FREEDOM

Verse Passage: Isaiah 61:1 “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners” – NIV

When God’s people rebelled against Him, captivity has been His discipline. You can read it over and over in the Old Testament. 

The prophet Isaiah wrote these words of freedom to encourage God’s people who were under siege by the Assyrians. One day, he promised, their captivity would be over. One day their repentant hearts would bring back freedom. In 681 BC, it did. What is even more amazing is that 700 years later Jesus spoke these same words. Which we can find in Luke 4:18-19. Jesus was invited to read the daily scripture in the synagogue. He opened to this very passage and after reading, closed the scroll and declared, “This day the scripture is fulfilled.”

How could that be? Isaiah had delivered this encouragement hundreds of years before. 

What we see here is that the prophecy in which was spoken for the captive Jews, also contained words for a captive world. It’s so powerful to see Jesus which is God read the living Word. This also brings another amazing thing to see is that instead of Jesus saying it He resorted to reading it from the scripture. Reading what had already been declared and that which was already final. 

Jesus was saying “Look, God has sent Me, to deliver all from the chains of sin. The Spirit of God is on Me, I have been anointed for such a time as this. I have come to proclaim the Good News. I have been sent to mend every broken heart. I have come to proclaim there is freedom. I have come to be the deliverer. I have come to take those bounded and chained and release them from this darkness.”

Repentance leads to God’s forgiveness and God’s forgiveness leads us to freedom. Whatever it is that holds us captive — bills, time, physical limits, jobs, addictions, and fleshly struggles, emotional roadblocks, mental chains, Jesus can free our hearts. We can have peace, we can be free as we trust God to free us from those things that chain us. Jesus proclaimed that He had come to fulfill the prophecy of freedom. But this would be an everlasting freedom. Let Him free you today! 

God bless. 

Copyright © 2019 by Jacob D. Olinger