The ‘favor of the Lord’ (ratzon la’Adonai in Hebrew) is a recurring refrain in the Kingdom symphony conducted by the great Jewish sage from Nazareth, Rav Yeshua – the Rabbi, Jesus. We first hear its melody in the angelic voices proclaiming the birth of Israel’s promised King, Messiah Jesus: ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests’ (Luke 2:14).
We hear it again in the record of Jesus’ first sermon, at the synagogue in Nazareth: ‘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 freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour’ (Luke 4:18-19). Here the text is taken from Isaiah 61:1-2 (‘to release the oppressed’ is an allusion to Isaiah 58:5-6). Jesus chooses it as the haltarah (concluding) reading following the Torah (the Pentateuch – five books of Moses) portion for that Sabbath.
To the rapt attention of His hometown audience, Jesus opens the Isaiah scroll and creatively and emphatically declares that He is the one spoken of by the prophet – the Anointed One or Messiah – and that at the heart of His Kingdom agenda is the extending of the ‘favour of the Lord’ to all who would receive Him. Yeshua emphasises the latter point by suddenly stopping his reading in mid-sentence. In the original, Isaiah 61:2 reads: ‘…to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favour and the day of vengeance of our God…’
Jesus stops after reading ‘the Lord’s favour’, hands the scroll to the attendant and sits down. He refuses to read the last phrase about God’s judgment – something many in Nazareth and elsewhere in Israel were eagerly expecting the Messiah to execute against their Roman oppressors. That Messianic task will come with the apocalypse of the last days. For now, the Kingdom will advance through redemptive acts of kindness, comfort, deliverance, salvation and sacrificial acts of love, even toward our enemies.
The Kingdom of God advances when we do the will of our Father in heaven by keeping his commands. The great summarising principle of the Torah as taught by Yeshua is the command to love God (Deuteronomy 6:5) and one another (Leviticus 19:18). Indeed, for Jesus, acts of love, kindness and charity toward our neighbour (made in the image of God) are the necessary and truest ways we love God. This is why the two commands essentially are one (Galatians 5:14).
As followers of the Rabbi from Nazareth we continually benefit by the Lord’s favour. Surely our actions should reveal His favour to others, especially the Jewish people. One important way is to help them return to the land of the Israel from where they have been scattered to!
Dwight A. Pryor
Founder and President of the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies in the USA, www.jcstudies.com Dwight was a speaker at the 2006 Operation Exodus UK Conference.