The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

                                        To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.  

                                             Luke 4:18-19

Litany for Christian Unity by Karol Wojtyla, Pope Paul II (UM Hymnal, 1989, #556)
Let us ask the Lord to strengthen in all Christians faith in Christ, the Savior of the world. Listen to us, O Lord. Let us ask the Lord to sustain and guide Christians with his gifts along the way to full unity. Listen to us, O Lord. Let us ask the Lord for the gift of unity and peace for the world. Listen to us, O Lord. Let us pray: We ask you, O Lord, for the gifts of your Spirit.Enable us to penetrate the depth of the whole truth, and grant that we may share with others the goods you have put at our disposal. Teach us to overcome divisions. Send us your Spirit to lead to full unity your sons and daughters in full charity, in obedience to your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

Quotes & Notes on:     Luke 4:18   John Wesley,  Notes On the New Testament (1755):  He hath anointed me-With the Spirit. He hath by the power of his Spirit which dwelleth in me, set me apart for these offices. To preach the Gospel to the poor-Literally and spiritually. How is the doctrine of the ever-blessed trinity interwoven, even in those scriptures where one would least expect it? How clear a declaration of the great Three-One is there in those very words, The Spirit-of the Lord is upon me! To proclaim deliverance to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised-Here is a beautiful gradation, in comparing the spiritual state of men to the miserable state of those captives, who are not only cast into prison, but, like Zedekiah, had their eyes put out, and were laden and bruised with chains of iron. Isa 61:1. Reginald Fuller's Preaching the Lectionary (1984):  To be posted. William Baird, Interpreter's Commentary, 1971:  To be posted. J. McNicol, The New Bible Commentary, 1954:  To be posted. I.H. Marshall, The New Bible Commentary, 1970:  To be posted. David Guzik, Study Guide: To be posted. Chuck Smith, Study Guide: To be posted. Catechism of the Catholic Church: To be posted. J. Norval Geldenhuys, Bible Expositor, 1960: To be posted. Abingdon Bible Commentary (1929): To be posted. D.D. Whedon, Commentary on Luke, 1866: To be posted. Joseph Parker, People's Bible, 1901: To be posted. Anchor Bible: To be posted. The Fourfold Gospel:  Because he anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor. Anointing was the method by which prophets, priests, and kings were consecrated or set apart to their several offices. This prophecy says that the Holy Spirit came upon Jesus because he was appointed to do a work of divine helpfulness.   Treasury of Scripture Knowledge: * Spirit. Ps 45:7; Isa 11:2-5; 42:1-4; 50:4; 59:21 * anointed. Ps 2:2,6*marg:| Da 9:24; Joh 1:41; Ac 4:27; 10:38 * to preach. Lu 6:20; 7:22; Isa 29:19; Zep 3:12; Zec 11:11; Mt 5:3; 11:5; Jas 2:5 * to heal. 2Ch 34:27; Ps 34:18; 51:17; 147:3; Isa 57:15; 66:2; Eze 9:4 * to preach deliverance. Ps 102:20; 107:10-16; 146:7; Isa 42:7; 45:13; 49:9,24; 52:2,3 Zec 9:11,12; Col 1:13 * and. Ps 146:8; Isa 29:18; 32:3; 35:5; 42:16-18; 60:1,2; Mal 4:2 Mt 4:16; 9:27-30; 11:5; Joh 9:39-41; 12:46; Ac 26:18; Eph 5:8-14 1Th 5:5,6; 1Pe 2:9; 1Jo 2:8-10 * bruised. Ge 3:15; Isa 42:3; Mt 12:20 Robertson's Word Pictures:  Anointed me (echrisen me). First aorist active indicative of the verb chriô from which Christ (Christos) is derived, the Anointed One. Isaiah is picturing the Jubilee year and the release of captives and the return from the Babylonian exile with the hope of the Messiah through it all. Jesus here applies this Messianic language to himself. "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me" as was shown at the baptism (Lu 3:21) where he was also "anointed" for his mission by the Father's voice (Lu 3:22). To the poor (ptôchois). Jesus singles this out also as one of the items to tell John the Baptist in prison (Lu 7:22). Our word Gospel is a translation of the Greek Euaggelion, and it is for the poor. He hath sent me (apestalken me). Change of tense to perfect active indicative. He is now on that mission here. Jesus is God's Apostle to men (Joh 17:3, Whom thou didst send). Proclaim (kêruxai). As a herald like Noah (2Pe 2:5). To the captives (aichmalôtois). Prisoners of war will be released (aichmê, a spear point, and halôtos, from haliskomai, to be captured). Captured by the spear point. Common word, but here only in the N.T. Set at liberty (aposteilai). First aorist active infinitive of apostellô. Same verb as apestalken, above. Brought in here from Isa 58:6. Plummer suggests that Luke inserts it here from memory. But Jesus could easily have turned back the roll and read it so. Them that are bruised (tethrausmenous). Perfect passive participle of thrauô, an old verb, but here only in the N.T. It means to break in pieces broken in heart and often in body as well. One loves to think that Jesus felt it to be his mission to mend broken hearts like pieces of broken earthenware, real rescue-mission work. Jesus mends them and sets them free from their limitations. William Burkitt's Notes: No comment on this verse. Family Bible Notes: No comment on this verse. 1599 Geneva Bible Notes: No comment on this verse. People's New Testament Commentary: No comment on this verse. Albert Barnes' Commentary: The Spirit {m} of the Lord is upon me. Or, I speak by divine appointment. I am divinely inspired to speak. There can be no doubt that the passage in Isaiah had a principal reference to the Messiah. Our Saviour directly applies it to himself, and it is not easily applicable to any other prophet. Its first application might have been to the restoration of the Jews from Babylon; but the language of prophecy is often applicable to two similar events, and the secondary event is often the most important. In this case the prophet uses most striking poetic images to depict the return from Babylon, but the same images also describe the appropriate work of the Son of God. Hath anointed me. Anciently kings and prophets and the high-priest were set apart to their work by anointing with oil, 1Ki 19:15,16; Ex 29:7; 1Sa 9:16, &c. This oil or ointment was made of various substances, and it was forbidden to imitate it, Ex 30:34-38. Hence those who were set apart to the work of God as king, prophet, or priest, were called the Lord's anointed, 1Sa 16:6; Ps 84:9; Isa 45:1. Hence the Son of God is called the Messiah, a Hebrew word signifying the Anointed, or the Christ, a Greek word signifying the same thing. And by his being anointed is not meant that he was literally anointed, for he was never set apart in that manner, but that God had set him apart for this work; that he had constituted or appointed him to be the prophet, priest, and king of his people. See Barnes for Mt 1:1. To preach the gospel to the poor. The English word gospel is derived from two words--God or good, and spell, an old Saxon word meaning history, relation, narration, word, or speech, and the word therefore means a good communication or message. This corresponds exactly with the meaning of the Greek word -- a good or joyful message--glad tidings. By the poor are meant all those who are destitute of the comforts of this life, and who therefore may be more readily disposed to seek treasures in heaven; all those who are sensible of their sins, or are poor in spirit (Mt 5:3); and all the miserable and the afflicted, Isa 58:7. Our Saviour gave it as one proof that he was the Messiah, or was from God, that he preached to the poor, Mt 11:5. The Pharisees and Sadducees despised the poor; ancient philosophers neglected them; but the gospel seeks to bless them--to give comfort where it is felt to be needed, and where it will be received with gratitude. Riches fill the mind with pride, with self-complacency, and with a feeling that the gospel is not needed. The poor feel their need of some sources of comfort that the world cannot give, and accordingly our Saviour met with his greatest success among the poor; and there also, since, the gospel has shed its richest blessings and its purest joys. It is also one proof that the gospel is true. If it had been of men, it would have sought the rich and mighty; but it pours contempt on all human greatness, and seeks, like God, to do good to those whom the world overlooks or despises. See Barnes for 1Co 1:26. To heal the brokenhearted. To console those who are deeply afflicted, or whose hearts are broken by external calamities or by a sense of their sinfulness. Deliverance to the captives. This is a figure originally applicable to those who were in captivity in Babylon. They were miserable. To grant deliverance to them and restore them to their country -- to grant deliverance to those who are in prison and restore them to their families--to give liberty to the slave and restore him to freedom, was to confer the highest benefit and impart the richest favour. In this manner the gospel imparts favour. It does not, indeed, literally open the doors of prisons, but it releases the mind captive under sin; it gives comfort to the prisoner, and it will finally open all prison doors and break off all the chains of slavery, and, by preventing crime, prevent also the sufferings that are the consequence of crime. Sight to the blind. This was often literally fulfilled, Mt 1:5; Joh 9:11; Mt 9:30, &c. To set at liberty them that are bruised. The word bruised, here, evidently has the same general signification as broken- hearted or the contrite. It means those who are pressed down by great calamity, or whose hearts are pressed or bruised by the consciousness of sin. To set them at liberty is the same as to free them from this pressure, or to give them consolation. {m} Isa 61:1 {n} "heal" 2Ch 34:27; Ps 34:18; 51:17; 147:3; Isa 57:15 {o} "recovering" Ps 146:8; Isa 29:18 Jamieson-Faussett Brown:   To have fixed on any passage announcing His sufferings (as Isa 53:1-12), would have been unsuitable at that early stage of His ministry. But He selects a passage announcing the sublime object of His whole mission, its divine character, and His special endowments for it; expressed in the first person, and so singularly adapted to the first opening of the mouth in His prophetic capacity, that it seems as if made expressly for this occasion. It is from the well-known section of Isaiah's prophecies whose burden is that mysterious "SERVANT OF THE LORD," despised of man, abhorred of the nation, but before whom kings on seeing Him are to arise, and princes to worship; in visage more marred than any man and His form than the sons of men, yet sprinkling many nations; laboring seemingly in vain, and spending His strength for naught and in vain, yet Jehovah's Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and be His Salvation to the ends of the earth (Isa 49:1-26, &c.). The quotation is chiefly from the Septuagint version, used in the synagogues. Spurgeon Devotional Commentary:  No comment on this verse. Adam Clarke's Commentary: The Spirit of the Lord] This is found in Isa 61:1; but our Lord immediately adds to it Isa 42:7. The proclaiming of liberty to the captives, and the acceptable year (or year of acceptance) of the Lord, is a manifest allusion to the proclaiming of the year of jubilee by sound of trumpet: see Le 25:9, &c., and the notes there. This was a year of general release of debts and obligations; of bond-men and women; of lands and possessions, which had been sold from the families and tribes to which they belonged. Our Saviour, by applying this text to himself, a text so manifestly relating to the institution above mentioned, plainly declares the typical design of that institution.-LOWTH. He hath anointed me] I have been designed and set apart for this very purpose; my sole business among men is to proclaim glad tidings to the poor, &c. All the functions of this new prophet are exercised on the hearts of men; and the grace by which he works in the heart is a grace of healing, deliverance, and illumination; which, by an admirable virtue, causes them to pass from sickness to health, from slavery to liberty, from darkness to light, and from the lowest degrees of misery to supreme eternal happiness. See Quesnel. To those who feel their spiritual poverty, whose hearts are broken through a sense of their sins, who see themselves tied and bound with the chains of many evil habits, who sit in the darkness of guilt and misery, without a friendly hand to lead them in the way in which they should go-to these, the Gospel of the grace of Christ is a pleasing sound, because a present and full salvation is proclaimed by it; and the present is shown to be the acceptable year of the Lord; the year, the time, in which he saves to the uttermost all who come unto him in the name of his Son Jesus. Reader! what dost thou feel? Sin-wretchedness-misery of every description? Then come to Jesus-He will save THEE-he came into the world for this very purpose. Cast thy soul upon him, and thou shalt not perish, but have everlasting life. Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary: No comment on this verse.

Quotes & Notes on:     Luke 4:21   John Wesley,  Notes On the New Testament (1755): By what you hear me speak. Reginald Fuller's Preaching the Lectionary (1984):  To be posted. William Baird, Interpreter's Commentary, 1971:  To be posted. J. McNicol, The New Bible Commentary, 1954:  To be posted. I.H. Marshall, The New Bible Commentary, 1970:  To be posted. David Guzik, Study Guide: To be posted. Chuck Smith, Study Guide: To be posted. Catechism of the Catholic Church: To be posted. J. Norval Geldenhuys, Bible Expositor, 1960: To be posted. Abingdon Bible Commentary (1929): To be posted. D.D. Whedon, Commentary on Luke, 1866: To be posted. Joseph Parker, People's Bible, 1901: To be posted. Anchor Bible: To be posted. The Fourfold Gospel:  No comment on this verse. Treasury of Scripture Knowledge: * This day. Lu 10:23,24; Mt 13:14; Joh 4:25; 5:39; Ac 2:16-18,29-33; 3:18 Robertson's Word Pictures:  And he began to say (êrxato de legein). Aorist ingressive active indicative and present infinitive. He began speaking. The moment of hushed expectancy was passed. These may or may not be the first words uttered here by Jesus. Often the first sentence is the crucial one in winning an audience. Certainly this is an arresting opening sentence. Hath been fulfilled (peplêrôtai). Perfect passive indicative, stands fulfilled. "Today this scripture (Isa 61:1,2, just read) stands fulfilled in your ears." It was a most amazing statement and the people of Nazareth were quick to see the Messianic claim involved. Jesus could only mean that the real year of Jubilee had come, that the Messianic prophecy of Isaiah had come true today, and that in him they saw the Messiah of prophecy. There are critics today who deny that Jesus claimed to be the Messiah. To be able to do that, they must reject the Gospel of John and all such passages as this one. And it is no apocalyptic eschatological Messiah whom Jesus here sets forth, but the one who forgives sin and binds up the broken-hearted. The words were too good to be true and to be spoken here at Nazareth by one of their own townsmen! William Burkitt's Notes: No comment on this verse. Family Bible Notes:  This scripture; the scripture which he had just read, and which he said was that day fulfilled, was written more than seven hundred years before, and strikingly described his character and work as the Messiah. 1599 Geneva Bible Notes: No comment on this verse. People's New Testament Commentary:  By the preaching to which they were now about to listen. Albert Barnes' Commentary: This scripture. This writing, or this part of the Scriptures. Fulfilled. It is coming to pass; the thing originally intended by it is about to be accomplished. In your ears. In your hearing; or you hear, in my preaching, the fulfillment of this prophecy. It is probable that he said much more than is here recorded, but Luke has preserved only the substance of his discourse. This was the amount or sum of his sermon, or his explanation of the passage, that it was now receiving its accomplishment. Jamieson-Faussett Brown:  His whole address was just a detailed application to Himself of this and perhaps other like prophecies. Spurgeon Devotional Commentary:  No comment on this verse. Adam Clarke's Commentary: No comment on this verse. Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary: No comment on this verse.

Additional Notes   Jesus understands his own mission as fulfilling the ancient prophecy. - William Baird, Interpreter's One-Volume Commentary, p. 680 The works of God are the accomplishment no only of his secret word, but of his word revealed;  and it will help us to understand both the scriptures and the providences of God to compare them one with another. Matthew Henry, Commentary, Vol. 5, p. 625 Fulfillment in your hearing does not guarantee acceptance. Wayne A. Meeks, HarperCollins Study Bible, p. 1963 Here is a beautiful gradation, in comparing the spiritual state of men to the miserable state of those captives who were not only cast into prison, but, like Zedekiah, had their eyes put out, and were laden and bruised with chains of iron. John Wesley, Notes Upon the New Testament, Vol. 1, on vs. 18

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