Show Notes
Clay
Chapters
- (00:00:01) - Jubilee
- (00:07:31) - The Lord's Prayer
- (00:11:44) - Prayer of Jubilee
- (00:19:41) - The Love of the Prodigal Son
- (00:26:20) - Forgiveness
- (00:27:09) - Communion
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] This is our third week on a sermon series on jubilee.
[00:00:07] Jubilee is this really crazy idea from the New Testament, the law of Moses, where every 50 years the people of Israel are called to return the land back to their original owners.
[00:00:23] They're called to let all captives go free.
[00:00:27] They're called to let the land rest and to not work the land and to trust that God will provide.
[00:00:36] We don't know that they ever actually fulfilled this.
[00:00:39] The first time that they were supposed to have the jubilee would have been 50 years after they started following the law of Moses, where they were working out the law of Moses in their life for 50 years. And there was a seven year cycle.
[00:00:56] So there would have been seven cycles of these seven years working out the law of Moses before they came to this year, where they were called to return all possessions that they had back to the original owners, to let their prisoners go free and to trust God to provide for them for that year.
[00:01:21] This was something that God held against them, that they chose not to obey. This act of this law of Moses, we're told, I'm pretty sure it was in Isaiah, but we're told that when they later were captive in Babylon, the years that they were captive were the same number of years that they were supposed to let the land rest. So the land got its rest, but they chose not to get their rest because they didn't follow the law.
[00:01:55] This was a tremendous act of fate, would have required a tremendous act of faith. Totally. Can you imagine, you purchase a home and then 50 years later you have to give that home back to the person that you bought it from, the original owner of the home.
[00:02:12] Like everyone had to return their stuff back to their original owners.
[00:02:16] It made a lot of sense in their context.
[00:02:20] The land was a part, was the, was the fundamental aspect of the covenant God had made with them. God gave this land to the people of Israel. He said, this tribe gets this land, this tribe gets that land, this tribe gets this land.
[00:02:38] And that promise was for this generation, the next generation, and the next generation.
[00:02:43] And so the jubilee was to reset that promise that God had made to them and their faithfulness they were to be a part of. They were supposed to participate in God's promise to them to give that land to them forever. They had to cooperate.
[00:03:02] Now, initially, this would have sounded wonderful to them. They were people who were slaves. They came out of Egypt as slaves. And they were told, you're not going to be slaves anymore.
[00:03:13] You will always be able to reset and to be made whole again. You're not going to be like you were in Egypt.
[00:03:21] But I think probably after 50 years, they forgot how important it was for them not to be slaves.
[00:03:29] And they liked having what they had. The people who had gotten what they deserved wanted to keep what they deserved, and they didn't want to reset according to God's law.
[00:03:44] This is a beautiful idea.
[00:03:47] Tragic because they didn't follow the law.
[00:03:49] But what's interesting was as Jesus begins his ministry, he uses this idea of jubilee to explain what he is coming to do on earth.
[00:03:59] In Luke, Jesus says, he opens up the scroll of Isaiah, and he says, I have come to set the captives free.
[00:04:08] The year of our Lord's favor has come with me. The year of the Lord's favor is the year of jubilee.
[00:04:15] Jesus life, the kingdom that he has brought about through his life, has often been called the perpetual jubilee.
[00:04:26] We don't have a year. Every 50 years of Jubilee, we have a lifestyle in which we are forgiven, that our debts are released. We are released from our debts, and that we trust God to provide every single day, not just one year and 50.
[00:04:45] So last week I talked about how Jesus came and in his life, he. He inaugurated that jubilee in his forgiveness, his death, and resurrection on the cross.
[00:04:56] His life was what unlocked our jubilee. When we repent and we receive his forgiveness, we receive his grace.
[00:05:09] We get to be a part of his kingdom, which is a jubilee. I love that the word used is jubilee. When we come into God's kingdom, it's not just like, oh, good, like, debts are forgiven, I need to, like, do good things now or whatever. It's a celebration. There's a reason Christians sing songs all the time. Just this morning, you said humans are made to celebrate. Like, we're.
[00:05:34] We celebrate the wrong things a lot. But, like, in our gut, like, celebration is just like a part of what we are.
[00:05:41] And God's kingdom is the ultimate celebration. It's the ultimate. It's the true north of celebration. It is the jubilee. When we live in God's kingdom, when we receive his grace and his forgiveness, we are receiving jubilee. We are receiving celebration. We aren't just receiving the forgiveness of sins. We are receiving celebration.
[00:06:04] There's a reason Christians sing worship songs all the time. It just comes out of us as a result of our celebration of this perpetual jubilee.
[00:06:17] Now, it's important, though. So much of the New Testament doesn't just describe us receiving a jubilee, it describes a people participating in a jubilee. We are citizens of the kingdom of God.
[00:06:35] When you are a citizen of a kingdom and you celebrate, there are Indicators of that celebration. Like in the United States, we just celebrated the Fourth of July. We have. If you say Fourth of July, it's a celebration. And there are certain things that you expect to do on a Fourth of July celebration. You may not do it, but you know, fireworks and, you know, like cookouts and, you know, those kind of things are going on.
[00:07:01] Those are symbols of the celebration of the jubilee.
[00:07:06] The primary symbol of the celebration, a citizen in the kingdom of God. The way we celebrate is to participate in God's forgiveness. Not just to receive his forgiveness, but to participate in the forgiveness. We are. We are recipients of God's forgiveness and we are perpetuators of God's forgiveness.
[00:07:29] It's all over. There's like. There are literally dozens of passages I could look at, but I want to look at a few. And I just wanted to start with, with the Lord's Prayer. It's embedded in the. This comes from the Sermon on the Mount. When Jesus is describing, like the Christian lifestyle and as he's. Well, I'll just go ahead and say, he says, you should pray like this.
[00:07:52] Now, I want you to think of this prayer as a jubilee.
[00:07:57] Don't just think like, I'm going to God asking for things. Think I'm going to my Heavenly Father, who has all things.
[00:08:07] And I'm asking to participate with him in all that. He has not just my limited resources, but his limitless resources.
[00:08:17] I want to be a part of his kingdom. And this prayer, you think of it like.
[00:08:23] Imagine you could ask your dad who, like, really loves you. He's like, ask me anything. Ask. Ask me. I love you and I want to give you. Right? I want to give you out of my. Out of what I have, like, who I am.
[00:08:40] You're not going to ask your dad to give you something that's not who he is. You know, you're not going to ask a good. You're not going to ask a good father to give you something rotten. You know, you're going to ask your good Father to give you something that's fit to his character.
[00:08:56] And then Jesus describes what it looks like to know your Father and to ask rightly what's fit for his character.
[00:09:05] Imagine asking this with a mindset of jubilee of celebration.
[00:09:10] He says, pray like this.
[00:09:13] Our Father in heaven, our Heavenly Father, our unlimited Father.
[00:09:17] We have good earthly fathers in this room.
[00:09:21] All of these good earthly fathers and have unlimited heavenly Father that is our sustainer, our unlimited heavenly Father. May your name be kept holy.
[00:09:35] Every time I think of you, every time you get brought up. I just think, yeah, that's my daddy. Like, there's like a.
[00:09:42] Like anytime your name gets mentioned, people go, oh, yeah, that's a good. That's a good dad. You know, he's good. He's special, right? Every time your name, every time I think of you, it makes me smile. There's something special and different about you. Father, may your name be kept holy.
[00:10:06] I want your kingdom to come soon. I want what's normal in your world to be normal in my world all the time.
[00:10:16] I want things that aren't fit for your kingdom to become less and less a part of my life.
[00:10:22] I want your life to be more normal in my life.
[00:10:27] May your kingdom become soon.
[00:10:29] May your will be done here on earth as it is done in heaven, eternally in all places.
[00:10:38] May your.
[00:10:41] May what's normal for you be normal for me.
[00:10:46] Then he says, give us today the food that we need.
[00:10:50] Just like. Just like that year of jubilee that I trust you to provide.
[00:10:54] I don't know how provision's gonna happen today, but I trust you to provide.
[00:11:01] And he says, forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors. That's interesting. That's the only time here so far that it's like we do anything. It's all been, Father, may your will be done. May your kingdom come. You provide. And now he says, and forgive us our debts as we have forgiven debtors.
[00:11:24] And don't let us yield to temptation again. That's God's work. Don't let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from. From the evil one. There is evil and there is an evil one working to separate us from a good Father.
[00:11:41] Don't let us yield to that.
[00:11:44] Now in this prayer of jubilee, the celebration prayer, Jesus has one comment at the end of this. Of all the things, he could comment on the holiness of God's name, you could write a whole book on that or on being faithful to God's provision.
[00:12:01] Jesus could have commented on anything in this prayer, but here's the one thing he decided to comment on. He said, if you forgive others their lapses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
[00:12:15] But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your transgressions. That word lapses and transgressions is the same word. It just has to do with misdeeds.
[00:12:29] Anything that we have done that has made us forget who you are.
[00:12:39] I misunderstand myself when I forget who God is.
[00:12:44] Who I am only makes sense in relation to who God is. Who I am only makes Sense. When I remember myself and then remember that you're my brothers and sisters. When I remember who God is and I remember that everything that I have belongs to God. The way I relate to God and people and stuff only makes sense. I don't trans.
[00:13:04] I do good deeds. When I remember who I am in relation to God, when I forget who I am, when I lapse in that I am prone to not forgive other people, I forget that I've been forgiven.
[00:13:27] When you think that your life is lost for whatever reason, when you've done something so embarrassing or evil wrong that you feel like it's reasonable that my life, I would lose my life. It's reasonable that my friends would abandon me, it's reasonable that my wife would leave me because of something that I've done.
[00:14:00] But then they forgive you and they love you anyway.
[00:14:05] It does something to you.
[00:14:11] Come to realize that you are loved even when your worst parts are known.
[00:14:18] You knew you were loved before when your good parts were known. But when your worst parts are known and you're still loved, then you know that you're truly loved. And that does something deep to a person.
[00:14:33] God knows who you truly are.
[00:14:36] And when you've been loved by God to the depths of who you are.
[00:14:40] And you've received that forgiveness from the most embarrassing things that you are unwilling to share with people because you don't think people would still love you if they knew it.
[00:14:52] And God forgives you anyway because he loves you more than life itself.
[00:14:58] It does something to you.
[00:15:00] It makes it very difficult for you to turn around and hold other people, hold other people's sins against them.
[00:15:08] You come to realize that the worst parts of who we are are human.
[00:15:14] And you don't think anything worse of other people even when you find out the worst of who they are.
[00:15:21] The same way that it wasn't held against you.
[00:15:25] You find it impossible to hold it against other people when you have not been transformed that way. When your heart has not been remade as a result of receiving the kingdom of God, the grace of God.
[00:15:41] It's very easy to be judgmental towards other people and to feel like you don't need to forgive other people when you find out their worst.
[00:15:51] Participating in God's kingdom first means you have received the deep forgiveness from the worst of who you are. It transforms you and it makes you a part of his kingdom. It literally changes the way you view other people when they're at their worst.
[00:16:09] And instead of holding their worst against them, you are grateful for the opportunity to forgive them. When you have the opportunity because you remember what it was like to be forgiven yourself.
[00:16:21] This is what Jesus comments on. To be a part of his kingdom means that you are a part of forgiveness. You don't just receive forgiveness. You are transformed by forgiveness. You become an agent of forgiveness. You are a citizen of forgiveness and you are a giver of forgiveness.
[00:16:38] That is what it means to be a part of his fourth of July celebration.
[00:16:45] It is a. The kingdom of God is a perpetual jubilee of forgiveness received and given.
[00:16:53] This is the jubilee. We don't shoot fireworks as Christians. We don't even just sing songs.
[00:16:59] Everything that we're doing is orienting us back towards forgiveness.
[00:17:04] Forgiveness is the fundamental activity of a Christian kingdom.
[00:17:11] That is what it means to be a participant in God's kingdom. God, may your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. God, may your forgiveness inhabit me, not just in receiving, but also in giving. May forgiveness mark the way that we interact with each other. May forgiveness be the base load for what it means to be human.
[00:17:35] Your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.
[00:17:40] In Luke, Luke describes this prayer a little bit differently.
[00:17:45] He's talked about debts. Matthew described it as debts.
[00:17:49] Luke describes it as sins.
[00:17:52] This is how you should pray.
[00:17:54] Father, may your name be kept holy. May your kingdom come soon.
[00:17:59] Give us each day the food we need and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us and don't let us yield to temptation.
[00:18:11] Debts is a broad. It could be, you know, any.
[00:18:15] Anything owed.
[00:18:18] Sin specifically is something owed.
[00:18:22] It's a. It's a violation of law. It's a missing of mark in relation to the one who decides what's good.
[00:18:30] All sin is first a sin against God, and then it is also always a sin against. Against God's creation. When we miss the mark, we miss the mark. Not just to God, not just to you, not just to our stuff. It affects the way we interact with the whole world.
[00:18:49] Our debt is to the entire. Debt is to God. Our debt is to each other. Our debt is to our stuff because we have missed the mark.
[00:18:58] I like the idea Jesus talks about debt, money a lot, but it's in reference to sin. I think sometimes we can think of sin as like a conceptual thing, but debt is very tangible.
[00:19:17] Sin really is very tangible.
[00:19:20] It affects our relationships, it affects our stuff, it affects our whole life. It's physical, it's tangible.
[00:19:28] We are forgiven.
[00:19:31] I don't just conceptually receive forgiveness from God. He literally wants to give me a good life. He wants me to be his Child and a part of his kingdom. And we forgive each other. It's not just an idea. I'm not just like, okay, I forgive you. I'm literally physically like, grateful to be like with you. Again, one of the best examples of this.
[00:19:54] Well, Ephesians, chapter four. Paul says this when he describes what Christians are like when they live this in the kingdom.
[00:20:04] He says, first, you're getting rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, slander, and all types of evil behavior.
[00:20:14] Instead, we're kind to each other, we're tender hearted, we forgive one another. Just as God, through Christ has forgiven you.
[00:20:24] So it's not just that this forgiveness is like, okay, I'm not going to hold that against you anymore. Our hearts literally become tender towards.
[00:20:34] It's not like we are good people because we've just.
[00:20:38] I've stopped holding like you owed me a debt or you did something wrong and I've just. That's fine. I don't hold that against you anymore.
[00:20:47] Our hearts are tender towards that person who wronged us.
[00:20:53] We are genuinely grateful to be in a position that we get to forgive.
[00:21:00] This is a big next step. It's not just like, I forgive you. And oh man, that person is really that person that's very forgiving, man. They have such high character. They're great people. No, it's not that you're not a great person for forgiving.
[00:21:16] You are.
[00:21:18] You are grateful to be in a position that you are able to forgive.
[00:21:23] One of the great stories from the Bible Jesus used to illustrate this is the story of the prodigal son.
[00:21:30] This shows a relationship of forgiveness that's like God's forgiveness towards us and our forgiveness towards each other.
[00:21:39] The prodigal son got to the point that he, he wanted to go live his life. He told his father, give me my inheritance, which basically means, you're dead to me. Give me what I'm owed. Give me what I'm owed. Now when you die and I'm gonna leave you as if you're dead, you're nothing to me anymore, just give me my inheritance.
[00:22:00] He runs off, he squanders it, he ends up living a terrible life. And he says, what have I done?
[00:22:08] The same. The story picks up and he says, he comes to his senses and he says to himself, I'll go home to my father and say, father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.
[00:22:24] Please take me on as a hired servant.
[00:22:27] Look at the heart of the person who will be forgiven in the Story that person is repentant.
[00:22:36] They no longer want to be the person that they were.
[00:22:40] They've changed. They stopped being. They stopped being who they were when they were offensive to God.
[00:22:51] Then the prodigal son returns home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming.
[00:22:58] Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son and embraced him and kissed him. And he said to him, and then his son said to him, father, I have sinned against both heaven and you and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. I imagine that the son was like the father. Okay, so first of all, dads don't run to their sons like this. Like, this guy is wealthy. This guy has status.
[00:23:23] This kid that was in the wrong. It was his job to come to the father and to kneel down and to repent. The father didn't let him do it. The father went running off to him. And the son is trying to say, trying. He's got his speech all figured out. I'm going to go to my father, I'm going to say, I don't deserve this. Will you please take me this? And like the dad, the father just like bear hugging him. And he's like, I imagine the son's like trying to father, you know, he's trying to get his words out and the dad just doesn't, I don't care about any of that. He, he's kissing him and he's hugging him and he's just so grateful to have his son back. He can't even hear the son saying, I don't deserve any of this. Matter of fact, he doesn't. The response that the father gives, it's like he didn't hear him.
[00:24:10] But the father says to the servants, totally ignoring the speech that the son worked out, right, father, I don't deserve this.
[00:24:19] Quick, bring the finest robe in the house and put it on my son.
[00:24:24] Get a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Kill the fatted calf.
[00:24:29] We must celebrate. We must have a jubilee right now.
[00:24:34] For this son of mine was dead and now he has returned to life.
[00:24:40] He was lost, but now he was found. And so the jubilee began.
[00:24:46] The celebration occurred because this father had a heart that wasn't bitter.
[00:24:53] He didn't rage, he didn't anger, he didn't have harsh words. He wasn't slant. He wasn't like, see, I told you you shouldn't have done this in the first place. Instead, he was tender hearted and he was forgiving.
[00:25:07] Just the way Christ has forgiven Us, Father, forgive us our debts as we have forgiven those, as we have forgiven our debtors.
[00:25:20] Father, forgive us our sins just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us.
[00:25:26] We do that through love.
[00:25:30] It only happens this way.
[00:25:33] When you love someone, what is the greatest commandment that unlocks all the laws, everything else that we're supposed to do?
[00:25:43] Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.
[00:25:51] When you love your neighbor as yourself, you're not bitter, you're not raging, you're not angry. You don't have harsh words when they come and ask for forgiveness. Instead, you are celebrating, you are jubilant, you are happy that they put you in a position that you could forgive them.
[00:26:11] You're not working out like, oh, hold on, let me try to figure out how I can muster up the strength of will and the great character that I can forgive you. No, it doesn't show any great character to forgive somebody that you've been desperate to have a great relationship with when they give you the opportunity to have that relationship.
[00:26:31] The great commandment unlocks the kingdom of God. It is the key to the kingdom of God. It initiates a jubilee of forgiveness Anytime anyone repents and gives us the opportunity to forgive them.
[00:26:50] We are grateful that we get to celebrate the kingdom of God and to participate in God's forgiveness.
[00:26:58] That's what it looks like to be citizens marked in the kingdom of God. That's our fireworks. That's what it looks like to celebrate the kingdom.
[00:27:09] This morning I wanted to give some opportunity for us to respond when we at Horizon, when we've like taken some time to receive what Jesus had to say.
[00:27:27] It's helpful to have an opportunity to say, I take what you've given me, Father. I want to take into me these words, this lifestyle that you've taught. I want to take this into me and I want your words to nourish me. I want to become your kingdom. I want to become. I literally want my cells to be nourished by what you've taught and by who you are.
[00:27:56] And we take communion when we do that.
[00:27:59] Communion is an opportunity to say, I receive you, Jesus, into me, Father God, I receive the gift you have given through Jesus Christ of forgiveness. I receive the grace of forgiveness not because it's anything that I've deserved, but because you love me like your child and you have been looking for the opportunity to forgive me, God, I ask your forgiveness today.
[00:28:29] I want to receive you knowing that you are the good and Loving Father, but God, I not only want to receive your forgiveness, I want to become your forgiveness. I want to look around for the opportunity to love my neighbor and to forgive others the way you've forgiven me. I want. I want to receive all of that this morning.
[00:28:51] I want that jubilee of the forgiveness kingdom.
[00:28:55] That's what I want to receive this morning.
[00:28:58] If you are anyone who has made the commitment, you've decided that Jesus Christ is your Lord, that he is your Savior, that you are following him, you're welcome to come and receive communion with us. That's up to you.
[00:29:16] After I read this passage, I'm going to pray.
[00:29:20] And then you can just take a few minutes. And when you're ready, you can come down front and receive the juice and receive the bread. Come back to your seat and just take it. And as you are taking the bread, remembering that you are eating this, remembering Christ. As you are drinking the juice, remember you are drinking it remembering Christ. Remembering. Remembering the one who has saved you into the forgiveness kingdom.
[00:29:48] In Luke 22, Luke records in the upper room, just before he's going to be crucified, it says, jesus took some bread and gave thanks to God for it.
[00:30:01] Then he broke it into pieces and he gave it out to you guys, to his disciples. And he said, this is my body which is given for you.
[00:30:11] Do this, receive this, remembering me.
[00:30:15] Then after supper he took some wine and said, this cup is a new covenant between God and his people.
[00:30:22] A covenant of forgiveness, a covenant of jubilee, an agreement confirmed with my blood, which is poured out as a sacrifice for you.
[00:30:33] I am sacrificing so that you can live this jubilee. And I want you to receive this jubilee this morning.
[00:30:43] Let's pray, Father. God, as Ben said, we are oriented, human beings are oriented towards celebration.
[00:30:55] God, I pray that this morning we have looked at everything that we can celebrate.
[00:31:00] And then we've looked to you. And all other celebrations pale in comparison to this life of deep forgiveness.
[00:31:09] A life where we are known and where we are forgiven for the worst of who we are.
[00:31:16] And God, as we know each other, we forgive them, knowing that they are human just like us.
[00:31:23] God, make us citizens in your kingdom as we receive your deep forgiveness and we participate in your forgiveness.
[00:31:31] We receive you into us this morning, God, we want your forgiveness to nurture us and to transform our heart, to transform our souls, to make us citizens in your kingdom, to make us a part of your family.
[00:31:45] We love you, God. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
