Isaiah 61 Jesus at Nazareth after Baptism 9 18 26

1. The Sentence at the Edge of the Page#

Packet 1 ended with a sentence still open: “he hath sent me.” Isaiah does not present the Anointed One as a teacher who simply arrived with a useful idea. He is authorized, anointed, and sent.

Isaiah 61:1 — The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;

Luke 4:43 — And he said unto them, I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also: for therefore am I sent.

That sends the reader backward. Long before Nazareth, YHWH sent a man into a house of bondage with a command of release.¹

2. I Will Send Thee unto Pharaoh#

Exodus 3:10 — Come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt.

Exodus 3:12 — And he said, Certainly I will be with thee; and this shall be a token unto thee, that I have sent thee: When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain.

Moses is not self-appointed. The mission begins in the will and authority of the One who sends him. Then Moses asks the question of identity: when Israel asks the name of the One who sent him, what shall he say?

Exodus 3:13–15 — And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, The LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.

3. Sent to Demand Release#

Exodus 5:1 — And afterward Moses and Aaron went in, and told Pharaoh, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness.

Exodus 7:16 — And thou shalt say unto him, The LORD God of the Hebrews hath sent me unto thee, saying, Let my people go, that they may serve me in the wilderness: and, behold, hitherto thou wouldest not hear.

The English reader sees two ideas: Moses is sent, and Pharaoh is commanded to let the people go. In Hebrew, the relationship is even tighter. The verb shalach (H7971) is used for sending Moses and for sending or releasing the people.⁴

YHWH sends Moses → Moses confronts Pharaoh → Pharaoh is commanded to send / release YHWH’s people¹

The pattern is already larger than a messenger carrying information. The sending is directed toward release from another ruler’s grip. Yet the words still have to be kept precise.

4. Sent and Liberty Are Related — but They Are Not the Same Word#

Isaiah 61 uses shalach for “he hath sent me.” But the word translated “liberty” is deror (H1865), not shalach. The Exodus connection is therefore between sending and sending/releasing; it is not a claim that Isaiah’s word for liberty is the same word as “sent.”⁴

That precision makes the pattern stronger, not weaker. God sends the messenger; the messenger proclaims or demands release; the release itself has its own vocabulary and later its own legal structures.

5. From “I Will Send” to “A Man Sent from God”#

The sending language does not disappear when Exodus ends. Near the close of the prophetic writings, expectation is still framed with the words “I will send.”

Malachi 3:1 — Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.

Malachi 4:5 — Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:

Then John’s Gospel opens its public witness with another sent person.

John 1:6–8 — There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

John is sent, but he is not the Light. His mission is preparatory and testimonial. He points beyond himself.

John 1:29 — The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

The canonical movement is now visible without making every sent figure identical:

Moses sent → prophetic promise: “I will send” → John sent to prepare and testify → Jesus: “he hath sent me”¹

Jesus is not merely another Moses, Elijah, Joshua, or David. Each earlier servant performs a real but partial work. The Nazareth mission reaches toward deeper captivity: sin, death, darkness, estrangement, uncleanness, and lost inheritance.¹

Hebrews 3:1 — Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus;

The word “Apostle” means a sent one. Hebrews places that sent-one title beside High Priest. The two offices must not be collapsed, but their meeting in one Person matters.

Matthew 21:37 — But last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son.

Jesus’ vineyard parable gives the progression its sharpest form: servants are sent; then the son is sent. The Son is not simply one more servant in the sequence.

6. The Son Makes Free#

John 8 brings sending and freedom into the same conversation, and it identifies the bondage more deeply than Pharaoh ever could.

John 8:34–36 — Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.

John 8:42 — Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me.

John 8:56–58 — Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad. Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.

slavery to sin → the Son makes free → He did not come of Himself → the Father sent Him → Abraham saw His day → Before Abraham was, I AM¹

7. The King Arrives#

The Sent One also arrives inside Israel’s royal expectation. This matters because Isaiah 52 has already joined good tidings with the announcement, “Thy God reigneth.” The one sent with good news is not detached from kingship.

Zechariah 9:9 — Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass.

Psalm 118:25–26 — Save now, I beseech thee, O LORD: O LORD, I beseech thee, send now prosperity. Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the LORD: we have blessed you out of the house of the LORD.

Psalm 118 belongs to the Hallel, the collection of praise psalms in Psalms 113–118 associated with Israel’s festal praise. At Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, its language is placed upon Him.

John 12:12–13 — On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord.

John then explains that the crowd has also been stirred by testimony concerning Lazarus. The expectation is not floating free from signs; once again, testimony and visible work accompany recognition.

John 12:17–18 — The people therefore that was with him when he called Lazarus out of his grave, and raised him from the dead, bare record. For this cause the people also met him, for that they heard that he had done this miracle.

Daniel contributes a timed expectation of Messiah, but the present study does not need to claim that every person in the crowd independently calculated an exact day. Luke gives a safer and direct phrase: Jesus calls Jerusalem’s failure a failure to know the time of its visitation.¹

Luke 19:44 — And shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.

8. The Owner Never Lost His Title#

At this point the language of kingdom, freedom, and return could create a serious misunderstanding unless ownership is settled first. Scripture never presents creation as something God once owned and then lost to a rival.

Psalm 24:1 — The earth is the LORD’S, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.

Genesis 14:19 — And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth:

Genesis 14:22 — And Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have lift up mine hand unto the LORD, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth,

John 1:3 — All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

Colossians 1:16–17 — For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.

9. What Man Lost Was Delegated#

Genesis 1:26 — And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

Genesis 1:28 — And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

The language is gift and delegation. Image, blessing, fruitfulness, dominion, access, fellowship, and vocation are received. They are not independent title against God.

Psalm 8:5–6 — For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:

Genesis 3 then shows the breach: death enters, the ground is cursed for man’s sake, access to the garden is barred, and the human vocation now operates under fracture. God remains God. The human possession and vocation are what become damaged and alienated.²

10. The Covenant at Genesis 15#

Now Abraham’s story introduces a scene whose importance is easy to miss if it is read only as a promise of land.

Genesis 15:7–8 — And he said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?

The question is inheritance. YHWH answers with a covenant scene involving slain animals.

Genesis 15:9–10 — And he said unto him, Take me an heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not.

Genesis 15:12 — And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him.

Genesis 15:17–18 — And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates:

The text directly states that Abram is in a deep sleep, that the smoking furnace and burning lamp pass between the pieces, and that YHWH makes the covenant. The text does not say that Abram walks between them.²

11. The One Who Passed Between the Pieces#

The legal significance of the scene, as this study has developed it, can be stated in one sentence:

That does not mean that moral guilt becomes a moral quality inside God. Scripture will later insist upon the sinlessness of Christ even while saying that He bears the curse, bears sins, and bears the consequence owed by others. Covenant liability and personal moral corruption are not the same claim.²

Isaiah 53:11 — He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.

Galatians 3:13 — Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:

1 Peter 2:24 — Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.

Genesis 15 and these later passages are not the same text and should not be made to say more than they say. But once Scripture identifies Christ as the One who bears what others could not bear for themselves, Genesis 15 becomes a profound legal question: if God Himself has assumed the covenant consequence, how will that commitment be executed in history?²

12. The Question Has Become Legal#

Sent One → release from bondage → arriving King → Owner / Possessor → delegated human loss → covenant-bearer → How is restoration lawfully accomplished?³

The study has moved from mission into title, from title into ownership, and from ownership into covenant. That is the doorway into the next packet.

HOW CAN WHAT WAS LOST BE LAWFULLY RECOVERED — AND THEN LAWFULLY RESTORED?

Packet 3 follows that question.