I’m looking at the start of the ministry of Jesus. In Luke 4:14 it says, ‘Jesus returned in the Power of the Spirit into Galilee, and there went out a fame of Him through all the region round about and He taught in their synagogues being glorified by all.’ He’s been baptised by John; and full of the Holy Spirit, He’s been led by the Spirit into the wilderness where He was tempted for 40 days by the devil! In v9, the devil takes Him to a pinnacle of the Temple, it’s the last of the temptations, saying, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down!” It was a challenge of course and Jesus resisted him, saying, “It is written, you shall not tempt the Lord your God.” There’s a big lesson here that we must be careful we don’t ‘tempt’ God in the wrong way by attempting to do something that is not in His Will for us. And the devil, having finished tempting Jesus, departs from Him – ‘for a time’!
That is very significant. The devil hasn’t left Him – only for a time.
So now Jesus returns from the wilderness, from being tempted, in the Power of the Spirit, and goes into Galilee. I want to emphasise: Jesus Himself NEEDED the Power of the Holy Spirit in order that He could fulfil His ministry. By v16, He arrives in Nazareth, His hometown where He grew up, and, as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and got up to read. They gave Him the book of Isaiah and He found the place where it is written, saying, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He – the Spirit of the Lord – has anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor, He’s sent Me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, the recovery of sight to the blind, and to set at liberty those that are bruised, and to preach the Acceptable Year of the Lord.” He closed the book and said, “Today, this Scripture is fulfilled!”
What He reads from Isaiah covers the whole of His ministry! For some of us, this is OUR ministry. It certainly is mine! I would say, as an evangelist, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, and for 75 years this has been my ministry. 75 years ago, He anointed me to preach the Gospel. To the poor, to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance, to heal, to set at liberty those that are bruised – and to preach the Acceptable Year of the Lord. In other words – JESUS IS COMING! This is the whole of the Gospel that we preach! And as I read the New Testament, I find that Jesus spends more time talking about His Kingdom than He does teaching about healing and salvation.
In Nazareth, v22, the people were intrigued by Him, but they knew Him, he grew up in there, with them. Isn’t this Joseph’s son? And they became so indignant, they tried to throw Him off the cliff on which the town was built! But of course, He passed through the midst of them and carried on His way down to Capernaum, v32, where again, they were intrigued and astonished at His doctrine – BECAUSE HIS WORD WAS WITH POWER!
There was an evidence of Power in His ministry! In Nazareth they rejected Him, yes, but He came into Galilee ‘in the Power of the Spirit’. He read from Isaiah, saying, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He has anointed Me!” Thank God for the Anointing and thank God for the Power of the Holy Spirit! If you want to be effective in ministry – I want to encourage you – you NEED the Anointing and Power of the Spirit!
I want you to understand that when we have the Anointing and Power of the Holy Spirit, when the Spirit of the Lord is on us, we have Authority. The reason I was able to do all those crazy things in the former Soviet Union under communism is because I have Authority – from the Holy Spirit! Even the hardened communists, my biggest opponents recognised the Authority that I had. We are Christ’s Ambassadors; in His Name we have ALL the Authority of HIS Kingdom through the Power of the Holy Spirit. Use it!