What Sort of Year Will It Be? (Friday Devotional)

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

- Luke 4:18-19

With 2016 now upon us, this is the time when many people map out what the new year will look like. Resolutions are made, activities are planned, priorities are reassessed, and routines are implemented, all in an effort to ensure that this year is an improvement on the last one. This is the year, we proudly proclaim, that a bad habit finally bites the dust or that a better one takes hold; this is the year that everything changes.

Our Lord himself made such a proclamation 2,000 years ago in his hometown of Nazareth. Standing in a crowded synagogue, he read from a scroll bearing the words of the prophet Isaiah, words that prophesied a time when one anointed by God would grant freedom from want, captivity, sickness, and oppression. This anointed one, or “Messiah”, would usher in “the year of the Lord’s favor”, the era of jubilee. His arrival would signal the inauguration of the kingdom of God.

None of this was foreign to Jesus’ audience, who knew this text well and looked with hope to its promised future. But Jesus made news—and enemies—when he rolled the scroll up and looked to those seated around him. “Today,” he said, “this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” The implication was clear: Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah, and the year of the Lord’s favor had begun.

The people in the synagogue that day responded to that message the same way so many do today—they rejected it outright. Jesus did look like the Messiah they imagined; he did not have the regal bearing or military training for such a role. He was nothing but a blasphemer with delusions of grandeur. Their rejection of Jesus foreshadowed the day when a different crowd would demand his crucifixion for making the same promises.

Today, believers recognize the truth of what Jesus said that day in Nazareth, that he was and is the Messiah. He came offering salvation from the afflictions of this world, including the ultimate cause of those afflictions, sin. Through his life, death, and resurrection, the kingdom of God has been ushered in, and it will one day be consummated with his return.

But while we are quick to acknowledge the truth of the message, we can be slow to accept the responsibility it places on us as Jesus’ disciples. If he came so that the oppressed could be freed, then surely we have an obligation to assist them. If he came so that the captives could be released, then surely we have a responsibility to those in chains. If his gospel is for the poor, then how can we ignore the least among us?

There are plenty of goals you can set for the new year, plenty of changes you can make. Maybe for you this is the Year of Productivity or the Year of Losing Weight or the Year of Quitting Smoking. But before you devote all of your energy and resources to your own goal, remember that Christ has already given this age a label: the year of the Lord’s favor. As his follower, may you surrender yourself faithfully to his goal, desiring that this new year is not only happy, but blessed.