All right, I'm very excited to go through this with you because we're continuing the theme that we began last lecture on The public ministry of Jesus as it revolves around the announcement of the kingdom of heaven the kingdom of God We saw how Jesus prepares his baptism. He's anointed He defeats Satan in the wilderness He's gonna continue to defeat Satan throughout his whole public ministry leading up to the Paschal Mysteries Of course, but then the miracles demonstrate that the kingdom has come We saw all this stuff even even Jesus making Peter the al-ha-baiit the grand puba for his kingdom Now I want to continue along those themes of the kingdom because we only have two lectures to talk about the entire life of Christ You're at least the public ministry. That's pretty darn difficult So that's why I want to narrow down on this theme of the kingdom as it relates to his teachings in this lecture and his deeds in the last lecture All right, that being said here looking at the notes I want to begin in Luke chapter 4 with the proclamation of the Messiah's Jubilee. What does that mean?
Well, let me just take you to Luke chapter 4 over 16 Let's read a few verses here then on paknes as it really you're gonna see this great messianic Jubilee is is part and partial of the messianic kingdom All right So chapter 4 over 16 says he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up and he went to the synagogue as was his custom on the Sabbath day And he stood up to read and there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah He opened the book and found a place where it was written quote the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach Good news to the poor He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and Recovering of sight to the blind to set it liberty those who are oppressed and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord In quote and he closed the book gave it back to the attendant and sat down in the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him And he began to say to them today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing and everyone speaks well of him And they're all excited and that goes on from there All right, this is a really really important passage here and in Luke's account guess what it comes right after the Temptation of Jesus so he's baptized the temptation he begins preaching and teaching a Galilee Then he goes to Nazareth his hometown synagogue and he takes the scroll of Isaiah and he goes to this passage Isaiah chapter 61 verses one And following we touched upon this last lecture about how there the Messiah is going to come along and proclaim the kingdom and he'll accompany it with All of these different miracles. Okay, we talked about that last time Well, there's more to it than this because when Jesus reads Isaiah 61 What this is alluding to what he says the acceptable year of the Lord that is the messianic Jubilee year Well, what is the Jubilee year the Jubilee year in the Old Testament occurred every 50 years So every seventh year was a sabbatical year We have that here of course in academic circles you take your sabbatical year to recharge or write a book or whatever it might be If you're sabbatical year well every seventh seventh year The year after is the great Jubilee year is the 50th year and it commemorates the Exodus the Exodus I said it time and time again is the quintessential paradigm of salvation So God delivers his people he shows the mercy And so what God wants the people to do is to show each other mercy and to kind of have this as Isaiah says a year of release right to set Liberty those were oppressed etc So there are three elements to the Jubilee year in the Old Testament The first is the release of slaves every 50 years all slaves needed to be released The second is the cancellation of all financial debts, which is a big deal I mean if you could imagine if your Jerusalem credit card is maxed out and all of a sudden and it's the 50th year and boom It's all clear that would be amazing debt forgiveness here Obviously the economy doesn't work that way, but it gives you the sense like your debts are forgiven And then finally number three you would have the return of your ancestral land So if you ended up having to sell your land to pay off debt or whatever whatever might have happened that land because it's your ancestral land Given to you by family going all the way back to Joshua what would happen here is it would be returned to you every 50th year those three things release of slaves cancellation of financial debts and the return of your ancestral land Now according to the prophets like this this prophet here Isaiah chapter 61 when the Messiah comes he would be anointed We saw fat the Messiah means the anointed one He is publicly anointed at his baptism and he would proclaim the messianic Jubilee So Jesus as the Messiah as the son of David Transforms and upgrades the Jubilee year of the Old Testament into the Jubilee year of the new covenant So he transforms these three aspects profoundly the release of slaves is now transformed to the point where Jesus now releases us from slavery to Satan and sin The cancellation of financial debts now Jesus pays our spiritual debt There's a great line that circulates around the the preachers and teachers comes to mind right now So hope it'll box this up But essentially it's you know Jesus came to pay a debt He didn't owe because we owe a debt we cannot pay our spiritual debt to God is infinite when we send against an infinite God We can't pay it off because all of the ways that we should try to pay it off through prayer fasting Oh, I'm just giving whatever it might be it's still temporal because it's from a finite creature So Jesus pays that spiritual debt for us, okay And then the third aspect of the return of the land points forward and now how Jesus returns us to the promised land The heavenly promised land of eternity of the Sabbath rest with God, okay So these are the three aspects when Jesus comes along and he opens his mouth and and says today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing He is saying one. I am the anointed one. I am the Messiah and then to the messianic Jubilee year is here It's here and it accompanies it comes with the arrival of the Kingdom of Heaven So all of Jesus is deeds the miracles demonstrate this like he says here in Isaiah and the whole context is important But you know he has sent me to recover sight to the blind all the miracles that he's performing demonstrate to the arrival of the Kingdom The arrival of the messianic year and all of his teachings are gonna do the same as well Okay, the year of release has come the new Exodus has come all right So hope you're tracking with me on that this is how in Luke's account He begins his public ministry by teaching in this very significant Old Testament way Okay, so the next thing we want to look at then for the rest of our With the rest of our time togethers I'd like to spend some time with you looking at the Sermon on the Mount Which is the one of the most famous teachings if not the most famous teaching of Jesus in Matthew Matthew chapters 5 6 and 7 will spend some time looking at the highlights of tip of the iceberg yet again of his teaching in the Sermon on the Mount If then what I'd like to do after that is look at some key parables So the term on the Mount and the parables and how they demonstrate the arrival of the Kingdom of God our participation in that Kingdom And what we can learn about the Kingdom the Kingdom the Kingdom and ourselves as citizens of the Kingdom through the parables Alright, so let's dive into Matthew chapter 5 looking at the Sermon on the Mount Obviously books have been written about this.
It's super challenging to do this and what are we gonna do half an hour give or take less than that So let me just look at the highlights and the first thing to keep in mind is that the Sermon on the Mount is a summary of the entire Christian life We can read this every single day over and over again meditating and praying over the Sermon on the mountain How we are called to the Kingdom of the Heavenly Father and how we're to behave towards our Father and towards our brothers and sisters our siblings in the Kingdom So it summarizes our entire Christian life. It really can't be overstated truly now as the Sermon on the Mount begins It says Jesus with the chapter 5 verse 1 Jesus went up to the mountain and he sat down you open his mouth and began to teach Well, this is important because here Jesus is going to the top of the mountain to give his disciples and his followers to give the people of God a new law So that is a strong echo yet again of Moses Jesus is being depicted here as a new Moses He goes up to a new mountain to give a new law and surprise surprise this comes right after the 40 days in the wilderness Which was chapter 4 so just as Moses went up to the mountain for 40 days to fast before giving the people the law So to does Jesus fast for 40 days defeats Satan in the wilderness and gives the people a new law You see so the difference however with Moses and Jesus is back in Exodus All the people remained at the foot of the mountain Moses went up by himself the people stayed down at the foot of the mountain and they're scared to death Of the thunder and the lightning and the earthquakes so they're soiling themselves because they know they're unworthy at the bottom of the mountain The difference now is Jesus brings the people up to the mountain with him because that's the point He has the new Moses in his new Exodus wants to bring the people into relationship with God restored friendship with God the Father Alright, so he's not just a new Moses on a new mountain bring a new law He's also a new Solomon to Jesus is a new Solomon because he gives the people wisdom and he speaks in as we're gonna See later parables and Solomon was very well known for not just the wives and the concubines But his wisdom right Solomon was the wisest king of all and he gave the people the people of God wisdom So Jesus now is doing the same thing speaking in riddles speaking in parables and proverbs and giving the people wisdom from the mountain Okay, so I said before you're gonna get sick and tired of me saying Jesus is new this and knew that but he says in Revelation 2 1 5 behold I come to make all things new So you're not gonna understand the New Testament if you don't understand the Old Testament All of the figures and the characters the geography all these things we've been spending time on in this introductory course Shed so much light on what Jesus is doing here when he does make all things new, okay? So hopefully that excites you it definitely excites me so here we are then that's kind of an introduction super quick on this So on the Mount let's dive into the sermon and begin with the beatitudes