[Leviticus 25] The Jubilee Mentality: Stewarding the Commanded Blessing. In this chapter, God instructs Moses regarding the protocols for total deliverance of the people of God. The preparation for the Promised Land did not take place in the land surrounded by milk and honey. The preparation for reigning takes place while the enemy yet thumbs his nose at God’s people. When we think victory is a matter of supreme effort and sacrifice, God brings His Sabbath rest and Jubilee into our lives. In this session, we will see the protocols for victory and ruling and reigning that must be implemented in our life while we are yet to enter the full provisions of His promise.
[Lev 25:1-55 KJV] 1 And the LORD spake unto Moses in mount Sinai, saying, 2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye come into the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath unto the LORD. 3 Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof; 4 But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard. 5 That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed: [for] it is a year of rest unto the land. 6 And the sabbath of the land shall be meat for you; for thee, and for thy servant, and for thy maid, and for thy hired servant, and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee, 7 And for thy cattle, and for the beast that [are] in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat. 8 And thou shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times seven years; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. 9 Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth [day] of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. 10 And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout [all] the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. 11 A jubile shall that fiftieth year be unto you: ye shall not sow, neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather [the grapes] in it of thy vine undressed. 12 For it [is] the jubile; it shall be holy unto you: ye shall eat the increase thereof out of the field. 13 In the year of this jubile ye shall return every man unto his possession. 14 And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbour, or buyest [ought] of thy neighbour’s hand, ye shall not oppress one another: 15 According to the number of years after the jubile thou shalt buy of thy neighbour, [and] according unto the number of years of the fruits he shall sell unto thee: 16 According to the multitude of years thou shalt increase the price thereof, and according to the fewness of years thou shalt diminish the price of it: for [according] to the number [of the years] of the fruits doth he sell unto thee. 17 Ye shall not therefore oppress one another; but thou shalt fear thy God: for I [am] the LORD your God. 18 Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety. 19 And the land shall yield her fruit, and ye shall eat your fill, and dwell therein in safety. 20 And if ye shall say, What shall we eat the seventh year? behold, we shall not sow, nor gather in our increase: 21 Then I will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it shall bring forth fruit for three years. 22 And ye shall sow the eighth year, and eat [yet] of old fruit until the ninth year; until her fruits come in ye shall eat [of] the old [store]. 23 The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land [is] mine; for ye [are] strangers and sojourners with me. 24 And in all the land of your possession ye shall grant a redemption for the land. 25 If thy brother be waxen poor, and hath sold away [some] of his possession, and if any of his kin come to redeem it, then shall he redeem that which his brother sold. 26 And if the man have none to redeem it, and himself be able to redeem it; 27 Then let him count the years of the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to whom he sold it; that he may return unto his possession. 28 But if he be not able to restore [it] to him, then that which is sold shall remain in the hand of him that hath bought it until the year of jubile: and in the jubile it shall go out, and he shall return unto his possession. 29 And if a man sell a dwelling house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a whole year after it is sold; [within] a full year may he redeem it. 30 And if it be not redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house that [is] in the walled city shall be established for ever to him that bought it throughout his generations: it shall not go out in the jubile. 31 But the houses of the villages which have no wall round about them shall be counted as the fields of the country: they may be redeemed, and they shall go out in the jubile. 32 Notwithstanding the cities of the Levites, [and] the houses of the cities of their possession, may the Levites redeem at any time. 33 And if a man purchase of the Levites, then the house that was sold, and the city of his possession, shall go out in [the year of] jubile: for the houses of the cities of the Levites [are] their possession among the children of Israel. 34 But the field of the suburbs of their cities may not be sold; for it [is] their perpetual possession. 35 And if thy brother be waxen poor, and fallen in decay with thee; then thou shalt relieve him: [yea, though he be] a stranger, or a sojourner; that he may live with thee. 36 Take thou no usury of him, or increase: but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee. 37 Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase. 38 I [am] the LORD your God, which brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, [and] to be your God. 39 And if thy brother [that dwelleth] by thee be waxen poor, and be sold unto thee; thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bondservant: 40 [But] as an hired servant, [and] as a sojourner, he shall be with thee, [and] shall serve thee unto the year of jubile: 41 And [then] shall he depart from thee, [both] he and his children with him, and shall return unto his own family, and unto the possession of his fathers shall he return. 42 For they [are] my servants, which I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: they shall not be sold as bondmen. 43 Thou shalt not rule over him with rigour; but shalt fear thy God. 44 Both thy bondmen, and thy bondmaids, which thou shalt have, [shall be] of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and bondmaids. 45 Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that [are] with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession. 46 And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit [them for] a possession; they shall be your bondmen for ever: but over your brethren the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigour. 47 And if a sojourner or stranger wax rich by thee, and thy brother [that dwelleth] by him wax poor, and sell himself unto the stranger [or] sojourner by thee, or to the stock of the stranger’s family: 48 After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him: 49 Either his uncle, or his uncle’s son, may redeem him, or [any] that is nigh of kin unto him of his family may redeem him; or if he be able, he may redeem himself. 50 And he shall reckon with him that bought him from the year that he was sold to him unto the year of jubile: and the price of his sale shall be according unto the number of years, according to the time of an hired servant shall it be with him. 51 If [there be] yet many years [behind], according unto them he shall give again the price of his redemption out of the money that he was bought for. 52 And if there remain but few years unto the year of jubile, then he shall count with him, [and] according unto his years shall he give him again the price of his redemption. 53 [And] as a yearly hired servant shall he be with him: [and the other] shall not rule with rigour over him in thy sight. 54 And if he be not redeemed in these [years], then he shall go out in the year of jubile, [both] he, and his children with him. 55 For unto me the children of Israel [are] servants; they [are] my servants whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt: I [am] the LORD your God.
Moses and the children of Israel were still in the wilderness when God began to prepare them conquest and total victory in the Promised Land. We tend to deal with life’s problems in the immediacy of the urgent, but God is always taking the long view because the struggle that is at hand in your life is just a footnote in the breakthrough that he is about to accomplish in your behalf. You will come into the land. You will overcome. Notice that God’s promise was not IF, but WHEN you come into the land that when you come into the land of your promise. If Moses and the people of God had a sure promise under the fading glory of the law of sin and death, even so, you and I have a sure promise under the unfading glory of the law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus. When they came into the land of promise, they were expected to work six years and, in the seventh year, allow the land to rest. Six is the number of man, and it means you do what you can do, and let God do what He can do. How many times has God’s blessing come into people’s lives, and they take it and bring themselves to the point of exhaustion just managing the blessing that God gave?
God’s purpose and high priority when he answers your need and green lights all of your prayers is to bring you to a place of rest. Resting and ruling are not mutually exclusive one to another, where the purposes of God for your life are concerned. Yes, there is obligation, and there is responsibility, but there is a time that God declares the Jubilee and establishes a season of freedom and liberty financially, physically, relationally and in every area of life that represents the conflict and bondage of the enemy and illegitimate authority that attempts to lock you down and keep you from walking in the kingdom and walking in blessing and freedom.
In v. 10 we see that the people were to proclaim liberty every fiftieth year. Liberty is something that has to be proclaimed. Jesus, when he stood up in the synagogue and declared the acceptable year of the Lord, he was doing so in the face of the hypocrites and the Pharisees and the Sadducees who had not celebrated the Jubilee because they were unwilling to take their expectations off of the people but chose rather to grind the faces of the poor. God wants you to have your year of Jubilee. God wants return, restoration, and blessing to be your portion. The Jubilee and the concept of Jubilee is not some archaic process, but it is a season of liberty that God will enforce even upon the modern economies of man. God will not allow you to struggle and sacrifice without coming into your place of release. Release is your portion; release is the sure season of God that descends upon the person who determines to put their trust in God above all else and know that even though man may criticize and man may threaten and the enemy rattle his saber, liberty will surely come by the hand of God and freedom will mark your life and not bondage.
In v. 22 mention is made of special instructions regarding every eighth year. The eighth year represented a year of a new beginning. The numerical value of Jesus’ name is 888. When God saved Noah and his family in the flood and gave them a new beginning, they numbered eight altogether. There is a portion of blessing both naturally and spiritually that God has given to you before the foundation of the world was laid and though it be taken from you or maybe it was taken in your bloodline before you were ever born, but the Lord has declared there will come a return and there will come a redemption both of the blessings of natural things upon the earth and the inheritance of spiritual values as well. God is a God of redemption and restoration and renewal; he will not allow his promise to go unredeemed in your life. We must come to the place of rest and expectation by cooperating with him and knowing that as we obey him and do what we can do, He’s going to rise up and do what he can do and establish us in our going out and our coming in and seeing to it that we have what God has promised.
In v. 35, we see the mandate to relieve those who are less fortunate. What you make happen for others, God will make happen for you. If you oppress those that are unable to defend themselves, God will take that personally. If, on the other hand, you purpose to be a blessing to those who are undeserving, those who cannot do for themselves who cannot repay you who come to you for relief, then God will open the windows of heaven and see to it that when the enemy is ranged round about you tries to make merchandise of you in ways from which you cannot defend yourself He will be your defender.
The idea and the concept of Jubilee is something that God expects us to defend not only for ourselves but on behalf of those around us who cannot stand up for their own rights. When you see someone, who has sold themselves into a difficult situation, we must be prepared to be agents of deliverance, agents of redemption, to get involved and speak liberty and speak freedom even when we stand not to gain by doing so. God rejoices when you are willing to put yourself in the crosshairs of your neighbor’s enemy. He wants you in every circumstance and in every situation to make yourself a part of the solution and not part of the problem in the lives of those around you, even when there is nothing in it for your benefit.
The Jubilee is sacred. The sad fact of the matter is that God’s people seldom celebrated the Jubilee, and because of that, God allowed them to go into captivity. When the prophets asked of the Father why Israel was brought into captivity, he pointed to the fact that there were 70 jubilees that were not celebrated among God’s people because of the refusal to let the people go out of the bondage of debt and indentured servitude. Just as the people of God in the Old Testament suffered unnecessarily because they were not willing to allow their fellow Hebrews to go free, even so, we should uphold and champion the precept of the Jubilee to speak liberty and freedom to the captives with the authority that heals sick bodies, raises the dead cleanses the lepers and cast out devils. In so doing, we not only bless others but open the door for God to do likewise in our own lives.
