This sermon explores how God’s promises, foretold in the Old Testament through prophecies and ceremonies, are perfectly fulfilled in Jesus Christ, the central theme of the entire Bible.
Transcript
A couple of weeks ago when I was here with you it feels longer than a week ago, but I enjoy every time I get to address you. We were looking at 1 Corinthians 12. 1 Corinthians 12, and we were looking at the gifts of the Spirit. One of the things that we said last week:
The one of the things that we pointed out is that the local church is a single unified body formed by the Holy Spirit. I just wanted to remind you of where we were and what we were talking about because we’re going to come back to that idea pretty soon. God has gifted each individual and every individual in the church is important and vital to the ministry. The church cannot function, that’s the point of that passage that we looked at. There’s no person in the church who God has sovereignly brought into His church that is important and vital to the ministry of the church. So we have to reflect on that.
Shifting Focus to Advent
This morning, I want us to shift our thinking away from that to the Advent season, so that we can begin to think about the coming of our Savior. In particular, the theme that has already been introduced to us through Jared and the hymn that he shows: about the longing for the coming of the Christ, the longing of the Savior.
We sang those beautiful words:
Come, long expected Jesus, born to set Your people free;
From our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee.
The idea of the expectation of Christ. So this morning, I know it’s a bit unusual. I know that Kirby talked about Hebrews chapter 11 last week. I wished I was able to hear that message. I was counting on hearing that, but something happened to our podcast last week and we weren’t able to do that. But he talked about faith, as I understand it, and he used Hebrews chapter 11 as this incredibly beautiful chapter that draws and builds on our understanding of what faith is from the Old Testament examples of the people of God, the prophets, and the people of God who minister in faith.
I wanted to take a verse from this chapter. Just a single verse, and it’s toward the end of the chapter. You wouldn’t really think of this as really leading into something that might be considered an Advent sermon. But I think really, when you begin to think about this, it is really rather profound. It’s the kind of verse that you read, you kind of understand or maybe don’t understand perfectly clearly, and then we pass over to the next. But we’re going to read verses 39 and 40. Hebrews chapter 11. This is truly God’s holy word:
And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us, they would not be made perfect.
And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised.
What does that mean? What is the writer of the Book of Hebrews talking about?
The Bible’s Unified Message
The Bible is an incredibly wonderful book. It’s a book that is composed of all different types of genres of literature. It includes poetry, it includes history, rich in history. It includes prophetic texts that are apocalyptic. It has in the Bible it has passages that are epistolary; they’re basically letters written. And yet, it is a Bible with one big idea. We lose our focus and our understanding of what that means.
There was a well-known Bible teacher in the early part of the 20th century. He was taught at Oxford for a number of years. He was Wycliffe Hall in Oxford. He was the principal of Wycliffe Hall for some years. His name was W. H. Griffith Thomas. He wrote a book on how to interpret the Bible. In that book he gave an interesting illustration. What I thought I’d do this morning is just use his illustration. I just want to think about this idea that he introduced in that little part of his book on the Old Testament.
He says, “Suppose that you gave someone who knew nothing at all about the Bible, a copy of the Old Testament.” They diligently studied it. They came to it and read it carefully, trying to seek to understand truly every line that they came to. So they read it multiple times, and as they read the first time they read it, they come to passages, and I want to expand on this so that we can think about it. They recognize that in the Old Testament there are prophecies concerning someone who is to come. There are prophecies in the Old Testament that have to do with a coming deliverer.
You don’t have to go very far to be able to discover that. In fact, if you turn your Bible to Genesis chapter 3, there’s a very well-known verse, you probably know what I’m going to turn to most of you. But it’s interesting where it comes in, the place that this comes. It comes after Adam and Eve have sinned, and they’re called out by God, and God is pronouncing judgment. He’s pronouncing judgment on Adam and Eve. You remember Adam and Eve were formed of the earth, and so the judgment falls upon the earth itself because of that binding connection. And also on the serpent.
So in verse 14, the text says the Lord God said to the serpent:
Because you’ve done this, cursed you are more than all cattle, and more than every beast of the field; on your belly you will go, and dust you will eat all the days of your life.
And then the next verse. This is considered the first evangelism, the first gospel message.
And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise Him on the heel.
It’s a very interesting verse. The verse is interesting because a person is described as the seed of a woman, and it’s a male person based on the pronouns that are used. And it’s singular, not a plural seed. It’s one person. And there’s a powerful imagery here. This adversary, this serpent, there’s going to be enmity between the two of them, and He will crush the head of the serpent. The imagery is a person stomping on the head of the serpent, and in the stomping, their heel is bruised. That’s the imagery. It’s kind of open-ended and vague, but still interesting. It’s interesting because there is a person who’s coming, who’s going to bring judgment and deliverance. And this person is prophesied this early.
So you’re reading through the Bible, you come across this verse, and you recognize that there is someone to come. And as you continue reading, that’s, that, that begins to be narrowed down with more and more definition. You know, this could be any man born in the world who’s going to fulfill this. But when you get to Genesis chapter 11, God calls out Abraham. And he calls out Abraham and he tells Abraham, he tells Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you, and curse those who curse you, and through you, all the families of the earth will be blessed.” And so we know that redemption is coming through Abraham. God is going to send His person through Abraham. And it becomes even more and more clear as you go through Genesis, as you read through Genesis, you get to chapter 17. When you come to chapter 17, that promise is confirmed to Abraham again. Abraham wants his son Ishmael to be the fulfillment of this promise. And God says, “Not Ishmael, I’m going to give you a son.”
“You’re an old man, Abraham, but I’m giving you a son, and in Isaac your seed will be called.” And so it’s coming through not just Abraham, but through the line of Isaac. And so Isaac has children. You remember Jacob and Esau? And as you continue reading in the Old Testament, in Genesis, you come to chapter 22 and it’s not, it’s not Esau. No, it’s Jacob. Jacob is the one who receives the blessing. And Jacob has 12 sons. And when you get to chapter 49, you come to a really interesting verse. Turn to chapter 49 really quickly. Jacob is giving his blessings, his prophetic blessings, to his children. God is speaking through Jacob. And as you’re reading this, he comes to bless his son Judah. And in verse 9, I’ll just read from verse 9:
Judah is a lion’s whelp; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He couches, he lies down as a lion, and as a lion, who dares to rouse him up?
The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes. The idea is that Shiloh is coming, and He’s coming and reigning through Judah. Judah is the one who is the ruling person, and the Messiah who is coming is the one who will rule. So it’s narrowed down further to the tribe of Judah, through these people, the Messiah is coming. God is promising someone, and He’s giving us this description. And this description is, as He’s giving us this description, it’s getting more and more focused, more and more definite.
Prophecies of a Coming Messiah
In 2 Samuel, it tells us that He’ll come through David. David was the great king of Israel. In David’s day, David took a nation that was almost insignificant, and he turns it into basically a world power by the end of his life. Incredible wealth and power at the end of David’s reign. And in Samuel, it tells us that He’s going to be, 2 Samuel tells us that the line comes through David. Verse 16:
Your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever; your throne shall be established forever.
In accordance with all these words and all this vision, so Nathan spoke to David. David’s house is an eternal house, his kingdom is an eternal kingdom. His line will rule forever and ever. So it becomes focused, and it becomes remarkable because of all these passages. It tells us in Jeremiah that,
Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord, “When I will raise up David a righteous Branch.”
He’ll be a king, acts wisely. So it’s very specific, and in the specificity, in Peter, Peter alludes to the prophets, to Isaiah and the other prophets in the prophecies that they’re giving of this coming Messiah. He points out that they’re seeking to understand. There’s things here that they don’t quite get. And you start working your way through these prophecies in the Old Testament, and they’re incredible and remarkable, and sometimes seemingly contradictory. He’s going to come as a great king. He’s going to come with power and bring peace to His people. And yet, He’s going to come as a suffering servant and die for His people, as Isaiah 53. How can those two things split together? How can that possibly be? It had to be confusing. He’s going to sit on David’s throne and rule forever. A son of David. And yet, Jehoiakim—you go through David’s line: David, Solomon. Solomon has two sons. You know, Rehoboam and Jeroboam, and the kingdom is divided. And then you have all of these kings in the line of David. And then you come to the last king of the line of David, and his name is Jehoiakim. So you come to Jehoiakim, and you find out that God put a curse on him. And He told him, He promised him that no one would rule from his line. And he is the ruling line. He is the ruling line of David. And so he has children, but none of them rule. His uncle takes the throne. His uncle takes the throne who is not of the line of David. And that was the end of the Davidic kingdom. And yet the Messiah is going to be of the line, the royal line, of David. How can that possibly happen? It can’t happen. You look in the Old Testament, you can imagine how they would struggle over something like that. How could these two things come about?
You might remember, we have a New Testament perspective, which is pointing it out, but the Angel, Angel comes to Mary and says, “Nothing is impossible with God.” He can do anything. So if you remember in the New Testament, there are two genealogies. The first genealogy in Matthew comes and traces the line through Jehoiakim to Jesus. He’s the son of David through Jehoiakim, tracing it to Joseph, the husband of Mary. And then in Luke, you have a genealogy where it’s worked backwards all the way to Adam. And in that line, Jesus is a son of David, but not through Jehoiakim. He inherited the right to rule through his father Joseph, who was not his natural father. But he got the legal right to rule. He was a natural son of David, but not through Jehoiakim. Extraordinary thing. Who else could fulfill this? Show me, I mean, you look through all history or you look into to the future when Israel, anybody who rejects our Savior, who could fulfill this?
Go back to the prophecy I read earlier about the scepter that is given to Judah. In the early church, kept incredible detailed records of genealogies. Incredibly detailed, far more detailed than even what we have in scripture. They kept them in the temple. In 70 AD, when Rome destroyed the temple, these genealogies were lost. So it was said in Israel, “The scepter has departed from Judah, and the Messiah is not come.” Ah, but He had come. He had come.
Unfulfilled Prophecies and Christmas
There’s only one answer. It all points to one person. So He’s the Son of David, and these things, it becomes so, so, so incredibly specific, so remarkably specific. And then all the details of the prophecies, you can remember some of them. There are literally hundreds, hundreds of prophecies in the Old Testament pointing to His coming. It tells us that He would be born of a virgin, in Isaiah chapter 7. Born of a virgin, and you’d call His name Immanuel, which means God with us. It’s an incredible prophecy. Looking back as we celebrate Christmas, just as a side here, we celebrate Christmas and we can get really sentimental over our celebrations, and we focus on the baby in the manger. And all that’s okay, but the wonder isn’t that there’s a baby in the manger. And it’s not even, it’s an incredibly amazing and wonderful thing that the baby was born of a virgin. That’s an extraordinary thing. You want to know what Christmas is about? It’s that meaning of that phrase, God with us, Immanuel, because God took upon His own self human nature as well, and He becomes the Messiah. So He’s born of a virgin. God is born of a virgin. And He is Immanuel.
So it goes on. You might remember in Micah, it prophesies that, that, that in Bethlehem He would be born. The prophecies, that dozens and dozens and dozens of prophecies concerning the life of our Lord Jesus in incredible detail. Remarkable detail of His life, His coming into Jerusalem. The fact that, and His birth, there would be the slaughter of the innocents. It’s prophesied in the Old Testament. You have all sorts of passages like that that, you know, the details of His life, the details particularly of His, of, of being declared to be the Messiah, the Palm Sunday, and all that He experienced on the cross, the sufferings that He had. These things are in the Bible, with incredible detail. You might remember in Zechariah, you have some remarkable passages that talk about Him being abandoned by His disciples, prophesied that, and being sold for 30 pieces of silver, and that money being spent on a potter’s field. That’s pretty specific. That’s pretty incredible. This isn’t the kind of prophecy that you get in other religions with mythologies and things. You see, that’s one of the remarkable differences between Christianity and religions and mythologies in the world. In mythologies, you have fanciful things that’s not rooted in history at all. But when you study Christianity and in in in the Old Testament and Israel, you’re talking about a history of a people, and it’s outlined with things like the nation of Rome, and and other, and you can correlate your study with the historical, what we know in history. It’s a history, it’s rooted in history because God wrote it in history. He wrote the story as he worked out things in in history itself. And so all these things, in the Psalms, that he, they gave Him gall and vinegar to drink, that His hands and feet were pierced, prophecies of the Old Testament concerning the Lord Jesus. The incredible passage in Isaiah 53, which describes Him as a suffering servant, and exactly what He did on the cross, laying down His life, being, taking the place, your sin and my sin upon Himself, and being the sacrifice for our sin.
And so you have all of that. You have all these things, and they’re incredibly remarkable. And then Thomas’s illustration. You come to the end of the Old Testament. You get to the end of the Old Testament, and you come to Malachi chapter 4, and you know what? None of these prophecies have been fulfilled. You read, if all you had was the Old Testament, and you read about this remarkable person who’s going to come with all this detail. You come to the end of the Old Testament, and nothing is fulfilled. Nothing’s fulfilled. All these, the text in Hebrews 11 says,
And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised.
They didn’t see it. It didn’t happen in their lifetime. You come all the way to the end of the Old Testament, and you don’t have any, any fulfillment of any of these things. It’s incredible. And then in his illustration, he has the guy go back again. And he reads this time, paying noticing in Genesis chapter 4 that the introduction of the sacrifice. And he says to himself, “What does that mean? What killing an animal mean? How could that mean anything at all?” And then the sacrifices, these ceremonies develop and become more and more elaborate, but in the Old Testament, hardly anything is given as a way of explanation for them. And so you have, you have all of these sacrifices and and and these things coming about. And how, how do they, what do they mean? And so by the time he gets to the end of the Bible, reading at the second time, he says, “Not only is the Bible, a book, the Old Testament, a book of unfulfilled prophecies. It’s also a book that’s filled with unexplained ceremonies. We don’t know their meaning. We don’t know what it’s about.”
And then he reads the book again, and he reads the Psalms and paying attention to all the Old Testament, the longing hope for the future that is stirred in their hearts, the the the desire of the presence of God that they experience in part, but is lacking, is not fulfilled. And he says, “It’s also a book that has unfulfilled expectations and longings.” And all that is true. And then he says, “When you open the pages, the very first page of the New Testament, you find that it is written, so that it may be fulfilled.” It’s written so that you may be, that it may be fulfilled, and you realize that Jesus, the prophet, fulfills in His life all the prophecies. And that Jesus, the priest, explains in His death all the ceremonies. And that Jesus, the King, gives fulfillment to all, all of the longings. They’re satisfied in His resurrection and in our future resurrection.
So Jesus is the key to the Bible. It’s the subject of the Bible from beginning to end. Jesus, it says in Galatians 4, “When the fullness of time had come, He sent His son, born of a woman, born under the law.” And so these things are remarkable. They’re true. They’re the fulfillment, and they show the continuity and the, the incredible unity of scripture. All the Old Testament points to Jesus. Points to Him. Philip in the Gospel of John, chapter 1. Philip meets Jesus. He meets Jesus, and he goes to Nathanael, and he says, “We found Him. We found Him of whom Moses spoke.” He’s the fulfillment. And Jesus, talking to the Pharisees and Jews of His day, and He said, “You search the Scriptures, because in them you believe you find eternal life, but they are they which speak of Me.” He is the fulfillment of the word of God. The Bible’s about Him. All the prophecies, all the Scriptures, have to do with Jesus.
When you understand that Jesus is the focus, all of a sudden the Old Testament is really rich. You understand the Old Testament, you can far better understand the New. You can’t really understand the New very well without the New Testament. The Old Testament is simply something that is unfulfilled, unsatisfied, revelation from God, but not complete. Jesus Christ completes it. He’s the theme of the Bible. He’s the, He’s the purpose of all the revelation. And every part of the Bible directs our hearts to Him because He’s the Redeemer. There’s no one under heaven, no other name given among men by which we must be saved. That’s the message this morning. You want to know what Christmas is? Christmas is that God keeps His promises in Jesus. They waited, they heard these prophecies. They waited so long, and many of them got discouraged. There was the remnant of faith. There were the priests, Anna, who was looking for the Messiah. But so many people after thousands of years, not conceiving it, began to doubt it, thinking maybe this is just a myth. But God keeps His word. He doesn’t repent when it comes to His promises. And it’s been 2,000 years since Jesus came. And He promised to return. People lose patience, lose their faith. God never backs up on His promises. He will do what He says. We can trust Him. So just as they looked for His coming, how, you know, that’s all that is true. And how rich, how wonderfully rich we are having the history and what we’ve been given in the New Testament. That’s, that’s what Hebrews, the writer of Hebrews, is saying. You know, we have something precious that they didn’t have. We have the Gospel, and we know how it works. We know that it all points to Jesus. And it’s glorious.
Let’s set our hearts on Him. He’s our Savior. He’s the glorified King of kings and Lord of lords. That’s what Christmas is about. Who He really is. Let’s pray to Him now and ask that He helps us to worship Him this, this Christmas season. Father, as we, as we reflect on these things, we thank You, Lord Jesus, for the truth of Your word. We thank You, dear Savior, that You sent Your precious Son to us. You sent Him to be a Redeemer. You sent Him to do the thing that we cannot do in ourselves. We couldn’t live the perfect life that He lived, and we dared not die and experience the judgment that He died in our place. We thank You, Father, for and we pray, Father, as we, as the, as the hymn says that that He would be the focus of our heart, that, that He would, as we reflect on Him, that we would have the assurance of His presence within us. Father, that we would be able to rejoice in the power of the Holy Spirit that He gives us to live the life that You want us to live. Thank You, Father, for salvation. Thank You that it is in the Lord Jesus. Thank You, Father, that it is offered to us and given to us by Your sovereign will. We ask, Father, for Your blessing this morning as we reflect on these things. Make these things precious in our heart, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.