ROAD TO REDEMPTION 1: Palm Sunday
Sunday, April 5, 2020
Pastor Troy Brewer, OpenDoor Church, Burleson, TX
“When it comes time, The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”
– Mark Twain
THIS IS THE FIRST OF THREE PARTS. TODAY WE’RE GOING TO TALK ABOUT
What Redemption is and how redemption works.
What redemption changes and transforms.
The exchanging power of redemption.
How redemption interacts with time.
How God changes the timing of things influenced by relationship.
Redemption changes the order of things.
How redemption changes time, space and matter.
The benefits of redemption.
How we access redemption through faith.
If you are going to glorify the Lord, you need to have next-level understanding of what redemption is, how it works and what it does. Allow yourself to learn and appreciate redemption the way you would if someone gave you a giant mansion. Explore redemption and celebrate it. This segment will help you do that.
It’s the center theme of the entire Bible. It’s the prophetic story of heaven declaring to the glory of God. It’s what Jesus Christ came to bring and who He himself became: REDEMPTION
Redemption is the act of buying something back; paying a price; ransom; to return something to your possession.
Redemption is the English translation of the Greek word agorazo, meaning “to purchase in the marketplace.” In ancient times, it often referred to the act of buying a slave. It carried the meaning of freeing someone from chains, prison, or slavery.”
(Jack Zavada at ThoughtCo.com)
REDEMPTION CHANGES EVERYTHING. Not just over time, but for ALL time.
Psalms 103:12 – As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from you.
Time and space (distance) are in perfect continuum. When God says He has removed our transgressions from all distance, (East to west) He is also saying redemption overcomes all time, from the beginning to the end.
NORTH AND SOUTH HAVE AN ENDING POINT – THE POLES. EAST AND WEST HAVE NO ENDING POINT.
There is nothing created that redemption doesn’t change.
Redemption is what happens when Jesus steps onto any scene and has His amazing way. It’s what He brings every time to everything in time.
Redemption changes lost people to family, hated people to celebrated, wicked people to Holy. Redemption changes leprous bodies to perfect human specimens. Redemption brings enslaved people into freedom and transforms dead things into living things.
Through the transformational power of redemption, messed up minds become gifted for learning. Shameful and pitiful people become honored and confident.
I cannot tell you how much I love redemption.
Redemption changes ownership and when things move from the Kingdom of hell to the Kingdom of Heaven, the King of Kings gets to have His glorious dominion and his will on earth as it is in heaven.
Redemption is beautiful because our redeemer is beautiful.
Redemption is an awesome power God brings to the table. The power to buy back those of us enslaved isn’t bought with money. Redemption is when Jesus brings Jesus to the table.
Only Jesus could redeem us.
Psalms 49:6-9
Those who trust in their wealth
And boast in the multitude of their riches,
7 None of them can by any means redeem his brother,
Nor give to God a ransom for him—
8 For the redemption of their souls is costly,
And it shall cease forever—
9 That he should continue to live eternally,
And not see the Pit.
Redemption is the single-most wonderful and precious “thing” inside or outside the created universe.
It is the spotless and pure LIFE of Jesus Christ.
The blood is the life. (Leviticus 17:11)
His blood is the essence of His life and it was spent and poured out to pay the terrible price of our filth so we would no longer be slaves to sin.
1 Peter 1:18-19 – Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
THE REDEEMER BRINGS IT
At His very first sermon, Jesus quoted the prophet Isaiah and delivered His mission statement of bringing redemption.
Luke 4:18 – The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised…
When the Spirit of the Lord is upon you, that IS different than being with you or in you. The Spirit upon you is an anointing for a specific action to accomplish something or to do something amazing.
What was Christ, which means “anointed one,” anointed to do?
1. Reach the poor; people who had never been granted access, by redemption.
2. Heal the broken hearted; bring hope and love of life to people who had been broken, by redemption.
3. Set captives free by redemption.
4. Restore sight and understanding to the blind by redemption.
5. To set people free from the things that beat them up, or as the King James boys say, “to set at liberty them that are bruised.” Bruised is when you are beat up on the inside and wounded is when you are beat up on the outside.
All this by paying a price that only He could pay.
The New Bible Dictionary gives this definition
“Redemption means deliverance from some evil by payment of a price.”
Now think about that amazing definition for a bit. “Deliverance from some evil by payment of some price.”
It’s all about confronting the things that own us.
BUYING SLAVES
I run an organization called ANSWER INTERNATIONAL and in the past 38 months we have had the privilege of redeeming thousands of girls out of sexual slavery and restoring them to a life of freedom and hope.
I know something first-hand about the power of redemption.
This is what redemption does. After redemption makes it’s transaction, freedom, transformation and renewal will follow.
Take another biblical look at what redemption brings so you can learn to walk in the gifts the redeemer has given you.
THE EXCHANGE OF REDEMPTION
If redemption declares we are not guilty, that means none of the penalties of sin or lawlessness are allowed to chain us or enslave us. No shame, guilt or feeling the horrible dishonor of deserved judgement belongs to us once redemption comes.
Christ’s redemption has freed us from guilt, being “justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 3:24)
At the same time, another declaration is proclaimed. Redemption also declares we are worthy of the gifts, rewards and benefits of being holy.
The benefits of redemption include:
Eternal life (Revelation 5:9-10)
Forgiveness of sins (Ephesians 1:7)
Righteousness (Romans 5:17)
Freedom from the law’s curse (Galatians 3:13)
Freedom from guilt and shame (Romans 3:24)
Freedom from accusation (John 8:11)
Complete justification (Romans 3:24)
Adoption into God’s family (Galatians 4:5),
Deliverance from sin’s bondage (Titus 2:14; 1 Peter 1:14-18) Peace with God (Colossians 1:18-20) and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
To be redeemed, then, is to be forgiven, holy, justified, free, adopted, and reconciled. (Psalm 130:7-8; Luke 2:38; Acts 20:28)
You have to make a big deal out of redemption.
If you are going to have a true revelation of God’s heart toward you, you must have a true revelation of God’s gift and acts of redemption toward you.
Psalm 103:2 – Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits.
Redemption is the ultimate game-changer. Redemption is God’s plan for transforming all created things. Redemption is what Jesus brings when invited into place and it changes everything.
What this means to you:
If you can believe in the power of redemption, you can believe in the power of transformation.
The act of changing common well water into the best wine you ever tasted is exactly what an act of redemption looks like.
This, the very first miracle of the 34 biblically recorded miracles of King Jesus, shows us exactly what Jesus was supernaturally commissioned or anointed, to bring into our lives.
He changed something common into something extraordinarily marvelous. He changed a place and a time of sadness into place and time of great joy. He changed a situation from being not near enough into way more than enough.
He changed a shameful situation of lack and disappointment into a highly honorable situation of opulence and dreams coming true. And all this at the setting of a covenant wedding.
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