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Epiphany 3, 01/24/2016
Sermon on Luke 4:14-21, by Richard O. Johnson
4.14 And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about him went out through all the surrounding country. 15 And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all. 16 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. 17 And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, 18 “The Spirit 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, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.” 20 And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” Luke 4.14-21 [ESV]
It must have been quite a sermon that day when Jesus went into the synagogue at Nazareth. There were, in those days, no Jewish “clergy” who had responsibility for teaching and preaching regularly; each Sabbath one of the men in the congregation would have the privilege of reading from the Scriptures and then interpreting what these words meant. Jesus was a local boy who had been causing a bit of a stir, and so on this Sabbath, he was invited to teach.
And so he stood and read from Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
It is that last phrase I want to talk about this morning, “the year of the Lord’s favor”—or, in some older translations, “the acceptable year of the Lord.” This is one of those phrases which we may jump right over without realizing the significance of what Jesus said. If we can take a moment to understand its meaning, I think the passage may come alive for us in a new way.
The Sabbath year
Many of us are probably familiar with at least the very basic parts of the Jewish calendar. We know, for instance, that the Jews celebrated the seventh day, Saturday, as the Sabbath. It was a day of rest, observed as a reminder that God made the world in six days, and rested on the seventh. So the faithful Jew would do nothing considered “work” on the Sabbath. No travel, no cooking, no housework. The Sabbath was for rest, and for worship, and nothing else.
But perhaps you don’t know that the ancient Jews also celebrated a Sabbath year, as well as a Sabbath day. Every seventh year was set aside as holy to the Lord. In that year, no crops would be planted, but the land would lie fallow. In that year all personal debts were canceled; any money owed by one person to another was forgiven during that year, the debt was wiped out. The idea here was that no Israelite should make a profit from another, and so debts were not allowed to accumulate. Every seventh year, all debts were canceled.
But there was still another observance, and it was the year of Jubilee. It was the year after every seventh Sabbath year—that comes out to every fiftieth year, if you’re trying to do the math in your head. There would be six years, then a Sabbath; another six years, then a Sabbath; and so on, until there had been seven of those seven year periods, or 49 years—and then came the year of Jubilee.
The Year of Jubilee
Jubilee was like a Sabbath year, only grander. In this year, the idea of canceling debts was expanded. Slaves were given their freedom during the year of Jubilee. It didn’t matter if they were Israelites or foreigners, in the year of Jubilee they were set free. This is why, incidentally, if you study the literature of slavery in America, you see so many references by those who longed for its abolition to the “Year of Jubilee”; they were looking forward to that day when the slaves would be set free.
There was more: those who had lost their land due to economic hardship were entitled to get it back in the year of Jubilee; all land reverted to its original owners, or their descendants. Everyone went back to the beginning and started over. All obligations were canceled. Everyone’s slate was wiped clean.
The word “Jubilee” came from the Hebrew word yobel, which means “ram’s horn.” There was a very special trumpet made of a ram’s horn, and at the end of the 49th year, as the year of Jubilee was dawning, that horn would be blown, first in Jerusalem and then in all the cities and villages of Israel. The trumpet signaled that it was the Jubilee. This is spelled out in Leviticus 25—not a chapter most Lutherans spend much time reading, but perhaps you will recognize one phrase. The writer says “You shall hallow the fiftieth year and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants.” Do you know that phrase “proclaim liberty throughout the land”? It is inscribed on a bell in Philadelphia that we call the “Liberty Bell.” Just as our Liberty Bell rang to proclaim that the people of America were free from the yoke of England, so the ram’s horn was blown in Israel to proclaim that the people of Israel were free from any bondage or any servitude or any debt that they owed.
Scholars generally do not believe that this year of Jubilee lasted very long, particularly since the Jews had a rather stormy political existence for many centuries and it might not even have been possible to observe such a radical concept. But when they were in exile in Babylon, Isaiah used this ancient idea of Jubilee to give them hope. They were slaves, not to other Israelites but to foreign conquerors. It seemed to them as if they had always been in bondage. They had lost not only their freedom but their homeland. This is a “people who sit in darkness,” as Isaiah puts it. But just when things seemed to be at their worst, the prophet spoke: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to . . . to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” He’s talking about the year of Jubilee. The prophet was telling his people they were about to be set free—that their slavery was to be ended, their debt canceled, their land restored. He had no ram’s horn to blow, but his voice was lifted up like a trumpet blast, proclaiming that the Year of Jubilee had come!
The Year of Jubilee has come!`
Now all this Old Testament history is interesting, but what does it have to do with us? Well, we come back to Jesus in the synagogue. This takes place right at the beginning of his ministry, right after his baptism. There are some scholars who argue that Jesus’ ministry actually began in what would have been a sabbatical year, perhaps even a year of Jubilee. We don’t know enough about the chronology to say for certain, but that doesn’t really matter. What matters is the idea, the ancient law of Jubilee.
And this is why Jesus chose to read this passage: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Then, Luke says, he closed the book, looked right at the people, and said, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” Today, in other words, the Year of Jubilee has come. Today I proclaim to you that all captives are set free, all those bound are release, all those homeless will return home, all debts are canceled. This is the Year of Jubilee when God shows mercy to his people!
And though all this took place centuries ago, his proclamation is for us, his words are good news for us! For we are held captive by such a number of things! Some of us are bondage to things past. Perhaps we feel guilty about something in our past, and it still colors our life. Perhaps something happened years ago that has made us permanently bitter toward someone else, so bitter it still gnaws at us today. But Christ has come, and it is the Year of Jubilee! You need not be bound by the past; whatever it is, whatever it was, Christ has set you free from it!
Release from our prisons
Some of us are imprisoned by sins of our present! How often we find ourselves bound by attitudes or events or habits that just won’t let us go. We try to avoid the things we know we should not do, but often we do them just the same. But Christ has come, and it is the Year of Jubilee! You need not be defeated by anything in your day-to-day life! There is no power too great for Christ to handle, no chains too strong for Christ to break! You perhaps cannot free yourself—but you don’t have to! It is the Year of Jubilee, and Christ has come to proclaim freedom from the sin that binds you!
Some of us are imprisoned by fear of the future. We don’t know what tomorrow will bring, and so we just give up today and wait helplessly, expecting the worst. But Christ has come, and it is the Year of Jubilee! You need not fear tomorrow, for he has promised that he will be with you, come what may. You need not be afraid!
Charles Wesley wrote a hymn which he entitled “The Year of Jubilee.” It was popular for many years on the American frontier as a kind of revival song. Its archaic language and metaphors have caused it to drop out of use in many churches, but because it was a revival song its tune is not difficult to pick up and I really wanted to have us sing it this morning. The words are an earnest proclamation of the freedom Christ has brought—freedom from our past, from the sins of the present, from the fear of the future. It goes something like this:
Blow ye the trumpet, blow! The gladly solemn sound!
Let all the nations know to earth’s remotest bound,
The year of Jubilee is come, the year of Jubilee is come,
Return, ye ransomed sinners, home!
The Year of Jubilee has come. And you, my friends, you who feel bound by anything, past, present or future: you need be bound no longer! In the mercy of God, Jesus Christ has come to proclaim the Year of Jubilee—and we are free!