13.05 Redemption

13 - Jubilee; Section 5

REDEMPTION

Incorporated into the law of Jubilee is a second law known as the law of Redemption. Very few Christians are aware of the fact that Redemption is closely associated with Jubilee. Many confuse the two terms, but the truth is that though they are related, Redemption and Jubilee are not the same thing at all. They accomplish the same end, but do not work the same. The law of Redemption is given in the same chapter we have under consideration, Leviticus 25. "If your brother has become poor and has sold some of his property, if any of his kin comes to redeem it, he shall be allowed to redeem what his brother has sold. And if the man has no one to redeem his property, and he himself has become more prosperous and has enough to redeem it, then let him count the years since he sold it and restore the over-payment to the man to whom he sold it, and return to his ancestral possession. But if he is unable to redeem it, it shall remain in the buyer’s possession until the Year of Jubilee, when it shall be set free and he may return to it. And if a sojourner or stranger with you becomes rich, and your Israelite brother becomes poor beside him and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner with you, or to a member of the stranger’s family, after he is sold he may be redeemed; one of his brethren may redeem him. And if he is not redeemed during these years and by these means, then he shall go free in the Year of Jubilee, he and his children with him" (Leviticus 25:25-28; Leviticus 25:47-48; Leviticus 25:54, Amplified). The prefix "re" in "re-deem" means "again" (as in re-copy, re-wash, re-write). The main part of the word is from a root that means "to purchase, to buy." Redeem means to re-purchase or to buy back. Perhaps the best illustration of redemption that we have in modern life is the transaction that takes place in a Pawn Shop. A pawnbroker is a person who lends small sums of money on articles of clothing, watches, jewelry, and other belongings that are left with the pawnbroker as security. The articles that are left are pawned. The pawnbroker has the right to sell these articles, if the loan is not repaid with interest and charges within a certain time after the debt becomes due. When you pawn something you get a piece of paper called a pawn ticket. This ticket has a date on it, usually one year from the day you got it. If you pay the loan or the interest on it within a year, the pawnbroker cannot sell the valuable thing you pawned. The pawnbroker usually limits the loan to the amount that he or she could get by selling the article. The sum is generally less than the article is worth to the borrower. For this reason, pawnshop customers do not usually regard the transaction as a sale of their goods. In most cases, the customers pay back the loan with interest and redeem their property. In effect they have bought back the property from which they were alienated.

It was a long time from one Year of Jubilee to the next. If a man lost his property shortly after a Jubilee, there was the possibility that he would not be alive to enjoy it the next time a Jubilee came around. So God made another provision for the recovery of the land and of slaves. A person who leased out his land could get it back before Jubilee if he so desired. He could repossess it any time he wanted it by canceling the lease and refunding a fair prorated amount to the person to whom he had leased it. If the land had been seized by creditors, a rich relative was able to redeem the property if he was willing to do so, and then the land could be restored to the original owner. If the owner had been sold into slavery he, too, could be redeemed by a near-kinsman. This is the law of the kinsman-redeemer. In the event that no kinsman had been able to redeem the land, and the former owner was unable to do so, it remained alienated until the Year of Jubilee. At that time it automatically reverted back to its former owner or heirs.

"If your brother be waxen poor, and have 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" (Leviticus 25:25). The Hebrew says, "The redeemer thereof, he that is near unto him, shall come and redeem it." The Hebrew word for "redeem" is GOEL and is the term applied to the kinsman to whom pertained the right, according to very ancient custom, of redeeming lands, houses or persons. The GOEL was required to be the nearest blood relation. If this person was unable to redeem, then the relative next in line as kin could become the kinsman-redeemer. The story of Ruth and Boaz is the Bible example of this ancient custom. Boaz redeemed the estate of the deceased Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, by marrying Ruth, the widow of one of Elimelech’s sons. There was a kinsman nearer in relation than Boaz, but he chose not to be redeemer, and this left the way open for Boaz, who was next in line to become the kinsman-redeemer. The person sustaining the office of kinsman-redeemer was a beautiful figure of our Lord Jesus Christ, who assumed our nature that He might become OUR KINSMAN-REDEEMER. In Israel, if an Israelite fell into poverty, then he had to sell himself. He had to sell his services, his labor, his very life to another. And to whomsoever he sold himself, that one became his master. His own brother, or a stranger, if he sold himself to a stranger, became his master. Now we, through the infirmity of our fleshly nature sold ourselves into sin. And that "stranger" who possessed us was the devil himself. "... and that they may recover themselves from the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will" (2 Timothy 2:26). We became the servants, the slaves, the captives of the devil whether we liked it or not, and he owned us, until Jesus came and bought us back, redeemed us.

We know that we came into this world, born in sin and shapened in iniquity, being debtors to the law, we were enslaved by the law of sin and death. Therefore sin owned us and controlled us and we were the servants of sin. Our inheritance was lost and we were in hopeless bondage. Brethren who could not redeem themselves had to be redeemed by a kinsman who had the power of money to buy them when they were slaves or servants of another. We could not redeem ourselves from under the law of sin and death, we could not ransom ourselves from the power of the devil, therefore we have a near kinsman who came and had the wherewithal to purchase us, that we might be released from our slavery to the devil and enter again into the inheritance or lot or position in God which was given us in Christ before ever the worlds were created or the ages framed. We are the brother that dwells by our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the rich brother, we are the poor brother. We waxed poor and had to be sold. But He bought us, He paid the price for our freedom from slavery, for "you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that through His poverty might be rich" (2 Corinthians 8:9) Hallelujah! The expression, "If any of his kin come to redeem it," implies the necessity for willingness on the kinsman’s part; and it points at the same time very naturally onward to HIM who is so often spoken of as "coming to redeem" us. "The redeemer shall come to Zion," says Isaiah, using the name GOEL kinsman-redeemer. He Himself said in eternity, "Lo, I come!" "Blessed is He that comes" - the kinsman, the Goel, that comes to restore our possession. And Job’s hope becomes fruition, "I know that my redeemer lives, and shall stand on the earth at the latter day." "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." Our Saviour needed to be our kinsman in order to possess a right to offer the price of redemption. Hence, He took on our very nature, and was "bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh" (Ephesians 5:30). "Forasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same" (Hebrews 2:14). And by becoming thus related to us, He has the right, which He will enforce, of fully redeeming those He so loved. How glorious our prospect - how sure our redemption, spirit, soul and body, as well as our inheritance, when our Redeemer is such an one as would become our kinsman in very love to us! He loved "the children", His younger brothers; and since they had flesh and blood, lo! therefore, He must out of love insist on taking the same. And it is done. He is born of Mary of Nazareth, yet continuing holy, harmless, undefiled. He is feeble, and needs to be swaddled in swaddling clothes, and to lean on a mother’s breast; and now so evidently and truly is God manifest in flesh that one could write - "There is no God but He, Who lay upon His mother’s knee And suck’d the Virgin’s breasts."

Truly He is our kinsman! He is the "mighty man of wealth" in Bethlehem and "in Him is strength" to reinstate the impoverished one in possession of an inheritance that has been lost, praise His wonderful name!

You have read what the scripture says of Moses: "This Moses whom they refused, saying, Who made you a ruler and a judge? the same did God send to be a ruler and A DELIVERER by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush" (Acts 7:35). We find that this word "deliverer" is the same Greek word which in its various forms is translated ransom, redemption, redeem, and redeemed. The question follows, How was Moses a deliverer, a redeemer, or a redemption-price for Israel in Egypt? Did Moses pay a price to Pharaoh for Israel’s redemption? Did he promise Egypt anything in return for allowing Israel to leave? Absolutely not! Moses paid Egypt exactly NOTHING. And yet, he was a redeemer and redemption for Israel! It was his own life which he poured out for Israel, it was the freely giving of his life to Israel which led them up out of the house of bondage. When Jesus Christ became our redemption He didn’t have to pay redemption money to God. He didn’t take His blood and say, "Here, God, is a price for the people." Nor did He go to satan, and say, "Here, satan, is a redemption-price, now you let God’s people go." NEVER! He, like Moses, poured His life out and freely gave it to the people. "I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I WILL GIVE FOR THE LIFE OF THE WORLD. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh, and drinks My blood, has eternal life. For My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. As the living Father has sent Me, and I live by the Father: so he that eats Me, even he shall live by Me" (John 6:51; John 6:53-57). We are the ones who are receiving the redemption money, and receiving of His life we are able to get up and leave the filth of the world behind, and walk in the higher realms with Him. In the natural the redemption price was paid to the slave owner or creditor; and it will clearly be seen that God operates by the same principle once we understand that that which had us bound was in very fact something inherent within ourselves. Ah, the law of sin and death works within, the carnal mind operates within, and the devil himself is but a figure for the bestial spirit of this world which sits enthroned within the very nature and heart of man. People have painted satan as a huge, ugly, impish personage with horns, bedecked with a red suit, having a long pointed tail and carrying a pitchfork. In our minds he belongs in dark pagan jungles where frenzied worshipers hysterically practice devil worship. He belongs in ancient voodoo ceremonies where primitive peoples offer human sacrifices to appease his anger. He belongs to the Garden of Eden, spoiling life for Adam and Eve; to the Judean wilderness, tempting Jesus; to Berlin during the 1930’s and early 1940’s, possessing and using Adolf Hitler, masterminding history’s great atrocities. Certainly satan is present in the above-listed activities. But may I hastily add that he is not present there one whit more than he has been in your life and mine. The pen of inspiration truthfully recorded the fact that "You has He quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins: wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience" (Ephesians 2:1-2).

Ah, yes, this evil spirit is IN MAN! On the very day of Adam’s sin the voice of God brought this message to the serpent in Eden: "Because you have done this, you art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon your belly shall you go, and dust shall you eat all the days of your life" (Genesis 3:14). When the serpent was lowered into the dust realm, man became the base of operation for his activity, which activity is limited to the realm of the flesh. "Dust you art, and unto dust shall you return," the Lord told Adam in the same conversation. The dust man is the serpent man. "The first man was from out of the earth, made of dust - earth-minded; the second Man is the Lord from out of heaven. Now those who are made of the dust are like him who was first made of the dust - earth minded; and as is the Man from heaven, so also are those who are of heaven heaven minded. And just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, so shall we and so let us bear also the image of the Man from heaven" (1 Corinthians 15:45-49, Amplified). I do not hesitate to declare to you, beloved, that you will find satan operative in NO OTHER REALM except the fleshly nature of man anywhere in the whole vast universe! You do not need to worry about the devil stealing the keys to your car and driving off with it. But you may have to worry about THE DEVIL IN MEN doing so! You need not fear the devil breaking into your home at night and blowing your brains out. But THE DEVIL IN MEN has done so many, many times. The devil as a spirit being will never try to seduce your wife, but THE DEVIL IN SOME MAN may surely attempt it. Betimes it has even been THE DEVIL IN A PREACHER! I must tell you frankly that I have not had any trouble with that terrible devil out there someplace; but I have had a great deal of difficulty with that devil I behold when I look in the mirror! That ancient serpent slithers about in the lowest realms of man’s earthiness, in the crooked thoughts, perverted desires, and unbridled emotions of the carnal nature, in all the corrupt motions of the flesh. Within man lies the seat of satan. We have been the captives of a power within us, slaves to our own bestial nature. So Christ did not pay a ransom to God in heaven, nor to the devil in hell, in order to redeem us and gain our release. Rather, He gave His life and poured it into us that the transcendent power of His Spirit within might break asunder the bands that bind us. Victory over the carnal mind is gained only by putting on the precious mind that was in Christ Jesus. Victory over the flesh is wrought alone by the mighty power of the Christ-life within. HE GIVES OF HIS LIFE TO US WHO ARE IN BONDAGE, AND THEN WE HAVE THE VITALITY AND STRENGTH TO ARISE AND RETURN TO FATHER’S HOUSE TO CLAIM OUR INHERITANCE. We cannot do it on our own, we are weak and helpless, fettered by the shackles of sin and shame, but when He gives of His life, and fills us with His strength, then through Him we are able to rise up and return. Praise God, His life is given as redemption TO US, so that, as the apostle says, "Of Him are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us ... REDEMPTION" (1 Corinthians 1:30).