all of Scripture – it is so profound and different to anything we know that there is nothing like it in all of modern life. Yet it is so profoundly a part of everything we believe.
Turn with me to the Book of Leviticus in the Old Testament and to the 25th chapter. My title this morning is “Your Jubilee.” Let me tell you about the Levitical Jubilee.
Sabbath – 7th day
Sabbatical year – seventh year
Jubilee – seven times seven – 50th year
All debts are cancelled. We look like the kind of group that would think that was good news.
All prisoners are set free. I know some of you get nervous at that point. You say, "I don’t mind the debt thing. Maybe that’s a good thing. But prisoners set free? Murderers, rapists on the streets? That scares me." Don’t get nervous. I have read the Old Testament. The only thing they put you in jail for in those days was debt. Everything else, they killed you.
All land is given back to those who originally possessed it, a redistribution of the land. All of this, of course, was good news for the poor. The jubilee was a new start for poor people. For those who had lost out in life’s race, it was a chance to get a new beginning, a point of hope.
The thing that in Israel was supposed to turn economics from the dog-eat-dog world we inhabit into a 50 year game with a reset button.
The Year of Jubilee was God’s big ‘Reset’ button – it was the ‘Reboot’ in the system, the ‘Ctrl-Alt-Del’ in the universe.
Year of Jubilee – a year-long party that was preceded by a year-long party.
Why did God create a Jubilee? Because it was His desire that His children should never live in bondage and should never be bound by poverty.
Now here is the incredible truth – although God have given Israel this 50 year reset button, this unique opportunity to celebrate worth, to express justice, to honor life - not once did Israel ever celebrate a Jubilee year. They talked about it, they taught about it, they referred to it – but not once in their history did they ever actually celebrate it. They agreed with it, they believed it – but they never did it.
As a matter of fact, by the time we get to the New Testament thousands of years later, they had still not celebrated Jubilee, not even once. But by then they believed that when the Messiah came, He would bring back Jubilee, He would show them how to do it.
So Jesus arrives on the scene in Nazareth where He had grown up, and early one Sabbath He makes his way to the temple as He was accustomed to, and motions that He has something to say. He is recognized and He call for the scroll, the one containing the book of Isaiah. Let’s pick up that account in Luke 4:17-21.
Luke 4:17-21
What was Jesus doing? He was proclaiming the Year of Jubilee. He was saying that He was the Messiah. You see, Isaiah had said in chapter 61 that the Messiah would come, and He would proclaim the year of Jubilee. Jesus proclaimed it – and said, ‘I am He.’ But He doesn’t seem to simply have been inaugurating a Jubilee year. Rather, He was announcing a Jubilee age - the kingdom of God.
And what was the response? The people liked the idea that He was speaking about Jubilee. They all wanted that. But when they realized that He was saying that He was the Messiah, they tried to kill Him. The Bible says in verse 28 that “All the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff.”
That was not the last time He would be led to a Hill because of His message of Jubilee, of freedom.
The message of salvation is the message of Your Jubilee.
Did you know that this nation was founded not simply on religious freedom, but on the concept of this Jubilee? Those famous words engraved into the Liberty Bell in Pennsylvania when it was made in 1751 read, “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.” They are a direct quote from Leviticus 25:10 – the Jubilee chapter.
Precious believer, may I tell you a little about Your Jubilee this morning? I want to give you the Four Messages of Jubilee.
1. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FORGIVENESS
In a famous Peanuts cartoon, Lucy approaches Charlie Brown with a paper and pen and says, “Here, sign this. It absolves me from all blame”. Then she goes to Shroeder with the same paper and says, “Here, sign this. It absolves me from all blame”. Finally she comes to Linus: “Here, sign this. It absolves me from all blame”. As she walks away Linus says, “Gee, that must be a nice document to have”.
Jesus say to you this morning, “Here, this is signed in my blood. I absolve you. I forgive you. I cleanse you.
Jesus understood the power of forgiveness – He hung on the cross and uttered those incredibly powerful words, “Father . . . forgive them.”
Precious believe, the message of Jubilee is a message of forgiveness. The good news is that your debt of sin has been forgiven.
God Forgives Our Sins
That is why Psalm 32:1 tells us that “Happy is the man whose sins are forgiven, whose sins are covered.”
God Forgets Our Sins
And precious believer, did you know that when God forgives your sins, He actually chooses to remember them no more?
Is 43:25 “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”
God Removes Our Sins
Ps 103:12 “As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.”
2. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FREEDOM
In Bible days, if you incurred a debt and somehow became unable to pay, you enslaved yourself or a member of your family to your creditor to work off the balance.
These Jews who heard Jesus words did not understand what freedom was. They did not consider themselves slaves.
And nor does the average person you ask walking down the street. But the truth is they do not know what freedom is.
The words of the scroll Jesus read that day in the synagogue said the message that the Messiah would proclaim included “. . . freedom for the captives.” It does not matter when has got you captive this morning – the message of Jubilee is ‘freedom.’
The good news of Jubilee is that there is freedom from slavery to sin, bondage to satan and from ourselves and the tyranny of our human nature.
“Whom the Son sets free, is free indeed.” John 8:36
Jesus said “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”
Then He said this, “I am the way, the Truth and the Life.”
Do you need freedom this morning? Do you need freedom from fear, freedom from oppression, freedom from slavery to your past, your weaknesses, your failures?
3. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT RESTORATION
One of the incredible promises of Jubilee was that if you had sold your land, or lost your land in a debt civil case, or somehow got separated from your land – in the Year of Jubilee you were given your land back. Why? Because the land was really the Lord’s and they were but tenants.
Restoration is about giving back what Satan has stolen from you Christian.
It could be your Calling, Hope, Spiritual Abuse, Trust, Love, Peace, Health!
Psalm 23 “He restores my soul.”
Psalm 51:12 “Restore to me the joy of thy salvation.”
Matthew 17:11 “And He answered and said, ‘Elijah is coming and will restore all things.’”
4. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FAITH
The year before Jubilee was the 49th year- that meant it was a Sabbatical year. One of the rules for the Sabbatical year was that you were not to plant any crops – the land had to lie fallow. You could eat the crop that grew naturally out of the ground from the previous year’s harvest, but you could not sow seed for a new harvest.
In the Jubilee year you had to do the same thing. That meant that for two years you could plant no seed. For two years you had to live by faith – trusting God as your supply and your resource. It was a season of great faith.
1 John 5:4 “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.”
Ro 10:17 “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”
Here is the simply message of faith – God is in control – and I trust Him!
God is in control, it doesn’t matter what is happening in the economy, and it doesn’t matter what is happening on a political level, or whose in the white house. It doesn’t matter what they do to social security, healthcare, or anything else. God is in control.
It is time to stop listening to your head, and start empowering your faith.
Nothing moves the hand and heart of God like the faith of His children.
Matthew 9:20-22 - The woman with the issue of blood . . . no doctor could help – she had tried the doctors for 12 years. Perhaps she had heard Jesus, and wondered if this Teacher could help her in her hopeless situation.
In verse 21 "For she said…" J.B Phillips renders it: "She kept on saying." Or “For she said to herself. . .” She was encouraging herself in the Lord and speaking to her own spirit. That’s what faith is made of! She had "pressing in" faith.
• So line up your confession with His Word
• Conform your behavior to His Purpose
• Stand still and wait for the salvation of God
• Position Yourself for a Miracle
Le 25:48 “. . . then he shall have redemption right after he has been sold. One of his brothers may redeem him.”
1. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FORGIVENESS
2. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FREEDOM
3. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT RESTROATION
4. IT IS A MESSAGE ABOUT FAITH
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