The Lord told Paul, “I send you, to open their eyes, to turn them from darkness to light and from the authority of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me” (Acts 26:17b-18). As we have seen, the inheritance referred to in this verse is God Himself. In 2 Corinthians 6:2, Paul says, “Behold, now is the well-acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” Paul exhorts us to receive the Lord right away because now is the acceptable year of the Lord, the year of jubilee. The year of jubilee is a holy year, a year of grace. If we have jubilee, we have God; if we have God, we have grace.
The Chinese word for jubilee means everything being to one’s satisfaction. When everything is to our satisfaction, we are in the jubilee. Jubilee means having no worry or anxiety, no concern or care, no lack or shortage, no sickness or calamity, and no problems whatsoever, but rather having all benefits; hence, everything is to our satisfaction. How is it possible today for a person to have everything to his satisfaction? Every day nothing in our human life is to the satisfaction of our heart’s desire. Perhaps things are satisfactory today, but tomorrow they may not be. Therefore, our human life is not always satisfying, and our environment is not always gratifying. Everything can be satisfying to us only after we have gained the all-inclusive Christ as our enjoyment. In Philippians 4, Paul indicates that he knew Christ and experienced Him to such an extent that everything was to his satisfaction. He says, “I have learned, in whatever circumstances I am, to be content. I know also how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in everything and in all things I have learned the secret both to be filled and to hunger, both to abound and to lack. I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me” (vv. 11b-13). It is not outward persons, matters, or things but Christ within who enables us to be calm and free of worries as we face all kinds of situations.
In the age of the Old Testament, which was the age of law before the coming of Christ, man was in the position of a slave. It was not until Christ came that He proclaimed the coming of the year of jubilee (Luke 4:16-21). It is easy to understand the year of jubilee as lasting only for a year. However, the word year implies an age. We may say that “the year of jubilee” refers to the age of the jubilee, not just to one year, the fiftieth year. The fiftieth year typifies an age, an era. Dispensationally, the age of jubilee is divided into two periods. One period is the New Testament age, which is the age of grace today; the other period is the age of the millennium, which is the fullness of the jubilee.
According to the dispensation, Christ has already come, so the age of jubilee is here, but we do not have the jubilee in us unless we have allowed the Lord Jesus to come into us. Thus, according to experience, Christ must come into us to be our jubilee. Not only so, even if we have believed into Christ and have allowed Him to come into us, unless we allow Him to live in us and unless we live by Him, we are not practically living in the jubilee. If we live by Christ in a certain matter and allow Him to live in us, we enjoy jubilee in that matter. In this way everything pertaining to that particular matter is to our satisfaction. In our married life, for example, if we allow Christ to live in us and we also live by Christ, then everything in our marriage will be to our satisfaction. Whatever is unpleasant becomes pleasant, and whatever is not satisfying becomes satisfying. The same is true in going to school, in teaching school, and in doing business. If we allow Christ to live in us and if we live by Him, everything is to our satisfaction. Otherwise, everything is a problem, and nothing is a jubilee. In other words, when Christ comes into us, jubilee comes into us. Do not think that just because we are saved, we have the jubilee. Christ is our jubilee whenever we live by Him, but He is not our jubilee when we do not live by Him.
The year of jubilee is Christ; therefore, the year of jubilee is the year of grace, because grace is God Himself in Christ to be our enjoyment. When we hear the gospel, we hear the jubilee. Once we repent and believe into the Lord, jubilee enters into us. From then on, at any time and in any matter, in dealing with anyone or anything, if we live by Christ, Christ is our jubilee. Sometimes we may have the painful experience of putting Christ aside and thus losing God temporarily. Once we have lost God, we have sold ourselves and become slaves again. However, once we begin anew to enjoy the Lord Jesus, we have God and we enjoy freedom. At this time, within us everything is to our heart’s satisfaction, and the jubilee is in us. We are happy and rejoicing, we prosper, and we live long. This is the meaning of the jubilee.