In Luke 4 Jesus goes to His hometown of Nazareth and
teaches in the synagogue. He reads from the book of Isaiah, “The Spirit of the
Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to proclaim good news to the poor.
He sent Me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the
blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the
Lord’s favor.”
Jesus
is proclaiming at the beginning of His earthly ministry what His ministry would
be all about.
In
Luke 7 John the Baptist hears the reports about Jesus and he sends two of his
disciples to ask Jesus if He is the Messiah.
Jesus
responds, “Go tell John what you have seen and heard; the blind receive their
sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are
raised up, the poor have good news preached to them.”
Jesus
is saying, “I am fulfilling what the Father sent Me to do”. Jesus lets what He
is doing, His action, show the world who He is.
The
church needs to see this as the example that we are to follow.
The
church needs to be empowered by the Spirit to help the bind receive their
sight. The physically blind and the spiritually blind.
2
Corinthians 4:4
In
their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to
keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is
the image of God.
People
don’t naturally know God. People don’t come into the world with a knowledge of
God. People are unblinded by what they say. They come to see the truth, see
Jesus, who is the truth when they see Jesus in us.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is living the truth so that people can see
Jesus and allow Jesus to transform them by enabling them to see and believe.
The
church needs to be empowered by the Spirit to help the physically lame and the
spiritually lame to walk.
Galatians
5:16
But
I say walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
God
will heal those who are spiritually lame when the church shows them how to walk
by the power and guidance of the Spirit daily.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is walking by the power and guidance of the
Spirit daily so that others can see Jesus and learn to walk with Him.
The
church needs to be empowered to cleanse the physical and spiritual lepers. Leprosy
has a lot in common with sin.
Leprosy
and sin both start small but end up affecting the whole person.
Leprosy
and sin both separate (leprosy separates from people and sin separates from
God).
Leprosy
and sin both contaminate (leprosy our bodies and sin our spirits).
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is being cleansed from sin and helping others
to come to experience Jesus’ blood cleansing them from sin.
The
church needs to be empowered to enable the physically and spiritually deaf to
hear.
Romans
10:17
So,
faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of God.
People
are transformed by the word of God so our speech needs to be filled with the
word of God and our lives need to be filled with the word of God.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is filling our speech and our daily lives with
the word of God.
The
church needs to be empowered to enable the dead to rise.
Ephesians
2:1-2
And
you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following
the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the
spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.
Every
person that has not come to faith in Jesus is spiritually dead because of our
sin. Jesus through His death paid for our sins, and our faith in Jesus makes us
alive. The church is to proclaim that truth in our words and our actions.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is proclaiming that life is found in Jesus.
The
church needs to be empowered to proclaim good news to the poor.
The
word poor here is the same word Jesus uses in Matthew 5:3. It means bankrupt.
The church has good news to share with the morally bankrupt, the spiritually
bankrupt, and the hope bankrupt.
Raise
the Roof and Remove the Walls is sharing the good news of Jesus’ love with
those who have no hope.
Jesus
is the head of church and what He did we as the church are to do.
Doing
What Jesus Did, Raising the Roof and Removing the Walls,
Joe
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