Set Free

Intro

When I was a teenager a movie came out that was a huge success. So big, that it became a trilogy and they are in the works of supposedly making another one in the near future.

The name of this movie was The Matrix. The film shows a dystopian fallen world where people are held captive in chambers.

They are oblivious to the reality that they live in a fallen and broken world, ruled over by machines that use their life force as the power source for their technology. The people are oblivious to this reality because their minds are continually plugged into the Matrix, which is a computer-simulated reality.

Some humans have escaped or been set free, and one group of them, led by the character Morpheus, is searching for “the One.” The One has been foretold in prophecy to deliver humanity, setting them free from the rule of the machines.

And in the movie this idea of a savior-like character who is unlike any who have come before him has the power to fight back against the machines and unplug humanity from the Matrix, thus setting them free.

And you know what appeals to us about a messianic-type character? It’s this idea that someone will one day come and fix everything that is wrong with the world. And so we see these types of stories in popular culture.

And we wonder why they are so appealing, but as followers of the one true Messiah Jesus, we know it is because we have been created to be connected to our creator.

And since sin has disrupted that, a rescuer, or messiah was needed to make things right. Whether you are a follower of Jesus or not, the longing for that still exists, it is just that as fallen humans we can’t put our finger on what it is we are missing and so we see it illustrated in the things we create.

And we are so blind to it that we don’t even realize we are doing it. But it is true that there is something about the idea of a messiah or messianic prophecy that deeply appeals to the human psyche.

So today as we continue into part 4 of our Proclaim series we are going to take a look at another proclamation from the early church and see that one of the crucial elements of the early church’s proclamations was that Jesus is the Messiah.

Power in the Text

By Acts 13, the focus has shifted from Peter to Paul. Paul and his companions have arrived in Pisidian Antioch. On the Sabbath day, they attend a synagogue service. After reading Scripture, the leader invites them to speak, and so Paul gets up and addresses the congregation.

Fitting the context of Jews and gentile converts to Judaism, Paul steeps his message in the Scripture they know: the Old Testament. Paul goes over four important events in Jewish history, and his message culminates in a declaration of messianic hope.

Acts 13:16-20a NLT 16 So Paul stood, lifted his hand to quiet them, and started speaking. “Men of Israel,” he said, “and you God-fearing Gentiles, listen to me. 17 “The God of this nation of Israel chose our ancestors and made them multiply and grow strong during their stay in Egypt. Then with a powerful arm he led them out of their slavery. 18 He put up with them through forty years of wandering in the wilderness. 19 Then he destroyed seven nations in Canaan and gave their land to Israel as an inheritance. 20 All this took about 450 years.

Here we see Paul establishing God’s grace in the selection of Israel as His chosen people and his provision in leading them out of slavery and into the promised land

Acts 13:20 NLT “After that, God gave them judges to rule until the time of Samuel the prophet.

Then we see as an act of God’s grace he raises up these judges to lead Israel and to keep them oriented toward God.

Acts 13:21 NLT 21 Then the people begged for a king, and God gave them Saul son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, who reigned for forty years.

The judges weren’t good enough for the people of Israel and they wanted a king like the other nations around them. God warned them that they didn’t need a king for he was their King. Yet God gave them what they wanted.

Acts 13:22 NLT 22 But God removed Saul and replaced him with David, a man about whom God said, ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart. He will do everything I want him to do.’

Unfortunately God was right and Israel’s King fell away and turned his heart away from God. But again as an act of grace God gave them another King, but a better one.

And with each of these events, all of them had two things in common.

Each were an act of God’s grace,

and each demonstrated that it was God who did everything for Israel.

Paul goes on to describe an even greater act of grace when he says in...

Acts 13:23-25 NLT 23 “And it is one of King David’s descendants, Jesus, who is God’s promised Savior of Israel! 24 Before he came, John the Baptist preached that all the people of Israel needed to repent of their sins and turn to God and be baptized. 25 As John was finishing his ministry he asked, ‘Do you think I am the Messiah? No, I am not! But he is coming soon—and I’m not even worthy to be his slave and untie the sandals on his feet.’

Here is where Paul is getting to the point of his proclamation. That God had been faithful to Israel throughout the OT by providing for them and meeting their needs because he had a plan all along and that was to fulfill the deepest yearnings and needs of his people through a coming Messiah.

This is the one, he proceeds to point out, of whom John the Baptist testified. Keep in mind that John the Baptist was extremely well known; even in Acts 19, Paul encounters people in Ephesus who were followers of John the Baptist. So Paul uses John the Baptist as his launching pad from Old Testament Scripture to the Messiah Jesus.

The story of the Jewish people up to this point was not an easy one. Often times because of their own sin and rebellion, but regardless of the reason, it was a difficult journey for them as a people.

The Jewish people knew bondage and oppression well. Whether is was external political and economic oppression by occupying kings and rulers, or an internal self imposed religious legalism.

First-century Jews needed relief from both. Paul came preaching a dying and rising Messiah who would free people from inner bondage so they could cope with external oppression.

It was the promise of a Messiah that kept them going when it seemed like God had forgotten about them. It was the hope of liberation that allowed them to keep moving forward as a people.

That’s what the Jews were experiencing under Roman rule as they yearned for the Messiah who would set them free both physically (from their military oppressors) and spiritually as a Jewish kingdom would be established. Paul makes it clear that the freedom Jesus brings is different, but also more powerful.

In the very next point, Paul really drives home the power of this promised liberation:

Acts 13:38-39 NLT 38 “Brothers, listen! We are here to proclaim that through this man Jesus there is forgiveness for your sins. 39 Everyone who believes in him is made right in God’s sight—something the law of Moses could never do.

Paul here is proclaiming a salvation where we are justified by faith in Jesus and not by what we do. This is radical and liberating! The division between clean and unclean that guided the life of observant Jews was never enough to make them acceptable to God, and so they still had to perform sacrifices of cleansing, sin offerings, purification rites and so forth.

Jesus lived the perfect life for us and then took the curse of God upon himself when he was crucified. Why did he do this?

Because, like the Jews, all of humanity past, present, and future is living in bondage. Bondage to sin and its deadly effects.

The Jewish people believed their bondage was in their external circumstances. But they failed to see that the real bondage was something they could not see or fight.

Likewise, people today have tried to come up will kinds of ways to find peace and relief from the things that enslave us. The problem is that we are trying to find our freedom in ways that only enslave us further.

Only Jesus, the promised Messiah can set us free and fulfill the deepest yearnings of our soul.

True freedom is not the ability to do whatever I want. Because doing whatever I want is a form of slavery. We are enslaved to our flesh and sinful desires.

No, true freedom is the ability to live our lives in alignment with our creator’s will. Something that sin prevented us from being able to do. True repentance was impossible until Jesus rose from the dead.

Now when we repent, it isn’t just a desire to do better. We actually have been set free to have the power to actually do better. That is freedom. That is liberation!

As I close, I want us to notice their reaction to Paul’s proclamation...

Acts 13:42 NLT 42 As Paul and Barnabas left the synagogue that day, the people begged them to speak about these things again the next week.

Can you imagine this? People hearing the truth of God’s word and it cutting so deep into their souls that they were begging, pleading to hear more.

And here we are in the 21st century complaining because we might not be able to sleep in as much as we would like on a Sunday morning because we have to go to Church.

Or we have to be enticed to show up for a Bible Study because we are too busy to be bothered with it.

If the music isn’t just right, or the atmosphere isn’t just right, or the preacher isn’t just right then it isn’t worthy of my time.

As long as it doesn’t interfere with my life and what I want and my plans… They were begging!

I don’t know what’s oppressing you today? I don’t know what you are hoping for that Jesus can satisfy? But what I do know is that Jesus can set you free and be your hope.

Come to him and believe. That was Paul’s message and it is still true today. Come to him and believe, but not on your terms. As a beggar who has nothing to lose and everything to gain.