The Lord’s jubilee is the age of grace that we are presently in. Christ has returned us to God so God could now be our possession. We are now all his prodigal sons who have lost our possession and have returned to Him. Having sold ourselves to sin because of our poverty, we now have come home. We realize that in our own strength in the flesh, we cannot meet the righteous requirements of the law. It leaves us only in poverty. It is demeaning and senseless, like feeding pigs. However, because we have sold ourselves to sin, we are now under the bondage of sin. Sin had taken us captive. Sin tells us we can hold the book up in the air against gravity ourselves because we have the knowledge of good and evil. (Please refer to the previous blog and blogs for the references. I have deliberately left the common references for this passage out as it could be placed after every phrase in this passage.) Sin tells us we can keep the law by our own strength without God…But we can’t. No matter how hard we try, eventually we fail. That is the law of sin within us all. You see, keeping the law was not something we were supposed to know. The knowledge of what is good and what is evil is something for God to discern in His holiness. It is distinct from us who are made of the flesh. We don’t have the ability to carry it out, to follow the laws in our flesh. Apart from Him, we can do nothing. We need to return to God as our possession.
When God is returned to us as our possession, we have been filled to all His fullness. As Christ comes to dwell in us, He holy nature becomes a part of us. He dwells within us with His divine life and gives us His life so we may have it abundantly. We had all been blinded by sin thinking we could reach holiness ourselves without His divine life dwelling in us. He came “to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.” (Isa. 42:7) Sin had blinded us to think we could do all things in ourselves. We were enslaved to sin, imprisoned sitting in darkness. We were blind but now we see. For the life in us “is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint; and to him who has no might He increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up on wings of eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.’ (Isa. 40:28-31). When we rely on our flesh, even youths will faint and fall exhausted and drop the book. But when we rest in the Spirit and wait on Him who dwells within us, our strength will be renewed and we shall mount up on wings of eagles and take flight in the resurrection life as the dove flying into the open field. We are freed by the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and of death. We can run and not be weary; we can walk and not faint.
When we walk based on the strength of our flesh, we faint and are powerless against sin. It is a law. In our flesh, realize we are one of “a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed” (John 5:3) who are waiting to be healed (see John 5). We have been here for a long time, lame and unable to walk according to the laws of God based on the efforts of our flesh. Then in the age of the jubilee, Jesus said to us, “Do you want to be healed?” (John 5:6) “Get up, take your bed, and walk.” (John 5:8) When Christ tells us to walk, we walk by his Spirit within us. Jesus equates this ability to freedom from sin. “Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, ‘See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.’” (John 5:16) We were lamed in our ability to keep the law. Christ has set us free when we walk by his power, the power of the Spirit. This is how Christ is working today. “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” (John 5:17)
God is very busy today. The Father, the Son and the Spirit are working to transform us into His image. He is working within us to express Himself out from us. That is why we can all say, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” (Gal. 2:20) Realize He came by being incarnated as a man, lived a human life on this earth and went to the cross to die for us so our sins could be forgiven. By dying for us, He met the righteous requirements of the law so He released the life-giving Spirit and returned to us to be our possession. When we possess God in our spirits, He expresses Himself through our bodies (flesh). Just like the bronze serpent lifted up on a cross, He was made like sin, in the form of flesh, yet He had no sin, no poison within Him. We today are like Him, in this body of flesh on the outside, but with God and His holiness on the inside. Realize our lameness and weakness in our flesh has been healed. The lamed man, in his flesh, was healed so he could walk by the Spirit who is the reality of the laws of God. All our deficiencies of our flesh are healed when Christ comes to be our possession. “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. For waters break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become like a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water…And a highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Way of Holiness, and the unclean shall not pass over it. It shall belong to those who walk on the way, even if they are fools, they shall not go astray…but the redeemed shall walk there. And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing, everlasting joy shall be upon their heads, they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.” (Isa. 35:5-10) We have found the Way of Holiness. It is Christ as our possession. Christ heals the brokenness in our flesh restoring our bodies to holiness. We are on the highway of Holiness. Realize we have been ransomed by the Lord and have return to Zion, to the house of God, singing with everlasting joy upon our heads, obtaining gladness and joy. We have Christ as our possession, our jubilee.
Today, God is building His house through us. Each one of us is a temple containing God, possessing Him. Collectively, we form the house of God. That is why, “In my Father’s house are many abodes; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself, so that where I am you also may be. And where I am going you know the way. Thomas said to Him, Lord, we do not know where You are going; how can we know the way? Jesus said to him, I am the way and the reality and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:2-6 – Recovery Version) In the Father’s house we are the many abodes. He went to the cross to prepare a way for us so He could abide in us as our possession. In turn, we are His for His possession as He was preparing the place for us to be received into Himself. He is the only way to the Father because we cannot be one with Him unless we are holy. So no one comes to the Father except through Christ.
Through Christ, the Father does His works. “The Father who dwells in Me does His works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves. Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in My name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in My name, I will do it.” (John 14:10-14) Realize it is the Father who dwells in the Son that is doing the works. Today, the fullness of God has come to live within our spirits. Christ is no longer limited in time and space. He has multiplied Himself into a vast number of people by entering into man to make those who believe all sons of God because they contain Him. From one Son, God now has many sons like the sand of the sea. “Yet the number of the sons of Israel will be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the place where it is said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ it will be said to them, ‘You are the sons of the living God.’” (Hos. 1:10) The covenant He established with Abraham and the sons of Israel has now reached the Gentiles in His second covenant when Christ returned to us as our possession. Realize though God established the first covenant with Abraham, the Bible refers to the children of Israel, and not the children of Abraham, as God’s chosen people. The reason was that the sons of Hagar, the bondservant of Abraham, was not counted as God’s chosen people. Because Sarah was so old, they thought that she could never conceive and tried to help God out so Abraham would have children through Hagar. Realize man’s efforts to help God through the flesh created immense difficulties for himself…even up to this day. We need to rest in God on His Sabbath and learn to do no labour in our flesh relying solely on His promise. This promise today is the Holy Spirit. “In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.” (Eph. 1:13-14) The Spirit in us has gone through incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension and now has come back to us to be our promise sealing us in Him. He sealed us with the Spirit as a pledge that we will inherit God as our possession. “So much the more also Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.” (Heb. 7:22) We are in this better covenant that is opened to all people including Hagar’s descendants. “For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.” (2 Cor. 5:4-5) While we are in the flesh, in this tent that the Word “tabernacled” in (John 1:14 – Recovery Version), we groan and are stilled burdened. We do not divest ourselves of these mortal burdens, that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed. We need to do all things well still in our bodies through the Spirit, but the desires of the flesh no longer hold us as captives. We no longer have idols. An idol is anything other than God that holds us captive. We are no longer enslaved to the things of the flesh so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by the divine life. Things on this earth no longer enslave us as we rest in Him, taking Christ as our possession. Realize the Spirit has become a guarantee of this.
The Spirit in us lives out God’s holiness in our bodies. When we ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we internalized a knowledge that was in the realm of God. We knew what is good, but we were not given the ability to carry out what we knew. With Christ as our possession making a home in our hearts, we have gained the ability to follow our conscience through Christ living in us. That is why we need to do everything to the best of our abilities in this world. His holiness inside makes us righteous outside so we can follow our conscience. We no longer add new laws to our knowledge of good and evil. Knowing better or worse is no longer important, as we have learned to be content, learning the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. (Phi. 4:11-14) We no longer struggle to obey our conscience. “Pray for us; we are convinced that we have a clear conscience and desire to conduct ourselves honorably in all things.” (Heb. 13:18) That is why the law is spiritual. “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.” (Rom. 7:14) Obeying the law now does not come from us, but from Christ living in us. That is why disobedience is equated with unbelief.
After the children of Israel were delivered out of Egypt, through the many signs God showed Pharaoh, and having crossed the Red Sea in such a miraculous way, they continued to complain and rebel. “For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.” (Heb. 3:16-19) Disobedience is equated with unbelief. If we don’t belief that Christ is now our possession, we will work in our flesh, becoming disobedient so we will not enter into His rest. Realize triumphing over sin is believing He is living inside of us.
In the jubilee, we have gained Christ as our possession and we have been freed from sin so Christ lives out of us. As Christ lives out of us, realize His righteousness will abide by the commandments and follow our conscience. If we sin, realize it is because of our unbelief.
“Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?” (2 Cor. 13:5) Christ in you is the most important reality for man to recognize. It makes Him our possession and us His possessions. That is how the house of God is built.
Why? The Divine Revelation 