The Legacy of Liberty, Part 2

Welcome to Delight in Grace, the teaching ministry of Rich Powell, pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. The salvation Christ offers us is the richest of gifts. 1 Peter 1, 10-12 tells us that the ancient prophets searched and inquired carefully about it, and the angels longed to look into it.

This story of redemption stretches backward to the garden and forward into eternity. Let's look into the legacy of this liberty that only comes from Christ. This is the second part of the message, which was first preached on July 31, 2022. He said David wasn't a prophet. He was a king. He was a prophet, too, because God spoke through him.

We have things that David wrote down. So not only are we we are looking at the doctrine of inspiration, you're concerning the scriptures of God in which we find the legacy of this freedom of salvation, but we also find an amazing continuity. What is continuity? One definition is uninterrupted connection, like a storyline, an uninterrupted connection.

Oxford Dictionaries is unbroken, consistent operation of something over a period of time. So the continuity that we're seeing that Peter is pointing out here is the continuity between God's promise and the present experience that they have in God's saving grace. The saving grace that they are now experiencing in Christ, it was promised and foretold, prophesied long ago.

And now you're experiencing it in your reality. So if I could just put this illustration up here, it's kind of like a brief timeline. You have Christ in the Old Testament and and he is speaking through the prophets and they are looking forward to the cross. All right, the cross is the central focus. It was on that cross where the holiness of God and the love of God collided. And then we, as the New Testament believers, look back at the cross and we look back at the Old Testament prophets and we see, look what God did. But all of that is pointing forward to what we have to look forward to when Christ comes and he sets up his reign and he makes all things new. You see, it's a continuity. It's one story.

The Old Testament, the New Testament, it's one story and the common theme through all of it is God's redemptive love in Jesus Christ. Because as Bobby pointed out very well studying James this morning, God yearns jealously for our spirit. God wants us. He desires us.

Why? Because we were made by him and for him. We bear his image.

He wants us. That is the continuity of all of the scriptures. Revelation 19 10 says the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.

Let me quote Edmund Clowney. He says, Jesus is not simply the one of whom the prophets speak. He is the one who speaks through the prophets. The spirit of Christ in them as he's speaking through the Old Testament prophets. Let me talk here for a moment about the nature of prophecy.

Two points I want to make. Number one, the nature of prophecy is this. God provides enough information for us to know that he has a good purpose and he will carry it out. It's like two sides to the coin. God provides us with enough information for us to know that God has a good purpose and he will carry it out.

Now he doesn't reveal all the specifics. There's a lot of detail that's left out but there is enough information for you and me to know that God has a good purpose and he will carry it out. The second side, the other side of the coin to prophecy is just simply this. When his purpose is realized there's no question God did this. That's the nature of prophecy. Now we see that in the prophecies of Jesus Christ because through the Old Testament God gave us, God gave his people enough information to know that Messiah is coming. God has a purpose and he will carry it out.

No question about that. And then when Messiah did come, when you look at all of the prophecies, there's no question God did this. This is God's doing. Psalm 118-24. This is the day that the Lord has made.

We will rejoice and be glad in it. God did this. New Testament so many times it is written that it might be fulfilled.

I've said this before but I just want to do it here again for your encouragement. 332 specific prophecies of Christ fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Specific prophecies of the Messiah who would come, 332 all of them fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Now what would be the probability of something like that happening randomly? If you were to just say, I mean there are prophecies all the way, Genesis chapter 3, Psalm 2, Psalm 16, Psalm 22, Isaiah 7, 9, 52, 53, Micah 5-2, Zechariah 9-9, all of these prophecies even to where he was born. Nobody's in control of where they're born, except maybe God, second person of the Trinity who comes.

But he's the one that foretold it. What would be the probability if we just take 8, 332, if we just take 8 of them, what would be the chances that 8 of them would be fulfilled in one person? Chances are 1 in 10 to the 17th power.

It's an astronomical number you and I can't even figure it out. I don't even know there's a name for that. Lots.

That's a good name for it. Yes, lots. In other words, the probability of that happening by chance is very, very, very small. You say, well there is a chance.

No. Remember there's 332 of them. Let's take 48 of them. If we take 48 of the specific prophecies fulfilled in Jesus Christ, 48 of them, what were the chances that that would happen randomly? That would be 1 in 10 to the 157th. That's just mind-blowing.

That takes it into the realm of, statistically, it's an impossibility for that to happen randomly. There's purpose. God did this. So that's the nature of prophecy. God gives us enough information to know that he has a good purpose and he's going to carry it out. The second side to that is when it does happen, when it is realized, there is no question about it, God did this.

And you might say, well Rich, how come not everybody believes that? Well, there's the nature of the human heart and the pride of the human soul. What does Romans say? We are experts at suppressing truth in unrighteousness.

That's the problem of the human heart. Now what he's really talking about in these three verses, 10, 11, and 12, are the servants of God. So that's the scriptures of God. We looked at the salvation of God, the scriptures of God, and now let's consider the servants of God.

Four different categories here. First of all is the prophets. Going back to verse 10 again. The prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preach the good news by the Holy Spirit. So the prophets. The prophets included the likes of David, Moses first, then David, Isaiah, Micah, Zechariah, I've mentioned them already. Alright, here's the nature, here's the prophets. Jesus mentioned them. Matthew 13, 17. For truly I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see and did not see it and to hear what you hear and did not hear it.

That's what he says right here. They searched and inquired carefully. They were prophesying and they knew that they were communicating something that God has a good plan and he's going to carry it out. But they couldn't understand it fully.

Let me give you an example of that. David was one of the authors of scripture. God used him prophetically because he prophesied prophecies of Messiah. Consider Psalm chapter 22. Here's what David writes, okay? They have pierced my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They stare and glowed over me.

They divide my garments among them and for my clothes, for my clothing they cast lots. That never happened to David. But David wrote this almost a thousand years before Christ was on the earth. Can you imagine being David and he's writing this and he's like, hmm, what's this all about? You see, it was the Spirit of Christ in him indicating that his son, the Messiah, would suffer. That's the nature of prophecy. You take Isaiah chapter 52 and 53 where it talks about the suffering servant and God predicting that and it's just so clear that it's perfectly fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. Acts chapter 8, you take Philip, he goes down and talks to the Ethiopian, one of the first converts in the New Testament, the Ethiopian, the one of the first converts that's not a Jew.

All right? And Philip goes to him and what is he reading? He's reading Isaiah 53 and he asks a question of Philip because the Spirit led him there.

He asks, who is he writing about, of himself or someone else? And what does Acts chapter 8 tell us that Philip opened the scriptures and preached to him Jesus? Luke 24, thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead. What do the scriptures tell us that when Jesus was walking on the road to Emmaus with these two followers of his, that he opened up the scriptures beginning with Moses and through the prophets and the Psalms, that he unpacked to them all of the scriptures that are just pointing to him. And remember what they said after Jesus disappeared? Didn't our hearts burn within us as he opened the scriptures to us?

It is an amazing truth of the inspiration, the power and the continuity of the Word of God. And that's why the prophets, as they were prophesying these things, they gave diligent examination. Who is this Messiah?

When is he going to come? What are the circumstances surrounding all of this salvation that is to come? Here's the thing for them, the full meaning of their prophecies could not appear until Christ came. They were prophesying Christ, but the full meaning of what they were prophesying could not appear until Christ came and they weren't alive then. That's why they were writing those prophecies for us, Peter says here in verse 12. Now, not only is he speaking of the prophets in this, but he also mentions the angels at the very end.

Let's read it in context here. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves, but you in things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look. You've been listening to Delight in Grace, the teaching ministry of Rich Powell, lead pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. To hear this message and others, check out www.delightingrace.com. You can also check out Pastor Rich's book, Seven Words That Can Change Your Life, where he unpacks from God's Word the very purpose for which you were designed. Seven Words That Can Change Your Life is available wherever books are sold. As always, tune in to Delight in Grace weekdays at 10 a.m.