Sermon Tone Analysis

Proclaim Liberty to the Captives

Last week Doug shared how God calls us to proclaim good news to the poor.

This is what Jesus was anointed to proclaim.

The Good news was His own death and resurrection.

Victory over death and sin.

As Jesus proclaimed this with His own life, so we are called to proclaim it as we live in Him.

But the Good News - The Gospel - is powerless if we think it was only a thing that happened in Jesus’ life.

Is it good news to know that Jesus was victorious over death and sin but not allow that same victory in our own lives?

And what if we tell someone the Good News of Jesus but don’t call them to repent and follow Jesus?

This is the question we will address today.

I pray it is encouraging to you, and effective in clarifying our purpose.

Pray

Today we will be focusing on Jesus’ imperative to proclaim liberty the the captives.

I wan’t to observe something about us, something about the lost, and something about God.

Prisoners Don’t Proclaim Freedom.

I’m imagining one prisoner telling another prisoner to follow me to freedom!

Dude! We’re all running around the same prison cell!

The first thing we need to realize about Jesus’ purpose to proclaim liberty to the captives is that captivity is slavery to sin.

The word for ‘practices’ here means to make or create.

So don’t think practice as in doing again and again and again.

It’s more having ever sinned, you and I are slaves to sin.

Outside of the perfect covering of Christ, a solitary sin makes us slaves.

All of us in the same boat.

But the passage continues.

In Christ we are no longer slaves to sin.

If we were, how could we proclaim freedom?

Paul says...

The voice of freedom comes from one who has been set free.

If we are to have an effective voice to share the message of hope to the lost, we must take seriously living according to the Spirit of Righteousness, not in our sinfulness.

I pray we all but to death the desires of the flesh and walk in the Spirit.

Prisoners Of Sin Don’t Know They’re Slaves.

I’ve already heard in this building someone say to me “Have you found Jesus?

I didn’t know He was lost.”

I know the terrible affront that is to the holy God and creator of all things.

But that lost sole heard the gospel, but it didn’t mean anything to him.

When all someone knows is chains, captivity is normal.

The gospel is something to sneer at.

Part of proclaiming liberty to the captives is revealing to them the bondage they are in.

Our results will be poor when we don’t have a connection.

If a stranger walked up to you in the grocery store and said “Let me tell you why you are wrong.”

they wouldn’t get very far.

But if that same person came to you and said, “Hey, I’d hate for you to get sick.

I see that package of meat you just grabbed expired three days ago.”

we would see their concern and head their words.

Sharing the Gospel without showing love first often leaves people bound in sin offended rather than convicted.

If we are to proclaim liberty, let’s let lead with care and concern.

God Breaths Life

How can a dead man receive the gift of life?

How can someone who seethes hate be transformed into love?

How can the lost be saved?

There are two answers.

They are both true.

And they are both opposite.

We call this a contradiction.

God calls it His plan.

The first answer to the question is “But God”

But God

When all the world was lost to sin and flood and judgement was on the whole earth… “But God remembered Noah and all the beast and all the livestock”

When Joseph was hated, and sold, and given up for lost and all the evil in his brothers harts were intended for him, “but God meant if for good.”

When the Psalmist in Psalm 49 sees the iniquity and evil of every man destroying each other, he says Psalm 49 7-8 “7 Truly no man can ransom another, or give to God the price of his life, 8 for the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice,” Then how shall we be saved?

Psalm 49:15 “15 But God will ransom my soul from the power of the grave, for he will receive me.

Selah”

Almost in direct response, the Pharisees ask, Mark 2:7 “7 “Why does this man speak like that?

He is blaspheming!

Who can forgive sins but God alone?””

So Jesus affirmed His identity by not only forgiving sin, but also healing the paralyzed man.

“Take up your bed and walk!”

So Jesus in both a man and God who walked among us.

His love and His answer to our problem of deadness is found in Rom 5 8 “8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

And when Jesus paid that price for all our sin, dining on the cross, Acts 13:30 “30 But God raised him from the dead,”

And so when God calls out to one who is dead, like Lazarus, the poser is in God’s hand’s Eph 2 4-5 “4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—”

God will do it.

The living water, the breath of life.

We were but a valley of dry bones when God found us.

It is HE who breathed life into us.

His power, and only His power.

… But for some reason, only God knows, He chooses to work through us.

No one reading Ezekiel would say Ezekiel raised an army from piles of dry bones.

But God chooses to use him.

God will cause the flesh and sinews and breath to return to the dry bones.

But Ezekiel is delegated the responsibility to proclaim it.

This is our second answer.

We Must Declare

Ezekiel was to declare the Word of the Lord to dry bones.

And so are we to declare the word of the Lord to the valleys of dry bones around us.

Paul preached.

But the salvation was o the Lord.

What is that salvation?

That Jesus died and rose again.

Have you ever wondered you pedigree of faith?

There was an faithful believer who shared the gospel with you, one who brought you to the Lord.

The same for that person, and the one who brought them to faith.

On and on.

I suppose we are twelve tribes.

Maybe, if we had God’s vision of history, we could all trace our faith back to one of the 12 apostles.

That’s entertaining to think about.

But a much more profound question: who will count YOU in their lineage of faith?

Who will have heard the words of salvation from you, been given the opportunity to receive God’s free gift of salvation and turned from death to life because you declared what God has done for you?

We don’t need to know the whole of scripture to be able to share.

We need to know those five words, and know our own story.