The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me; he has sent me to preach glad tidings to the poor, to heal the broken in heart, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind; The meek shall eat and be satisfied: they shall praise the LORD that seek him: your heart shall live for ever. captivity..." — Christ led captivity captive in that God, through the redemption in Christ, released sinners from the domain of darkness, Satan’s kingdom, and transferred them into Christ’s kingdom. During His days on earth, Jesus was concerned primarily with those who were enslaved by Satan. They were prisoners of Satan in a spiritual war. Millions of people today are Satan’s captives. They are under his influence. They may be captives of habits, attitudes, and lifestyles that they cannot control. You may be one of them.

To open blind eyes, To bring out prisoners from the dungeon And those who inhabit darkness from the prison. to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison. The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, Because the LORD has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives, And freedom to prisoners; I think we can take this a step further. Since we are viewing the words "he led" (Ephesians 4:8) as an act ofChrist begun at his ascension, but continuing throughout the gospel age, then we should see those words as including even his final act of leadership on earth, shouldn't we? That final act is one that he will perform personally at his second coming toearth. to say to the prisoners, 'Come out,' and to those in darkness, 'Show yourselves.' They will feed along the pathways, and find pasture on every barren hill.Peter quotes this Psalm in his preaching on the day of Pentecost: "You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption" (Acts 2:27). You will notice the word “Hades” in place of the word “Sheol”. This occurs because the quote in Acts is in Greek rather than the original Hebrew. “Hades” is the Greek equivalent of “Sheol”. Now if Christ were in Hell, the word would be “Gehenna” not “Hades”.

As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the LORD; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the LORD, from henceforth and for ever. How many times have you felt downtrodden and broken? The circumstances of life have taken their toll. You don’t know whether or not you can get up and go again. Just remember that Jesus identifies with you in every moment of brokenness. He understands.You will open the eyes of the blind. You will free the captives from prison, releasing those who sit in dark dungeons. Today, Christ is present to heal. The recovery of sight simply meant that the person who was blind could now see. While we seldom see people healed of physical blindness now, it does happen. Moreover, we know that in the long run, all physically blind people will see! Moreover, tens of thousands of people who have been spiritually blind are being set free. Jesus opens their eyes. The Spirit sent Christ to proclaim release to the captives. The Spirit would enable Christ to proclaim the message of deliverance and freedom. The Spirit is a bridge between the present and the future. Through the Spirit, the power of the Kingdom of God breaks in upon the earth. For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.

What is the leading that Paul has in mind in that same quote, "He led captivity captive" (verse 8)? To open the blind eyes, To bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, And them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house. Christ opened the eyes of the spiritually blind. Many came to faith in Him and followed Him. In addition He healed people who were physically blind. Thus, both literally and spiritually, this proclamation was fulfilled during the days of Christ on earth. The good news is that we are still in the “favorable year” of the Lord. Jesus is still fulfilling His mission. He has anointed us with the Spirit to bring the message of good news to you. Now, we are helping fulfill the mission of Christ.

That thou mightest open the eyes of the blind, and bring forth the prisoner out of prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house. To find out where Jesus’s soul went when his body was buried, we go to the Psalm which has Christ saying to his Father, "You will not leave my soul in Sheol, nor will you let your Holy One see corruption" (Psalm 16:10). So we see that Jesus was in a place called “Sheol”. In a moment we will see that this is not hell, the place of eternalpunishment.