Isaiah 61: A Year And A Day

According to Luke 4:16-21, when Jesus was ready to initiate His public ministry, He chose to read from this section of Isaiah to announce the fulfillment of scripture.  The Messiah was at hand!  But Jesus also chose to abruptly stop reading at a specific point, perhaps giving us a further clue about His mission and what was to come.

Isaiah 61:1-2 states, "The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor [this is the point that Jesus stopped reading] and the day of vengeance of our God."

It seems fairly obvious to me why Jesus would share this prophecy as a sign of His impending ministry.  For the next several years, Jesus planned to go around doing exactly what the passage states.  He would be preaching good news to the poor and the oppressed of Israel.  He would be healing and encouraging the lost sheep.  He would be freeing people from captivity to sin, and illness, and demon possession, and death.  He would, in short, be proclaiming grace (i.e. the Lord's favor) throughout His ministry and ultimately upon the cross of Calvary.

Yet Isaiah's prophecy also goes on to talk about a "day of vengeance of our God" - and Jesus pointedly did not read that section.  Does this mean that the day of vengeance is cancelled?  No.  Instead, I think that it signifies Jesus' earthly ministry is to be all about ushering in the good news, the gospel, of God's favor and grace.  There will (still) be a time of judgment coming, but Jesus' first coming is focused on the reconciliation of God and human beings.

Even in realizing that there is a day of judgment coming, however, we find it tempered by God's mercy!  The extent of the Lord's favor?  The length of His grace?  Biblically speaking, that is reckoned as a year.  The time of His wrath and vengeance?  In comparison, that is but a day.

A year and a day.  A year of favor and a day of vengeance.  I'm glad it's this way and not the other way around!