As of this weekend, as I write this, there are still about 100 hostages taken forcefully from southern Israel on October 7, 2023, and still being held in Hamas tunnels in the Gaza region. So many times, in the past year I’ve sat pondering what it must be like to be a hostage, held underground, by people who hate you and want to destroy your country? And then what would it be like to suddenly be rescued, delivered to freedom after so long in captivity?
With that picture in our minds, listen to these words Isaiah wrote 2700 years ago as he was led by the Holy Spirit of God: “The Spirit of the LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners...” (Is. 61:1)