Anytime we read of Jesus, we need to be conscious of two main things. We ask what Jesus has done for us. And we ask what example he is for us. 1 Peter 2:21 says, ’to this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.’ Jesus has done for us that which we could not do for ourselves. He suffered and died for us. His suffering is our salvation. And he’s left us his example. We don’t atone for people’s sins, but we do take up our cross and endure hardship to lead people to the one who can.
This passage is the mission of Jesus. And, as our example, I believe this passage is the mission of the church as well. In Jn. 20:21, Jesus tells us that he sends us as the father sent him. And Paul speaks of us as the body of Christ. The mission that Jesus performed in his own flesh, he now performs through the church. That is us. And we have our mission in this passage.
This passage is often misused. It is often misunderstood and misused in one of two fashions. Sometimes, the gospel, the mission of Christ in the church, is merely physical and social. The poor and captives and blind and oppressed are purely physical and social states. But Jesus said in Revelation 3:17 to the church in Laodicea, “You say, `I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.“ John Piper is a pastor who wrote, “arrogant, self-satisfied, wealthy American is utterly poverty-stricken and miserable in God’s eyes and ought to be in our eyes. Most of you work with those people and your heart should go out to them just like Jesus’ did to Zacchaeus.“(John Piper, Christ in Combat: Offense by the Spirit - Lk 4:16-21 on SermonCentral.com).
Many of you know that I went out to California last week. I had this passage in front of me the whole time, because I was coming back to preach on it. And it seemed to frame everything I did there.
The timing for the trip came about because my best friend, Greg Hughes, for whom we have prayed when he lost twin sons a couple years ago, and when they had another son almost a year ago, he was installed as pastor at Malibu Presbyterian Church, and invited me to give his charge at the installation service. Since this is the passage I had in my mind, it is the passage I used, for it is his mission. I read this passage about the poor, the captives, the blind, the oppressed. And then I asked him to look out at the congregation. Then look out of the windows of their sanctuary. What you see is amazing, beautiful people in and amazing, beautiful place. Executives, wealthy, movie stars - the people who have created hollyworld and californication - the makers of our culture. At first glance, poor, captive, oppressed and blind is not what comes to mind. But it is his job, his mission, to see them, to see Malibu, exactly that way. This is a mission field, and God is alive and here.
The moment we think we have this God stuff all under control, we are in trouble. The worst patients are doctors. And the hardest people to minister to are those who think they know more than you do – that they know the bible better and God better. They have sat in that pew for so long, that they couldn’t possibly need anything more from God or anyone else. But God came for the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed. He came for you and me. And when we know that, then we are free to minister. It is only if we are free to be ministered to that we are free to minister to others.
The other misuse of this passage is to completely spiritualize it. Then, we sit back and think we are following Jesus when we have no compassion on those who really are struggling financially, really are behind bars, really are hungry and addicted and oppressed.
Vic Pentz is the new pastor at PeachTree Pres. in Atlanta - the sort of St. Peter’s of American Presbyterianism. He was speaking at the church I grew up in this past weekend, and so I got a chance to catch one of his sermons. He told a story about this. He talked about a time when he, as a pastor, was trying to hook some resources, some funds, up with some folks who were living in poverty. A single mother in the slums of Houston needed some money to get some food. Someone in his congregation offered to get them some money, but couldn’t do it that night. Without thinking, Pentz asked the contact person to have the single mother put it on her credit card and they would pay her right away. As soon as it came out of his mouth, he knew what he was saying. He was so far out of touch with what her life was really like, he knew that wasn’t living in the gospel.
I spent the weekend with my friend Greg, but most of the time I spent at my parents’. I say that I went out because of Greg’s installation. But the truth is that God got me out there a week ago last Thursday because that morning, my Dad found out that his cancer has gone to his brain. My brother-in-law picked me up at the airport and told me there.
The cancer has turned my dad into an old man in the space of a couple days. He is having a hard time walking. He should use a walker, but will only use a cane and the arm of someone walking with him. His decisions and behavior have become erratic. He needs someone there, preferably two or more people, to keep an eye on him all the time. And that’s what I did this past week.
We had good, serious, deep talks about life and death, about the witness of handling aging and illness with faith and grace. And I went to the doctor with him and helped him out of chairs and got a handicap sign for the car and took care of my mom and dad while they transitioned into a new, hard time of life. My uncle died last week, too. it was certainly the worst week my family has ever known, and I’m glad I was there for it. It certainly wasn’t fun. But I got to love my family in a very real way, by both helping my dad out of the chair, and speaking to him words of faith. It really was carrying out the mission of preaching good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind.
We must not make either mistake. We cannot over spiritualize, nor can we over socialize the gospel. We must be a church that sees as God sees. Our mission is to the whole person. We have a mission to the rich who are slaves to comfort and security. We have a mission to those who are crushed by their life circumstances as well as their eternal circumstances.
Now, we are not a wealthy congregation. We don’t have lots of programs and money to finance lots of needs. The needs of folks in our neighborhood are enormous. We could pick many different sorts of ministries, and there would be a need. But we just don’t have the resources for that. Still, God has a great history of providing for us and for our neighborhood. But all those provisions stand on this one conviction we have as believers in Christ: the greatest and most loving thing we can do for anyone is release them from captivity to sin (Rom 6:22-23), heal them from the blindness of unbelief (Ats 26:17f.; 2Cor 4:4) and set them at liberty from the oppression of Satan (2Tim 2:26)“(Piper, Ibid). Everything begins with that.
There is so much I could say about our call to ministry. There is so much in this passage. I’d love to spend time on each one of these things. We could take a look at the fact that the first mission, to proclaim good news to the poor, that one contains in it the next three missions. I’d want to take a look at what each one says. But there is just not time right now. But I think we get the point. And the key to any scripture is living it. Understanding it is just a beginning. Seeing our lives and our world as a response to the call of God, to the mission he has given us, that is what matters.
The key to our ministry is right here in this passage. It is the part that gets skipped over very easily. The key is not so much what the mission is as it is the means to the mission. We are blessed by not having huge endowments and tons of resources. We don’t have the luxury of just deciding what we want our ministry to be, what particular needs we want to meet, and put the funds there and do it. Too many churches rely on their money and their gifts, and they don’t rely on God.
TheSpirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me...“ In our own strength, neither do we have salvation, nor do we have even the words or actions of salvation to offer. For we, ourselves are poor and blind and oppressed. But when the Spirit comes upon us, then and only then are we given a mission, in Malibu, in Newport Beach, in our families, in our church here on the corner of Bird and Hoyt. We are anointed for mission.
Something has been happening at Bethlehem. There are a growing number of people who have recognized their poverty, their blindness, their captivity and oppression. And they have been chasing desperately after God. And when that happens, God lets himself be found. Jesus himself comes, the Spirit comes, and brings good news to their souls, releases them from having to sin, opens their eyes to see the world in a whole new way, with God in charge of His Kingdom, and frees them from the powers of this world. In the manifest presence of God, lives are changed. That has been happening in the testimony, the excitement and passion of a number of people in this congregation. God has been moving.
But there is a next step. It is the anointing for ministry. It should come as a natural outgrowth of the personal experience of Christ. But God allows there to be choices made. I believe this is a time in the life of our congregation where we are going to decide whether we will receive the call, whether we will accept the power of the Spirit, the anointing, to go ahead in mission. It is an exciting time, and I love hearing all the stories of how God is touching people’s lives right now. It is also a fragile time. God has been doing his work in us. Are we going to go forward with it, or stop right here.
We have our mission. It’s not an easy one. We don’t have much to do it with. We don’t have wealth and resources and facilities for all that would be really affective around here. All we have is God and his anointing.
