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Have Yourself A Covenantal Christmas (Advent Grab Bag #4) (King’s Cross)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

The birth of Christ is the fulfillment of God’s covenant with Adam, renewed with Noah and Abraham and David. And the overarching promise is a promise of mercy and the remission of our sins, which is like the sun coming up after a long dark night. 

The Text: “And his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied, saying, ‘Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people, and hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David…” (Lk. 1:67-79).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

This song of Zacharias is traditionally called the “Benedictus,” after the first word of the song: “blessed” (Lk. 1:67), and this song of praise centers on God’s faithfulness to His covenant promises to Israel (Lk. 1:68). The salvation that is coming is a direct fulfillment of promises to David (Lk. 1:69), but really all of the prophets since the beginning of the world, that we should be saved from all our enemies (Lk. 1:70-71). This was His holy covenant of mercy promised to our fathers, going back to Abraham, that we would be delivered from all our enemies and serve God in holiness and righteousness (Lk. 1:72-75). This song of praise is particularly for the birth of Zacharias’s son, John, who will be the prophet of God, to prepare the way of the Lord (Lk. 1:76). What God is ushering in is a greater knowledge of salvation through the remission of their sins, which is like the sun coming up at day break, giving light to everyone everywhere (Lk. 1:77-79). 

ONE COVENANT OF GRACE

One of the central themes of this song is covenant continuity. The birth of John and the coming Messiah are the “fulfillment” of all the covenant promises of all the prophets since the world began (Lk. 1:70-73). This began in the Garden of Eden after Adam sinned: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel… And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all the living” (Gen. 3:15, 20). This was the first covenant promise and prophecy of God’s mercy. But it was reaffirmed to Noah when God mercifully promised to never destroy the earth again and reissued the Dominion Mandate (Gen. 9:7-12). Likewise, God promised to be Abraham’s God and the God of his children after him, to bless all the families of the earth through his seed, and Abraham was justified by faith alone in these promises of God (Gen. 12, 15, 17). It was on the basis of those covenant promises to Abraham that God called Moses in His mercy to deliver Israel from Egypt and gave them His law (Ex. 3). It was the same covenant of mercy that God renewed with David, promising that he would have a son who would reign over the house of Israel forever (2 Sam. 7:12-29). 

A NEW COVENANT NOT LIKE THE OLD ONE

However, Zacharias’s song also indicates that something new is happening with the birth of John: there are some significant differences between the Old Covenant with the fathers and the New Covenant in Jesus (Heb. 8:7-9). This is why we also rightly speak of two covenants (Old and New) under the Covenant of Grace. We can call them covenant administrations of the one Covenant of Grace because that is the basis of salvation for all saints in both covenants: all were/are saved by faith in God’s promise to take away our sins (Lk. 1:72-75). But there really are some striking differences. It was the same “sun,” but the Old Covenant was the “night” of the history of the world and all the sacrifices and prophecies were like the reflection of the moon (think of God’s promise to Abraham, pointing at the stars in the night sky), but when Jesus was born, the sun rose over the horizon: “the dayspring/the sunrise… to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Lk. 1:78-79).

Hebrews is all about the vast improvement of the New Covenant and the futility of returning to the Old. The New Covenant is better because Christ is the perfect High Priest (Heb. 7), Christ is the perfect and final sacrifice for sin (Heb. 9), and because the offer of forgiveness is clearer and more effective (Heb. 10). This means we do believe that the New Covenant is far more potent, efficacious, and expansive (Heb. 8:10-12, 10:16-17). However, even Hebrews indicates that there are some who come into “the knowledge of the truth… who trod underfoot the Son of God” (Heb. 10:26, 29), who like Esau sell their birthright (Heb. 12:15-17), and fall away (Heb. 6:4-6). And so the warning is to flee all lust, complaining, idolatry, and pride (1 Cor. 10:1-14). Flee to His mercy.

APPLICATIONS

The central question is this: does God’s covenant mercy still extend (in history) through families? The Song of Zacharias says, yes. But what if some do not believe? What if some fall away? The sun is still risen. It’s still getting lighter. And what exactly is getting more and more clear and obvious? The grace of God.   

The covenant mercy of God is extended primarily through households, and in particular, through men who take responsibility for communicating that mercy to their households. This begins with believing that this is true: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved; and thy house” (Acts 16:31). This also includes praying for your house, both confessing sin and asking for grace for them (Job 1:5, 1 Pet. 3:7). And then teaching, correcting, and leading in grace. But you can’t give what you don’t have. 

What came upon that midnight clear was the Daybreak of God’s covenant mercy, the Sunrise of His tender mercy to families; not dark clouds of covenant condemnation, not the bleakness of covenant fear and anxiety, not the harshness of covenant threatening. Yes, we are required to speak the truth, but the truth about sin is that Christ was born to take it away. Christ was born for this.

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Gold In the Genealogies (By Prophet Bards Foretold #3)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

The texts we are going to look at today are the genealogies of Christ, and other passages related to them, but the theme of this message will be on the promises of God. The fact of genealogies in Scripture are often nothing more than an obstacle to Christians in their Bible reading, but this is not the way to think of them. The genealogies are vast and intimidating mountain ranges, but what we need to realize is that there are actually rich veins of gold there. Like the land of Havilah, the gold is good there (Gen. 2:12). 

THE TEXT

“THE book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren . . .” (Matthew 1:1–2). 

“And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli . . .” (Luke 3:23). 

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

One of the more obvious facts about the genealogies of Matthew and Luke is that they are different. A common solution is to say that one of them is the line of Joseph, and the other the line of Mary. But this doesn’t really solve the problem because the lines are not entirely different. And besides, both claim to be the line of Joseph (Matt. 1:16; Luke 3:23). And because we don’t examine the problem closely, what God gave as a testimony to the fact that He is a covenant-keeping God is used by us as a way of rattling our faith instead of establishing it.

A genealogical line is called a stirp. Luke traces the Lord’s descent all the way back to Adam. Matthew gives us His line from the time of Abraham. We know that Matthew relied on a written account because in verse 1 he mentions the book. Luke follows Genesis 5 and 10, including Canaan between Arphaxad and Shelah, in line with the Septuagint. The stirps in Luke and Matthew run basically the same from Abraham to David. They then diverge from David to the Exile. Matthew goes through Solomon, and Luke goes through someone named Nathan (1 Chron. 3:5). They join up again in Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, before splitting up again. Then they both arrive at Joseph of Nazareth. So that is our central problem. There are some other very minor glitches which can be easily resolved, and so we won’t bother with those here.

But we should face the problem. It is not normal for the patrilineal lines of two brothers, Solomon and Nathan, to land on one individual, Joseph, a millennium later. Still less can distinct stirps converge, diverge, and then converge again. And if we try to solve the problem with a Joseph/Mary division, we just flip the problem over to the other side. Do we want to explain the divergences or the convergences? We have to explain either way.    

EXCOMMUNICATED FROM THE LINE

Matthew omits four ancestors of Christ from his account—Ahaziah, Jehoash, Amaziah, and Jehoiakim. This is not arbitrary or capricious. The first three of these were removed because of the curse pronounced by Elijah. Ahab’s line, to the fourth generation, were expunged, as Moses said. (Ex. 20:3-6).

“‘Behold, I will bring calamity on you. I will take away your posterity, and will cut off from Ahab every male in Israel, both bond and free” (1 Kings 21:21, NKJV).

And Jehoiakim was a really bad actor, and he fell under Jeremiah’s curse:

“Therefore thus saith the LORD of Jehoiakim king of Judah; He shall have none to sit upon the throne of David: and his dead body shall be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost” (Jeremiah 36:30).

So Matthew excludes illegitimate kings or kings who disqualified themselves and were cursed.   

THE VARIABLE OF ADOPTION

According to Matthew, Jeconiah was the father of Shealtiel. According to Luke, Neri was the father of Shealtiel. Which was it? Again, a prophetic curse pronounced on Jeconiah helps us out. 

“Thus saith the LORD, Write ye this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah” (Jeremiah 22:30). 

We are told in 1 Chron. 3:16 that Jeconiah had a son, Zedekiah (likely named after his great-uncle). But the very next verse (1 Chron. 3:17) lists seven sons of Jeconiah, none of whom were Zedekiah. While captive in Babylon, according to an ancient source, Jeconiah had married a woman named Tamar, and their son Zedekiah died young and without issue. Jeconiah then adopted her sons by a previous marriage, from the time when she was married to Neri, and Shealtiel becomes the crown prince. Neri was descended from Nathan, that mysterious son of David. Thus Jeremiah’s curse is fulfilled, and Matthew and Luke are both right. 

JOSEPH’S FATHER?

Was Joseph’s father Jacob or Heli? The best explanation comes from a second century source (Sextus Julius Africanus) who knew descendants of the Lord’s brother James. He said that the discrepancy was the result of a levirate marriage. Heli had died without issue, and so his brother Jacob raised up seed for him—by law a child of Heli, and biologically a son of Jacob.

HOW TO MINE FOR GOLD

At the risk of causing your eyes to glaze over a little bit more, I will conclude with just a little bit more. For the ancients, they used to keep careful track of the genealogies. They did this because they were looking intently for the way in which God would fulfill His promises. At the end of Ruth, this blessing is pronounced by the elders of Bethlehem.

“And let thy house be like the house of Pharez, whom Tamar bare unto Judah, of the seed which the LORD shall give thee of this young woman.” (Ruth 4:12, 18-22).

Pharez had a twin, Zarah, who was the first born twin who came out second. He was marked by a scarlet thread around his wrist. Generations later, Zarah had a descendent, a man named Achan, who stole some things in the battle of Jericho. He and his whole royal line were wiped out as a result. Rahab, who had marked her house with a scarlet rope, came out into Israel, and married a man named Salmon. Their son was Boaz, who later married Ruth. The thing that this illustrates is that these men and women of faith were tracking with the genealogies carefully. They were looking for the Christ. 

“And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ” (Matthew 1:16).

“And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli,” (Luke 3:23).

So always look for the Christ. Always look to the Christ. He is the desire of nations. He is risen with healing in His wings. He is the gold in the land of Havilah.

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The Last Laugh (Shadows of Bethlehem #3) (Christ Church Downtown)

Grace Sensing on

INTRODUCTION

The coming of the Christ-child was God’s brilliant wit on full display. How would God overthrow Satan’s kingdom? With a baby. How would God defeat the mighty, fallen cherubim, Lucifer? By planting a human seed. How would God destroy death? By laughing in its face.

THE TEXT

And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name. And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation. He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away. He hath holpen his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy; As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever.

Luke 1:46-55

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

At Mary’s coming, her cousin Elisabeth––pregnant with John the Baptist––breaks forth in a blessing upon Mary (Lk. 1:41-45). Elisabeth’s blessing echoes what was said of Father Abraham: He believed and it was credited to him for righteousness. Mary, like Abram & Sarai, was promised a miraculous conception, given a name for the promised son, and she believed.

In response to Elisabeth’s blessing, Mary breaks forth in what we commonly refer to as the Magnificat. Her song is almost verbatim of Hannah’s prayer (1 Sam. 2:1-10). The Lord granted Hannah’s prayer for a child, and conceived the son who would become the great prophet Samuel. Hannah’s prayer is full of exultation that God had caused her to triumph over her rival. This rival (Peninnah, Elkanah’s other wife) had a unique talent for getting under the skin; she frequently threw Hannah’s barrenness in her face.

That same key signature of exultation is present in Mary’s song. The proud are scattered (v51). The vanity of the mighty is thwarted by God’s mighty arm (v51-52). The rich find themselves penniless (v53). Meanwhile, the humble are exalted (v52), the hungry filled (v53), the lowly handmaid is regarded (v48), the servant/son Israel is helped (v54). And all of this flows from God’s remembrance of mercy (v54). But brought into keen focus is the promise which God made to Abraham and to his seed (v55).

RISE THE WOMAN’S CONQUERING SEED

Mary’s closing line takes us back to the ancient stories found in Genesis. While she explicitly mentions Abraham and his seed, God’s promise of a seed was first given in Eden. The promise to Abraham was an expanded revelation of the promise given to the serpent at the fall of Adam: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel (Gen 3:15).” In the face of man’s rebellion and subjugation to the dragon, God reveals that a seed of the woman would arise to crush the dragons head. The rival would be overthrown. The Lord echoes this promise to Noah (Gen. 9:9), hanging His war-bow in the sky as an assurance that He would surely bring this promised seed to pass.

God called Abram out of the idolatrous people of Ur, and promised him Canaan, assuring him that his seed would possess it forever (Gen. 12:7, 13:15-16). Abraham believed this promise, and God reckoned it to him as righteousness (Gen. 15:6). But then Sarah’s barrenness persisted. This led to a lapse of faith on their part, and the conception of Ishmael by Sarah’s handmaid Hagar. Hagar becomes a rival for Sarah, and thorn in her side. Eventually, Abraham pleads with God: “O that Ishmael might live before thee! And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him (Gen. 17:18-19).”

Sarah, memorably, laughs at the news that the Lord would grant her conception (Gen. 18:12-15). But then, as the Lord had promised she conceives and bears a son, “And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me (Gen. 21:6).”

THE SINGULAR SEED

The seed promised to Abraham was a big deal, and the Apostles spend a great deal of time commenting on it. Paul in Galatians makes the clearest assertion regarding the inner pith of this promise to Abraham regarding his seed: “And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed. So then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. … Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. … And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise (Gal 3:8-9, 16, 29).”

So then Isaac was only a partial fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham. The true fulfillment was found in Jesus Christ, born of Mary. God’s mercy was not to be found in simply having Abraham as an ancestor. His mercy would be found in a Seed; singular not plural. This promised seed was not a collective of human effort or lineage. The Seed would engage in mortal combat with the dragon and emerge wounded though victorious. In order to be righteous in God’s sight, you must trust in this Seed.

A JOLLY BELIEF

Mary’s prayer of exultation is the prayer of all believers, exulting over the triumph of the seed of the woman over the serpent’s seed. God made good on His promised mercy to mankind, and He did so by bringing to pass His word of promise to Abraham: a seed.

God’s promise of mercy which Mary recalls is to Abraham and to his seed. That Seed of mercy was now gestating in her womb. God’s covenant of mercy is found in Christ alone. There is no mercy outside of Him.

There is divine humor in this promise. It was by design that Isaac’s name means laughter. God was going to do something which no eye had seen, or ear heard, or mind had conceived. The serpent sought to engulf all of mankind, and Christ submits Himself to being devoured by the dragon. But Christ, the promised Seed, was the true and better Isaac. Satan sought to kill God, but God the Son overthrew death by His death. Christ became the curse, that you might not be accursed. The Word became a speechless baby, in order that His blood might eternally plead for you. And your response to this is to lay hold of this better Isaac by the same faith which Abraham, Hannah, and Mary all demonstrate. Exult, for God has overthrown your rival. For He has crucified your old man, and begotten you, not by perishable seed, but by the imperishable seed of the living and abiding word of God.

Mary’s namesake, Miriam, danced as the Egyptian warriors drowned in the Red Sea. This is the jolly faith which God reckons as righteous, because it is faith in His Son: the Word made flesh. The Word that bled. The Word that was put to death. The Word that crowns you with the cleansing waters of your baptism. The Word that is a feast of covenantal bread & wine. The Word that says to all who believe in Him, Yahweh is Salvation.

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