28 When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."
Here Jesus is encouraging all of His faithful disciples – “stand up and lift up your heads” – look heavenward in faith and hope with great joy when these things begin to take place because our redemption is near. We have no need of fear. We have been redeemed by the precious blood of the Lamb. The word translated “redemption” in our verse for today is from the Greek word “Apolytrosis” meaning “to release on payment of ransom, redeem; redemption, ransom, liberation, manumission, the act of redemption, the freeing of a slave through payment or ransom. Of spiritual redemption, the rescuing of captives (sinners) from captivity (sin) through the payment of a ransom for them, that is, Christ’s death. Deliverance from sin results in freedom.” Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible New Testament Lexical Aids.
I am reminded of Paul’s words to the believers in Colosse:
12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. 13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Col 1:12-14 (NIV)
Freedom – no longer slaves to sin but slaves to righteousness. John tells us in his gospel:
34 Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. John 8:34-36 (NIV)
Paul gives us more insight into our freedom in Christ in Romans:
16 Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey--whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. 18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. Romans 6:16-18 (NIV)
“The first thing I must be willing to admit when I begin to examine what controls and dominates me is that I am the one responsible for having yielded myself to whatever it may be. If I am a slave to myself, I am to blame because somewhere in the past I yielded to myself. Likewise, if I obey God I do so because at some point in my life I yielded myself to Him. If a child gives in to selfishness, he will find it to be the most enslaving tyranny on earth. There is no power within the human soul itself that is capable of breaking the bondage of the nature created by yielding. For example, yield for one second to anything in the nature of lust, and although you may hate yourself for having yielded, you become enslaved to that thing – lust is “I must have it now” – whether it is the lust of the flesh or the lust of the mind. No release or escape from it will ever come from any human power, but only through the power of redemption... Yielding to Jesus will break every kind of slavery in any person’s life.” Oswald Chambers
“Has Christ brought life and immortality to light? Then look unto him and live. Is there redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins? Then throw all thy guilt upon his atonement. Has he blotted out the hand-writing of ordinances that was against thee? Then shake off self-righteous dependences, and legal fears also. Did he die for thy sins? Then let his goodness and love lead thee to unfeigned repentance; let the sense of thy sins break thine heart, but encourage thy hope in the gospel.” K.H. Von Bogatzky