Friday, November 6, 2015

What I'm Learning about Jesus



I don't have time to blog; I really don't. I have seven photo sessions to edit, and I'm off to take more photos in three hours.

I'm behind with my Bible study and struggling to keep up with homeschooling. I don't have time to blog,

and yet. I'm thinking of my friend from the restaurant: the one who advised me to slow my pace when I'm in the weeds. I'm thinking of his saying that, if I slow down, I'll remember everything I need to remember, and one thing I need to remember comes out of my Bible study.

This Bible study. There have been moments that I've felt as though God were speaking directly to me. And He was. He does that. His Word is so relevant to our daily lives. When I don't have time to read the Bible, when I don't want to read the Bible, I need to read it, most. I don't know why I have to learn this lesson over and over.

The Bible study is on Isaiah and took me, recently, into the fourth chapter of Luke. Jesus had entered His hometown of Nazereth after spending forty days in the wilderness. He had eaten nothing for those forty days and had resisted the aggressive temptation of the devil. Scripture says the devil departed from Jesus for a season. Jesus entered Galilee in the power of the Spirit. In Nazereth, He stood up to read in the synagogue on the Sabbath day. He read this from the book of Isaiah (Chapter 61):

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord (Luke 4:18-19).
Before Jesus closed the book, gave it to the minister, and sat down, He said: "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears" (Luke 4:21b).
Up until that moment in my Bible study, if someone had asked me what Jesus's purpose was, or is, I would've said He died to save us from our sins. Maybe, if pressed, I would've referred to Him as the Creator. And I wouldn't have been wrong, but I wouldn't have been entirely right, either, because I wouldn't have presented these verses. I wouldn't have offered that Jesus's purpose was, in part, to heal the brokenhearted. I wouldn't have suggested that His purpose was to give sight or release captives.

I knew He does those things, but it's different--isn't it?--to say someone does something and to say his or her purpose is to do something. It would be one thing, for example, for someone to say of me: she bakes a good cookie, another for her to say that I was put here on earth to bake cookies.

More than seven hundred years before Jesus was born, Isaiah prophesied that Jesus was coming to heal broken hearts, free captives, and so many other things, besides. Jesus didn't just do those things; He came to do those things. I'm having a hard time articulating why I find this distinction so meaningful for the same reasons I've found blogging so challenging, recently: there are things I can't write in this space.

But. My heart hurts. I am grieving. I have blind spots. I am in a prison (or two) of my own making. And it matters to me that not only can Jesus help me, but my life is in the hands of the One who was sent to address these specific concerns.

6 comments:

  1. Oh, yes!

    Brandee, that passage has come to mean so much to me for that very reason. Jesus said this is why He came. He came for the specific purpose of healing and delivering.

    I know sometimes people probably think I'm a broken record blogging over and over about redemption and deliverance. I know people probably get tired of reading yet another post on my blog about the concept of godly divorce and God's desire that His children trapped in abusive relationships be redeemed and delivered from enslavement.

    But this is why!

    This is such an area of tremendous blindness in today's church. An abused woman is too often told that to honor God she must remain married to her abuser and seek to better meet his needs. Yet Jesus told us that He came to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance of the captives...to set at liberty them that are bruised. That is His heart!

    Yes, I understand that in the grand scheme the primary prison from which He has delivered us is from sin and death. But if His heart is one of redemption and deliverance, why does today's church continue to blindly preach a legalistic doctrine that shows no sense of justice or mercy for those who are most broken, bruised and enslaved?

    If we can't get that part right...how will we ever understand His heart for us?

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  2. A Holy Spirit insight into a familiar passage. This spoke to me, friend.

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  3. Such truth and honesty, Brandee. Love and prayers my friend. {{hugs}} xo

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  4. I love this, Brandee. The Lord is always pursuing you. I am always so blessed when you share what He lays on your heart. Praying for you now.

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  5. love this....love you..... totally understand .... welcome to "anjie's world" ....in a nutshell.... except I don't have that tremendous amount of faith that you do....mine is miniscule in comparison

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  6. BRANDEE!!!! How did I miss this? Yes, oh the Holy Spirit, He is so alive in us. I see Him in you all the time.

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