This week we studied Luke 3 and 4. There was one passage I was particularly excited about. Luke 4:16-21.
And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written,
"The Sprit 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 recovering 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 the eyes of all the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, "Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."
I hear people call Christ a redeemer quit a bit, but I have never given it much thought. It wasn't until I read a passage from Calvin that I understood it. "Luke directed his view to a higher point; for though, from the time that God had made his covenant with Abraham, a Redeemer was promised, in a peculiar manner, to his seed, yet we know that, since the transgression of the first man, all needed a Redeemer, and he was accordingly appointed for the whole world." This is referring to Levitical law. In Leviticus 23 God says, "The land shall not be sold into perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me." If a man becomes poor and sells some or all of his property, a redeemer can purchase his brothers land back for him. In the prophecy that Jesus reads, it says that good news will be proclaimed to the poor. I always felt the message was for me, but I never categorized myself as poor, but Calvin says, "those persons to whom God promises restoration are called poor." Then I realized my true inheritance had been lost long ago. My place before a Holy God was my true inheritance. Adam and Eve had lost it and mankind has been poor ever since. I have always thought of poor in terms of material possessions but I think what Isaiah means is spiritual poverty.
The last line also has to do with the redemption of property. "…to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Calvin says, "Many think that here the prophet makes an allusion to the Jubilee, and I have no objection to that view." In the year of Jubilee, all property went back to its original owners. And with the blood of Christ, our place with God is restored as it was in the garden. We are made holy again, as was our birthright.
