Marcel: Alright, well my name is Marcel Hall and uh, uh, with my
wife Karina, we have the honor and privilege of being able to serve full
time in the ministry here and just so grateful for our church family.
So grateful for the church family that we have all across the globe, but so
grateful for the church family we have right here in North Orange County.
As I look around, I can see certain things, uh, that I connect with certain
people on, whether it's sports, even if we like different teams, like, you know,
my good friend Brian over there with this LA Dodgers hat, and, and, uh, even though
I'm an Angels fan, I, I, I still love him.
Still love him to death there.
You know what I'm saying?
Uh, we got, we have so many things and points of connection and, and whether it's
been through hard times where we've cried together, where we've laughed together,
uh, or whether we've served together.
So grateful for this spiritual family.
So grateful for the, uh, chance that my kids have.
To be a part of this spiritual family and to have you guys as uncles and aunties and
older brothers and cousins to look up to.
So thank you for, uh, being that for our family here.
Um, we had a great time as was mentioned, that there was.
Uh, last weekend, the, uh, international Campus Ministry Conference, which
was called Proclaim, and then we had the, uh, LA Jubilee take
place for the rest of us there.
And wasn't that a fantastic time?
And so whether you were there from Wednesday, like I was, or you only made
it on Sunday, how incredible was it again to be in there with a, a worship
service at the Anaheim Convention Center?
Over 5,000 people there, right.
I mean, that was so, it was so cool driving up and seeing, you know, the
name on the Anaheim Convention Center.
It's like, that's my church right there.
I even fired up about stuff like that.
I'm like, disciples are in the building.
You know what I'm saying?
And so it was so encouraging, so uplifting.
Uh, I know personally for me, minister to my soul, being able to see friends
for many years and being able to connect friends I haven't seen in years and
being able to connect right on the spot.
And just being able to, uh, remember and think about the connection that
we have and how we've helped each other to stay faithful in Christ.
And so it was a fantastic time and it was so cool to have, uh, uh, college
students from all across the country.
Uh, as well being able to, uh, be inspired and all of us in LA Church and
Pacific Southwest to be inspired by God.
And I know God ministered to many of us and he ministered
to me through the messages.
I know I'm inspired, uh, to be a better, a better father.
I'm always trying to be a better father, but man, I heard a message and I was
like, man, I still have a long way to go.
Amen.
And I was inspired to be a better minister.
I was like, man, I need to be the minister again.
Uh, that God wants me to be, to continue to become more and more like Jesus.
Amen.
And so don't know about you, but I know even talking on Wednesday for
our midweek, many of you share how God has been ministering to you and
how he's calling you, uh, to draw more and more to him in relationship
and to become more and more like him.
In character and in nature.
And so, uh, now we've had this experience.
We've had the ICMC, we've had the Jubilee, and we are called to proclaim
the Jubilee the year of the Lord's favor.
But here's my question for us today, the Jubilee.
Now what?
Now what we've had the ICMC, we've had the Jubilee.
We had a sermon series that led us to these great, phenomenal
conferences and where we looked at the heart of the Jubilee and
how God wants to reset his people.
He wants to release his people from what can hold his captive and how
he wants to restore what's lost.
And then we had this great experience, this mountaintop
experience this past weekend.
So now what,
so here's what I wanted you to do.
I want you to answer those questions, okay?
I want you amongst each other there in twos and threes.
And if you weren't here, uh, obviously you can't answer that question, but you can
receive some answers from those around us.
So let's go ahead and let's share with one another.
What do you believe now?
For us as a church and maybe for you individually coming from this
kind of season, if you will, or beginning of a season of a jubilee.
So let's go ahead and give you a couple minutes to share with each other.
And if you're online with us, you can go ahead and put on the chat there
whether YouTube, Facebook, put on the chat and we can share with one another.
What do we believe God wants?
After the Jubilee, we had a sermon series Jubilee.
Now what?
Okay.
Alright, so let's, uh, let's, let's, let's run this risk right here.
Let's go ahead and have a couple people share.
Uh, what do you believe now the jubilees happen?
We had a sermon series to prepare our hearts to understand what the Jubilee was
about and how Jesus fulfills the Jubilee.
And we've had this great time at the ICMC, the Jubilee.
Now what?
So let's go ahead and let's have a couple people share.
Now, here are some parameters.
It has to be brief.
So I know some of you, and I love every one of you, but some of you we know.
You wanna get up here for 30 more minutes and share?
That's not what we're doing right now.
That's not part of the answer.
Okay.
So, but we can have in one to two sentences brief but yet descriptive
and not two run on sentences, but one or two sentences being able
to share what do you believe as a church or you at individually.
We had the jubilee.
Now what?
You guys with me here?
Alright, so let's go ahead.
Let's have a couple people go ahead and share.
Okay.
All right.
Thank you.
A need for trust and to pray that God's will be done and not my own.
Okay, great.
Awesome.
All right, uh, let, let, let's go right here.
Okay.
Alright.
Allen said he feels like it's a call now to build relations and
my man signed up for the man camp.
Come on, let's go.
I signed up last week.
It's for the low, low price.
Did y'all see that?
$55.
That's good.
It's a low, low price right there.
I mean, you go to Chick-fil-A, you spending $55.
You know what I'm saying?
That's on one meal.
Or at least that's my family.
All right.
I saw it $70 the other day.
I said, we are never ordering drinks again.
You know what I'm saying?
So I'm sorry.
I'm just being vulnerable here.
If you here for the first time, this is my therapy.
All right.
There you go.
Alright.
Uh, Jane.
Yes.
Alright, thank you very much.
She talked about really the, the decision and the opportunity to
experience joy and not just happiness.
Okay.
Let's get a college student over here.
Okay.
All right.
Alright.
Who is that right there?
Go ahead.
Yes.
Okay.
Awesome.
Amen.
It was Sam, correct.
Yeah, so, so Sam, uh, said basically he feels the, the call to proclaim,
uh, the word, not just in Long Beach.
He's coming from Long Beach, but all across and other places.
And it sounds like you're moving to Orange County.
Oh, I'm already here.
Oh, you're already here.
Oh, cool.
Alright.
Maybe next week we'll have you up here for the new member spotlight.
All right.
There you go.
He's like, what's that?
Don't worry about it.
We'll tell you.
Okay.
Alright, so as we can see there's things individually, but remember
that God is ministers to us individually and he individual and
he ministers to us collectively.
And so he has a message for us collectively, and he
also has something for us.
Individually, and so now we've gone through a sea where we started something.
We read, okay, what was the jubilee?
What was God's heart behind the jubilee when he established it after
Moses led the people outta slavery and they were entering the promised land
and we saw how Jesus is the truth, fulfillment of the jubilee, then we've
had these great classes and conference.
So now what is God calling us to collectively?
I believe that God is calling us to be Jubilee People Living a Jubilee Life.
To be a jubilee people living the jubilee life.
And in fact, I believe that this season that really the, you know, the Jubilee
wasn't an event, it was a season.
It was a year in which God called for his people for a whole year to trust in him.
Yeah, for them to take a rest, for them to hit a reset button spiritually,
emotionally, and even physically, and for the land to hit a reset button.
And it was an opportunity that God wanted for his people to
release and also be released from things that could hold us captive.
And then God wanted this season where his people can restore what was lost.
And we see again that Jesus fulfills all of that.
And brings all of that to us.
And so every single day of our lives as a disciple of Jesus, we have the
opportunity to live a jubilee life.
Amen.
But God is reminding us, I believe, to be a Jubilee.
People living the Jubilee life and as the Orange County Church, and especially here
us in North Orange County, we wanna take the next several months and continue,
not an event, but a season where we can really dive more and more into this.
Reality that we can enjoy and experience of a reset of a release
of a restoration in which we can proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
So that's our plans here for the next several months.
Here is for us to do this, but this is the title of the lesson today,
Jubilee, people Living the Jubilee Life.
Can I go ahead and pray for us?
Father, thank you so much for allowing this to already be filled
up to even to hear what others have shared and how you administer to 'em.
I'm excited about these, uh, uh, things that you are doing in their lives
and the things that will be produced.
God, I pray right now as we look at a few scriptures that we are
reminded of truth and reality, that we allow nothing to get in our way
from hearing your voice this morning.
And Father, we pray that, that we can walk away with greater faith.
Greater trust and a greater faithfulness to you.
In Jesus name.
Amen.
Let's go ahead.
Let's go on over to Luke chapter four.
Luke chapter four.
Again, we're gonna have a couple reminders here, and so we're gonna
look at a couple of scriptures that many of us are very familiar with.
But what I want to ask of you as we look through these is to look
through the lens of a jubilee, people living a jubilee life.
You guys with me here?
So it's a fresh take here on some of these verses, but let's
be reminded that Jesus fulfills.
The Jubilee.
And a couple weeks ago we, we studied this out, but we'll read it again.
Luke chapter four, Luke was a doctor, he became a Christian, and he decided
I'm gonna do some interviews about Jesus and I'm gonna write this biography.
And it's a letter that he wrote to someone.
And he writes this, really, this biography capturing Jesus and his ministry.
So we take it up in chapter four in verse 16, talking about Jesus.
He says he went to Nazareth where he had been brought up.
And on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue as was his custom.
He stood up to read and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah
was handed to him, unrolling it.
He found a place where it is written.
The spirit of the Lord is on me because he is anointed me to
proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for
the blind, to set the oppressed free to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
And then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down.
The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fasting on him.
He began by saying to them, today this scripture.
Has been fulfilled in your hearing.
Jesus again, brought the true jubilee because he's the
embodiment of the jubilee.
He brought a reset and he still continues to bring a reset.
He released and he still continues to release and he restores as he did then.
And so we saw in his ministry, as we study out the gospels, we see his ministry.
Fulfill these things prophesied about here in Isaiah 61.
So let's take a quick snapshot, look at Jesus's ministry to see that not
only did he preach this, but he, again, he fulfilled this call in his life.
And we take it up in Matthew chapter nine, verse 35.
Brother and sister, are you still with me here?
Amen.
Well, Jesus went through all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues,
proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness.
When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were harassed and
helpless like sheep without a shepherd.
Then he said to his disciples, the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.
Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.
We get a snapshot of Jesus in his ministry and what's he doing?
He's proclaiming the good news again, that the Lord's favor is here.
Why?
Because the Messiah is here.
And he's healing and he's preaching.
Why?
Because he has compassion upon the people.
Things are being transformed.
Things are changing because lives are being changed.
Communities are being transformed by the word that Jesus brought, and
by his healing and his teaching.
That he brought to those who would hear and you say, well,
okay, well what happened after Jesus's death and resurrection?
Well, we take it up in Acts chapter two.
Again, a passage many of us are very familiar with, but
look at this again through the lens of Jubilee, people living.
The Jubilee Life.
Acts chapter two, again, is a really documenting what the church was like
after Jesus' resurrection and the Holy Spirit filled up every follower of Christ
and led the church to great things to transform the the ancient near East in
which will eventually transform all of.
The earth.
And so we take it up in Acts chapter two, verse 42, talking about the day
the church was, uh, right after the day the, the church was initially
inaugurated and, and started, and it says, this is a snapshot of what the
church was like in the first century.
They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and to fellowship, to the
breaking of bread and the prayer.
Everyone was filled with all of the many wonders and signs
performed by the apostles.
All the believers were together and had everything in common.
They so property and possession to give to anyone who had need.
Every day they continue to meet together in the temple courts.
They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and
sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people.
And the Lord added to their number daily, those who were being saved.
What happened here?
The church is established and what happens?
The church becomes a jubilee.
People.
Living the Jubilee life, they experienced the heart of the Jubilee through their
relationship with God, through Jesus.
They had a reset in their lives.
They had a release from their past and from their sin, and then a
restored view of who God really is in a restored relationship with God.
And so they have this, they experienced this, and not only did they join,
enjoy the Jubilee through Jesus, but they joined Jesus and bring
the Jubilee to their communities.
Amen.
They just didn't say, man, this is awesome to experience, but they went
out and brought the jubilee life to their surrounding communities,
and you see radical sharing.
Radical love, radical relationships.
What scholars believe is that as they came in, remember they're coming from
all across the known world at this time, and that 3000 of them got baptized.
So you have over now this new fellowship of over 3000 and many
people stayed there, and so they have, they need a place to stay.
Now they're living with their brothers and sisters who they
just met after their baptism.
That's some radical living right there, isn't it?
I like all of y'all, but I don't know if I can house all of y'all.
Some of y'all might eat my favorite snacks and we just can't have that.
You know what I'm saying?
But there's radical relationships to anyone who had need.
They sold property for one another, we gonna take care of you.
They enjoyed each other.
They didn't say they tolerated each other.
Did you catch that?
Yeah.
They said they enjoyed being around each other.
Beautiful.
They praise God.
There was a joyful unity met needs, and they help people get restored to God.
They help people find their true purpose and find their mission in life.
You know, the early church, they were Jubilee people, living the Jubilee life.
What should the church today be?
Should it be any different?
No.
So then let me ask you this question then, are we.
A Jubilee.
People living the Jubilee Life
question.
I want you to think about that for a second.
US right here.
Are we a Jubilee?
People living the Jubilee life?
Some of us would say no.
Am I right?
Yes.
Okay.
We, we heard a couple people like yes.
Someone say, yeah,
I ain't heard a couple people we're trying.
Here's what I would say.
I would say we are, I would say without a doubt that this group of people, those
of us who are disciples of Jesus, we are Jubilee people living a jubilee life.
Amen.
I believe that wholeheartedly we are, and this room is full
of people who have experienced a spiritual reset in their lives.
Amen.
Am I wrong?
No.
'cause most of you wouldn't be here if you hadn't had that experience.
Correct.
So many of us in here, we've experienced the spiritual resets.
Many of us have experienced being released and releasing others
from our past sin and past.
Many of us have experienced being restored in our relationship with God, restoring
our view of God, our perspective of God.
And so yes, we can lay claim to the fact that we've had a reset, we've had a
release and a restoration in our lives.
Can I get an amen?
Amen.
So yes, we've had that and we have so many stories.
If we were to go around to get people on the stage, could we not
have hours of stories of radical love and radical sacrifice?
We could go around with stories.
Some of you guys at the Jubilee, at the ICMC, you were connected with people.
What was it?
You remember the radical nature of your relationships and past.
Remember that time?
Remember so and so?
Man, that was crazy.
And remember all that we did.
Remember the love, remember the relationships?
There's radical stories right here in this room, and it wasn't just back in the day.
It's still taking place.
You know, there's there, there, there's radical relationships in this.
Right.
We have relationships for many years.
There's love, there's, there's, there's intergenerational relationships.
We have radical, uh, changes of lives.
We've seen so many people over the years here in Orange County just over
the last five years, just a snapshot.
We had all those people and that wasn't even half.
All those people had their lives change over the last five.
We've had, uh, uh, we, we, we actually met our goal for our special missions.
We gave over $330,000.
Come on now, man, to raise up in over 330,000.
That's some radical sacrifice right there.
We've also helped plant the TJ Center for Hope, where they're giving free dental
care for those, uh, uh, uh, kids in Tijuana who've never received dental care.
We've also have our Saturday Academy, which we, we either have experienced or
we sponsor, in which we help those at risk kids right here in our community.
Right here in Santa Ana.
We are Jubilee people living a jubilee life.
But why do we hesitate?
Well, there is a reason to hesitate sometimes when we, if we were to
answer that question, because perhaps.
Maybe our problem is we know that we aren't living the Jubilee Life daily,
or we know, you know what?
I know as a whole, we're not living the Jubilee life daily.
But let me ask you this, do you really think and ask, remember, it's just
capturing basically the essence of church.
Do you think.
That every single disciple at every single moment at the exact same
time, we're living a Jubilee life.
No, because that's why we have the letters written by Paul and the others.
Think about that.
We read Acts two and go, they were perfect.
No they weren't.
Just get to Acts four.
Just get to two more chapters later.
People are lying.
People are dying.
It gets crazy.
It gets real up in there.
But there was a culture.
It was, it was a snapshot of, that's in essence, essence who they are.
And so perhaps for some of us, the reason that we're maybe not
living the jubilee life is 'cause we forget the opportunity we have
in Christ to live the Jubilee life.
The opportunity for a reset, a release, and a restoration, A time of genuine,
emotional and spiritual rest to truly trust in our father who is a provider.
Sometimes we maybe get distracted by life and its worries, or we even
regress and we get trapped and deceived by sin and, and the devil himself.
And so that leads us to go.
I, I don't know if we're living a jubilee life or I don't know
if we still are a jubilee people.
What I would argue is we don't need to become a jubilee
people living the jubilee life.
We need to remember that we live every day in the year of the Lord's
favor in Christ because of Christ.
We live every single moment in the year of the Lord's favor.
Yeah.
And we need to remember that we live Jubilee lives because we are
Jubilee people because of Jesus who is the embodiment of the jubilee.
And so our response, I believe again, to remembering that God is calling us to
be Jubilee people live a jubilee life.
I believe our call isn't to become something new, but it's to be who we are.
To be who we are, jubilee people living the Jubilee life, not becoming
something extra or new, but just being exactly who you are in Christ.
That's who God is calling us.
To be, to be who we are, and we need some reminders of what that looks like.
Can I, can I get an amen to that?
Amen.
Second Corinthians five, verse 17.
I want to read this.
This is the Apostle Paul.
He writes a letter to the church that met in the city of Corinth, and
it says, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come.
The old is gone, the new is here.
He's talking to people and that they didn't just get
baptized, they had been baptized.
All this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us
the ministry of reconciliation that God was reconciling the world to himself
in Christ, not counting people's sins against them, and he has committed
to us the message of reconciliation.
We are therefore Christ's ambassadors as though God we're
making his appeal through us.
We implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.
God made him where no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might
become the righteousness of God.
As God's coworkers, we urge you not to receive God's grace in vain for he says,
in the time of my favor, I heard you.
In the day of salvation, I helped you.
I tell you, now is the time of God's favor.
Now is the day of salvation.
Amen.
The church then in Corinth and the church throughout the centuries in
the church now is called to live out the heart of Jubilee, restoring
relationships, reconciling people to God, and renewing hope in a broken world.
We are ambassadors of reconciliation and agents of renewal.
That's who we are.
That's how we live.
No, the Jubilee wasn't an events, and neither should our Jubilee or
ICMC experience be just an events.
It should be a call, a launching pad to be who we are, Jubilee
people living the Jubilee life.
And the fruit of the Jubilee is a lifestyle shaped by Jesus.
It is Jesus shaping us, forming us, and how we live the choices we make,
our perspective, our worldview, how we think, and how we talk.
And we live Jubilee lies by how we forgive, how we give, how we restore
and lift others like Jesus did.
And through the spirit, we, the church, become a people of freedom.
And a people of restoration.
I dunno about you, but that sounds good.
But that's who we are and that's how we live.
And so yes, you are as a disciple of Jesus.
You are a jubilee person.
You are freed, you are forgiven, restored, and you are called
to live in God's freedom.
Now it's easy to forget.
We can slip, we can regress, but here's my call for every single one of us this week.
Return to who you truly are in Christ and live the Jubilee life today,
this hour tomorrow and the day after.
Amen.
I wanna get real practical here.
As we close on out, I wanna give some action steps here.
First, we're gonna go ahead and have, I just wanna give one more, uh,
uh, uh, reading plan for the week.
So there's some questions.
You can use it as a quiet time for personal devotional for yourself or not.
But go ahead and, uh, uh, uh, uh, pull out your phone to get the QR
code and you'll get that for the week.
There's some questions and some, and some, uh, scriptures and some
thoughts for every day this week that can help guide you there.
All right.
And then here's the other call for the week is to follow through on what you
have decided from the Jubilee and ICMC, whatever it is that God put on your
heart, whether it's joy, it's meeting people, it's moving to oc, et cetera,
whatever it is that God put on your heart.
And we talked a little bit about it at our midweek service, whatever
it is, follow through this week and what you have decided, the Jubilee.
Now what?
You know God is calling us to be who we are, Jubilee people
who live the jubilee life.
God wants us to respond to his work in our hearts individually and
collectively, and we need to follow through with the decisions we've made.
We'll close out here in second Corinthians six as God's coworkers.
We urge you not to receive God's grace in vain.
For, he says, in the time of my favor, I heard you.
And in the day of salvation, I helped you.
I tell you, now is the time of God's favor.
Now is the day of salvation.
May we live or proclaim the Lord's favor today and may we be Jubilee
people living the jubilee life.
Amen.