The ministry of Jesus

I was drawn recently to the passage in Luke, in which Jesus, quoting from Isaiah 61, says these words:

“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

Sometimes, I think I’ve not paused enough to really reflect on the ministry of Jesus. Yes, He came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10). He came to give us life, and life more abundantly (John 10:10). And He came to be the perfect atonement for our sin (Hebrews 10:10), so we can have everlasting life by believing on Him (John 3:16). 

But encompassed in these truths is a ministry that heals our hurts, breaks the chains that enslave us, and removes our blindness so we can truly see. 

Consider, for example, that Jesus came to heal the brokenhearted. 

The word translated “heal” is iaomai, which means “to cure.” And “brokenhearted” comes from two words: syntribo and kardia. Syntribo means “to crush completely, i.e. to shatter.” And kardia means the heart, but also in the sense of the thoughts or feelings (the mind).

Have you ever been completely crushed? Shattered? Jesus came to cure your brokenness. To make you whole. 

Or how about the truth that Jesus came to preach deliverance to the captives? 

The word translated “preach” is kerysso, which means “to herald (as a public crier).”  Jesus came to herald—to announce for all to hear—deliverance.  

This word “deliverance,” translated from aphesis, means “freedom” or “pardon.” The word translated “captives” is aichmalotos, which means a prisoner of war.

When Adam sinned, he willingly surrendered himself to the captivity of Satan. And through Adam, we are all born into this same captivity. But Jesus came to set us free—to liberate us. 

Hebrews 2:14-15 says, “Since the children have flesh and blood, he [Jesus] too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

Jesus also came to restore our sight. 

The word translated “recovering of sight” is anablepsis (restoration of sight). It’s from the word anablepo, which means “to look up; by implication, to recover sight.”  

And the word translated “blind” is typhlos, which means “opaque (as if smoky),” and which can refer to either physical or mental blindness. Whether mental confusion or physical blindness, Jesus came to restore sight.

The ministry of Jesus is one of healing, hope, restoration, and liberation. And it’s based not on anything that we’ve done to deserve it, but on His great love for us.