UNROLL
Dawn over the hill village of Nazareth in Galilee: a small cluster of flat-roofed fieldstone houses on a limestone ridge, terraces and olive trees below, smoke rising from one cooking fire.

New heavens and earth

Isaiah 61

What would good news sound like to you today?

11 verses≈ 3 minBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

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Where we are

  1. 1–5Zion on trialJudah’s sin, the mountain raised, the vineyard’s song
  2. 6Holy, holy, holyIsaiah’s call, in the year King Uzziah died (about 740 BC)
  3. 7–12ImmanuelAhaz’s fear, the sign, the Child, the shoot of Jesse
  4. 13–23The nations judgedBabylon to Tyre: the LORD is Judge of all the earth
  5. 24–27The whole earthThe earth laid waste, and death swallowed up
  6. 28–35Woe and a KingEgypt’s help or the LORD’s, and the King in His beauty
  7. 36–39Hezekiah’s crisisSennacherib, 701 BC: the prayer, the sickness, the envoys
  8. 40–48Comfort My peopleTo the exiles ahead: Cyrus, the idols, the Servant
  9. 49–55The Servant and ZionPierced for our transgressions; Zion restored
  10. 56–66New heavens and earthA house of prayer, the Anointed One, all things newChapter 61

The Year of the LORD’s Favor

The Servant

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me,

because the LORD has anointed Me

to preach good news to the poor.

Isaiah 61:1

Tap to go deeper: meaning, history and related Scripture

The Servant
A rock-cut prison cell with its heavy wooden door standing open, daylight pouring in across the dark stone floor, a broken wooden stock lying aside, no one inside.

He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim liberty to the captives

and freedom to the prisoners,

The Servant
The Servant

to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor

and the day of our God’s vengeance,

to comfort all who mourn,

The Servant
On a stone threshold in morning light: a strip of coarse dark sackcloth and a small heap of gray ash pushed aside, and beside them a festive white linen headdress wound with a green garland and a small horn of oil.

to console the mourners in Zion—

to give them a crown of beauty for ashes,

the oil of joy for mourning,

and a garment of praise for a spirit of despair.

The Servant
The Servant

So they will be called oaks of righteousness,

the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified.

Question

Quick question

Jesus stood up in the synagogue at Nazareth, was handed the scroll of Isaiah and read from this chapter (Luke 4:16–21).

When Jesus read Isaiah 61 in the synagogue at Nazareth, where did He stop?

The Servant
Morning in a ruined Jerusalem street of the Persian period: a new course of squared stones set on an old foundation among the rubble, a wooden mallet and a mortar trough at rest, new flat roofs beyond.

They will rebuild the ancient ruins;

they will restore the places long devastated;

they will renew the ruined cities,

the desolations of many generations.

The Servant

Strangers will stand and feed your flocks,

and foreigners will be your plowmen and vinedressers.

But you will be called the priests of the LORD;

they will speak of you as ministers of our God;

you will feed on the wealth of nations,

and you will boast in their riches.

God

Instead of shame, My people will have a double portion, and instead of humiliation, they will rejoice in their share; and so they will inherit a double portion in their land, and everlasting joy will be theirs.

God

For I, the LORD, love justice;

I hate robbery and iniquity;

in My faithfulness I will give them their recompense

and make an everlasting covenant with them.

God
God

Their descendants will be known among the nations,

and their offspring among the peoples.

All who see them will acknowledge

that they are a people the LORD has blessed.

The Anointed One’s work

The Spirit onMe61:1a: anointedGood news,liberty61:1b: the poor, thecaptivesThe year offavor61:2: where JesusstoppedBeauty forashes61:3: oaks ofrighteousnessRuins rebuilt61:4–7: priests of theLORDA covenantforever61:8–9Clothed insalvation61:10–11

Whiteboard

Jesus read the first lines of this list in Nazareth and said, Today.

The Servant
On a festive striped wool cloth in lamplight: a bridegroom’s tall wound headdress of fine white linen and a long white linen robe folded beside it, and a bride’s simple gold and carnelian jewelry in a small open wooden box.

I will rejoice greatly in the LORD,

my soul will exult in my God;

for He has clothed me with garments of salvation

and wrapped me in a robe of righteousness,

as a bridegroom wears a priestly headdress,

as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.

The Servant
First light on a walled garden plot in the Judean hills: rows of seedlings just broken through dark watered earth, a stone water channel between them, dew on every leaf.

For as the earth brings forth its growth,

and as a garden enables seed to spring up,

so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise

to spring up before all the nations.

0:12

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

Pray

Pray

Lord GOD, You sent Your Anointed with good news for the poor and the brokenhearted. Give me beauty for ashes and a garment of praise for my despair. Clothe me in His righteousness, and make me an oak that shows Your glory. Amen.

You’ve experienced

Isaiah 61

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A verse to carry with you

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor.

Isaiah 61:1

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