Jubilee–The Year of the Lord’s Favour

We have seen the consequences of man-as-king and seen how God called out a people and kingdom with God-as-king. God instituted the law of Jubilee to remedy the evils which accompany human society and government, to set a limit on unjust social relations. But Jubilee always had a future element to it, there was always a greater future hope in its promise of liberty, rest and restoration. Isaiah spoke of a messianic figure who would bring justice:

“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations... In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his law the islands will put their hope.” (Isaiah 42: 1-2)

Later he describes this servant's mission:

“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD'S favour...” (Isaiah 61:1-2a)

In the gospels we read how Jesus returned to Galilee and that brings us to our reading “He went to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. And he stood up to read. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

'The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

because he has anointed me

to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for

the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind,

to release the oppressed,

to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour'

Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying...”

It was customary in those days to sit down to preach so they knew a message was coming, a message about the passage that had just been read. The atmosphere in the crowded synagogue is charged with curiosity. What is this carpenter's son going to say? You could hear a feather drop and every eye is fixed on him.

Does he remind them of the golden days, long gone now, when God ruled over his people, performed miracles, ruled with justice? He doesn't. Does he entertain them with bright promises about how at some future date those times would return as prophesied? Not that either.

Instead he speaks about the here and now and assures them, and us, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Today, while you are listening to me, the passage I just read to you has been and is being realised.

This is sometimes called the Nazareth Manifesto. If you want to know what Jesus is about then look at his manifesto as he himself gave it. “To preach good news to the poor...freedom for the prisoners, and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour.” To announce and proclaim the Lord's Jubilee.

When Jesus sat down on a mountainside to teach his disciples he began:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the sons of God.”

Jesus' teaching was shot through with freedom, release, restoration and God's favour.

He told the story of the unmerciful servant who begged his master to be patient with him as he paid back the money he owed. His master took pity on him, cancelled the debt and let him go. But when the servant met a fellow servant who owed him money he demanded payment, refusing to be patient and had the man thrown into prison. His master heard what he had done and asked, “Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you?” and put him in jail. The economy of heaven demands mercy, generosity of spirit.

In the parable of the banquet he told of how wealthy guests found excuses for not attending the banquet to which they had been invited. The man who held the banquet sent his servants out to the streets and byways inviting the poor, the crippled, the blind and lame. The economy of heaven is inclusive, not discriminating according to status.

“When John [the Baptist] heard in prison what Christ was doing he sent his disciples to ask him, 'Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?'

Jesus replied, 'Go back and report to John what you hear and see. The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.” (Mt.11:1-6)

When we look at the church in the New Testament we read:

“They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to everyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts.” (Acts 2:42-48)

The principle of Jubilee being worked out in the saved people who enjoy the Jubilee of God in Christ. The message they preached was one of repentance, turning back to God, looking for that day when God restores everything, as he had promised.

We have a king, a king of kings who has inaugurated a Jubilee, a day of salvation. He invites all who would to come, great and small, to know peace with God, freedom from the bondage of sin and an inheritance that will not fade or rust.

Meanwhile, Christians operate in a corrupt world as salt and light, declaring the day of salvation is here, Jubilee is here and men and women can now, through Jesus, be restored to right relationship with God. Can know peace, security and an eternal inheritance in the kingdom of King Jesus. And so we come full circle to the way it was meant to be and will be again, because he has promised it.

Jubilee–God as King

Last time we saw the decline of man into sin and what happened when man made himself king in God’s creation. We saw how God set about putting things right by calling out of fallen humanity a people for himself , a kingdom of priests.  A kingdom once more established where God would be king and a nation that would do things God's way.

The Perfect Storm of Sin

When Israel eventually entered the land of Canaan they came up against a society that was as far from God's original plan as it was possible to get. City-states, a feudal society with a powerful and wealthy ruling class. Canaan was the perfect man-as-king, corrupt society; the perfect storm of sin.

God warned his people, “You must not do as they do in Egypt,where you used to live, and you must not do as they do in the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. Do not follow their practices. You must obey my laws and be careful to follow my decrees. I am the LORD your God.” (Lev.18:3-4)

God listed the sins of Canaan and said:“Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is the way the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. But you must keep my decrees and laws.” (Lev.18:24-26)

God's commandments to Israel describe a reversal of man's tragic decline into corruption.

Where man had made himself king, God said, “You shall have no other gods before me.”

Where man had rebelled against his parents God said, “Honour your father and mother.”

Where man had acted violently to kill his fellow man God said, “You shall not murder.”

Where man had used and exploited his fellow man God said, “Don't bear false witness, don't steal, don't covet what isn't yours, don't commit adultery.”

This was to be an egalitarian society in which all citizens enjoyed the same fundamental rights and privileges. Each was to have their share of God's provision and was not to be robbed of it. Individuals were not to get rich at the expense of others. Of course, with the best will in the world, Israel were still a fallen people who made sometimes foolish, selfish and destructive decisions and when sin raised its ugly head inequities and injustices still arose in Israelite society. It is these inequities that Jubilee was designed to eradicate.

Jubilee

Jubilee follows a cycle based on them number seven. You will be familiar with the biblical principle that we should treat the seventh day as a day of rest. How much we have lost of what was meant to be natural for mankind in our 24/7 society. It also followed that the land should lay fallow in the seventh year and get its rest. Then, on the seventh cycle of seven years, the 49^th year, Jubilee was observed, a year marked by rest, restoration and release.

You see, during that half-century bad fortune may overtake a man and his family. They may make unwise decisions, fall into debt and sell their land in order to settle debts. If they have no land left to sell they may even sell themselves into service to pay a debt over a period of time. But here you would not sell your land outright because it belonged to the family and the tribe, to more than one generation and ultimately to God.

Since Israelite society was based on a fair apportioning of the land between tribes and then families within tribes it was important that God's provision in the land should be fairly distributed and any inequities corrected. If someone “bought” your land they were effectively buying the use of it and its yield over a specific time, that is between the time of purchase and the time of Jubilee when the land reverted to its original owner.

This was so important that God's prophets sounded stern warnings, “Woe, to those who add house to house and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the land” (Isaiah 5:8)

“Woe to those who plan iniquity, to those who plot evil on their beds! At morning's light they carry it out because it is in their power to do it. They covet fields and seize them, and houses, and take them. They defraud a man of his home, a fellow man of his inheritance.” (Micah 2:1-2)

The word Jubilee derives from the clamour of trumpets, jobel, that announced throughout the land the beginning of Jubilee. At Jubilee the land got its rest, it reverted back to its original owner, family and tribe, and any sold into servitude for debt were released back to their families. A time to remedy the evils which accompany human society and government, to set a limit on unjust social relations, a time of great celebration and the reason why we use the term Jubilee today to mark significant, celebratory occasions.

This is why some Old Testament books are full of tedious lists of who was related to whom and where they lived.

What does this have to do with us today, apart from being a lesson in historic Israel and a brief explanation of the word Jubilee?

The Year of the Lord's Favour

Jubilee always had a future element to it, there was always a greater future hope in its promise of liberty, rest and restoration. Isaiah spoke of a messianic figure who would bring justice:

“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations... In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. In his law the islands will put their hope.” (Isaiah 42: 1-2)

Later he describes this servant's mission:

“The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD'S favour...” (Isaiah 61:1-2a)

Next we will look at this servant and discover why we have every reason as Christians to thank the Lord for Jubilee.

Previously: Jubilee – Man as King

Next: Jubilee: The Year of the Lord’s Favour

Jubilee: Man as King

Queen Elizabeth II was crowned on 2^nd June 1953 and in that ceremony the Bible was presented to her with these words:

Our Gracious Queen: To keep your Majesty ever mindful of the Gospel of God as the rule for the whole life and government of Christian princes, we present you with this Book, the most valuable thing that this world affords.

Here is Wisdom, this is the royal Law, these are the lively Oracles of God.

What is true for princes is as true for everyone. This is the rule for the best life, the life we were made to have. Now we are celebrating the 60^th anniversary of her Christian reign it is to the Bible we go to understand something of what that life looks like and the meaning of Jubilee.

Good Governance

If we were to trace our history of correct government we would go right back to the beginning, to Genesis, where God made man and placed them in a garden to work it and take care of it (Gen.2:15) We read there that, “God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number, till the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every living creature that moves on the ground'” (Gen.1:28)

Those words “subdue” and “rule” have carried for some the meaning to exploit, as though it is all there for our benefit. Such a man-centred view of creation can't be found in the Bible. The opening chapters speak of heaven and earth, sun, moon and stars, birds and beasts and God is concerned for them all. If we understand him as the God only of mankind he is no longer the God of the Bible.

“So God created man in his own image,

in the image of God he created him;

male and female he created them.” (Gen.1:27)

Man is described as being made in God's image, in other words he is to reflect God's character. Subdue and rule, then, mean to act for the welfare of creation, its a kind of stewardship. This is sometimes called the Creation Mandate. This God of all creation is king and man is his regent; God's world governed in God's way by God's steward – mankind. This is important when we look at Jubilee.

Have it Your Own Way

Have you ever wondered what human society would be like if our first parents had not rebelled, if they had followed this pattern? Well, they did rebel, man decided that he wanted to be king of his own destiny, make his own decisions, rule his own way. CS Lewis said there are two kinds of people, those who say to God “Your will be done,” and those to whom God says, “Okay, have it your own way.”

But having it your own way has consequences and we see the consequence of that rebellion in the story of Cain and Abel. Cain, from jealousy, murdered his brother Abel and when God, the king, called him to account, “Where is your brother Abel?” he replied, “Am I my brother's keeper?

The LORD said, ''What have you done? Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.” Personal sin, born of jealousy and selfish pride infests the family.

The story of the flood begins with the account of mankind, increasing in number, going their own way, colluding together in sin, “Then the LORD said, 'My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is corrupt.” Shared sin now shows itself as mankind lived as they pleased.

Finally, we read, “The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was evil all the time.” Sin finally shows its true nature, reach and influence. It is naturalised entering the very nature of men and women.

God set about putting things right by calling out of fallen humanity a people for himself and said to them:

“You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” (Exodus 19:4-6) A kingdom once more established where God would be king and a nation that would do things God's way.

Next: Jubilee – God  as King

Coming up: Jubilee – The Year of the Lord’s Favour

Seeing What you Want to See–Priceless!

Here is a tweet I saw today:

“Tattoo of Leviticus 18:22 forbidding homosexuality: £200. Not knowing that Leviticus 19:28 forbids tattoos: Priceless.”

The accompanying picture (below) was of a tattoo carrying the biblical text Leviticus 18:22

Leviticus 18:22 clearly states:

“You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a woman. It is an abomination”

But what about the injunction in in  the next chapter forbidding tattoos? A clear example of selective use of the Bible text it seems, a charge often brought by supporters of “gay rights” who love to talk about shell fish, mixed fibres and other such exotic and seemingly bizarre subjects mentioned as important and forbidden in the Bible.

Leviticus 19:28 states:

“You shall not make any cuts on your body for the dead or tattoo yourselves: I am the LORD.”

A priceless mistake? I don’t think so. You see, the verse is not forbidding the use of tattoos as such but the mutilation of the body in worship of false gods – as in 1 Kings 18:28

“And they cried aloud and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances, until the blood gushed out upon them.”

The tattoos, likewise, were made as a form of worship. The error here is on the part of the person who has hastily tweeted the story without finding out what the Bible actually says. It is what happens when you stop listening as soon as you hear what you want to hear.

It is all of it about not being like the heathens, not joining in with, or adopting their abominable practices. God’s people are to be holy and that has always meant set apart for exclusive service to God.

Matthew Henry explains this whole section of Scripture very well:

A law against the superstitious usages of the heathen, Lev_19:26-28.

1. Eating upon the blood, as the Gentiles did, who gathered the blood of their sacrifices into a vessel for their demons (as they fancied) to drink, and then sat about it, eating the flesh themselves, signifying their communion with devils by their feasting with them. Let not this custom be used, for the blood of God's sacrifices was to be sprinkled on the altar, and then poured at the foot of it, and conveyed away.

2. Enchantment and divination, and a superstitious observation of the times, some days and hours lucky and others unlucky. Curious arts of this kind, it is likely, had been of late invented by the Egyptian priests, to amuse the people, and support their own credit. The Israelites had seen them practised, but must by no means imitate them. It would be unpardonable in those to whom were committed the oracles of God to ask counsel of the devil, and yet worse in Christians, to whom the Son of God is manifested, who has destroyed the works of the devil. For Christians to have their nativities cast, and their fortunes told them, to use spells and charms for the cure of diseases and the driving away of evil spirits, to be affected with the falling of the salt, a hare crossing the way, cross days, or the like, is an intolerable affront to the Lord Jesus, a support of paganism and idolatry, and a reproach both to themselves and to that worthy name by which they are called: and those must be grossly ignorant, both of the law and the gospel, that ask, “What harm is there in these things?” Is it no harm for those that have fellowship with Christ to have fellowship with devils, or to learn the ways of those that have? Surely we have not so learned Christ.

3. There was a superstition even in trimming themselves used by the heathen, which must not be imitated by the people of God: You shall not round the corners of your heads. Those that worshipped the hosts of heaven, in honour of them, cut their hair so as that their heads might resemble the celestial globe; but, as the custom was foolish itself, so, being done with respect to their false gods, it was idolatrous.

4. The rites and ceremonies by which they expressed their sorrow at their funerals must not be imitated, Lev_19:28. They must not make cuts or prints in their flesh for the dead; for the heathen did so to pacify the infernal deities they dreamt of, and to render them propitious to their deceased friends. Christ by his sufferings has altered the property of death, and made it a true friend to every true Israelite; and now, as there needs nothing to make death propitious to us (for, if God be so, death is so of course), so we sorrow not as those that have no hope. Those whom the God of Israel had set apart for himself must not receive the image and superscription of these dunghill deities.

5. The prostituting of their daughters to uncleanness, which is here forbidden (Lev_19:29), seems to have been practised by the heathen in their idolatrous worships, for with such abominations those unclean spirits which they worshipped were well pleased. And when lewdness obtained as a religious rite, and was committed in their temples, no marvel that the land became full of that wickedness, which, when it entered at the temple-doors, overspread the land like a mighty torrent, and bore down all the fences of virtue and modesty. The devil himself could not have brought such abominations into their lives if he had not first brought them into their worships. And justly were those given up to vile affections who forsook the holy God, and gave divine honours to impure spirits. Those that dishonour God are thus suffered to dishonour themselves and their families.