The Ultimate Life Mission Series

The Ultimate Life Mission

Series: Naturally Supernatural

Brad Bailey - September 15, 2013

Intro

As people get older there is a tendency for them to think less about success...and more about significance. There is a natural tendency to connect our lives to something meaningful.

As one leader said: "There are two great moments in a person's life: the moment you were born and the moment you realize why you were born." [1]

Many try to find meaning in good causes and things which are valuable...but can't provide ultimate meaning when they are not connected to the larger source and storyline.

It's similar to what has been observed about some of the great business giants. A business expert once wrote about how railroads companies could have succeeded if they realized they were not ultimately in the railroad business...but in the transportation business... telegraph companies who didn't realize they were in the communications business. They didn't realize the bigger picture. [2]

> In a similar way.... most human lives sense that there is something wrong that needs to be set right...and they may feel some meaning in being a part of responding to that need...in casual ways or formal causes. But they cannot find their true meaning if they remain disconnected from the larger work of what is involved with "setting things right."

So today we are going to engage what Jesus declared to be his life mission...and ours....the ultimate life mission.

In the Gospel of Luke we hear Jesus place his whole life into the Divine Purpose and it is this he calls us into.

Luke...a doctor records this account...

In chapter 3 we are told of what was unfolding....John the Baptist.... a prophet who declared that God was on the move...bringing his salvation...and all should prepare... and then with the crowd gathered around him ...he points to Jesus...as the Messiah who had come to take away the sins of all. (Luke 3:1-6) [3]

Luke 3:21-22 (NIV) 21 When all the people were being baptized, Jesus was baptized too. And as he was praying, heaven was opened 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

At this point the Jesus receives this blessing of his Father...God the Father...and the Spirit's anointing. He then is led out into the wilderness for a period of 40 days of fasting... in which he faces spiritual opposition. He returns with a profound sense of destiny.

Luke 4:14-21 (NIV)

14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. 15 He taught in their synagogues, and everyone praised him. 16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read. 17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written: 18 "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." 20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, 21 and he began by saying to them, "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing."

Well...the response is wild... but Jesus slips away...ad now begins to go out into the world in this mission. As Luke describes....

Luke 4:40-43 (NIV)

The people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. 41 Moreover, demons came out of many people, shouting, "You are the Son of God!" But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew he was the Christ. 42 At daybreak Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them. 43 But he said, "I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent."

Years of silent preparation....and prayer had led to this moment. The time had come...to move out into the breakthrough God was beginning. It was time to go public...to declare what was at hand.

I suppose there is nowhere more appropriate to begin....than his hometown. So here Jesus was providing, to the hometown crowd of the synagogue he grew up in, his “mission statement” as the Messiah!