WEDNESDAY October 23rd
Luke 4:18-19
“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, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”
I wonder how many of us actually read and scrutinized the manifestos which the various political parties published before the recent elections in the United Kingdom, but perhaps more importantly, how genuine would any of them have been in keeping to the manifesto, and how well is the party that won the election doing with regard to what they claimed they would do—I’ll let you answer that last question for yourself, I best keep silent on the matter!
In our verses today as I mentioned a few devotions ago Jesus is letting the folk in the synagogue know what his manifesto was, which had been written for him almost 700 years previously through the prophecy of Isaiah. Now although I’ve used the word manifesto, we would usually call it his mission, the reason or purpose for which he come from heaven to earth, and as he completed the mission he returned back to heaven, and the good news is that his short visit of 33 years, and in particular the last few days has resulted in access being made available for men and women who come to believe in him to also be bound for heaven.
The first thing that Jesus said that he had come to do was to declare good news to the poor! And to understand who the poor are we need to look and see what Jesus said as he spoke from the mountain as he embarked on the preaching part of his mission, it is in Matthew 5:3 ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’.
The poor are those who have known what it is to have become poor in spirit, that is on hearing the good news of the gospel, that we come to realise that in and of ourselves we are nothing, we are hopeless and helpless, but we recognize that all our hope is to be found in Jesus. It is those who have come to an end of themselves, and in the words of the song say ‘Nothing in my hands I bring simply to the cross I cling’.
See the good news of the gospel is for all, but sadly not all will believe it or accept it, many in the past, many today and many in the future, have hearts that are too proud to be broken, they will not humble themselves and become poor in spirit and accept Jesus and the incredible offer of salvation, they will not respond positively to the good news which Jesus not only announced he had come to bring, but for which he died to provide.
How about you today? The good news is for you, Jesus was true to his manifesto, he suffered and died on the cross to bring about eternal redemption, humble your heart today, come in repentance and accept Jesus as your Saviour.