Freedom
Isaiah 61:1-3
Today is the third Sunday of Advent, the time when the church traditionally looks for the second coming of Christ. The first week, we spoke about expectation and that God wants to do something greater than ever before in your life and the life of this church. Last week, we looked at Isaiah 61 which is a prophecy of the coming Messiah written 800 years before Jesus’ birth and talked about how Jesus brought the Good News to the poor and that is why we who follow Jesus should focus our time and resources on the marginalized poor and the oppressed. Today, we’re going talk about the freedom God brings from the things that bind you.
In the 8 centuries before Jesus’ birth, the Jewish people knew well the life of oppression, slavery and death. In 722 BC, they were captured and enslaved by the Assyrians. In 586 BC, they were captured and taken into slavery to Babylon. In 538, they were captured, ruled and occupied by the Persians. In 63 BC, Rome conquered and occupied Israel So for more than 7 centuries, the Jewish people knew fear, occupation and a lack of freedom, all the while crying out to God to deliver them. Times in Jesus’ day were hard under Roman rule. If a Roman citizen came up to you and hit you up the side of the head, you had no rights and no recourse. During the cold winter months of Jerusalem, which has an elevation of 7000 feet, a Roman soldier could come up to you and take your coat and you could do nothing about it. Or if you were on your way to work, which was difficult to get a job and keep as a Jew and more than likely was a menial job, a Roman soldier could come up to you and tell you to carry his 45 pound pack for one mile and you could not refuse. The Roman tax rate was more than 60% to support the Roman soldiers, fund Herod’s construction projects and support Rome. This often caused people to live in poverty and fall into debt. Under Roman law, if I was late paying on my debts, they could enslave me to pay it off through indentured servanthood. Under these circumstances, you can well imagine that the people were longing for a Messiah. And you can well undersatand that the majority of Jesus’ teachings address the impoverishment, hunger and debt that most people experienced in their lives. It is in this contect that Jesus read from Isaiah 61 and proclaimed the release of those held in captivity, not only for his hearers but for us as well.
Today, I want us to look at the root cause of the oppression and captivity we experience in our daily lives. Jesus comes to proclaim freedom for the captives and that means we need to first ask, What is keeping you captive from living the life God calls you to and being the person God created you to be? What does Jesus want to liberate you? Write it down or name it.
But there is a deeper question we need to ask: Who is keeping you captive? Jesus read, “to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God.” Who are the enemies of God? The real enemy of God is not the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians or even the Romans. The real enemy is the evil one. There is a force of darkness which is wreaking havoc over our lives and in our world. God is not attacking the ones who are the perpetrators of the evil but the cause of the evil itself. Paul puts it this way: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Ephesians 6:12
First, we are infected with sin. Last week, we talked about generational sin. You and I are affected by the baggage of our parents and those before them. But the Bible also says we are all infected by the sin of Adam or Original Sin. It can be like a cancer that grows inside of us. All of us have thoughts and desires inside of us that we can’t believe. We do things we pledge to never do. And so we do things that we don’t want to do and then promise that we’ll never do it again. Paul put this struggle with sin this way: “We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do, I do not do; but what I hate, I do.” Romans 7:14 So what we bring with us is the baggage of our parents and the baggage of Adam and Eve. The mission of Jesus is to free us from the pull of sin in our lives. We’re fighting an enemy whose sole purpose is to kill and destroy anything, especially that which has been dedicated to God. We are fighting unseen powers and principalities. Our society’s thinking is that if we just destroy those who do bad through the death penalty then we destroy evil. But that does not destroy the cause of evil. Evil still exists.
Not only does this generational sin have a personal affect in our lives, it has social affect. Take how Germany which became built around Nazism and the supremacy of the Arian race, persecuted and destroyed more than 6 million men, women and children. Or what about our own nation which was supposedly founded on freedom and yet was built on the back of slaves or the imprisoned American citizens of Japanese decent during WW II. This evil has been there since the beginning of time. There is a deep-seated evil which seeks to destroy and kill and this darkness is everywhere. We see it in our own city where children are killed in their front yards by drive-by shootings, where 14 years olds are climbing in people’s yards and are shot at 2 am in the morning, where young men are killing young men because they’re from the wrong neighborhood or wear the wring colors or say the wrong thing or look at people the wrong way or where a young woman is gang raped in her own house. There is a deep, dark power all around us and it is seeking to destroy, divide and conquer.
Second, Jesus’ mission is to set us free from sin. The mission of the Messiah is not just to set us free from the oppression of the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians or the Romans. It is something much deeper than that. Colossians 1:13 says, “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves.” And Colossians 2:15 says, “And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” These powers are stronger than you and I. But knowing what is right does not ensure doing what is right. There is something greater in me which causes me to sin, despite the fact that I may know it’s wrong or that I don’t want to do it. So the mission of the Messiah is to disarm this power and authority and give us victory through the cross. Jesus doesn’t try to defeat evil with evil or by having a stronger army. Jesus submits himself to the power of evil but then experiences victory three days later through the resurrection. Evil can’t keep a good man down, the Good News down or the power of God down in our battle against sin and darkness!
Third, freedom comes through being a part of God’s kingdom. There is a deeper reason that Jesus seeks to build this new kingdom here on earth: that is to offer an alternative to the kingdoms of this world, which never last. We are meant to be a community of light in the midst of darkness. It’s not about the Republican agenda or the Democrat’s agenda, Bush’s agenda or Obama’s agenda, it’s about God’s agenda. And the sooner we claim that, the sooner we begin to experience victory and freedom in our lives! The real Jesus isn’t about free trade or uniform health care. Jesus is about Good News to the poor and freedom from that which shackles us. The people who claim that and get on God’s agenda, rather than trying to get God on their agenda, are going to be a dangerous thing to the ways of the world.
We have to understand who the captor is and the power Jesus brings to release us. “He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners…” The word for darkness in the Hebrew means open eyes, like when your pupils dilate in the darkness so that you might see better. The Hebrew for prisoners comes from the word meaning to be blind. So when Luke quoted this passage, he quotes it as “recovery of sight to the blind…” In other words, Jesus came to open the eyes of people not only to see the world as it is and evil for what it is, but to see the Messiah and the kingdom of God. In the temptation in the wilderness, the devil took Jesus up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor, that’s the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Romans, the Democrats and the Republicans and America. But the problem is that those kingdoms will not last. Satan said to Jesus, “All this is mine.” And it is! When we focus on these kingdoms, their values and what they’re selling, then we are in darkness. But when we realize that “it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me” then I am in the light and the devil has no influence in my life. Darkness is the absence of light. If I step over into the light and see that what the world is selling is a bunch of junk and it’s about the poor, the disenfranchised, the captive and not about me, then I become a child of the light.
Here’s the Good News: You and I, as followers of Jesus, are anointed and given authority over evil in the world. Verse three says, “ to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.” When you put on the crown, you’re a member of the royal family. I never understood why Kate Middleton’s pregnancy had such media coverage. It was everywhere! People lined up outside the hospital for days! Why is the birth so important? He’s the heir to the throne. But here’s the thing: the crown in Britain and royalty is ceremonial. They have no power whatsoever. But you? You have received the crown of righteousness and have been anointed with oil which consecrates you for the authority and the power of Jesus’ mission against evil. He has given you his authority over evil. You are not just to be recipients of the freedom he bestows on us but a purveyor or sharer of that freedom to others on behalf of Christ. What we need to understand is that our physical power can never overcome the evil powers of this world. Jesus said, you cannot defeat me with evil and human strength, you can even kill my body, but you cannot kill what’s inside of me or take my identity as one consecrated and set apart for the mission of God.
So when evil rears its ugly head and darkness threatens to cover us and that which binds seeks to hold us captive, we need to remember that we serve and worship an awesome and powerful God, who is over all things. Our witness is to show the world through the power of Christ that we will not be defeated by the evil powers of this world and their influence on us.
They can try to take your joy, they can mire you in fear, they can take your clothes, your time, your energy, your hope, your dreams. They can kill you but your children will come after you. They can kill your children and all of your family, but your tribe, your family of God, will rise up in the name of Christ and follow in the footsteps of Jesus. They cannot take what God has bestowed on you
Three simple action steps to freedom. First you have to receive. Our lives are based on a man who was born by a virgin birth and who was crucified and then raised from the dead. Jesus said, “if you follower my teachings, you are really my disciples.” If we really commit ourselves to follow Jesus and his teachings which is to do what he did, then he says, “you will know the Truth and the Truth will set you free. Second, you have to speak it. If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord” which means absolute authority and believe that he was raised from the dead, then you will be saved. When you speak that you are a disciple, people are going to hold you accountable. There is a different kind of expectation. It’s not just some of the teachings but all of the teachings, everything from loving, forgiving, tithing, turning the other cheek. Third, you have to sow it. Jesus saw a poor old woman put a widow’s might in the offering plate, whuch was the equivalent of a penny. She gave out of her poverty and then he pointed out a wealthy man who gave a $100 but was a drop in the bucket of his waelth. One sacrificed but the other did not. This woman was willing to sow into the kingdom and God was glorified. God can make a miracle out of the ordinary but you have to be willing to trust God with everything you have. The darkness says, I need to hold on to what I have. The light says I need to give it away for the sake of the kingdom and Jesus’ mission and freedom from the ways of the world.
