By Francis Frangipane
All major companies have a vision or mission statement. A mission statement defines the primary purpose and direction of a corporation, what services or products it provides and who would likely be interested in their organization. Likewise, when Jesus began His ministry, He issued a sort of "mission statement" that explained the nature of His Father's business. He said,
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are downtrodden, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord" (Luke 4:18-19).
Liberating the human heart from oppression and spiritual incarceration is the mission statement of the Son of God. When Jesus declared He "must be about [His] Father's business," that specific business is to provide redemption of the lost and freedom to the imprisoned.
You say, "I want to serve God, but I am in bondage to sin. I am a captive of guilt, shame and condemnation." Good. You qualify. You are the type of person heaven is looking for. Even when we are enchained and trapped in our failures, held prisoners to demons too strong for us, Christ does not reject us. He does not come to condemn or punish, but to set us free.
You may be one who has never known God. Today, you find yourself trapped in addictions and fears beyond your ability to resist. Yet, according to the mission statement of heaven, you are exactly the type of person Christ came to find.
Or, you might be a pastor, knowledgeable of the Scriptures, serving in professional ministry for over 50 years, but do not love yourself. You can quote the Bible, but inwardly you are tormented by your personal short-comings. You desperately want to regain your spiritual health, but you don't know where to start, for you feel dead inside.
If you feel imprisoned inwardly, remember, Jesus Christ came to set captives free. This message is in your hands and you are reading it because Christ loves you and has come to rescue you! You may not sense it, but God's angels have been fighting a war with the devil for your soul. Indeed, Christ Himself has defeated the enemy on your behalf!
"Can the prey be taken from the mighty man, or the captives of a tyrant be rescued?" Surely, thus says the LORD, "Even the captives of the mighty man will be taken away, and the prey of the tyrant will be rescued; for I will contend with the one who contends with you, and I will save your sons" (Isaiah 49:24).
God desires wholeness and healing for our souls, even promising to "contend with the one who contends" with us. Our enemies may too strong for us, but they are not too strong for God. The Almighty is on our side; He will continue to fight our oppressors until we are free from the grip of hell upon our lives. Yes, the Holy Spirit corrects and disciplines us along the way, but He does so to transform our hearts and remove our vulnerability to Satan's attacks. Our rescue is at the center of God's heart.
The Desperate Find Help
Within the variety of ways God reveals Himself through Christ, remember this one truth: "The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil" (1 John 3:8). The war is not between you and God, but between God and the devil.
In verse after verse, Jesus makes it plain that He came to heal and redeem the wreckage wrought by Satan upon humanity. Remember, Jesus said of Himself that He came "to seek and to save that which was lost" (Luke 19:10); He assures us, "I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world" (John 12:47). Indeed, He says His primary mission field was not the "[self-] righteous, but sinners" (Matthew 9:13).
It is an amazing truth: the Son of God is seeking to save the very people most Christians seek to avoid.
Those highest on God's agenda are usually those lowest in society - people in bondage to sin and its consequences. In truth, He seeks the desperate, regardless of their outward status in life. The mission statement of heaven is to find these people, deliver them from sin and fear, and then pour into them the very heart of the Savior Himself. The mission statement of heaven is to seek and to find the lost.
