Chapter 31: Jesus' Mission Statement

How did Jesus understand his own ministry? His mission statement gives us a great clue!

The words “Mission Statement” conjure up pictures of a boardroom a whiteboard with a half formed sentence on it, and a room full of people arguing over the precise meaning of words so they can make sure the company’s mission statement precisely reflects what the company wants to accomplish. We do the same thing in churches when we want to “revision” the church and give it a new direction. One of the reasons we do this is because a carefully crafted mission statement helps us to evaluate whether a good thing is worth doing. For example, in my church, our guiding statement is “Helping people take the next step toward Jesus”. Theoretically at least, this helps us decide whether a new venture, a new ministry or some project is worth doing. If a new ministry helps us help people take their next step, then we want to support it. However, if something is a good idea, but doesn’t help us achieve our mission, we won’t pursue it.

Jesus had a mission statement too. He makes his mission statement clear in Luke 4 and it is the first thing Jesus did in his ministry. Jesus too, it seems, had a mission statement that would guide his ministry. His mission statement comes directly from the prophet Isaiah and he declared it to the world in Luke 4:16-21

Luke 4:16–21 CSB

16 He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. As usual, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read. 17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him, and unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written: 18 The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. 20 He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. And the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today as you listen, this Scripture has been fulfilled.”

This is the very first time Jesus speaks in the book of Luke and he makes a massive claim, quoting from Isaiah chapters 58 and 61. The thing Jesus wanted his hearers to understand is that he here claims to be the Messiah – the one who would come to set the captives free. He was telling everyone in the synagogue, that he would break the chains of the oppressed and heal people’s blindness (both physical and spiritual).

We should not miss how significant this is. This is the moment when the battle for dominion over the world,  between Jesus and Satan starts coming to a head. We have been waiting for this moment, ever since God’s promise to one day send someone to fix the sin problem, way back in Genesis 3.

When sin entered the world, the world broke in four very specific ways, that conveniently all start with the letter D. Death entered the world, disease started to spread, demonic oppression filled the Earth and dearth was the status quo. (Dearth, by the way, means to not have enough of something. I tried finding another D word to work with and this is the best I could do). As long as sin was around, you would have death, disease, dearth and demonic oppression.

So for Jesus to step out and say I am going to undo that, using the words of the prophet Isaiah is a massive thing! In effect he is declaring that he himself is the solution to the sin problem that started way back with Adam and Eve. This is his mission statement: I am going to undo these four things – Demonic Oppression, Disease, Dearth and Death. In Luke’s gospel, everything that Jesus does is guided by this mission statement.

Demonic Oppression

Right after declaring that he was here to undo the effects of sin, Jesus starts his ministry. How? By undoing the effects of sin, starting with demonic oppression. The very first captive Jesus sets free is a man possessed of a demon. We read this in Luke 4:31-37.

There we read of a man who has been possess by a demon who was part of the worshippers in the Synagogue. In those days there were people who made a living as exorcists, and this particular man may have been in the synagogue looking to be healed. The exorcists who lived at the time would use elaborate rituals to cast out demons, but in this passage Jesus proves that he has the power to set the captives free. Not by engaging in some elaborate ritual, but simply with the authority he had as God. As Jesus commands the demon to come out, the demon completely capitulates and Luke makes a point of showing us that the man was not harmed in any way.

Jesus freed the captives from demonic oppression.

Disease

The very next thing Jesus does, is he heals Simon’s mother in law. In this story Jesus enters Simon’s house, stands over the sick woman and rebukes the fever. She is instantly and completely healed. When the word about this miracle spreads, people from all around come to Jesus and he heals them all. The same power Jesus uses to cast out the demon is the same power that empowers him to cast out the sickness. Jesus shows us here that he ushers in freedom from demon possession and from sickness.

Dearth

One of the consequences of sin God gave Adam is that he would have to work hard. Work itself became cursed and God tells Adam: “You will eat bread by the sweat of your brow”. As a result the world turns from an abundant garden, into a dustbowl that needs cultivation to provide food. Famine and food shortages have existed ever since.

Jesus’ miracles start undoing this problem. Perhaps the most famous of these is the feeding of the 5000 where he feeds thousands from a few fish and a few loaves of bread. He makes gallons of wine out of water. Again and again he provides abundance for people, completely undoing the curse of sin in that regard. Perhaps it is for this reason that Jesus himself says in John 10:10 “A thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance”.

Jesus ushers in freedom from dearth.

Death

Throughout his ministry, Jesus brought several people back from the dead. There is the young girl in Matthew 9:18-26. The dead son of the Widow of Nain in Luke 7:11-17 and of course Lazarus in John 11:1-37. Each of these was another reminder of the power that Jesus had. He could even undo death – the very thing God had warned Adam and Eve of, should they eat the fruit.

Jesus had the power even to free people from death.

In each of these cases, Jesus showed us what his ministry was going to be about. He followed his own mission statement. But, there was more work to be done. Those he healed would get sick again, those he fed would get hungry again, and all three people he raised from the dead died again. Jesus’ miracles point us to his ultimate work. That work would still need to be done for the undoing of the curse of sin to “stick”. How would that happen? That is a story for next time…