I encourage you to meet me in the Gospel of Mark in chapter
12, please. And today our portion will be
two verses that we trust will suffice.
And our understanding of this brilliant passage Mark 12, verse
35. And as Jesus taught in the
temple, he said, How can the scribes say that the Christ is
the son of David, Dave himself in the Holy Spirit Declared the
Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I put your
enemies under your feet. David himself calls him Lord.
So how is he his son? And the great throng heard him
gladly. Lord, bless the reading and the
preaching of your word. Bless our hearts, and receiving
and applying it open the eyes of our hearts.
Oh, Lord, even as we hear what you have to say.
May it wash away all troubles, all fears, all anxieties, all
indifference. It may affordify our faith
afresh. We ask these things in the name
that is above every other name, the living name, the name of
Jesus Christ. Amen.
I hope you remember what we've been discussing the past few
weeks, where there have been a series of interrogations that
Jesus experienced. We saw the Pharisees with the
Herodians approach Christ following them.
We saw the Sadducees the same day, and following the Sadducees
we left off with the scribes who came to Christ as well.
But after those questions were without any effort really were
answered by Christ, these groups now stood stupefied in the
presence of the wisdom of God in the person of Jesus.
And now the tables are about to turn because Jesus has his own
question. He has this question now that he
is going to target towards these religious leaders.
And the essence of this question deals with the true identity of
the Messiah that has been promised from of old as revealed
in the scriptures. And the reason why the Lord
asked this question is because the contentious religious
leaders not only prove their ignorance of the general
application and understanding of the Word of God, they missed
what the Messiah was all about and who he would be.
And so Christ now wants to really expose the underlying
issue of the hostility of these men.
He's now going to get to the centre of it.
The the real reason why they approached them with such
aggression and abuse is because they do not understand what the
Bible has to say about the Messiah.
They are sorely ignorant, and Christ is about to reveal that
and compound that yet again. And reading this exchange and
Mark, as you just did with me, we see that the format of Jesus
teaching here seems to be general, like he's just sharing
it to whoever is there. But when you read it from
Matthew's account, he targets this question toward the
Pharisees. He's speaking to them.
Now why is he doing that? Because if there was anyone who
should have understood the prophecies and the descriptions
of the anointed One who has to come the saviour of the people
of Israel, it was the Pharisees. There was if there was anyone
who was supposed to get it, it was this band of men.
But unfortunately that wasn't the case.
Instead, they're abusing the very one who fulfilled them.
And Christ is about to challenge their faulty thinking Yet once
more, and what we see here is Jesus going to the Old
Testament. He is going to go to the Hebrew
Scriptures to make his case. And when you hear this teaching
today, you're going to feel as though there's been a golden a,
a glistening nugget that's been placed in your hand that we get
to look at and enjoy. But it's much more than that.
This passage that you and I are holding in our hands is a key.
It's a key that should encourage you and I to unlock a world of
treasures. The world that I speak of is the
Old Testament, and the treasures that I'm referring to are the
vast pictures and prophecies concerning Jesus Christ of
Nazareth. And that's where we're headed
today. You and I are just going to have
a glimpse of this world of where we might have overlooked Christ.
And my my simple prayer in today's message is that there
would be this heightened reverence for the word of God,
that your heart would be stirred to see the divine authorship of
this book and how it has in fact been given to us by the
Almighty. And that you would relish in it,
and you would rejoice in it, and more than that, you would submit
to it to a greater degree. And so let's do that.
Together. We come back to our text in
verse 35. And before the Lord does
anything, he acknowledges that the scribes believed and taught
that the chosen one of God would in fact be the descendant of
David. So we don't have to turn that.
But when you read the same account from Matthew's
perspective, Jesus asked the question to the Pharisees.
He says it this way. What do you think about the
Christ whose son is he? And the Pharisees rightly answer
the Son of David? They weren't wrong in their
answer, but they were not entirely right.
Because what the Lord is about to now convey is that the
Messiah is more than just a descendant of David.
He's more than just a son of David.
He is the Lord of David. And the way he's going to do
that is by going to one particular Psalm.
You should be familiar with the Psalm.
You know why? Because it's the most referenced
and alluded to Psalm in the New Testament, Psalm 110.
And Christ quotes the first verse of that Psalm to make his
point. And it's a brilliant point.
But I want to pause here before we explore his exposition of
that verse. Pause for a moment and consider
this. Jesus is asking a question,
right? The past few Sundays we've been
exploring questions asked to Jesus and how he would answer
them. But the Sanhedrin, the spiritual
Supreme Court of Israel's day, when they asked their questions
to Jesus, did not do so from a pure heart.
They wanted to trap Jesus. They wanted to find evidence to
arrest Jesus. But now when Christ returns the
question, he does not have the same intent.
Yes, he's going to he's going to expose their ignorance, but not
so that they can be red faced and mortified.
When is this question asked again?
When you read your Bible zoom out from time to time.
Remember, we are at the final moments before Jesus is
arrested, put on trial, and then nailed to a cross.
We're in that that last week of his earthly life.
And so we know that in just a couple of days things are going
to change drastically. In fact, this is Jesus's last
face to face conversation with the religious leaders before his
trial. This is it.
And when you consider that truth with what we learned last time,
you have a brilliant revelation concerning the heart of Christ.
What happened before Jesus asked this question?
Well, ascribe asked him a question.
What's the most important commandment?
Jesus answered it, and this was the response of the man he He
acknowledged it, and Christ says to him, Look at verse 34 of Mark
12. And when Jesus saw that he
answered wisely, he said to him, you are not far from the Kingdom
of God, and after that no one dared to ask him any more
questions. So time is running out.
And yet we also see, at least from 1 scribe, a level of
humility and hunger. And I believe these things
reveal something about Christ asking this question and giving
the answer the way that he did. I can say with confidence, and I
hope you agree with me, that Jesus is teaching here is a
final opportunity for his enemies to come to the truth.
Time is ticking, and there is a blossoming of humility from at
least one of their band members. And here's Christ now,
responding from a place of love, opening their eyes to the truth
of who the Messiah is and who he is, I'm sure, with the hope that
they would hear it, understand it, and give themselves to it.
This is the love of Jesus Christ on display right here.
This is what we see about Christ, his love, even for his
enemies. You know what they've been
trying to do on this day? Corner him, Embarrass him more
than that, find a reason to arrest him, and how does he
return the favor? His response was to give him
another chance, by opening their eyes to see the truth, not just
in the Word, but the truth Incarnate right before them.
And the way he's going to do that is by going to this text
that we're going to explore together.
What do we read here in our text to get together in verse 36?
David himself in the Holy Spirit declared.
The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand until I put your
enemies under your feet. I know we want to get to Psalm
110, but I have to acknowledge something else here.
Forgive me. Do you see how Jesus
acknowledges the authorship of the Bible?
What does he say? David himself?
That's the human composition in the Holy Spirit.
That is the definition of divine inspiration.
And So what you have here is exactly what the apostle Peter
builds upon in his second epistle when he says the
following. For no prophecy was ever
produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were
carried along by the Holy Spirit.
That's the consensus of the Bible.
Jesus affirmed it. The apostles that he's trained
taught it that yes, men were used to write the Bible, but God
was the one who was guiding them and inspiring them and
protecting them from error. So what we have here, yes, has
been written by man, but there is an agent behind them, and
that is God himself. Here's what we have, Psalm 110.
David wrote it. That is huge because you have
people today who want to say that David didn't write this or
try to twist it concerning David, that it was not written
by David but written for David. And I'll get to the reason why
that's important to distinguish. It's important to establish what
Listen Psalm 110 and you can get there if you want early.
I didn't not going there yet, but you can prepare Psalm 110 is
a messianic Psalm. In other words, it is a piece of
work that prophecies of the Messiah, the Anointed 1, the
chosen One that is to come to bring deliverance to the people
of Israel. And ultimately, if you
understand the wider scope of prophecy to the world.
And the reason why that is important, again as I mentioned,
is because people try to dismiss it because Christ fulfills Psalm
110. Now how do we know Psalm 110 is
about the Messiah? Very simple.
You don't have to jump through many hoops.
Some would say this is a Psalm written by Abraham's servant,
like desperate attempts to try to make this not about Jesus
Christ. Some would say again that this
was composed to declare about David.
So when it says, the Lord said to my Lord that second Lord is
David, this is about David and his covenant with God.
Well, you're going to have problems there.
Do you know why? The reason why we know that this
is the Messiah being spoken of here is because of the content
of the Psalm. You have a king who's going to
not just rule in Zion, but rule from Zion.
You have a king who also listened to.
This is a priest, and not just a priest, He's a priest who will
have his priesthood and function and an operation for eternity.
No other person fits that description of a kingly priestly
role apart from the Messiah, apart from the one that not just
David but others before and after him declared about the one
who is to come. He is going to be a king, but
he's also going to be a priest. That was illegal in the Old
covenant. If anyone attempted to do that,
they were severely disciplined by God.
But we now have this description of one who is not just only
going to be a king and a priest, but he's also going to be
exalted and praised by God himself.
So he's approved in that function.
So right there that ends the argument.
This Psalm. Psalm 110 is messianic.
Now you can turn there. So let's turn to Psalm 110.
And I want you to see something, because the Greek version of
Psalm 110 here doesn't read in the same way that the Hebrew
version does. And that's what we have in Psalm
110. What we have in the Gospels is
the Greek translation of it. But look at Psalm 110.
First verse a Psalm of David the Lord says to my Lord, set on my
right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.
Notice that the first mention of Lord is different than the
second one in terms of spelling. If it's capitalizing your Bible,
then you understand this. I hope that that is a reference
to the covenant name of God. This is God's personal name,
Yahweh, and the second mention of Lord is not the same.
It's a more general term, one that can be granted to a human
authority. So you have Yahweh says to Adon
or Adonai and that word Lord. The second mentioned simply
means master, and you have people in the Bible as examples
who are granted that a term of respect.
You're the master. You are an authoritative figure
in my life, so I will call you Lord.
So you have Yahweh, God's personal name speaking to
another figure, distinct figure and addresses him as master.
This is this is important to make it distinguished about
because it can cause a lot of confusion otherwise.
Now Jesus doesn't go further in the Psalm, right?
He just he just sticks with verse one because verse one has
enough to challenge the wrong thinking of his foes.
And why is he mentioning this? It's very simple.
In verse 37, Mark 12, he says David himself calls him Lord, so
how is he his son? Do you understand the question?
If this is a messianic Psalm and they've already established that
the Messiah is going to be a son of David, then how is it that
David can call his son his Lord? It's very simple.
David's son, naturally would be inferior to David in terms of
honor and rank. I was talking to my dad about
this last night and I said dad not in terms of human dignity
and value. We're the same in that.
But because you're my dad, you have greater honor, you have
more authority. And so if David's son is in that
way inferior, then how does David dare to call him his
master? Do you understand?
Not what Jesus is trying to convey.
Now it goes even deeper than that.
If David is the king of Israel, which he was, then there really
isn't anyone else from a human standpoint, that is above him.
He holds the highest position of authority known to man, at least
in this realm. And so for him to call anybody
his master implies that this person holds a position that's
not in this world or not of this world.
Let me make that case further. Go to Psalm 89 with me.
Here's another Psalm concerning David but his covenant with God
and his descendants. Look at Psalm 89, verse 20, just
to make sure that we know that this Psalm is in fact about
David. Psalm 89 and we can go to verse
20 to get that clue. I have found in David my servant
with my holy oil. I have anointed him.
Now. Why don't we just read on to the
rest of it? So that my hand shall be
established with him. My arm also shall strengthen
him. The enemy shall not outwit him,
the wicked shall not humble him. I will crush his foes before him
and strike down those who hate him.
My faithfulness and my steadfast love shall be with him, and in
my name shall his horn be exalted.
I will set his hand on the sea and his right hand on the
rivers. He shall cry to me.
You are my Father, my God and the rock of my salvation.
Pause. There's a misconception among
Christians that when Jesus came, he introduced us God as Father.
No, he didn't. God is referred to as Father in
the Old Testament as well. You just saw one example of it.
The difference is now the fatherly relationship with God
has now been extended to the Gentiles.
That's the difference. Look at verse 27.
This is the part that I want to mention.
And I will make him the first born.
Who's him? That's David.
I will make him the first born. I'm hesitant to throw a lot
here, but I'm going to do it and it's recorded so we can revisit
it if it's too much, just to chew on it more.
Was David the first born among his family?
So why is he called the first born here?
Because the Bible's Dictionary is different than ours.
First born in many cases in the Bible refers to preeminence, not
order of chronology coming into existence.
You know why that's important? Because your friendly
neighborhood, Jehovah's Witness will use Colossians to say Jesus
is the first born. He's the first created thing.
And so they'll say that Jesus was created and then through him
everything else was created. But you have to come to Psalm
89, verse 27, to show them that first born doesn't need to mean
first to come into existence. It can also mean preeminence to
be above, to be elevated. And this is what we're being
told about David. He will be the first born, and
the second part reinforces that truth.
And I will make him the first born, the highest of the kings
of the earth. So David is not just king, he's
the highest of the kings of all the earth.
And yet, in Psalm 110, and speaking about his descendant,
he refers to the Son of David as what, my Lord?
How you're the king that's king above all the other kings on the
earth. Who is this son who by just
nature is inferior? Who is he for you to say that he
is your master? And the answer to that is when
you look at Psalm 110, that this Lord of David's is no ordinary
Lord. He's an otherworldly king and
the makeup of that king is described in Psalm 110.
Let's read, it's very brief and you will understand exactly why
David said what he said, because by the Spirit he had this
revelation. Verse 2.
The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty sceptre rule in the
midst of your enemies. Your people will offer
themselves freely on the day of your power in holy garments.
From the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be
yours. The Lord has sworn and will not
change His mind. You are priests forever after
the order of Melchizedek. The Lord is at your right hand.
He will shatter kings on the day of His wrath.
He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with
corpses. He will shatter chiefs over the
wide earth. He will drink from the brook, by
the way. Therefore, he will lift up his
head. When you read this, you realize
that the composition, the makeup of this king is something beyond
human. You realize that he has been
invited and summoned to sit at the right hand of God.
You realize that he's not just going to be a ruler, he's going
to be a priest. And not after the order of
Aaron. Hebrews tells us that the order
of Melchizedek, which is another sermon for another time, is
superior to that of Aaron, because the priest of Aaron died
and replaced the other. But when it comes to this
priesthood, we read what you will be priest.
How long? Forever.
So he's a human ruler over a human government.
Yes, he's been elevated to sit by the hand of right hand of
God, but he's also eternal. He doesn't cease to live.
He doesn't just rule in Zion, he rules from Zion.
And though you are convinced, I'm sure, that there is
something supernatural about this person, you come to verse 7
and you realize what? That he drinks by the brook,
denoting what? That his activity is still human
like. And this is who no other than
the person of Jesus Christ. And if you're not convinced of
that for whatever reason, realize that Jesus, in the final
book of this library of Holy Scripture, in the final chapter
reinforces and builds upon what he taught here in Mark 12.
Go to Revelation 22 and see it with your own eyes in verse 16.
I, Jesus, have sent my Angel to testify to you about these
things. For the churches, I am the root
and the descendant of David the bright morning star.
I'm not just the descendant of David.
I'm the root. I was before David and I came
after David. If the Messiah, the Christ is
David's son, why does he call him Lord?
Jesus answers it because he existed before David.
He created David, He made the covenant with David.
And at the perfect time, according to Galatians 4/4, he
came into this world born of the flesh, specifically from the
line of David, the root and the descended.
Notice that he didn't say I was the root and the descendant of
David. He says I am the root.
I am the root and descendant of David.
For him to say I am the root, I get it.
But for you to say in the present, I am the descendant.
You know what that means? Revelation 22.
Is Jesus on earth or is he in heaven?
Oh, please answer, yes, he's in heaven, right?
He's in heaven. And yet he can say I am still
the descendant of David. You know why?
Because he's still in the flesh, glorified.
That's why. He can say I am the descendant
of David, because yes, he did take on flesh, but he also
resurrected in the flesh. We don't believe in a spiritual
resurrection. No, no, no, no.
He rose bodily, he rose bodily, and he's returning bodily.
We're not waiting for an invisible return.
Every eye will see him and they all recognize that he is the
root and descendant of David. So Jesus, just with one verse,
shows these men that the Messiah that they claim to be
anticipating is more than a man just from one verse.
From one song he stumps them and shows them and shows us that the
Messiah, who is to come from a prophecy that's been written
hundreds of years before Christ time, is in fact divine.
He holds a dual nature. He took on flesh.
And when you read the character of Christ, the interactions of
Christ, the acts of Christ, you will be amazed to realize that
he is no mere ordinary man. He proved it with his life.
And remember, I told you that this Psalm would would be like a
precious jewel deposited in our hands and we would look at it
and enjoy it. But it's more than that.
It's a truth that opens up our eyes to a world ready to be
explored concerning greater revelations of Christ,
specifically in the Old Testament.
I feel bad for Christians who do not engage with the Hebrew
Scriptures for many reasons. Let me tell you one of them You
will not know the depth of the New Testament without it, you
won't. You always limit yourself as
long as you treat the Old Testament as second to the first
or the new. Rather, you can't do that.
It's the foundation upon the truths that you and I enjoy and
I've been saved by in the New Covenant, and I just want to
take this time we we could stop here and just rejoice in in
Jesus wisdom and his understanding of the Word being
the Word Himself. But I just want to just take a
little trip with you and just travel through a few of the
neighborhoods and the streets, so to speak, of the Old
Testament, to open your appetite and to see that Christ is
everywhere, everywhere. He's everywhere.
And I'm sure many of us, because many of you here love the word
and you know the word, you can, you can shoot off references of
the Old Testament that speak of Christ.
But I even want to explore the things in the places where we
might have not seen him, but he's there.
He is there. So let's just do that.
Right. Let's do that.
This Sunday, Jesus was born where Bethlehem was, that not
prophesied by the prophets. It was Micah prophesied in Micah
5/2 that he would be born in Bethlehem.
But I want to remind you today again, we're just just having a
sample. I want to remind you there was
another significant boy who was born in Bethlehem.
And when you understand his birth, the way the scripture
mentions it, you'll realize that though it was a historical
distinguished thing, it in fact carries prophetic weight.
And I hope that cheers your heart to see Jesus even there.
OK, let's do it. Genesis 35.
I'll wait for you. Genesis 35.
We're reading up here Rachel,
who is pregnant with Benjamin, but his name wasn't given yet.
She had a very difficult labour and we read about here in verse
17 of Genesis 35. And when her labour was at its
hardest, the midwife said to her, do not fear, for you have
another son. And as her soul was departing
for, she was dying. She called his name Benoni, but
his father called him Benjamin. Benjamin.
So Rachel died, and she was buried on the way to Ephrath,
that is, Bethlehem. This points to Jesus because
admit Rachel's deadly discomfort.
She chooses in her anguish, almost as a pathetic memorial,
to identify this boy as Ben Oni. You know what Ben Oni means, son
of my sorrows. And right there, Jacob, his
father interjects and says no, no, no, no, no.
He's going to be called Benjamin.
You know what that means, son of
the right hand. Some of you already got it.
And this boy who was once been Oni and then became Benjamin,
was born where Bethlehem, the one you and I worship, was born
in Bethlehem. And he was destined for sorrow
and suffering to the extent that, according to the Gospel of
Luke, his earthly mother would have a sword pierced through her
soul. She would be in anguish,
according to Simeon's prophecy, based on the destiny that this
boy would fulfill. And Isaiah tells us in fact that
he was a man of what sorrows? But what happens after his
atoning death? After his atoning suffering, the
Heavenly Father summons him, and he says, what in Psalm 110 sit
where? At my right hand?
And he did so by way of resurrection and ascension.
So even in a brief glimpse of the birth of one of the sons of
Jacob, do you have prophetic perfume sprayed on it where you
have the Son of sorrows who would be the son of the right
hand and he was born in Bethlehem?
Is there more? A lot more.
How much time do you got? So much more.
One of my favorite truths about Jesus in the Old Testament in a
non obvious way is with the cities of refuge.
The cities of refuge were designated by God in the old
covenant for the people when they entered into the promised
land. There were six of them, and they
were set apart by God as a means of grace for the one
specifically who committed manslaughter involuntarily.
So the one who accidentally killed someone else with no
premeditation, with no envy or history of hatred in his heart,
could flee to one of these cities.
Because in that law you also had God giving the right to a
relative to avenge the blood of the one who was murdered by
getting the one who did kill him.
So these cities of refuge that have been placed strategically
throughout the promised Land in a way, by the way, that wherever
you are in the Promised Land, you can have access to it, no
matter where you're parked, no matter where the sin was
committed, you could find a nearby city of refuge.
You know what? That's a picture of Christ.
That no matter where you've gone with your sin, no matter how far
you are from hope and refuge, you can find it in Christ.
But it's more than that. So this man, who may be in a
workplace or maybe with with without attention or care in the
home, kill someone, was called to not delay, but flee to flee
to any of those cities of refuge.
It's also a picture of you not delaying coming to Christ the
moment that you've been made aware of your sin.
You are not to be slow in running and throwing yourself at
the foot of the cross. So this man was to flee, and
once he fled and hid behind those walls, he had the council
and the elders of that city determine his case.
And if he was proved in fact to be innocent, he was safe from
the avenger as long as he remained in the city of refuge.
Also another picture of Christ. You want to be safe.
You have to stay in Christ. So much to say about the City of
refuge. But there's one particular
verse, because you might think to yourself, well, OK, so if I
do this and I, I leave, I flee. I'm also walking away from my
home. I'm walking away from my
livelihood. I'm walking away from my
inheritance. I'm making a new way of life in
this strange place. Yes, I'm grateful that it
protects me. But is there any way for
somebody who has fled to any of these cities to be free, to be,
like, really free, and to go back to his life upon one
condition? I'm not going to give you the
answer. You got to turn there if you
want to see it in Joshua Chapter 20.
If you're more interested in the city of refuge than you were
before you came in, look at Joshua 20 verses one to six and
its totality. But let's just for the sake of
time, look at verse 6, Joshua 20, verse 6 and he being the
one, the manslayer, he shall remain in that city until he has
stood before the congregation for Judgement.
Check this out until the death of him who was high priest at
the time. Then the manslayer may return to
his own town and his own home to the town from which he fled.
You would think that this was written in the New Testament.
It's not. It's in the Hebrew scriptures.
There's very little written about this, and I wonder why.
There's a lot of hush concerning this and I have a feeling,
especially from non Christian writers and theologians, this
shows us so clearly that there is something about the death of
the high priest that carries substitutionary merit for the
one who has committed involuntary murder.
How? What does the death of the high
priest have to do with me? Who has committed a sin?
Yes, accidental and allowing me to go free.
You hit a wall with your understanding, but that wall is
broken down when you understand the person and role of Jesus
Christ and listen, put that in your arsenal, please.
Because the friendly neighborhood Jewish person who
is serious about their faith will often criticize the
Christian and their core belief that there is one who has been
sent by God, who laid down his life so that through his death
and resurrection we might receive freedom from sin,
freedom from the wrath to come. And with that criticism comes
slander, that's unjust, that it's cruel, that's barbaric.
You believe in human sacrifice. And I say, have you ever read
Joshua chapter 20, verse 6? Because in the Law of Moses,
apparently the death of the high priest grants freedom for the
manslayer. You know what that means?
Jesus coming dying on the cross for the sins of man is not
contradictory to what the Old Testament has to say.
It's consistent. You see the same truth here.
Yes, it's a breath. Yes, it's a whisper.
But when you understand a new covenant, it's a megaphone.
And here we are missing these things because I'd rather be
John than Joshua. Oh, you're missing out on John
because you're not reading Joshua.
So we even see here that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of
this shadow. But can I tell you something?
He's not just a fulfillment of the shadow.
He's a greater than anything that you find in the Old
Testament. And even in this, yes, you have
a high priest who dies and allows a manslayer to go free,
but this is a sinful sin. Infected High Priest.
And though his death for some mysterious reason does grant
liberty, it's only for accidental sin.
You know why Jesus is better? It's even for sins that you've
committed on purpose. It's not just for involuntary
things that you've done, it's even for the things that you
have premeditated that you've consciously said.
I'm going to do this knowing that the Word says this, and
I've been taught otherwise, even for those sins.
The death of the High Priest can cover you and set you free.
He's greater than the high priest of the covenant of old
because he's a greater high priest.
And his covenant is greater in ways that you can't even think.
That we are granted truths to. Meditate on it, though, we see
through a glass dimly. Crisis everywhere, crisis
everywhere. Let's consider a final thought.
So I don't keep you too long. Yeah.
Let's go back to Mark 12. What's happening in Mark 12?
You're going to go to Mark 12, but I'm going to take you
somewhere else in a moment. What have we been studying the
past few weeks? The grilling examinations
against Christ by various groups from all angles.
The Pharisees, the Herodians, the Sadducees, the scribes.
And again, the timing of these examinations is important to
identify the full prophetic significance of it.
This was during the final week where Jesus was prepared and
being prepared to lay his life down as what?
The Passover lamb ultimately right?
And what's happening around them.
That same week where Jesus dies, the Passover feast is being
celebrated and you have on that week people coming in with their
lambs and having them checked out and ensuring everything is
put into place. For that 14th day of the first
month of the religious calendar, they could honor the Passover
feast. Can you just imagine the site
here? You have Jesus in the temple
going back and forth with these religious groups and all around
them you hear the bleeding of sheep, the hustle and bustle of
another festival. And I want you to see the
original instructions for the Passover and how it parallels
with Christ's experience, even in what we've been studying in
this chapter the past few Sundays.
This is our final text that we're going to explore.
It's an Exodus 12. Look at it with me, please.
Exodus 12, it will be worth it. Look at verse three of Exodus
12. This is the institution of the
Passover feast, and it says here tell all the congregation of
Israel that on the 10th day of this month, keep that in mind.
The 10th day of this month every man shall take a lamb according
to their father's houses, a lamb for a household.
And if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and
his nearest neighbor shall take according to the number of
persons according to what each can eat.
You shall make your count for the lamb.
Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male a year old.
You may take it from the sheep or from the goats.
Verse six is important. And you shall keep it until the
14th day of this month, when the whole assembly of the
congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight
Israel. This is a feast that you will
hold on to for generations. Here's how you're supposed to
observe it. On the 10th day of this month
you are to go out and select a lamb, and you are to ensure that
that lamb is without blemish. And on the 14th day you are to
kill the lamb. So there is an interval period
of four days that every household is to hold this lamb
in possession before they sacrifice it.
Why not just get it on the 14th day and kill it on the 14th day?
Why get it on the 10th day, Hold on to it to four days and then
kill it? The context suggests this as the
strongest reason why verse five tells us that that lamb should
be what without blemish. I am persuaded the reason why
they were to hold on to it for 10 days was so that they can
inspect it from head to toe. Think about how much depended on
the lamb being without blemish. The Destroyer, according to
Exodus 12, was ready to sweep over the land of Egypt and
destroy the first born of every living thing.
And the quality of that lamb would determine whether or not
that Destroyer would pass over those homes.
So imagine that was applied to you as an Israelite of that
time. Here you are.
You select a lamb. And you know, four days from
now, this lamb must be without blemish if it's supposed to be
honored by God Almighty, what are you going to do those four
days? Oh, you're going to protect that
lamb. And you're going to look through
it and you're going to look in the ears and you're going to
flip it over and look on the belly and you're going to
examine and inspect it because you want to ensure this thing is
right. And on the 14th day, if it
passed the test, it would be an acceptable sacrifice.
What was happening to Jesus before he would ultimately go to
the cross. You've been studying it these
past few Sundays, one religious group after the next, examining
him. By what authority do you do
these things? Pass the test?
Should we pay our taxes to Caesar or not pass the test?
How does the resurrection work? If a woman marries several men,
whose husband will she have? And who will have the wife pass
the test? Which out of all the
commandments is the greatest pass the test and no one asked
them the question afterwards. Finally these Jews bring him
before a gentile named Pilate, and Pilate examines him, and in
Luke 23 verse 4 this is what he confesses.
Then Pilate said to the chief priests in the crowds.
I find no guilt in this man. So in the same time where those
Passover lambs were being inspected and examined, you had
the Lamb of God from heaven undergoing the same thing.
And what was discovered of him? No sin, no wrong, no error, and
he would satisfy the one who demanded A spotless lamb for the
sins of mankind. Where is Jesus?
Everywhere. Everywhere.
I hope something in your heart was lit ablaze from this brief
study. We have a living God.
This book is a living book. It scares me in a good way.
I get scared from it because after all these years of reading
it day after day after day, it never fails to bring me to my
knees and to show me you don't know anything you think you do.
And I want to tell you today that Jesus Christ is the Lamb of
God. And I want you to see the
response of these people in our final verse of Mark 12, verse
37. David himself calls him Lord.
So how is he his son? And the great throng heard him
gladly. That's a sad response.
They heard him gladly. In other words, they enjoyed his
mastery over the Scriptures. They enjoyed how he was able to
defend himself and shut the mouths of those who claim to be
experts. You know, it's possible for
after a sermon like this or an Old Testament study, for people
to hear it gladly. And that's it.
What should have happened? Or they should have realized
this is the one that the scriptures pointed to.
This shouldn't 'cause just rejoicing.
It should have encouraged repentance.
But it didn't. It was just an intellectual
stimulation. It was just something that
impressed them. Is that how you heard the sermon
today? Oh wow.
I never thought the cities of rest.
You've only that was something else.
Oh wow. Yeah.
I don't really know the Old Testament as much as I thought.
That's not the response Christ wants from you.
Yes, you should be moved by the word of God, but you should be
moved by the God of the word, and you should want to love him
and surrender to him. And as a precious brother prayed
earlier, if you don't know him, do you realize what you're
dealing with? Do you realize that this was not
compiled in two years by one author, but the cross references
that we just did? There was from multiple authors
over a span of 1500 years? This book is not just one book.
It's a library of books. Three different languages,
different continents, 40 different authors, 1 consistent
theme. Jesus Christ, the Savior of the
world. What are you going to do with
that? But what are you going to do
with what you just heard? Doesn't it at least cause you to
be like, whoa, So you're telling me that Jesus fulfilled things
from thousands of years ago, that those authors were actually
pointing to him, That he didn't just show up on the scene as a
moral teacher and die to martyrs, death, and Christians
just appreciate him? You're telling me that he's
something more? I'm telling you he's more.
What are you going to do with that?
Are you just going to hear it? Gladly.
Oh, that was nice. He was very passionate, the way
he shared those truths. You're missing it.
And I would be a fool.
And I'm going to stand before the living God if I presented in
such a way. Oh, here's a nice little
collection of thoughts. Did you like it?
Oh, good, Wonderful. I'm compelled to tell you.
I just told you about the truths of God, and that demands a
response from you. You need to deal with that.
You need to now make a decision. What am I going to do with this
Christ that in an hour I've been told about in a way that can
only be deemed as supernatural? I didn't write this.
I'm just the one who deliver the mail.
So what are you going to do with that?
Are you going to just brush it off like these people did?
The great Throng heard him gladly.
And it was just another Sunday. I hope that's not how you
respond. I hope you at least endeavor to
say, OK, I have to do something with this.
And I'm going to do my personal investigation myself.
You do it. You do it now.
You examine the Lamb of God. You search for error in this
book. He authored it.
You look at his person. You look at his character.
You look at his dealings with man.
You look at his commentaries and his description and his and his
revelations about our world, our universe, and I can guarantee
you that if you do so with an honest heart, you will realize
that this is no ordinary man and this is no ordinary book.
I've done my part today, and I pray.
I pray. Really.
I hope you hear my love. I pray that you would do yours
if you do not know Him. Believers, I pray that you just
love him more than you did when you walked in today.
Let's ask him to help us do that.
Lord, we thank you and we love you and we worship you and we
exalt you. You are the name that is above
every other name. You are the centerpiece of this
word. You are the darling of the
universe. You are the one in whom every
person will see and behold, and every knee and tongue will
confess that Jesus Christ is in fact Lord.
But, Lord, we don't want to wait until that day until we
acknowledge it. We want to bow our knees today,
and we want to realize, and we want to acknowledge.
And we want to tell you that we believe that you are the
Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, the only
way to heaven. And Lord, if there's even one
person who has not made that confession yet, the same grace
that you show to those Pharisees and Sadducees and Herodians and
scribes by giving them a chance through the Word to see the
truth so that they can be saved by the truth.
We pray that people would register the same thought and
heart that you have that you had for them is for them as well.
Lord, we ask that on this day, as we fellowship in a moment,
that we would celebrate the truth that we are in.
You saved us, and we have the truth, and we're in the truth.
And there's more truth to explore and there's more depths
to discover. Thank you, O God, that every
week you remind us that you are eternal.
And there's no time in this life, even in eternity, that we
will arrive at where we say we figured it out.
Thank you, oh God, for being a mighty God and for showing us
that you are indeed splendid, glorious, majestic.
We pray in the name of the one that we just heard about Jesus.
Amen and Amen. Let's worship him.
That's all I can say. Let's stand and worship the
living Christ. He's alive.