“The Work Given to Jesus to Do”
Luke 4:14-21
1/21/07
Back
Recently, we’ve all seen or heard the swearing
in of the new Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, and other congressmen
and women. In the coming days, we will watch as they set forth
their agenda or program for the direction in which they would like to
lead our country. In today’s Gospel text, we see the Lord
setting forth His agenda, an agenda that was laid out for Him to do by
the Father, an agenda which was laid on Him to do by the Holy Spirit at
His Baptism. This agenda can be summarized by the word
“release.” Jesus’ ministry would be a ministry
of release, a release that He would proclaim to the poor, the captives,
the blind, and the oppressed on account of His work on the cross and
His resurrection from the dead.
Again, this agenda is one that was given to Jesus to
do by His Father, an agenda that put upon Him to do by the Holy Spirit
at His Baptism. It was an agenda which God had set forth from the
beginning, when He told the serpent that the promised Seed of the woman
would strike his head, and that he would strike His heal. This
agenda was reiterated again and again in the words of the
prophets. Now, as Jesus read from the scroll of Isaiah to the
people in the synagogue, He said that these words were fulfilled in
their hearing - that is, they spoke of Jesus and what He was to
do. He was the promised Seed. He was the One God had
anointed with the Holy Spirit at His Baptism to carry out God’s
agenda - His plan of salvation, to which the Law and the Prophets
testify.
As it reads, this agenda lays out four “to
do’s” for Jesus. Three of the four are proclamation
“to do’s.” The forth is a setting free
“to do.” The first thing on the Lord’s agenda
is to proclaim good news to the poor. These poor are not just
those who don’t have a lot of money. If that were the case,
the Gospel might not be for you, since you’re wealthier than most
people in the world. But the poor here are those who, even if
they have a lot of money, do not trust in their money or any other
possession, but confess that they are poor by God’s standards -
that is, they suffer from a lack of the righteousness that God
requires. The Apostle Paul states our condition clearly when he
writes that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of
God.” We come into this world poor - that is, having no
fear, love, or trust in God. Yet we have a rich attitude, that
is, we think we have everything we need and can get along without
God’s gifts. We think that God should look upon us with
favor on account of our good works and behavior, which we believe
outweigh any of the bad things we do. Thus we make for ourselves
our own gods and our own religions, and since the true God
doesn’t fit our specifications, we want nothing to do with
Him. A poor person, however, confesses what God’s Word says
about him, that he is nothing but a beggar before God, has nothing to
offer Him but his sin, and can be nothing but given to by God. To
such a person Jesus proclaims the Gospel, the good news that the poor
are made rich through faith in Him. Jesus gives you His riches;
He clothes you with His righteousness, a perfect righteousness,
otherwise known as the garments of salvation, given to you at your
Baptism. Now, when God looks upon you He doesn’t see you
dressed in the poverty of your own righteousness, but in the riches of
Christ’s righteousness. This is good news, because only
those who are so clothed can stand before God. Only those who are
properly dressed will sit at table with the Lord in His kingdom and
enjoy His heavenly banquet.
The next thing listed that is given to Jesus to do
is to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the
blind. Just as we must confess ourselves as poor before God in
our natural state, so we must also confess that we come into this world
as captive and blind. We are captives of sin, death, and the
devil. As captives of sin, we cannot not sin. We cannot
make any resolution to sin less or to try harder at obeying God’s
Law. Neither can we free ourselves from sin and its consequences
(which include sickness and death) nor can we do anything good that
isn’t tainted with our sin. We are captives of sin under
the dominion of the devil. We come into this world possessed by
the devil. We belong to him. We might not be controlled by
him in the same way some are controlled by demons. But the
Scriptures make it clear that we are citizens of his kingdom of
darkness and that we are held captive by him to do his will.
Because of our captivity to sin and the devil, we are captives of death
and hell. As the Apostle Paul writes, “The wages of sin is
death,” that includes not only physical death, but eternal death
in hell suffering under God’s wrath for all eternity. And
one of the results of being under the captivity of the devil is that we
are blind to the truth. During His ministry, Jesus healed many
people who were physically blind. But physical blindness is only
a consequence of spiritual blindness. There are many who can see
physically, but are blind spiritually. In fact, we all at one
time were blinded by the devil to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But
just as Jesus healed those physically blind, so He heals the
spiritually blind. He proclaims release to the captives and
recovery to the blind.
Jesus releases you from your captivity to sin,
death, and the devil. He releases you from your sins. This
release is called forgiveness. It’s the release
that’s proclaimed to you in Holy Absolution. With this
proclamation you can be sure that God has forgiven you all your sins,
that He remembers them no more, and that they can no longer separate
you from His love for you in Christ. Now, having been released
from your sins, you are also released from the wages of sin -
death. No longer will you suffer the eternal death of hell.
Even the sting of physical death has been removed, because you have
been given eternal life in Jesus, and just as He is risen from the dead
and lives and reigns to all eternity, so will you. Released from
sin and death, you are also released from your captivity to the
devil. You no longer belong to him; the Lord has put His Name
upon you at your Baptism and claimed you for Himself. You belong
to Him. He has driven out the devil and has made your body His
temple. And because you are no longer under the deluding
influence of the devil, the Lord has given you sight, so that you might
see Him in the Scriptures as your Savior and gracious Lord.
The third thing listed here on Jesus’ agenda
is to set free those who are oppressed, or in other words, to release
the broken ones. This is similar to the release of captivity to
sin, death, and the devil that we just talked about, but it points
beyond the release that we enjoy right now by faith and gives us the
sure hope of the perfect fulfillment of this release to come at the
resurrection from the dead. There what we have now by faith will
be a reality we’ll see with our eyes. It will be the final
release from this present evil age in which we constantly suffer under
the burdens brought on by sin and the devil into the age of glory,
where there will never again be any more death, mourning, crying, or
pain.
The final thing on Jesus’ list of things to do
is to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. If you notice
in the O.T. lesson from the book of Isaiah which Jesus was reading that
day, what follows the proclamation of the year of the Lord’s
favor is a proclamation of the day of the Lord’s vengeance.
But Jesus stopped reading and rolled up the scroll in mid-sentence,
right after He read the words about proclaiming the year of the
Lord’s favor. Why did He do this? Because the day of
proclaiming the Lord’s vengeance was not at hand; that was to
come in the future. Jesus’ work is to proclaim not
God’s wrath, but His favor and mercy. As the Apostle Paul
puts it, “Now is the time of favor; now is the day of
salvation.” But notice how Isaiah refers to the time of the
proclamation of God’s favor in terms of a year, whereas he refers
to the time of the proclamation of God’s vengeance in terms of a
day. God is patient, merciful, and long-suffering. The age
of the proclamation of God’s favor is much longer than the age of
the proclamation of His wrath. The day of His wrath is coming; in
fact, it has already come upon Jesus at Calvary and will be revealed
again on the Last Day against all those who reject Jesus. But now
is the age for the proclamation of God’s favor towards you in
Jesus. It’s just as the angels announced at Christ’s
birth: “Peace on earth, goodwill (God’s favor)
towards men.”
It was on account of Christ’s work on the
cross that God’s favor can now be proclaimed to you. This
agenda of Jesus goes hand in hand with His work on the cross and is put
into effect by it. With the laying on of this agenda at His
Baptism, so came the laying on of the cross. It is because Jesus
was the sacrifice for your sins, that He can carry out the agenda His
Father gave Him of proclaiming good news to the poor, liberty to the
captives and recovery of sight to the blind, setting free the
oppressed, and proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor.
This is what He was anointed for by the Holy Spirit at His
Baptism. There the Father said to Jesus, “You are my
beloved Son; with you I am well-pleased.” And with these
words the Father laid the office of the suffering Servant of the Lord
upon His Son, who, in the words of Isaiah, would bring
justice/salvation to the Gentiles. He would be a light for the
nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners
from the dungeon, and from the prison those who sit in darkness - all
this because He would bear our griefs and carry our sorrows on His
cross. Jesus allowed Himself to become poor, so that you might be
made rich. He allowed Himself to be taken captive by sin, death,
and the devil, so that you might be freed, released, and
forgiven. He allowed Himself to fall under the darkness of
God’s vengeance and wrath, so that you might live in the light of
God’s favor and mercy. And now He proclaims this good news
of release to you today, freeing you from your bondage, oppression, and
slavery through the delivery of His gifts through His Word and
Sacraments. Jesus has perfectly carried out His “to
do’s” for you. Go... You are free! Amen.