019 - Long Expected

When you pick up your Bible and wonder, is there more here than meets the eye?

Is there something here for me? I mean, it's just words printed on paper, right? Well, it may look like just print on a page, but it's more than ink. Join us for the next half hour as we explore God's Word together, as we learn how to explore it on our own, as we ask God to meet us there in its pages.

Welcome to More Than Ink. One of the delightful things about this season is the expectation of seeing our grandkids. We have a grandson named David. Yeah, but did you know that at Christmas time, the title Son of David means something really important? Well, it shows up a lot in the scriptures. What does it mean?

Well, we'll find out today on More Than Ink. Well, a great good morning to you. I'm Jim.

And I'm Dorothy. And we are so glad again that you've joined us. We say that every week, but we are actually very glad every week that you come back and we hope you're following with us. We're going to start looking at Christmas today.

This is December 5th and we're in the Advent season, so it seemed like the right thing to do. And since so many times when we talk about studying the Bible, we talk about context, context, context, context. So the question is, is there really a context that precedes the birth of Jesus? A historical context. Historical context, yeah. It wasn't just a little baby in a manger thing and that was the beginning of stuff.

This is actually a culmination of a lot of stuff context-wise. Well, and culturally we think about that baby in the manger as he's the whole story. Well, he's the beginning of the story.

Exactly, yeah. And he's the fulfillment of a bigger ongoing story. The beginning of the fulfillment. In fact, the birth of Jesus is kind of the middle of the timeline instead of the beginning of the timeline. So we're actually going to go to the Old Testament today so we can get a context. Was anybody waiting for the Messiah to be born? And if they were, were they waiting for someone like Jesus? So we're going to take a look at all that kind of stuff and next week we'll move into the New Testament. But today, what were they waiting for?

What were they looking for? What was the Messiah supposed to be? So where are we going to go to to start this context? Well, we really need to start with the promises that God made to David. So the fancy title for that is the Davidic Covenant and it's found in 2 Samuel 7. We're not going to read a whole lot of it, but there's just really four verses we're going to zero in on. And this is at the point in David's life when the Lord had given them peace, they were settled in Jerusalem, and David... Things were finally settled.

Right. And David was in, it was in his heart that he wanted to build a permanent dwelling for God because up to this point they still had the tent. They still had the tabernacle they'd been hauling around in the wilderness. Well, and the ark of the tabernacle just came into town, I think, when we get to this part. Well, I can't remember exactly where that takes place in the sequence.

I didn't look far enough back. I think that comes into town and David dances and now David says, I'm going to build you a house. Okay, but David wants to build a permanent dwelling for God because he says, hey, I got a house. God needs a house.

Exactly. And so as he's praying over that, the Lord says to him, now, you know, I'm going to build a house for you. So listen to what 2 Samuel 7, 12 to 16 says.

This is what God responds to David. When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you who will come forth from you and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him and he will be a son to me. And when he commits iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men and the strokes of the sons of men. But my loving kindness shall not depart from him as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. And your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever. Your throne shall be established forever. Now, that's a pretty amazing promise.

I just want to touch on a couple of things that leap off the page to me. God says three or four times in this short passage, I'm going to do this and I'm going to do it. I'm going to establish this throne, this kingdom forever. Well, David was going to die, right, and be laid in the tomb and that's actually figures in a lot of the sermons and acts.

They're like, so we must have been talking about somebody else. But we also know if we read ahead that Solomon becomes king after David, so is he talking about Solomon? Well, he was in the immediate fulfillment talking about Solomon, but Solomon wasn't going to live forever.

Right. But God says in this promise, I'll be a father to him and he'll be a son to me. And then he says, and I'll punish sin in him, but my love will never depart from him. So those things were evident in Solomon's reign.

So there was this an immediate fulfillment to the next generation. So this passage is kind of Solomon, but kind of something else too. And it demonstrates a really interesting point about Old Testament prophecies and that is that there is a dual fulfillment about them, especially the messianic prophecies. Either or Solomon or Jesus, this could be actually both simultaneously. Right. And we see that also when we look at the Isaiah 7 passage about the virgin conceiving.

But right now let's just stick with this one. So that's saying I'm going to establish an everlasting kingdom. Well, one that goes beyond just your physical life. And it's going to be a kingdom where my son will reign and he immediately starts talking about sin. So this is a this is a different kind of a kingdom. It's a much bigger and everlasting kingdom.

It's based on the heart. He says, I'm going to correct sin, but my loving kindness will not depart from him. Well, and I'll make his name a great name for him.

Right. I'll build a house for him and he'll build a house for me. So and we know, you know, in the New Testament, we are referred to we the believers as the house of God, the dwelling place of God in the Spirit. So there are hints here all through it that God is promising to bring the anointed the real king through the line of David. And so and his kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, one that transcends anything that takes place in a human timeline.

Yeah, yeah. And it's important to notice down in verse 16, that it's it's his throne that will be established forever. Yes, it's his throne. So that that actually does start to broaden this out to more than just Solomon. I mean, how can your throne be established forever? You mean like everyone who sits in the name David's throne from that point on? But who has a throne that lasts forever? Well, no, God does. Exactly.

He's the only one. So if you're just casually reading this section, little light bulbs will be going off in your head like, well, this sounds like Solomon kind of but but wait a second, there's a lot of forever words in here. So maybe there is a king coming, who will sit in the throne of David, this throne, which is forever. Right, which is why they expected a political king, right? A king who would literally come into Jerusalem and sit on a physical throne and rule a literal human kingdom.

Right, and fulfill this promise. And he also has to be genetically connected to David. Right, he has to come out of the line, he's literally the seed of David. So the genetic bloodline from David.

Yeah, and actually, it says this in many other places. There's this very famous phrase that you'll never lack for a man to be on the throne. And so in talking about the house of David as well. So whoever this king is, he has to, he occupies some forever throne. He has to be genetically biologically connected to David to make this all work. That's actually reminded many, many times, even in Psalm and Jeremiah.

And so who could this possibly be if it starts here with Solomon, but Solomon is not the forever personality in this passage. Right, right. And so this is Jesus. What?

Yes. And you know, I'll kind of skip fast forward and you know, we're going to look, we're going to see what Gabriel talks to Mary. Oh yeah, next week. And it turns out, he says explicitly he will occupy the throne of David. He will sit on the throne of David, right. So there's just no doubt in our mind here, once you get to that conversation, and we'll see that next week, there's no doubt that Jesus is the one being spoken of here in 2 Samuel 7. Which was, you know, the time of David is roughly 1000 years before Christ was born.

Exactly, exactly. So from that point on, the expectations are set pretty strongly that there'll be some great king who has some kind of forever context on the throne of David, which is forever. And then God himself is the one who's doing this.

So, so those expectations are all set 1000 years before Jesus. And that this is God's kingdom that he's establishing. Right.

It's not a human kingdom in any form. You know, as we talk about the kingdom, perhaps in the next couple of weeks, it occurred to me when I was studying the parables that the kingdom life in any kingdom depends upon the character of the king. Right. Right. So we know that David was not a perfect king.

Solomon was not a perfect king. Right. But they both serve as types. This is a word that theologians use or Bible studies use to describe a person or an event or a thing that is a picture.

It's kind of like it's a fulfillment or it's a pointer. Say, you know, this greater spiritual reality is like this thing. And so you'll run across that term type in the New Testament, actually, often in Hebrews. Yeah. So there's this dualism that's going on often in scriptures. And you'll say, well, is this thing that's being talked about?

Is it A or B? And you can often say, well, it's actually both simultaneously because the one prefigures the other one. Yes, because we're talking about real human people at a real place at a real time in history. And yet they were indicators, pointers. They were playing out a greater spiritual reality that we can look back on.

Yeah. And for those of us who are a little thick and slow thinking, it's nice to have an example. So you can say, oh, this Jesus guy, he's like David, the great king.

So that's just a helpful aid for the rest of us as well. So well, now there's other places in the Old Testament that point to this one that's coming. But don't miss the fact that coming out of the bloodline of David is a very important thing. And they were still debating it, even at the last week of Jesus' life when he was in Jerusalem teaching. And he actually asked the question, you know, how is it that when David says, the Lord says to my Lord, said at my right hand, then how is he the son of David? I mean, they were still trying to figure that out.

Right, right. So it was a subject of much discussion in Jesus' time. Because they thought that passage is all about David.

And he says, it can't be. And because there was this huge messianic expectation of a physical, political king. Yeah. You know, we live in a time when a lot of the Christian church in our country has placed its faith in a political system. Yeah.

And so there are a lot of, hmm, a lot of places to apply. Oh, yeah. I like to characterize it that, especially in these elections, people have displaced their belief in the divine to a devotion in government, to government. And that's just going to let you down every single time. An expectation that we can bring in a human government that will accomplish God's will.

A devotion to a man or a man's government is always going to disappoint you. Okay, so let's fast forward. Are there more passages as we work our way in time from a thousand years before Jesus? Oh, there are so many. Now, some of you probably have already played on your musical device, the Messiah, right? And so you know these passages, but you don't always know where they're coming from. You've heard them.

You know the words. You've heard them sung a lot of, you know, maybe you've even been to a Messiah sing already this season. And you've sung these passages. Yeah, and these serve to be signposts in the Old Testament to what the Messiah would be.

And so, you know, Handel put it in the music and there you go. But these signposts are important. Well, and we're just going to kind of pick the easy ones, the ones that are so familiar to everybody. Yeah, yeah. Well, do you want to start with Micah?

Or do you want to go earlier than that? Or Isaiah? We don't know what we're doing. Well, no, I love the Isaiah passage.

Let's start with that one. Isaiah 7.14. Isaiah 7.14. And the context again here has an immediate fulfillment in the time of Isaiah when he's saying to the king, you know, something's going to happen right now in your seeing and that's going to indicate to you that the Lord is with you. But Isaiah 7.14 says, Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and she shall call his name Immanuel.

Immanuel. Which then the gospel writers pick up and translate for us, God with us. Yeah, in case you missed what that means. Right, in case you didn't get it. Now, in the historical time of Isaiah, that would have meant within the next three years in this period of time that a child would be conceived, born and weaned, it's going to be very evident that God is with you. The event that you're expecting is or is not going to happen because of this child's birth.

It's going to be like a physical playing out of it. But the New Testament writers said, oh, well, that clearly is actually talking about Jesus. They connected it for us. Right. In Matthew's gospel. Yeah. So what is it about this that's the sign part?

The Lord himself will give you a sign. And the sign is a virgin shall conceive. Right. And in the context of Isaiah, I mean, that's just a run of the mill word for a young girl. Exactly. Exactly.

And so there's been lots of debate about this from scholars. Look at this. Well, it just means young girl. Well, then how is it a sign if a young girl conceives?

That's not a sign. But the word is also duly used for virgin as well. So it's rightly defined here as virgin because there's a sign and a virgin will conceive and bear a son.

Wow, that's just craziness. Well, we're going to talk about that in more detail next week when we talk about Mary and the song that she sings, which the historical title for it is the Magnificat. But, you know, that that's a Latin word. Yeah, you might want to pre think if you were Mary and you just got spoken to by Gabriel, well, everything that's going to happen, what would be the words out of your mouth?

And they probably will not match what you'll read when you go to Luke one. It's really astonishing. It's astonishing. But then but but then you call his name Emmanuel, you call his name God with us. Now that's sort of an over the top title over the top name. I mean, why not just call him David two or something like that? I mean, why not just call him David, you know, a newer David. No, we need to call him God with us. Because this child's very presence will be evidence that God has not deserted deserted you.

He is with you. Exactly. And that was his historical significance in the time of Isaiah, you can just read all of Isaiah six and seven, and you'll actually just chapter seven. And you'll kind of get the context for that historically, right. But this child, by his very birth and presence among you would be an indicator that God is near God is actually with you.

Yeah. And you know that the Jews who are reading the Gospels, Matthew or Luke, the Jews who are reading and especially Matthew's Gospel, which seems to be bent toward Jews, make a big deal about talking about the fact that Mary is a virgin, big, big deal, so that the readers won't miss it. Like, hello, wake up Isaiah seven, a virgin actually did conceive and bear a son. So they make sure you don't miss that in passing as you're reading through the Gospel story for the birth of Jesus. Just a big deal because Isaiah seven 14 says, well, that's just the way it's got to be.

You have to have a virgin who bears a son. So you want to move on to the other Isaiah passage? Isaiah nine. Yeah, boy.

It's an absolute favorite. There's way too much to talk about on it, but we got to get to it because this one you, if you didn't catch Isaiah seven in the Messiah, Handel's Messiah, you sure did catch Isaiah nine. So you want to do that.

Okay. You've sung this. You've heard this song every Christmas carol we ever sing or often is based on this passage. It actually begins at the beginning of the chapter, but the part we want to read is from verses six to seven. For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us and the government will rest on his shoulders and his name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of his government or of peace on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this. So this is actually a restatement of the Davidic Covenant, but it's added some more detail about the actual identity of this one.

And this is five centuries after David and five centuries before Jesus. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's, it's an amazing, so a couple of things that we can pick up on increase of his government, this government, this throne of David is we, we are expecting it to be forever. It sure seems to be forever here and God himself with his zeal, which means you can't stop him is going to establish it. So this is, this is an appointment from God that won't ever stop.

It's, it's forever. But interestingly enough, it starts off with the fact that a child will be born, which kind of helps us with Isaiah 7 where a virgin will conceive and bear a child, bear a son. So we're going to start with a son. We're not going to start with a fully grown man who just pops out of nowhere. We're starting with a child, a human child and the son who is given.

Given. Well, oh, you know, that suddenly makes me think of, well, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son in John three, John three, John three. Yeah.

John three. This is, this is God saying what's going to happen in, in John three 16 back in Isaiah nine, giving us his son. Exactly. So this birth of Jesus is actually the giving of God's son.

And we say that kind of flippantly, but here it says that's what's going to happen. And then when you get into Luke and Matthew, that's exactly what happened. And when you see the discussion with Nicodemus, that's exactly what Jesus is going on. It's just mind boggling that God would humble himself to give his son. He didn't just appear as an adult.

Exactly. He entered our human existence as an infant. And it's worth contemplating when you talk about meditating on what you know in scriptures, you know, it's one of the ways you do Bible study. Why in the world would God risk the throne to a baby, starting with a baby? Why start with it? Why is that so important? And we'll just kind of let that hang for a while.

And we'll talk about it over the next couple of weeks, perhaps. But why start with a baby? That's just a remarkable thing on God's part. Just a remarkable thing. Let's look at those four at the end of verse six. Let's look at those four titles that he's got right there, because these, these really throw people for a loop a lot of the times because we're talking about Jesus, the son of God. Oh, well, and they're, they're all together talking about a single person, single person, wonderful counselor, mighty God, eternal Father, Prince of Peace. Well, which is it?

Which one? This is our triune God, you know, if you think about the Trinity all the time, this is a great place to come back to and go, Yeah, okay, wait a second, we're talking about one person here, right? Because in the New Testament, we have Jesus says, I'm going to send you the paraclete, I'm going to send you the counselor, the one called along side.

So wonderful counselor. Well, why is he so wonderful? Well, because he's alongside and with you and speaking to you, but he's not flesh, blood, bone, right, right. He's a spirit, but then also mighty God, which gives a little credence to the Isaiah seven passage about a manual God with us, right? So we're not just talking about kind of an endorsement by God, we're talking about the presence of God, mighty God, we're talking about power, the one who accomplishes salvation, right? Which again, gives you a wonderful kind of clash, when we said think about a baby, and think about this baby, which is helpless, is also the mighty God.

Whoa, so you can chew on that. So there's the nearness of this wonderful counselor who is our mighty God who is able to accomplish, right? And on this everlasting eternal throne, it is the everlasting Father, eternal Father, and the Prince of Peace. That's all ruling kind of titles right there. Wow, wow, wow.

Wow, the Prince who rules in peace, who establishes peace, and this idea of establishing peace runs all the way through the scripture as part of God's original statement to his people, I'm going to establish you in peace, that comes from the Aaronic Covenant in number six. So I hope we'll do an entire conversation about that blessing at a future time. Maybe another time, yeah. Yeah, we can't do it today. Because we're already running short on time. We need to hit Micah, and that's about all the time we have left, I bet. Okay, lead the way.

Let's do Micah. So Micah's another prophet, he's sometime sent or so after Isaiah, and Micah 5-2, again, a very famous title. And remember, when you read the story in the Gospels, remember those wise guys? I mean the wise men come from the east and they come to Herod and say, where is the one who's born king of the Jews? And Herod says, kind of shrug your shoulders and go, I believe you. Yeah, I don't know, I don't remember. And so he brings his guys and his guys say, oh, well, if he's here, he's in Bethlehem.

And how do they know that? Micah 5-2. You want me to read that? Yeah, go ahead. But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans, just a nothing, from you shall come forth from me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old from ancient days. So this ruler doesn't just begin with the birth of a baby.

He has been ruling. Right. But it seems like he's born as a baby in Bethlehem. In this puny little out of the way place. But it's the fulfillment of a coming forth from of old, from the ancients of days.

So that's why we say this is kind of the middle of the timeline, not the beginning of the timeline, because this has been foreseen. And physically a baby will be born, we know that from Isaiah 7, God with us and this God with us, this God seems to also be a man, because he's going to be physically born in Bethlehem. In Bethlehem, of all places. Which is historically where David's house was. David's hometown. Right, so when you hear about the story about David and Goliath and David's out tending sheep, you know where he's tending sheep?

Right out there in the hillside. He's in Bethlehem. So this is David's family's home. So that's why this is just figures important, because now that puts us back into the throne of David, the house of David, the city of David, right there in Bethlehem. And you know the story, how that's not actually where Mary and Joseph lived. They had to go there in order to register for the census that was taken at the time that Jesus was born that was ordered from Rome. So you know, they lived up in Nazareth, and they had to make the journey down to Bethlehem. Yeah. And Mary, probably as a result of three or four days on a donkey, goes into labor.

That would do it to me. Really? Well, they're there in Bethlehem, which is astonishing. But it's so important. I mean, Mary and Joseph both have the lineage to qualify for the house of David. Which is why they have to go to Bethlehem. Which is why they have to go to Bethlehem, right. But still, it's fascinating. We were reading in John where the people were saying, well, wait, this guy can't be the Messiah, because he didn't come out of Bethlehem.

Right. They didn't know that he'd actually been born there and relocated to Nazareth after he was born. But they knew the prophecy. So Jesus is born in Bethlehem, thus again fulfilling the prophecy for the coming of the Messiah. So there it is in Micah 5, too.

So we know who he is, what he's all about. He's going to start as a baby, and he's going to be born in Bethlehem. And yet this is the fulfillment of a plan from ancient of days.

Wow. Well, and there's so many beautiful details about Bethlehem, and we don't have a lot of time. But in Hebrew, Bethlehem, Beit Lehem, means literally the house of bread. House of bread. Well, we know much later on in Jesus' life, he said, hey, I am the bread which came down from heaven.

That seems fitting. By the way, I was born in the house of bread, you guys. Well, and you know, John the Baptist pointed to him and said, there's the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Well, those hills around Bethlehem were where the flocks of sheep that were destined to be sacrificed in the temple were raised and cared for. There's so many beautiful details in this Bethlehem picture.

Lots of stuff. I did a whole study a while back on the history of what happens in Bethlehem, and it's pretty rich. And it is a nothing place. That's why he says, you owe Bethlehem Ephrathah.

Ephrathah was kind of a regional kind of family name. But anyway, amazing things. But these things were written hundreds of years before the actual birth of Jesus. Right.

So people had accurate expectations of what was going to happen, and then Jesus is born. Right. So we're in a season of expectation and looking to celebrate the coming of our Savior. Yeah. So next week and the week after that, we're going to look at some statements won by Mary the week after that by Zachariah, who's the father of John the Baptist, who says they both say some amazing things and give us kind of a heavenly context and viewpoint to what looks like just a simple birth of a baby filled with hints of these prophecies.

Exactly. They will all tie back and they'll have much more important. In fact, Mary will say things that's far beyond her pay grade actually. So we hope you join us next week. If you want to read ahead, read in Luke 1. We're going to be in Luke 1 for the next two weeks as we look at Mary and Zachariah, and we'll see these great things. So I'm Jim.

And I'm Dorothy. And I'm hoping you're looking forward to Christmas like we are. Amen. We are. Okay. We'll see you next week. Bye-bye. More Than Ink is a production of Main Street Church of Brigham City and is solely responsible for its content. To contact us with your questions or comments, just go to our website, morethanink.org.