The Acceptable Year of the Lord

Welcome to Insights. This is Pastor John

and today we're going to be talking

about the acceptable year of the Lord

and how it applies to us today. So

Isaiah 61:es

1 and the first part of verse two, it

says, "The spirit of the Lord God is

upon me because the Lord hath anointed

me to preach good tidings unto the meek.

He had sent me to bind up the

brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to

the captives, and the opening of the

prison to them that are bound, to

proclaim the acceptable year of the

Lord. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we ask

that you just help us to open our hearts

and minds to receive from you today and

that you help us to understand how this

word from you, how the acceptable year

of the Lord is still active and applies

today. in Jesus name we pray. Amen. So

when Jesus was uh in the wilderness was

tempted of the devil, he was there 40

days and 40 nights and he returns to

Galilee.

And this is in uh Luke chapter 4 starts

in verse 14. I want you to hear

what's going on here because this is

Jesus beginning his public ministry. It

says, "And Jesus returned in the power

of the spirit into Galilee, and there

went out of fame of him through all the

region roundabout. And he taught in

their synagogues, being glorified of

all. And he came to Nazareth, where he

had been brought up, and as his custom

was, he went into the synagogue on the

Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.

And there was delivered unto him the

book of the prophet Isaiah."

That's Isaiah. And when he had opened

the book, he found the place where it

was written, "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, and to

set at liberty them that are bruised, to

preach the acceptable year of the Lord."

And he closed the book, and he gave it

again to the minister, and sat down. And

the eyes of all them that were in the

synagogue were fastened on him. And he

began to say unto them, "This day is

this scripture fulfilled in your ears."

And all bear witness and wondered at the

gracious words which proceeded out of

his mouth. And they said, "Is not this

Joseph's son?" And he said unto them,

"You will surely say unto me this

proverb, physician, heal thyself.

whatsoever we have heard done in

Kaepernom Capernaum, do also here in thy

country. And he said, verily I say unto

you, no prophet is accepted in his own

country. But I tell you of a truth. Many

widows were in Israel in the days of

Elias. When the heaven was shut up three

years and six months, when great famine

was throughout all the land, but unto

none of them was Elias sent, save unto

Serepta, a city of Saddon, unto a woman

that was a widow. And many lepers were

in Israel in the time of Adysius the

prophet. And none of them was cleansed,

saving non the Syrian. And all they in

the synagogue, when they heard these

things, were filled with wrath, and rose

up, and thrust him out of the city, and

led him unto the brow of the hill,

wherein the city was built, that they

might cast him down headlong. But he

passing through the midst of them went

his way.

And uh

the very first thing that I want you to

notice about this is what Jesus said. He

said, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me

because he hath anointed me to preach

the gospel to the poor.

He has sent me to heal the

brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to

the captives and recovering of the sight

to the blind, to set at liberty them

that are bruised, and to preach the

acceptable year of the Lord." You know,

for the last 2,000 years, it's been the

acceptable year of the Lord. We're all

commanded by Christ to share the gospel.

And if we take a look in Mark chapter

16, Jesus gives us the parameters of how

our ministry should function as

believers.

And uh starting in verse 15,

he says, "Go you into all the world and

preach the gospel to every creature. For

he that believeth and is baptized shall

be saved, but he that believeth not

shall be damned. In these signs shall

follow them that believe. In my name

shall they cast out devils. They shall

speak with new tongues. They shall take

up serpents, and if they drink any

deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.

They shall lay hands on the sick, and

they shall recover. And you'll hear a

lot of times people say things like,

"Well, that was only in the apostles

time." And uh there's I if you left it

at that point and focused totally on

that you could probably say that

and uh

Jesus had told his disciples

that all the things that he did they

would do also and even greater things

because he was going to prepare a place

for him.

And uh I was looking through this and I

was thinking about what he said there

and what he said in uh Acts chapter 1

uh

about waiting for the promise of the

father. In verse four, it says, "And

being assembled together with them,

commanded them that they should not

depart from from Jerusalem, but wait for

the promise of the father, which saith

he, you've heard of me. For John truly

baptized with water, but ye shall be

baptized with the Holy Ghost not many

days. S hence

and he explained that the reason that

they needed to receive power was so that

they could become witnesses for him and

witnesses for what he said back in the

acceptable day of the Lord. And when we

get to

Pentecost, which happened 10 days later,

um you find out that all of the apostles

were there, uh gathered in the upper

room, the 11 that were left,

plus Mary and the mother of Jesus, and

all of his brethren, that means his

brothers and sisters. And uh on the day

of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was

poured out on the church,

there was 120 in the upper room and they

all became witnesses.

And the the power of the Holy Spirit was

so strong in Peter that even his shadow

would cause people to be healed.

And they performed many signs of

wonders. And people came to the Lord in

great numbers. And uh after Steven was

stoned,

we uh we start

seeing people everyday people who had

received the Holy Spirit

uh beginning to be used in ministry. The

first one that we see about after the

stoning is Stephen the church starts

being persecuted and Philip leaves and

heads to Samaria and

uh he

uh baptizes a unic out in the wilderness

and then the Lord takes him in there

uh to uh Samaria. But I want you to

notice something in Saul's conversion

which is in chapter nine

and u

Saul is on his way to Damascus. He's on

the road. He's got letters of of

authority from the Sanhedrin court uh to

take into custody any person he found in

Damascus in their synagogues that were

preaching the name of Jesus. And Jesus

appeared to him and after he

told Saul who he was

and

the bright light that he was there had

he was blind

and uh

Jesus sends him into the city and listen

who comes to pray for him it's Ananas

and there was a certain disciple at

Damascus named Ananas. Now, this is not

one of the 12.

This isn't um one of the 120. This is

one of the people that was saved under

the ministry

of the Holy Spirit through the apostles.

And he was in and God spoke to him and

said, "Ananas." And he said, "Behold, I

am here, Lord." That's the first key.

When God speaks to you, you have to

respond. And he said, 'Arise, and go

into the street which is called

straight, and inquire in the house of

Judas, for one called Saul of Tarsus.

For behold, he prayth and hath seen in a

vision a man named Ananas coming in, and

putting his hand on him, that he might

receive his sight.

And uh Ananas answered the Lord and he

said,"Ive heard by many of this man how

much evil he hath done to thy saints at

Jerusalem.

And here he hath authority from the

chief priests to bind all that call on

thy name." But the Lord said unto him,

"Go thy way, for he is a chosen vessel

unto me to bear my name before the

Gentiles and kings and the children of

Israel, for I will show him how great

things he must suffer for my name's

sake." And Annias went his way and

entered into the house, and putting his

hands on him, said, Brother Saul, the

Lord, even Jesus that appeared unto thee

in the way as thou camest hath sent me,

that thou mightest receive thy sight,

and be filled with the Holy Ghost. And

immediately there fell from his eyes, as

it had been scales, and he received

sight forth with, and arose, and was

baptized.

So this is the the the ministry of the

church.

The ministry of every believer

is to be empowered by the Holy Spirit

and they should have

miracles following them in the things

they do. That's the acceptable year of

the Lord to come and preach

deliverance

uh to the poor, to the brokenhearted, uh

to restore sight to the blind. And um a

lot of times in the church people get

focused on well the person that that

should that performs the miracles and

does all the things is the pastor of the

church or some minister somewhere or

some evangelist that's on the road or

something like this. But yet that's not

what Jesus said. Jesus said these signs

shall follow them which believe. It

doesn't say these signs shall follow the

apostles or these signs shall follow

prophets or these signs shall follow

evangelists or these signs shall follow

pastors and teachers. It says these

signs shall follow them that believe.

And that's you and I. That's everybody

who believes in Jesus' name. Uh believes

in the power of

God's transforming grace.

uh that we as believers should be

operating in those areas. Um I've seen

it many times in my own lifetime. Uh

went in and prayed for people that were

sick, seen God heal people from stage 4

cancer, bring back uh from the uh brain

dead patients back to life. Um seen

people um healed in so many different

ways. seen people set fe free from

depression. Uh have seen people's

um who had heart conditions and and

we're going to need pacemakers and seen

God fix their hearts. Um there are so

many things I have seen to verify what

I'm saying. So when I speak to you about

this, I'm not talking about

just something said in the Bible. It's

from personal experience. Um, and God's

not a respector of persons. If he did it

for one person, he'll do it for anyone.

And what it requires is for you to

willfully submit to the leading of the

Holy Spirit to do what God has called

you to do. And we're all called to do

the same thing. We are all called to

share the gospel of Jesus Christ with a

lost, broken, and hurting world.

to bring hope to them that

by grace

we're saved and for them to understand

the power of the cross. It's not a

simple thing. It's not a small thing.

It's not something that we should look

at and say, "Oh, well that happened at

the beginning of the church, but it

doesn't happen today." Because that's

not what Jesus said.

He said, "I'm the same yesterday, today,

and forever."

They said the word of God cannot fail.

So when we read these things and we look

at what God has said, we have to begin

to understand that we should also be

operating in that area. And so for you

to do that, for you to actually fulfill

that this is the acceptable year of the

Lord.

Um

we need to understand

that there there is God's part which he

did already when he said it is finished

and there's our part which is to

willfully submit to what God said to do.

And God provides opportunity after

opportunity after opportunity

for us to witness.

Uh when you read in the book of

Revelations, uh it talks about

this multitude of people under

underneath

uh the throne. And John asked the angel,

"Who are these?"

And he says, "These are them which came

out of the great tribulation, which

overcame by the blood of the lamb, the

words of their testimony."

We're supposed to overcome by the blood

of the lamb in the words of our

testimony. Uh Paul was very specific

about the things that we should do. He

to put on the whole armor of God that we

can withstand the ws of the enemy in the

evil day and to quench all the fiery

darts of the enemy. Um, but he also

commanded us to go forward. We're

supposed to go forward. We're supposed

to to continue to go forward. Jesus

didn't say, "Except me as Lord and

Savior and then sit and wait until I

come."

He said uh to the apostles when he

called them uh when he called uh Peter

and Andrew, James and John, they were

fishermen. He says, "Come follow me and

I will make you fishers of men." They

already knew what it meant to be a

fisherman for fish. But Jesus put it in

a way that they could understand that

just as they threw nets out into the

water and drew in the fish that he was

the net they were going to cast into the

world to draw all men unto me. And

that's what he said. He said, "If I be

lifted up, I will draw all men unto me."

So when you're going through your

day-today life and doing the things that

you need to do, you also have to make

sure that the that the major most

important thing you're doing is lifting

up Jesus for other people to see. I say

this all the time to people.

Your greatest tool for witnessing to

other people is living out your

testimony. If you say that you are

saved, that you confess Jesus Christ as

Lord, that you're a follower of Christ,

then you're the actions in your life

should reflect it. Uh he called us to

come out from among the world. He said

we're a peculiar people. He said that we

are supposed to be different.

And if you look like the world and you

talk like the world and you act like the

world, then you aren't anything

different than the world. And Jesus said

that's not the case. The case is we're

supposed to be different. We've been set

aside. We've been sanctified and we've

been set aside for service. That's truly

what holiness is, is being set aside for

service. And so we have to be willing

to do what Jesus asks us. We have to be

uh

confident that if we go and begin to

speak about Jesus, he's going to give us

the words and he's going to give us that

anointing we need to be able to talk to

people about him and not only talk to

him um but also demonstrate

him in our own lives.

And uh so I want you to think about the

fact that it is the acceptable year of

the Lord. That all the things Jesus

proclaimed

when he read that scripture passage out

of Isaiah and said, "This day is this

fulfilled in your ears." It has been the

acceptable year of the Lord ever since.

And we're as he uses people. He made us

responsible for the spreading of the

gospel and he empowers it.

And so as you're making your way this

week and you're going through and you're

looking at all the different things you

have to do and this is a busy week for

most Americans, it's Thanksgiving week.

Uh today is uh Thanksgiving Eve.

Tomorrow people are going to be should

be in an attitude of thanksgiving to God

for all of his bountiful blessings and

living in a place where we can uh live

in freedom and have the ability to

freely worship Christ as as he leads.

But we also need to remember that we

have we have a greater responsibility

and duty to Christ

and that we have a calling that he's

placed upon us as the church as a whole

to be able to go out and share the

gospel with those that are lost, those

that are wounded, brokenhearted,

that are in captivity.

And that captivity can be a lot of

things. I mean, addictions,

um, of all kinds, drugs, alcohol,

pornography, just go right on down the

list. These are all things that put us,

uh, bind us up and keep us from

finding true freedom in Christ. Uh,

Jesus said, "He whom the son is set free

is free indeed." You have a freedom the

world cannot take from you no matter how

hard they try. And I want to encourage

you especially in this week of

thanksgiving

to learn to be thankful to understand

your part in this gospel of Christ and

that he will use you as readily as he

will use anybody

and give him the opportunity to show

you. So, I want to thank you guys for

being with me this week. I hope you have

a fantastic Thanksgiving.

Um, to everybody that that watches

around the world, uh, God bless you and

keep you as we enter into this holiday

season and prepare to celebrate

Christmas and, uh, get prepared for a

new year. So,

I just want you guys to to feel the

blessings that God has for you, Jesus.

We just thank you and praise you for all

you did. We thank you for your work on

the cross. We thank you, Lord, because

you said, "It is finished." And that we

now have an opportunity to witness you

to other people that we meet. Lord, we

just ask right now that you help us to

focus on you in this time of

thanksgiving and the things that you

done and the things that we should be

thankful for. And we give you all the

glory and all the praise in your mighty

name. Amen. We'll see you guys next