Also by

Stephen P. Troxel

Going the Distance:

Life’s a Marathon, Not a Sprint

The Revelation to Remember:

Keys for Understanding the Book of Revelation

￼

JESUS from Genesis to Revelation:

Old Testament Concealed,

New Testament Revealed

By Stephen P. Troxel

©2013 Disciple Daily Publishing

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

As noted, some Scripture is taken from the Amplified Bible, Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

As note, some Scripture is taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

Editor: Joni Prinjinski

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Dedication

I wish to dedicate this book to pastors and spouses everywhere. I know from experience that ministry is difficult and at times quite disappointing. We minister to those who face all kinds of problems and temptations in a morally corrupt world. Our people face disease and death. But Jesus is there as the God of all comfort. Others will let us down. But Jesus will never let us down. He is there for time and for eternity. Hebrews 12:3 reminds us that we are to look to Him when we are tempted to be discouraged and to give up. May a simple reading of this book pull your eyes back to Him and help you to find strength for the rest of your journey home.

Acknowledgements

I give thanks to those who have made this book possible. Arlie Francis has been a friend and ministry partner for many years. He has a heart to disciple others and to bring them into the likeness of Christ. He has heard me present the material in this book several times and has encouraged me to put it into book form. He has taken the initial manuscript and massaged it and made many additions and corrections. He has also seen this book through to the finished product, cover design, layout and working with the printer. I owe much to Arlie for his persistence in seeing this through in a timely fashion. Thank you, Arlie. For more information on his ministry you can go to DiscipleDaily.org.

Joni Prinjinski has done the final editing and layout and has made many invaluable suggestions which have enhanced the visual format of the book, as well as giving clarity to the content in various places. Thank you, Joni.

My wife Connie, who has ministered with me over the years and throughout the world, also took the time to read through and give some valuable input for the final editing.

I also want to thank my Shepherds’ Support Board members, Tom and Barb Chandler, Dr. Keith Eyre, Lannie and Melba Green, Stuart and Lee Ann Hendry, and Dr. Bobby and Carole Limmer. They graciously and generously voted to fund the cost of producing this book so you can receive it free of charge. I have the best Board in the world.

Foreword

I am captivated by Steve Troxel’s presentation on how Jesus is the subject of the entire Bible from Genesis through Revelation. I have had the privilege of listening to Steve teach this material in local churches and at pastor training conferences around the world. We have co-led a number of tours to Israel, Greece and Turkey. I have insisted that Steve present this material to those who have traveled with us. Every time he does, I hear people say, “Wow, I feel like I just attended seminary. Why haven’t I heard this before?”

God has gifted me with outstanding pastors and disciplers from the first days of my walk with God. These men took seriously Jesus’ command to “make disciples.” Unfortunately, the kind of instruction that I was blessed to receive in the late 70s and 80s is seldom experienced by those who identify themselves as followers of Jesus today. One thing absent from most discipling materials is an adequate balance between the Old and New Testaments. For many who claim to be Jesus’ disciples, there is almost no recognition that two-thirds of the storyline in the Bible occurred before the events recorded in the Gospels. Don’t misunderstand. The New Testament reveals the life and work of the Savior of all who believe, no matter where in the world they live or who they are. This is critically important. But Jesus’ right to the claim that He is the only One through whom salvation may be attained is rooted in what God revealed about His person in the Old Testament. The Old Testament presents Jesus as the coming Messiah of the Jewish people, and the New Testament affirms that and additionally reveals that Jesus is also the Savior of the Nations. With that basic understanding, one can trace the fulfillment of God’s Old Testament promises in the New Testament, and see that all His promises point to Jesus.

The Old Testament provided Jesus’ first followers with His identifying credentials. Because Jesus fully measured up to all that the Law, Prophets, and the Writings said of Him, His first Jewish followers were able to recognize Him and believe. Following His ascension to heaven, their witnessing in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and throughout the rest of the world was based on their knowledge of how the Old Testament pointed to Him. The New Testament did not yet exist as they began going out into all the world to make disciples everywhere. The New Testament was written later as a testimony of all Jesus said and did. That testimony rested solidly on the foundation of the comprehensive story of God’s glory from Genesis through Malachi.

Now, it is time for you to find a comfortable place to sit down and enjoy a great meal. I want you to feast on the richness of God’s Word. This is a very readable book. If you will take the time to prayerfully and earnestly read it, measure it against what the Bible actually says, and think about it in a disciplined manner, you cannot help but marvel once again at the majesty and glory of Jesus, from Genesis to Revelation.

Study, Practice, Teach - Ezra 7:10

Arlie Francis

Director, Disciple Daily

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Study Guide

Jesus FORETOLD in the Old Testament

Introduction

The Foundation for Christ’s Coming

The Preparation for the Coming of the Christ

The Aspiration for the Coming of Christ

The Expectation for the Coming of Christ

Jesus REVEALED in the New Testament

The Manifestation of Christ’s Coming

The Realization of Christ’s Coming

The Consummation of All Things in Christ

Study Guide

GENESIS

Christ Over All

Types of Christ in Genesis

EXODUS

Christ in the Passover

Christ as Manna from Heaven

Christ as the Rock and Living Water

Christ as the Living Tabernacle

LEVITICUS

Points Only to Christ as Our Messiah

NUMBERS

Christ Lifted Up

DEUTERONOMY

Christ the Prophet Like Moses

JOSHUA

The Names “Joshua” and “Jesus

Christ Providing Victory

JUDGES

Christ, the Ultimate Judge and Redeemer

RUTH

Christ the Kinsman-Redeemer

I SAMUEL

Historical Overview

II SAMUEL

Christ and the Throne of David

I KINGS

II CHRONICLES

The Need for the King of Kings

EZRA, ESTHER, NEHEMIAH

Preparation for the Coming Christ

JOB

Job Longs for a Mediator

Job Foresees His Redeemer

PSALMS

Longing to See God

Messianic Psalms

The Downcast Await Their Shepherd

God’s Glory Revealed in Christ

PROVERBS

Practical Wisdom for Life

Christ Is Wisdom for Humanity

ECCLESIASTES

Emptiness without Christ

SONG OF SOLOMON

A Foreshadow of Christ and His Bride

The Major and Minor Prophets

The Prophet’s Function

ISAIAH

Isaiah – The Bible in Miniature

Messiah’s First Coming

Messiah’s Second Coming

Messiah’s Divine Identity

Messiah’s Purpose in His First Coming

Messiah’s Purpose in His Second Coming

JEREMIAH

Weeping Over Jerusalem

Christ Our Righteousness

LAMENTATIONS

Foreshadow of Christ’s Grief

EZEKIEL

Christ, God’s Victory Over All Enemies

Restoration, Christ Ruling in His Kingdom

DANIEL

The Kingdom to Come

The Figure in the Fiery Furnace

The Son of Man Coming from Heaven

Christ’s First Coming and Death

HOSEA

The Twelve Minor Prophets

A Picture of Christ’s Faithfulness

JOEL

The Day of the Lord (Christ)

AMOS

Restoration Promised

JONAH

Jonah: A Type of Christ

Christ’s Resurrection: The Sign of Jonah

MICAH

Micah 5:2: Christ’s Birthplace

NAHUM

Comfort God’s People

HABAKKUK

Christ’s Reign Ahead

ZEPHANIAH

Messiah’s Glorious Reign to Come

HAGGAI

Christ to Fill the Temple with His Glory

ZECHARIAH

Christ’s Identity

Christ Returns in Battle to Deliver

All Nations to Worship the King

MALACHI

Prepare a Way for Christ

The Four Gospels – Christ in the Flesh

THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

Christ, King of the Jews

Christ, The Lamb of God

Christ, The King to Come

Christ, Victorious Over Death

THE GOSPEL OF MARK

Christ, The Model Servant

The Servant’s Awesome Power

The Sacrifice of the Servant

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE

Christ, the Perfect Man

Christ’s Manhood

Christ’s Ministry as the Son of Man

Mistreatment of the Son of Man

The Son of Man’s Mastery over Death

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

Christ the Logos

Proofs that Christ is the Son of God

Christ’s Prevailing Power as Son of God

ACTS

Receiving Christ’s Spirit

Preaching Christ to the World

Paul Encounters Christ

Paul and Peter Preach Christ to the Gentiles

ROMANS

Righteousness Realized in Christ

Christ’s Initial Rejection by the Jews

“Put on Christ”

I CORINTHIANS

The Christ-Centered Life

Christ the Only Foundation

II CORINTHIANS

Christ Is Sufficient

GALATIANS

Justified by Faith in Christ

Christ Revealed in Our Lives

EPHESIANS

The Believer’s Blessings in Christ

Christ Dwelling in Our Hearts

PHILIPPIANS

Christ, Our Life

Christ, Our Mind

Christ, Our Goal

Christ, Our Strength

COLOSSIANS

Christ the Head of the Church

I THESSALONIANS

Joy and Hope in Christ’s Second Coming

II THESSALONIANS

Christ Yet to Come

I TIMOTHY

Christ Our All-Sufficient Mediator

Christ, Source of True Contentment

II TIMOTHY

Faithfulness to Live and Teach Christ

TITUS

Looking Up for Christ’s Appearance

PHILEMON

Christ Our Intercessor and Redeemer

HEBREWS

The Superiority of Christ

Christ, Our Rest

JAMES

Christ in Our Everyday Relationships

I PETER

Christ Our Living Hope to Endure Suffering

II PETER

Finishing Strong in Christ

Christ’s Sure Return

I, II, III JOHN

Witnesses to Christ’s Physical Appearance

Christ Is Love

JUDE

Contend for Pure Faith in Christ

Judgment for False Teachers of Christ

Christ Who Preserves Us in the Faith

REVELATION

Christ Unveiled

The Wrath of Christ, the Lamb

Alleluia! Christ’s Judgment Ends

Christ and the Eternal State

Jesus FORETOLD in the Old Testament

Introduction

For many years now I have wanted to undertake this project of expounding how Christ is the subject matter of the Bible all the way from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22. I had a professor at the college level, Dr. Norman Geisler, who first opened my eyes to this glorious truth in a little book that he wrote titled Christ: The Key to Interpreting the Bible. I am indebted to him for what I want to share throughout the course of this book. I can honestly say that it changed my whole approach to reading and studying Scripture over the years.

Let me say that I have taught this material, most often opening conferences around the world with pastors on how Christ is revealed in the Old Testament (O.T.) in one session. And this is followed by looking at Christ in the New Testament (N.T.) in a second session. Many of the pastors in developing countries feel like they have been through seminary with this overview of the Scriptures.

It begins with what Christ Himself said about Himself in all of the Scripture. In Luke 24, following His resurrection, Jesus joined Himself to two very discouraged and confused disciples, who were on the road to Emmaus, trying to make sense of all that had happened in Jerusalem in the past several days. But Jesus did not reveal Himself to them right away. He acted as though He knew nothing about what had happened in Jerusalem. He said to them “What things” in v. 19 The two followers go on to speak of Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word. They had been hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. But they watched the chief priest and rulers condemn Him to death. Now the rumor mill was in a frenzy suggesting that He was alive. Some even went to the tomb and discovered that the tomb was empty. V. 24. Then Jesus spoke, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?” And beginning at Moses and all the prophets (the entirety of the O.T.), He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. Before long, after breaking bread together with them, their eyes were opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight. And they said to one another, “Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures.” Wouldn’t you like to have your heart burn from the Word being opened to you by the Creator-Redeemer Himself?

They went back to Jerusalem and later on as they were gathered together with Him, after He had proven Himself to be alive, He said to them, v. 44, 45 “These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning Me.” And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures. Again He makes it clear that the focus of all the O.T. Scriptures is on Him.

John 5:39, 40 is another key in our understanding of Scripture. The Jewish religious leaders of His day were diligent in their study of the Scriptures. Yet they totally missed seeing the centrality of Christ in their O.T. He challenged them with these words, “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think that you have eternal life, and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you might have life.” They did not see Jesus as the Messiah and so they did not believe in Him, according to v. 38.

When we follow on through John 5 we see Jesus giving all of the witnesses evidence as to who He is, including John the Baptist, His own works, and the witness of the Father in v. 37. Then He gives the witness of the Scriptures in vs. 39-47. The last three verses speak to the point I am making: “Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you---Moses, in whom you trust. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for He wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?’

There are several different ways of seeing the whole of Scripture. The format which I have chosen has been most helpful to me. Again I say that much of this is not original with me. I owe much to past professors and Bible teachers such as Dr. Norman Geisler, W. Graham Scroggie, Warren Wiersbe, J. Sidlow Baxter, Henrietta C. Mears and numerous others for their knowledge of the Word of God.

Here is the overall outline, which is taken from Norman L. Geisler’s Christ: The Key to Interpreting the Bible,¹ p. 83.

THE FOUNDATION FOR HIS COMING…is laid in the first five books of the O.T. known as the Law or the Torah or Pentateuch.

THE PREPARATION FOR HIS COMING…is made in the historical books, Joshua through Esther.

THE ASPIRATION FOR HIS COMING…is evidenced in the 5 poetical books, Job-Ecclesiastics.

THE EXPECTATION FOR HIS COMING…occurs in the 17 prophetic books, Isaiah through Malachi.

THE MANIFESTATION OF HIS COMING…the four Gospels, Matthew through John

THE REALIZATION OF HIS COMING...Acts through Jude (It is the understanding of Christ in me)

THE CONSUMMATION AT HIS 2ND COMING…the Book of Revelation. All things will be completed in Him.

So let us begin at the beginning with the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

The Foundation for Christ’s Coming

THE FOUNDATION FOR HIS COMING is the theme of the first five books of the Bible, Genesis through Deuteronomy.

GENESIS

Christ Over All

When Christ walked along the road to Emmaus after His resurrection, He spoke with two disciples who wondered about all that had happened. They did not know at first that it was Christ who was teaching them His own story through the pages of the Bible.

I am relatively sure that Jesus took those two disciples back to Genesis, the very beginning when He created all things. Genesis, the book of beginnings, starts in 1:1 with the words:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

John 1:1 is the parallel passage in the N.T.:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.

In Colossians 1:15-18 the Apostle Paul spoke of Christ in these words:

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions of principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the Church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.

The term “firstborn” in this passage must not throw us off concerning His nature. Christ was clearly not created, but rather the Creator. He was the firstborn, which was in that culture a position of rank and privilege rather than referring only to the order of birth. With Christ being God and Creator, He is supreme in rank over all creation.

Hebrews 1:1 affirms this:

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

We live in the Milky Way Galaxy. It is the smallest of all the galaxies yet has over 100 billion stars in it, including the sun and the moon. Beyond the Milky Way there are at least 300 billion other galaxies larger than our own, yet Psalm 147:4, 5 reads:

He counts the number of the stars; He calls them all by name. Great is our Lord, and mighty in power; His understanding is infinite.

So we are confronted with the reality that the same One who met the disciples on the road to Emmaus after His resurrection, already existed in eternity past. He created all that we can see and way beyond what we can see. He was in the beginning, and the beginning began through Him. He knows how many billions of stars there are in space, for He created them all. And He knows each star by name. Just think how much more intimately He knows each one of us.

Types of Christ in Genesis

The O.T. is full of types of our Savior. Unger’s Bible Handbook,² gives us a definition of a type:

A type (from the Greek Typos, “a blow or mark left by a blow; a pattern or impress”) is a double representation in action, the literal being intended and planned to represent the spiritual. A type is thus the divine impress of spiritual truth upon a literal event, person or thing. Rightly understood and appreciated, typology offers a strong proof of divine inspiration. It is in reality the divine redemptive program of the ages deftly woven into the warp and woof of Scripture by God Himself.” (p. 7)

Adam is a type of Him who was to come according to Romans 5:14. Both Adams entered the world by miraculous means, from out of the dust, and from out of a virgin’s womb. Adam failed as our Head. He succumbed to sin. Christ, on the other hand, succeeded. He was without sin. Adam represents the old creation to which we all were born, in sin. But Christ represents the new creation, through whom we as believers now have new life. II Corinthians 5:17 reads “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”

When Adam and Eve sinned and a curse was placed upon this old creation, God promised a redeemer. To the serpent He said, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise His heel” (Gen. 3:15). A child was promised who would be bruised by Satan (as occurred on the cross), but He would ultimately crush the head of the serpent, which He did on that same Cross. Christ’s victory over Satan was confirmed by His powerful resurrection from the dead. Colossians 2:15 states: “Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.”

The Ark in Exodus 6-8 was also a type of Christ. I Peter 3:18-22 makes that reference. Only those who stepped into the Ark⎯Noah and his family⎯were saved. All others perished in the time of God’s judgment. Only those who enter into Christ will be spared from the coming day of God’s wrath.

Moving on, Melchizedek, “King of Righteousness,” was a very different type of Christ. Melchizedek appears in Genesis 14 and is mentioned in Hebrews 7. He was given the name “King of Salem,” meaning “King of Peace.” Melchizedek was “without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, [he] remains a priest continually” (Heb. 7:3). There is no record of Melchizedek’s birth or of his death. He was both a King and a Priest. It was in these ways that he was “like the Son of God.” But he was not God or a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ.

Isaac was a type of Christ, and Abraham was a type of God the Father. When Abraham was willing to offer up his son of promise, Isaac, as a sacrifice in Genesis 22, he gave us a picture of the Eternal Father offering up His own Son as a sacrifice for sin. Instead, God gave Abraham a ram that had been caught in a thicket by its horns which he then offered up as a burnt offering instead of his son. Abraham called the name of the place, “The Lord Will Provide.” All of this pictures the coming gift that God would give to the world in “providing” us a sacrifice to take away our own sins. Just as God provided a ram in Isaac’s place, He provides a Lamb who takes our place. In John 1:29 John, pointing to Jesus said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

Perhaps Joseph is the most complete portrait and fitting picture of Christ in the whole O.T. He is presented in Genesis 39-50. Both Joseph and Jesus were loved by their fathers. They were hated and rejected by their own brothers, mistreated, sold, condemned, and both experienced a certain death, even though Joseph was only presumed dead. Both were elevated. Joseph became second in command in all of Egypt, and Jesus was given a “name above every name” following His resurrection (Phil. 2:9). One day every knee will bow before Him and confess that He is Lord (Phil. 2:10-11). Just as Joseph revealed himself to his brothers as it is recorded in Genesis 45, Jesus will return and reveal Himself to His own people regathered in the land of Israel as stated in Zechariah 12:10:

Then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.

EXODUS

Exodus literally means “the way out.” It is the way out of servitude and suffering. Moses, the great leader, is a type of Christ in that He led them out. Christ in the same way delivers us from sin and bondage into a glorious new life of victory and freedom. Just as Moses authenticated his position by the miraculous plagues that were brought down on Pharaoh and Egypt, so Jesus authenticated His claims of Messiah-ship and deity by the many miracles He performed.

Christ in the Passover

The Passover sacrifice and meal is the most beautiful picture of Jesus in Exodus. The meal was to commemorate the deliverance of the Israelites from a life of servitude in Egypt and also pointed to Christ who would bring deliverance from sin. I quote a rather lengthy passage from the NKJV Study Bible (p. 108) that is very helpful:

More specifically, the New Testament identifies the Passover lamb, the young lamb sacrificed in place of the family’s firstborn, as a type of the person and work of Jesus. (A type is a divinely ordained correspondence between a person, event, or institution and its antitype of fulfillment. Most biblical types are fulfilled in the person and work of Jesus). Right at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, John the Baptist prophetically announced that Jesus was “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Furthermore, Paul wrote that “Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us” (I Cor. 5:7). Finally, Peter identified Jesus as the “lamb without blemish and without spot: (I Pet. 1:19) All these New Testament references allude to the Passover lamb.

Continuing (p. 109) we read:

The Passover lamb had to be (1) without blemish, (2) male, and (3) young. (4) It had to be examined (four days from the selection to the sacrifice) and (5) it had to be slain in public. (6) None of its bones were to be broken. Finally, (7) the blood on the Israelites’ doorposts was a sign that God should pass over and not destroy the family’s firstborn. In each particular, Jesus was the fulfillment of this divinely ordained type. Jesus was (1) sinless and perfect in his humanity. He was both (2) a male and (3) somewhat young when He was slain. (4) He lived a meticulously examined life, (5) He died publicly, and despite the brutality of His death, (6) not one of His bones was broken (John 19:36). Finally, (7) Jesus’ blood is the sign of Jesus’ death. Through Jesus’ death, we are saved from the coming judgment (Rom. 5:9, Eph. 2:13, Col. 1:14; Heb. 9:22, 10:19, I Peter 1:2; I John 1:7; Rev. 1:5, 7:14). Thus in all respects, Jesus fulfilled the divinely ordained prophetic picture. He is our Passover Lamb.

It must be noted in Exodus that Moses himself is also a type of Christ according to Deuteronomy 18:15. “The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. He will put His words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I shall command Him.” It is obvious that the reference is to the prophetic ministry of Christ. The writer of Hebrews notes the comparison in 3:5 where we read that Moses was faithful as a servant, but Christ was greater in that He was faithful as a Son.

Christ as Manna from Heaven

The manna from heaven was provided in Exodus 16. Through God’s miraculous intervention they came out of Egypt with the Egyptians pursuing them. The waters of the Red Sea parted before them then closed up over the pursuing Egyptian armies. As they entered the Wilderness of Sin, the problem became the need for food. There is always something that God allows in our lives to test us as to whether or not we will trust Him. The people complained over lack of food. God provided for them:

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you. And the people shall go out and gather a certain quota every day, that I may test them, whether they will walk in My law or not.” (Exodus 16:4)

God provided bread as He said. This is an unmistakable type of Christ the bread of life. In John 6:32-35 Jesus said:

“Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” Then they said to Him, “Lord, give us this bread always.” And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.”

The bread in Exodus 16 was the imitation. Jesus was and is the real thing. He is the bread of life, the one absolutely essential food that brings eternal life and satisfies that hunger that lies deep in the heart of every person.

Christ as the Rock and Living Water

In Exodus 17, while the people are still in the Wilderness of Sin, there is a critical need for water. The people contended with Moses. Moses interceded for them to God. In verse 5 the Lord said to Moses:

“Go on before the people, and take with you some of the elders of Israel. Also take in your hand your rod with which you struck the river, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb and you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it that the people may drink.”

Moses struck the rock, and the people and their livestock were able to drink from a river. Psalm 105:40, 41 reads:

The people asked, and He brought quail, and satisfied them with the bread of heaven. He opened the rock, and water gushed out; It ran in the dry places like a river.

I picture a local flooding of the barren dessert. All of this water came out of the rock with plenty to spare, simply from Moses smiting the rock once.

This episode is so important to remember because at the other end of the wilderness journey, the people again had a need for water while camped at Kadesh. The people gathered against Moses and Aaron. They wished they had died in the wilderness. Again Moses interceded for the People. God responded in Numbers 20:7-10:

…then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying “Take the rod; you and your brother Aaron gather the congregation together. Speak to the rock before their eyes, and it will yield its water; thus you shall bring water for them out of the rock, and give drinks to the congregation and their animals.” So Moses took the rod from before the Lord as He commanded him.

And Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock; and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring water for you out of this rock?” Then Moses lifted his hand and stuck the rock twice with his rod: and, water came out abundantly, and the congregation and their animals drank.

But notice the displeasure of the Lord with Moses:

“Because you did not believe Me, to hallow Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”

Does that not seem a bit odd, even severe punishment for Moses? But here is the point: God was painting a beautiful portrait of the coming death of His Son. He would be smitten just like that rock, but only once. And out of His side would flow rivers of living water.

John 7:37-39 states:

On the last day, that great day of the feast [of Tabernacles], Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirst, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

There would be a river of water coming out of Christ and coming out of His followers which will not only satisfy themselves but would also be given in such an abundance that others would drink and be satisfied. This would be the result of Christ being smitten once on the cross; and 40 days later the Spirit would descend upon His people.

To the woman at the well Jesus said:

“Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” (John 4:13, 14)

What a vivid portrait we have of Christ back in the wilderness, as the water of life. Only He is able to give us that water which will satisfy to where we will never thirst for anything more, or anything less, or anything else. Moses, in his anger, marred that beautiful portrait. Remember, nothing good ever comes from reacting in anger. We must give our circumstances time, and let God demonstrate His Sovereignty.

Christ as the Living Tabernacle

One cannot miss the significance of the first Tabernacle constructed in the wilderness. This was to be the symbolic dwelling place of God. In John 1:14 we read, “And the Word became flesh and ‘tabernacled’ among us and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten Father, full of grace and truth.” The Tabernacle was a beautiful type of Christ.

Space in this book will not allow us to go into detail on the furnishings, but each of the furnishings of the Tabernacle, along with the offerings, furnish a complete picture of the finished work of Christ.

The ministry of the High Priest typified the ministry of Christ as our great High Priest. All of this is brought out in detail in Hebrews 9. I quote beginning in verse 24:

For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another. He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And, as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.

Christ would only die once for sin.

LEVITICUS

Points Only to Christ as Our Messiah

Sacrifices

Moving on to Leviticus, we see the emphasis on the way to approach God. It is a reminder to us that there is only one way, not many ways, to approach Him. Leviticus points to John 14:6 where Jesus clearly said, “I AM the one and only way.” Leviticus as a picture book portrays Jesus as our Sacrifice for sin. Everything in the book points to Jesus. The five offerings detailed in chapters 1 through 7 all point to Him. The New King James Version (NKJV) Study Bible (p. 159) summarizes it well:

Leviticus is replete with types and allusions to the person and work of Jesus Christ. The five offerings described in chapters 1-7 all point to Christ. The burnt offering typifies Christ’s total offering in submission to His Father’s will. The grain offering typifies Christ’s sinless service. The peace offering alludes to the fellowship that believers have with God through the work of the Cross. The sin offering typifies Christ as our guilt-bearer. The trespass offering pictures Christ’s payment for the damage of sin. Leviticus points vividly to Jesus. He alone is the spotless Lamb who can make an eternal and final payment for sin. He alone is the perfect High Priest who can represent human rebels before the holy Judge of the universe.

Having already made a reference to the High Priest’s ministry, we next can address briefly the O.T. Feasts specified in Leviticus 23. They all point to Christ in some way.

Biblical Feasts

The Sabbath Feast represents our Sabbath rest in Christ as stated in Hebrews 4:1-10.

The Passover Feast speaks of Christ our Passover Lamb being sacrificed for us. (I Cor. 5:7, I Pet. 1:18)

The Feast of Unleavened Bread typifies how we are to live in holiness and purity before Him. (I Cor. 5:7,8)

The Firstfruits Offering typifies Christ in resurrection being the first fruits and “afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming.” (I Cor. 15:23, I Thess. 4:13-18)

The Feast of Pentecost anticipated the time when Jew and Gentile would become one body in Christ, which was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost after Christ’s resurrection. (I Cor. 12:13)

The Feast of Trumpets points to the time after the Church is gathered unto Him. Trumpets will be blown to regather the Jewish people from the four corners of the earth. This will occur at the end of this present age. (Matt. 24:31, Ezek. 37:12-14)

The Day of Atonement prefigures the repentant sorrow of Israel when they look upon Him whom they have pierced (rejected and crucified) and mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son. (Zech. 12:10)

And finally we have the Feast of Tabernacles. All the biblical feasts serve as a prelude to Israel’s Kingdom rest. The Feast of Tabernacles commemorates their deliverance out of Egypt, dwelling in tents, but now restored and living securely and peacefully in their own land.

NUMBERS

Christ Lifted Up

Moving on in the Law we have Numbers and Deuteronomy. One very poignant picture of Christ in the wilderness is recorded in Numbers 21:4—9 when the Israelites are journeying from Mount Hor by the Way of the Red Sea. It is a desolate area. Having been there I can validate that statement. The people became very discouraged and rebelled against Moses and Aaron. Lacking food and water they loathed the “worthless bread” which God was providing for them. So “the Lord sent poisonous snakes among the people and they bit the people and many of the people died.” The people came to Moses admitting their sin and beseeching him to pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from them. So Moses prayed, and here was the prescription from the Divine Physician, “Make a poisonous snake (a replica out of bronze) and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.” So Moses made that bronze snake, put it on a pole, “and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.” Now fastforwarding to the N.T., Jesus pointed to this amazing image in His encounter with Nicodemus. In John 3, He spoke of His coming crucifixion and being lifted up on a cross (vv. 14, 15):

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

The bronze represents judgment. Christ took our sin in judgment upon Himself. A simple look in faith brought healing in Numbers 21. In John 3, we see that a simple look at Jesus in faith brings healing from the venom of sin and gives us eternal life.

DEUTERONOMY

Christ the Prophet Like Moses

Deuteronomy is often referred to as the second law because it repeats much of what had been stated about Christ in Exodus and Leviticus. Remember Jesus said in Matthew 5:77, “Do not think that I came to destroy the law but to fulfill [complete] it.” The clearest reference to Christ is found in 18:15 where Christ is the Prophet, like Moses, but greater than Moses, to whom the people should listen.

Questions for Reflection:

What does the realization that you were divinely and uniquely created by God mean to you?

In what ways does Adam typify Christ? In what ways did Adam and Christ differ?

In what ways did Joseph point to Christ?

The Passover lamb was a vivid reminder of Christ becoming our Passover. How?

Why was Moses disciplined so severely and kept from the Promised Land?

In what ways was the Tabernacle a type of Christ?

Why is the poisonous snake incident in the wilderness such a powerful foreshadowing of the Cross of Christ?

In summary, the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) lay the foundation for the coming of Christ. Now we move on to the second of the seven divisions: THE PREPARATION FOR THE COMING OF CHRIST.

The Preparation for the Coming of the Christ

This is the theme of the 12 historical books which include Joshua through Esther. These 12 books record the failure of man at every level to walk in pleasing obedience to the Lord God. These history books prepare Israel and ultimately the world for the coming of the One who could truly deliver us from sin and evil. There is a constant reminder in these books of the kingdom of darkness and evil. This is the very kingdom that Christ came to render powerless. and He delivered us from its very presence.

JOSHUA

The Names “Joshua” and “Jesus

Now Joshua himself is a very clear picture of Jesus. Joshua’s name, which means “Yahweh saves,” is the Hebrew equivalent of the Greek name “Jesus.” Joshua led the people into the land of Canaan. Jesus leads His people to Heaven with all of its glory.

Christ Providing Victory

Perhaps the most poignant reference to Jesus in Joshua, comes in 5:13-15. Joshua is surveying the city of Jericho, and:

…he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, a Man stood opposite him with His sword drawn in His hand. And Joshua went to Him and said to Him, “Are You for us or for our adversaries?” So He said, “No, but as Commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshipped and said to Him, What does my Lord say to His servant?” Then the Commander of the Lord’s army said to Joshua, “Take your sandal off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.” And Joshua did so.

There is little question that the Man with the sword drawn was none other than the Pre-incarnate Christ in visible form. He was making it clear to Joshua that as the Commander of the Lord’s Army He would provide for the victory over Jericho. This call or selection of Joshua was very similar to that of Moses in Exodus 3 when the Pre-incarnate Christ appeared to Moses as the Great I AM. Our task today to defeat the power of Satan and Sin in our lives can only be realized through the indwelling life of Christ. This is why Paul writes in Ephesians 6:10: “Finally my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”

Joshua did experience many victories. But as 15:63, 16:10 and 17:13 remind us, they refused to drive out all of the Canaanites. This assured their failure in the future as these nations would continue to be a thorn in the side of Israel. So, even though Joshua is a book of victory, it still records their failure.

JUDGES

Christ, the Ultimate Judge and Redeemer

The Book of Judges records the brief leadership of 12 different judges, with three more recorded in I Samuel. Each one of the judges represents a kind of savior or deliverer and in this way they point us to the ultimate Judge, Jesus. We see a gradual deterioration of the moral fabric of the people until we get towards the end of the book in 17:6 where we read: “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” This massive moral meltdown sets up the people to cry out for a king to rule over them.

The people of the 12 Tribes of Israel drifted into idolatry and immorality, and morals became so low and shocking that a Levite gave his concubine to a group of deviants in one Tribe who abused her all night, which led to her death. He took her to his house, cut her up with a knife into twelve pieces, “limb by limb, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel” (19:29). Nowhere is the failure of the Tribes in the land more dramatic than in these closing chapters.

RUTH

Christ the Kinsman-Redeemer

There are some glimpses and portraits of the coming Redeemer recorded in the Book of Ruth. Ruth gives us an important connection in the developing account of redemption, prefiguring Christ our Lord as the glorious Kinsman-Redeemer. A close member of the family was to redeem land that been sold by the family due to poverty. Boaz purchased the land from Naomi. Boaz not only redeemed the land, but redeemed Ruth as well, by taking her as his wife. As the Kinsman-Redeemer Christ fulfilled all of the requirements as set forth in the O.T. One of the most important requirements was that he must be free from debt himself. Jesus owed no debt for sin and thus He was qualified to pay the debt for our sin.

I SAMUEL

Historical Overview

After the failure of the judges we have the period of the kings recorded in I and II Samuel, I and II Kings, and I and II Chronicles. The other six historical books record events within the reign of the kings.

II SAMUEL

Christ and the Throne of David

Another great passage is recorded in II Samuel 7:12-16. God gave David a covenant with this promise:

“When your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house in my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his Father, and he shall be My son. If he commits iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men and with the blows of the sons of me. But My mercy shall not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before you. And your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you. Your throne shall be established forever.”

This promised one will come from David. He would have a house, a kingdom and a throne, and it would continue forever. This promise was renewed to the virgin Mary by the angel Gabriel in Luke 1:31-33.

I KINGS

In I Kings, David’s kingdom was passed on to his son Solomon. Solomon began well but ended poorly. Like many men he was brought down, among other things, by his lust for a woman, or in his case, for many foreign women. After recording all of his impressive achievements in I Kings chapters 1 through 10, chapter 11:1-2a gives us his turning point:

But King Solomon loved many foreign women, as well as the daughter of Pharaoh: women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites—from the nations whom the Lord has said to the children of Israel, “You shall not intermarry with them, nor they with you. Surely they turn away your hearts after their gods.”

Solomon clung to these in direct disobedience and rebellion to God’s command in Deuteronomy 17:17: “Neither shall he [the king] multiply wives for himself, lest his heart turn away.” I Kings 11:3-4 shows us how excessive and extensive his sin was:

And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines; and his wives turned away his heart. For it was so, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned his heart after other gods; and his heart was not loyal to the Lord his God, as was the heart of his father David.

Solomon’s disobedience set the stage for the division of the kingdom of Israel into north and south. The divided kingdom continued to drift further downward into apostasy until God caused first the northern then the southern kingdom to be taken into captivity.

The failure of the kings, including Solomon, paves the way for the King of Kings.

II CHRONICLES

The Need for the King of Kings

In II Chronicles 36:15-16 we read these words describing Jerusalem under the failure of King Zedekiah:

And the Lord God of their fathers sent warnings to them by His messengers, rising up early and sending them, because He had compassion on His people and on His dwelling place. But they mocked the messengers of God, despised His words, and scoffed at His prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people, till there was no remedy.

Those were sad words indicating a bad day that was coming. All of this failure recorded of the kings was preparing the way for the coming of the King of Kings who will rule and reign forever.

EZRA, ESTHER, NEHEMIAH

Preparation for the Coming Christ

Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther give us some further connecting links. The events of these three books all occur after the time of the kings and judges and after the fall and captivity of the people. The people looked to the priests for leadership. As recorded in Nehemiah the high priest and the priests built the Sheep Gate. Rebuilding was beginning. Each book serves as a bright light in a culture and age of decline and darkness. God is still at work, bringing renewal, redemption and salvation in the midst of the earth. (Psalm 74:12)

Ezra interceding for his people in chapter 9 is a picture of Christ interceding for His Church. Nehemiah was focused on reformation, reconciliation and renewal in the same way that Christ came to reconcile us unto God and transform us into His image. (II Cor. 5:18, 19, II Cor. 3:18)

Esther speaks of a willingness (her famous words “If I perish, I perish!”) to die on behalf of her people in likeness to Christ who offered Himself for His own. (4:17)

To summarize these three beautiful little books we might say the theme of Ezra is the Restoration of the temple, of Nehemiah the Reconstruction of the walls, and of Esther it is the Preservation of the people.

So both collectively and individually we can affirm that all 17 historical books are a PREPARATION FOR THE COMING OF CHRIST.

Questions for Reflection:

In what ways did Joshua foreshadow the life of Christ?

Why did Christ appear to Joshua before the great conquest of Jericho?

What does the Book of Judges teach us about human nature and the ultimate Judge who would come?

What are the promises made to king David in II Samuel 7:12-16?

Solomon was the wisest man of his day and began well. What brought him down?

In what ways is Ezra’s prayer in chapter 9 like Christ praying for His Church in John 17?

How was Esther like Christ?

That leads to the third division in the O.T:

THE ASPIRATION FOR THE COMING OF CHRIST. The next five books (Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon) are referred to as the wisdom literature of the O.T.

The Aspiration for the Coming of Christ

In the poetic writings of the O.T., we see O.T. saints, God’s people, longing for God to show Himself, as can be seen in the books of Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. The heart of man aches deeply to see God manifest in human flesh, to see Him come down and visit His people.

JOB

Job Longs for a Mediator

Job wrestles with the question as to why the righteous suffer. Job does not understand his own suffering. He cannot see the ongoing spiritual battle behind the scenes. He lost everything dear to him. He was trying to make sense of it all. His mistake was in insinuating that God was not just. He believed God didn’t give him the good that he deserved. His wife told him to curse God and die. His “miserable” counselors accused him of sin, and that was why he was suffering. Job was driven to the dilemma of knowing God was just, but believing that God was not dealing fair and square with him. Maybe God was somewhat arbitrary and capricious. Job wanted to take up the issue with God Himself in a court of law. In 9:32 Job laments:

For he is not a man, as I am that I may answer Him, and that we should go to court together. Nor is there any mediator between us, who may lay his hand on us both.

Job longed for a mediator, someone who would give him instant access to Almighty God that he might argue his case. Of course this Mediator for whom Job longed eventually arrived upon the scene. His name was Jesus. In I Timothy 2:5 we read:

For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.

Ephesians 2:18 states “For through Him we both (Jew and Gentile) have access by one Spirit to the Father.”

Job Foresees His Redeemer

In Job 19:25, Job sees hope in the future. He is lifted from out of the pit of despair, and comforted with the hope that at some point in the future his longing will be fulfilled. Job’s is one of the great statements of faith in the O.T.:

For I know that my Redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth; And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, Whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!

This is a picture of the Risen, Living Lord Jesus who has conquered death and the grave. Whether Job was speaking of Jesus or someone else, the fact remains, this great proclamation of faith has its fulfillment in Jesus Christ.

PSALMS

Longing to See God

The Psalms gives us many references to the Lord Jesus Christ and the longing for the Psalmist to see God in the flesh. In Psalm 13:1 the psalmist asks the question: “How long will you hide your face from me?” He longed for the day he would see his God, face to face.

Messianic Psalms

Many Messianic psalms prophesy the coming of Christ, even referring to His violent death, burial and resurrection, such as 16:9-11:

Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; My flesh also will rest in hope. For You will not leave my soul in Sheol (the grave), nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

My hunch is that after His resurrection, the Lord Jesus may have taken the two Emmaus road disciples on a journey through the Psalms touching on Psalm 16 as well as Psalms 22 and 69. Psalm 22 addresses more of His physical suffering, and Psalm 69 His emotional and spiritual suffering. There is that longing for His coming, but Scripture instructs that in His First Coming He would suffer for all of humanity.

The aspiration for His coming is portrayed in that beautiful 42nd chapter:

As the deer pants (longs for) the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they continually say to me, where is your God? (Psalm 42:1-3)

The Downcast Await Their Shepherd

Again we see that longing in the heart of the psalmist to see God for himself and to experience His transforming presence. Psalms 42 and 43 were probably originally one poem. Three times in these brief two chapters, the psalmist asks a question and then gives an answer: “Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him for the help of my countenance” (42:5, 11, and 43:5). The fact that the psalmist was in a “cast down” state is significant.

As a side note, when I think of the downcast heart of this psalmist, I cannot help but remember a time when I was 16 years of age, growing up in a rural community. My father taught me a very valuable lesson regarding this, without even knowing it. Our farms bordered on a farm that had sheep. Early one morning I was driving by the farm when I looked to my left, and about 50 yards away from the neighbor’s fence was what appeared to be a dead sheep with all four feet stuck up in the air. I thought nothing about it. I worked out in the fields that day and on my way back home, as I arrived at that same spot, I looked and saw that same sheep lying flat on its back, with its feet pointed toward the sky. This time there was one notable difference: Its feet and legs were flailing rather briskly. When I arrived home I told my dad about it. He said, “Steve that sheep is cast down. You need to go and tell Sam (the farmer) so he can turn it back over on its feet. When a sheep is filled out with wool, and then lies down, it can roll too far and end up on its back. The legs are not weighty enough to get back over on its feet. It is cast down. It is totally helpless to help itself. It must have the immediate and tender care of the shepherd.”

The downcast sons of Korah were looking towards the Good Shepherd to come along and set them upright once again. Jesus declares that of Himself in John 10:14, “I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own.” Of course John 10 is only one of several N.T. passages that refer to Jesus as the good or great or chief shepherd. The longing and expectation was for Him to come and set things upright once again.

God’s Glory Revealed in Christ

Similar to Psalm 42 is the heart cry of the psalmist in Psalm 63. It is again the cry of one who is thirsty, longing, and panting to see and experience God:

O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water. So I have looked for You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and Your glory (Psalm 63:1-2).

Of course this passage reminds us of N.T. passages that answer this longing, such as John 1:14:

And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Later on, following His miracle of turning water into wine in Cana of Galilee we read another instance of Christ revealing His glory to the people of His day:

“This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory, and His disciples believed in Him.” (John 2:11)

Finally the moment had arrived when the God of glory appeared in the form of a man and the heart cry and longing of Psalm 63 was now realized.

You can find Christ on many pages in the Psalms, mentioned overtly and covertly. Psalm 145 is a depiction of the glory of King Jesus, the Messiah and His resplendent kingdom. In it we see that longing and desire to see Him:

All Your works shall praise You, O Lord and Your saints shall bless You. They shall speak of the glory of Your kingdom, and talk of Your power, to make known to the sons of men His mighty acts, and the glorious majesty of His kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and Your dominion endures throughout all generations. (Psalm 145:10-13)

PROVERBS

Practical Wisdom for Life

Proverbs is the book of wisdom. Many have observed that the Book of Psalms is for our devotional life, whereas the Book of Proverbs is more for our practical life. Each proverb is to be read slowly and pondered in one’s mind, even to the point of memorizing it. Perhaps the clearest and nearest reference to Jesus comes in Proverbs 8:22-31 as the NKJV Study Bible (p. 964) reminds us:

Although Jesus is not identified by name in 8:22-31, it is clear that the writer is describing Him. Wisdom, Godlike and perfect, is personified: “I have been established from everlasting, from the beginning, before there was ever an earth…..When He prepared the heavens, I was there….I was beside Him as a master craftsman; and I was daily His delight” (8:23, 27, 30). Compare that to John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…..All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” This divine wisdom is also the source of biological and spiritual life (3;18; 8:35). It is right and moral (8:8, 9), and it is available to all who will receive it.

Christ Is Wisdom for Humanity

Along with these words from Proverbs, Colossians 2:3 reminds us that it is written: “In whom [meaning ‘in Christ’] are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” If we have Christ, then we have all of the wisdom and knowledge that God has for us. Colossians 2:9, 10 reads:

For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.”

Couple that with I Corinthians 1:30:

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption---that, as it is written, He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.

Beginning with wisdom we have everything we need in Christ Jesus. So all of the wisdom of the Proverbs points to Him and longs for Him to come and live out that wisdom before humanity.

One further passage in Proverbs is quite intriguing. It comes at the end of the book in 30:4:

Who has ascended into heaven, or descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name, and what is His Son’s name, if you know?

This passage is in the form of a riddle written by Agur, the son of Jakeh. Again, I quote from the NKJV Study Bible:

At this point, the riddle [had] no answer. The O.T. would answer that “His name” is the Lord God, but did not have a name for His Son. This riddle was to remain unsolved until Jesus answered it for Nicodemus (see John 3:13). These verses form one of the most straightforward Messianic texts in the Bible. (p. 1006)

Like much of humanity, Agur desired to know the very nature of God. Proverbs reveals some of God’s wisdom, just as the NT reveals the source of wisdom, God’s Son, sent to us.

ECCLESIASTES

Emptiness without Christ

The Book of Ecclesiastes really describes the disconnectedness of man apart from his Creator and longs for purpose for man which can only be realized in the Creator robing Himself in human flesh and coming down to experience this miserable life with us and as one of us.

Solomon, the wisest and richest man of his time, had experienced it all. There was nothing with which he did not indulge himself. Wine, women, buildings, and possessions⎯he had it all. And he concluded that in the end it is all meaningless. “Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher; “vanity of vanities, all is vanity” (1:2). The word “vanity” means “breath” or “vapor” which is quickly passing. Years ago I heard a Bible teacher use the substitute phrase, “soap bubbles upon soap bubbles, all is soap bubbles.” It looks like there is something of substance in the material world, and you reach for it; but the moment your hand touches it, it is gone.

Everything apart from Jesus Christ is fleeting. Life has no real meaning. Ecclesiastes repeats the phrase “under the sun” 29 times. Reason alone is the best way man can respond when looking purely at the natural world “under the sun.” It takes divine revelation, the revealing of the Son of God, to bring real meaning and purpose in life. As Unger’s Bible Handbook puts it:

The purpose of the book [of Eccesliastes] must be seen to demonstrate to the natural man the complete emptiness of that which is “under the sun” apart from that which is above the sun, i.e., God’s revelation and salvation. (p. 296)

SONG OF SOLOMON

A Foreshadow of Christ and His Bride

Moving on to the next piece of wisdom literature we have the Song of Solomon. As I have made reference to this book throughout the years I have struggled to understand the ultimate meaning of the wedding, the bride and the groom.

Various interpretations have been offered such as the intimacy of marital love as seen in the bride and groom. God created marital love and gave the man and the woman sexual desires to fulfill them in the one flesh relationship. Sex is something to celebrate within the confines of a husband and wife relationship and is to be intimate. This might well have been what the author, Solomon, had in mind when he put this Song of Songs on parchment.

Secondly, this book might be an illustration of God’s love for the nation of Israel and His desire to have intimacy. We see this theme over and over again. He wanted to be king over them, but they cried out for a human king. After they received him, as the saying goes, the rest is history. The contrast between Israel’s disappointing earthly kings and the promised King of Kings plays out on the pages of the Bible.

Finally, this book can also be a foreshadowing of the N.T. Church as the Bride of Christ. The Father in the Song of Solomon is pictured as seeking a bride for His Son. Paul in Ephesians 5 addresses both wives and husbands and gives them a challenge as to how they are to respond and relate to one another and in the process become one flesh. Paul then concludes by writing,

For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church (Ephesians 5:30-32).

Then when we go to the other end of the Bible, in Revelation 19:7-9 we find a grand scene of rejoicing in heaven:

Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready. And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.

Christ desires that same intimacy with us that we see on display in the Song of Solomon. Nowhere do we see this more clearly brought out than in the words of Jesus in John 14:23:

Jesus answered and said to him, “if anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make Our home with him.”

Now having stated these three most common interpretations, I am inclined to go with the first one, that it is a picture of the love that God intended to be displayed between a husband and his wife. However, it may be that Solomon had in mind all three different portrayals. Again, the NKJV Study Bible has an excellent analysis of this:

The Song of Solomon celebrates the beauty and intimacy of married love in a narrative poem. It teaches that a lasting marriage requires dedication, commitment, and strong loyalty between husband and wife. The Song also presents an idealized picture of how human love can be expressed under God’s blessing. This is a very important issue. Some critics have claimed that Christianity’s standards for marriage ignore or undervalue sexual relationships. But the Song of Solomon refutes this. It reiterates the biblical admonition against sex outside of marriage, but it also affirms that God not only approves, but also encourages, sexual pleasure within marriage. (p. 1026)

This high view of sexual intimacy needs to be shouted loud from the housetops so that the younger generation understands it. God invented sex, and like any other inventor He intended His manual for operating His invention to be carefully followed for the best enjoyment of the invention.

Questions for Reflection:

What was Job’s biggest problem? Why did he want a mediator?

What gave Job hope according to 19:25?

How do so many of the Psalms such as chapters 13, 42, 43, and 62, address the longing of the heart of man?

Has your soul ever been cast down? How have the Psalms helped you?

In what way does the Book of Proverbs point us to Christ?

What is the basic theme of Ecclesiastes?

What is your understanding of the Book of the Song of Solomon?

We now move on to the fourth section of Christ in the O.T.: THE EXPECTATION FOR THE COMING OF CHRIST.

The Expectation for the Coming of Christ

The Major and Minor Prophets

The next 17 books are called the prophetic books, starting with Isaiah and ending with Malachi. Most of these prophets wrote between 800 and 400 b.c. Many of the prophets centered their messages of woe upon the northern kingdom called Israel and its fall in 722 b.c. and later, in 586, the fall of Jerusalem and Judah, overcome by the great power Babylon. The five Major Prophets consist of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel and Daniel. They are known as the Major Prophets because of the size, scope and stature of their prophecies.

Another way to categorize the prophets is according to their time period. Those who prophesied prior to the exile (pre-exilic) were Obadiah, Joel, Jonah, Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah and Jeremiah. Ezekiel and Daniel prophesied during the exile. However, the last three books of the O.T.⎯Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi⎯prophesied in the post-exilic (after the exile) period.

The Prophet’s Function

The main function of the prophet was to speak for God and to warn and call people to repentance. Their messages were often quite harsh, direct and far reaching. They were often hated and unpopular as they thundered forth with clear declarations on the moral and religious conditions of the people, directed at the king on downward. G. Campbell Morgan, the great Bible teacher of yesteryear, wrote:

There were three elements in the message of the prophets: 1. A message to their own age---directly from God. 2. A message of predicted future events. (a) The failure of God’s chosen people and God’s judgment upon them and the nations around them. (b) The coming of the Messiah and His rejection and final glory. (c) The Messianic Kingdom ultimately to be established on the earth. 3. A living message to our own age---eternal principles of right and wrong.” (Henrietta C. Mears in What the Bible is All About, p. 208)

ISAIAH

Isaiah – The Bible in Miniature

With that in mind let’s proceed with the prophecy of Isaiah. This book is often called a miniature Bible because it has 66 chapters just as the Bible has 66 books. The first 39 chapters center much on sin, condemnation, and judgment. But from chapter 40 to the end, it is a message largely of encouragement and comfort parallel to the 27 books of the N.T. with many chapters here speaking of events that were fulfilled at the First Coming of Christ and many that are yet to be fulfilled upon His return. In fact the same prophecy may speak of both His First and Second Comings, such as we have in 61:1, 2. We read:

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound; To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God.”

When Jesus stood in the synagogue and read from this passage in Luke 4:18, 19, He stopped short of the last phrase “the day of vengeance of our God” because this will not occur until His Second Coming.

Messiah’s First Coming

Another way of understanding the prophets’ messages was that they often did not see that events such as these would be fulfilled with great time gaps in between. It is like seeing a mountain way off in the distance, but unable to see another mountain peak that is directly behind it until you have reached beyond the first peak. But the prophets clearly foresaw the coming of the Messiah, and nobody saw the ultimate glory of His Kingdom, but His rejection as well, more vividly than Isaiah. For example, in Isaiah 7:14 we have the strange announcement of Messiah’s coming virgin birth. We read:

Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel [God with us].”

The Hebrew word for virgin literally means a young woman. But the evidence is clear that it is to mean a virgin. In the Greek Septuagint version, translated by some 250 Jewish scholars in the second century b.c. the word “virgin” was used in this verse. So the prophets expected the Messiah to come, and Isaiah saw His virgin birth 700 years before the event.

Then in Isaiah 9:6, 7 we see how great this Child would one day be:

For unto us a Child is born. Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.

He will one day sit on the throne of David. The angel assured Mary some 700 years later, in Luke 1:31-33:

“Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.”

Wow!

Messiah’s Second Coming

One of my favorite prophesies of Isaiah comes in chapter 35 where we have the future glory of Zion painted. Verses 4-8 read:

Say to those who are fearful-hearted, Be strong, do not fear! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing. For waters shall burst forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert. The parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water.

What a beautiful time Christ’s kingdom on earth will be. Flo Price wrote a song titled Bright New World³ that captures the essence of this coming kingdom:

Someday a bright new wave will break upon the shore,

And there will be no sickness, no more dying, no more war.

And little children never shall go hungry any more.

There’s gonna be a bright new morning over there.

There’s gonna be a bright new world for us to share.

(2nd Verse)

Someday there’ll be an end to unkind words and cruel.

The man who said there is no God will know he is a fool.

And peace will be the way of life with love the only rule.

There’s gonna be a bright new morning over there.

There’s gonna be a bright new world for us to share.”

The very miracles mentioned here were performed at Christ’s First Coming. They are a bit of a foretaste of that glorious day that is yet to come.

Messiah’s Divine Identity

Now I would be remiss if I did not include some thoughts on Isaiah 40, which is the pinnacle of the mountain in the book. It has Jesus written all over it. He is the Creator and Sustainer of all things. In verse 3 we have the ministry of the Forerunner explained.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

“Prepare the way of the Lord;

Make straight in the desert

A highway for our God.”

The Forerunner would prepare the way for the King to come, which was clearly fulfilled in the opening chapters of each of the four Gospels.

Isaiah 40:5 certainly refers to the glory of the Lord Jesus and His magnificent kingdom yet to be realized:

The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

In John 1:14 we read:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”

The people of Jesus’ day clearly saw glimpses of His glory which we will look at in the N.T.

Messiah’s Purpose in His First Coming

But before we get to His final coming in glory we must consider the purpose for which He came the first time. Isaiah 53, one of the clearest Messianic passages in the O.T., still confounds the Jewish people today. Clearly the prophet Isaiah had the Messiah in mind when he wrote of the Suffering Servant. He foresaw Him bearing the sins of all humanity. He would be persecuted and “His visage or appearance more marred than any man.” People would look at Him and be appalled and dismayed at His appearance. Though the prophet may not have seen Him hanging on a Roman cross, he foresaw His bloodied and battered body being offered as a sin offering. Verses 3-7 bring this out:

He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our grief and carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, ye He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth.

Isaiah could clearly see both why the Messiah would die (“The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all,” v. 6b) and how He would die as well, by remaining silent before His accusers.

The N.T. Gospel writers make it undeniably clear that Isaiah was referring to Jesus. I would imagine that Jesus brought this passage to the attention of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus on the afternoon of His resurrection. In referring to them as “foolish ones” He was no doubt drawing attention to the fact that it was clearly prophesied that it was necessary for Him to suffer, not for His own sins, but for the sins of all mankind.

Messiah’s Purpose in His Second Coming

The remaining chapters in Isaiah are filled with hope that when the Lord comes again in judgment He will bring salvation which will be experienced from one end of the earth to the other. In 65:24, 25 we read:

“It shall come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together. The lion shall eat straw like the ox, and the dust shall be the serpent’s food [The curse placed upon all creation in Gen. 3 will have been removed]. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain,” says the Lord.

Before we leave Isaiah, I want to summarize the enormity of this book as it relates to the Messiah. Unger’s Bible Handbook, p. 307, summarizes this so well:

Of all the prophetic books of the O.T. Isaiah is the most messianic; even more so than the Book of Zechariah. Only the Psalms contain a larger number of Messianic predictions. Every glory of our Lord and every aspect of His life on the earth are set forth in this great evangelical prophecy: His deity, eternity, preexistence, creatorship, omnipotence, omni-presence, omniscience, incomparableness (40:12-18; 51:13); His incarnation (9:6,7; 7:14 cf. Mt. 1:23)…

His appearance as the Servant of the Lord, anointed as such (11:2) and chosen and delighted in as such (42:1); His mild manner (42:2); His tender ministering kindness (42:3, Mt 12:18-20); His obedience (50:5); His message (61:1, 2); His miracles (35:5, 6); His sufferings (50:6); His sufferings as the gateway to His exaltation (52: 13-15) His rejection by the Jewish nation (53:1-3); His shame---struck, wounded, bruised (53:4-6); His vicarious death (53:8) and burial (53:9); His resurrection (53:10); His ascension (52:13); His spiritual progeny (53:10) and present high priestly ministry (53:12); His future glory. After chapter 53 Messiah is not mentioned again as the Servant of the Lord, and His coming glory centers more into focus (59:20; 63:1-6; 66:15-19).

JEREMIAH

Weeping Over Jerusalem

When we move on to Jeremiah we will not find the number of Messianic prophetic passages that we have in Isaiah. Jeremiah wrote about the coming fall of Judah but also foresaw her coming restoration, and ultimate world-wide blessing brought on by the coming of the Messiah. The prophet himself is seen weeping over Jerusalem and its coming destruction by the Babylonians. In much the same way, Jesus wept over Jerusalem some 600 years later because He saw the coming destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman armies. In Jeremiah 9:1 we read:

Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a foundation of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my People!

In Luke 13:34 we read of Jesus:

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, [the double address indicates Jesus’ deep sorrow] the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were not willing!”

Christ Our Righteousness

Jeremiah’s clearest and grandest prophecy of the coming Messiah and golden age is given in chapter 23. We first have a woe pronounced upon the false shepherds who destroyed the flock and caused them to scatter. God is going to deal with them in time. Then we have this wonderful promise beginning in verses 3-6:

“But I will gather the remnant of My flock out of all countries where I have driven them, and bring them back to their folds; and they shall be fruitful and increase. I will set up shepherds over them who will feed them; and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, nor shall they be lacking” says the Lord. “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “that I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness; A King shall reign and prosper and execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. In His days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell safely; Now this is His name by which He will be called; ‘THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.’”

The NKJV Study Bible (p. 1189) has a great summary of this phrase THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS:

The days of the Messiah’s reign would bring salvation. Both Judah and Israel would be restored. The name that characterizes this ideal king is THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. Contrast that to the name Zedekiah, which means “The Lord is my righteousness.” Zedekiah’s name was a gross misnomer compared to the One who would establish the true, righteous rule—God’s appointed King. This verse is one of the texts in the Hebrew Bible that speaks specifically and surely of the coming of the glorious Savior and King.

LAMENTATIONS

Foreshadow of Christ’s Grief

Lamentations is a series of laments over the broken and fallen city after the destruction by the Babylonians. The book is clearly an expression of the prophet’s grief, much like we have already seen in Jeremiah. He has even been referred to as the weeping prophet. And as already noted above he is a foreshadowing of Christ weeping over the same city some six centuries later.

EZEKIEL

Christ, God’s Victory Over All Enemies

That brings us to the prophet Ezekiel. Remember this whole prophetic section of the O.T. gives us THE EXPECTATION OF THE COMING OF CHRIST. Ezekiel gives us a view of the Glory of God and His ultimate victory over all enemies. He gave the exiles hope in the midst of their displacement and suffering. He saw their circumstances as only temporary, that the people “might know that He is God.” This expression occurs more than 30 times in the book. It is a hope-filled message that is ultimately fulfilled in the Book of Revelation. You cannot read through the Book of Ezekiel without seeing the parallel fulfillment in Revelation, that last great book of prophecy in the N.T. For example, Ezekiel 1 has a similarity to the great scene of worship around the throne in Revelation 4 and 5.

In Ezekiel 38 and 39 we have the destruction of Gog and Magog which probably symbolically represents all of the nations resisting the reign of the true Christ and deceived into rebellion by Satan. They are overthrown, as depicted in Revelation 20:8, once and for all. All opposition to the reign of Christ will have been removed.

Then beginning in 39:25 through the end of the book we have a vision of the nation of Israel restored to its former glory along with the magnificent temple, including all of its furnishings. Unger’s Bible Handbook (p. 380) gives four purposes for the restored temple:

1. To Demonstrate God’s Holiness, 42:10-20.

2. To Provide a Dwelling Place for the Divine Glory, 43:1-17.

3. To Provide a Center for the Divine Government, 43:7 and finally

4. To Perpetuate the Memorial of Sacrifice, 43:18-27.

This sacrifice, of course, is not rendered with a view of obtaining salvation, but it is commemorative of an accomplished redemption maintained in the presence of the revealed glory of God.

Restoration, Christ Ruling in His Kingdom

This all takes place during the Kingdom Age when Christ the King of Kings shall rule over the nations of the earth from His seat of authority, the great city of Jerusalem. In Revelation 20:1-7 that period of time is specified as 1,000 years six different times. Ezekiel ends on a very Messianic note. “The name of the city from that day shall be: THE LORD IS THERE.” Here the Lord of glory, who was rejected by the people at His First Coming, has now returned in all of His glory to His people, His temple, and His land.

DANIEL

The Kingdom to Come

The prophet Daniel, page for page, has more to say about Christ than all the other prophets. In Daniel 2, King Nebuchadnezzar had a dream that only Daniel could interpret. This dream presented four kingdoms that would rule over all the earth.

1. It began with the present head of gold which was Babylon, leading to the second empire

2. The chest and arms of silver stood for Medo-Persia.

3. The third kingdom, the belly and thighs of bronze would be Greece

4. The fourth empire, the legs of iron, was most notably Rome.

The fourth kingdom would then at a point in time be divided, as history records happened to Rome (Eastern and Western empires in a.d. 364, the two legs. There will then be a revival of this last empire (Rome), in the latter days, and this final form of Gentile power will be destroyed according to 2:44:

And in the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever. Inasmuch as you saw that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold—the great God has made known to the king what will come to pass after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation is sure.

King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream was a panoramic view of the future from the time of Babylon up through the final Gentile power. The Kingdom of Christ will break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.

The Figure in the Fiery Furnace

In chapter 3 because the three Hebrew children would not bow down and worship the 90-foot tall image of Nebuchadnezzar, they were thrown into a blazing hot furnace, but the fire would not consume them. The king was astonished as he looked into the furnace, and he responded:

“Did we not cast three men bound into the midst of the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True,” O king.” “Look!” he answered, “I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire; and they are not hurt, and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God.”

The king’s observation is probably better translated “a son of the gods.” What did the king really see? My hunch is that He saw a theophany of Christ, a pre-incarnate appearance of the Second Person of the Trinity. Our take from this is that whenever we are going through fiery trials, the Son of God is with us. He has promised us that He would never leave us nor forsake us (Mt. 28:19-20, Heb. 13:5-7).

The Son of Man Coming from Heaven

In Daniel 7 we have a similar prophecy to that of chapter 2. Only now Daniel had a dream in which he saw four beasts come up out of the sea, the first like a lion, and had eagle’s wings, the second like a bear, having three ribs in its mouth, a third like a leopard, which had on its back four wings of a bird, also having four heads. Then he saw a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and exceedingly strong. It had ten horns (the final form of Gentile world power). From the ten horns came a little horn (the future Antichrist, Man of Sin, or Beast). John saw this beast slain in verse 11. And then comes the great scene in heaven depicting the Lord Jesus Christ:

I was watching in the night visions, and behold, One like the Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven! He came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him. Then to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and His kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed.

Christ’s First Coming and Death

Moving on to one final prophecy in Daniel 9 we have a clear reference to the coming and cutting off of the Messiah. This again is one of those passages that Jewish interpreters do not know what to do with. It comes to us in the midst of a prophecy known as the 70 weeks. Verse 24 gives us an outline of what would be accomplished by the Messiah’s coming, told to Daniel by the messenger Gabriel:

“Seventy weeks are determined

For your people and for your holy city,

To finish the transgression,

To make an end of sins,

To make reconciliation for iniquity,

To bring in everlasting righteousness,

To seal up vision and prophecy,

And to anoint the Most Holy.”

The weeks are weeks of years so that 70 X 7 would equal 490 years. Verse 25 gives us further timelines.

“Know therefore and understand,

That from the going forth of the command

To restore and build Jerusalem

Until Messiah the Prince,

There shall be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks;

The street  shall be built again, and the wall

Even in troublesome times.”

From the command to restore and rebuild Jerusalem’s walls under Artaxerxes I (given in 445 B.C.) until Messiah would be 62 and seven weeks, which equals 69 weeks or 483 years. Then according to verse 26:

“Messiah would be cut off, but not for Himself.”

The Hebrew word translated “cut off” is kah-rath in the Niphal (future) tense. Years ago, while hosting a tour group to Israel, I was teaching on the bus, and the passage for that day was this 70 weeks prophecy from Daniel 9. The day before I had asked our Jewish guide, not a believer, what the meaning of the Hebrew word “Kah-rath” was. Without hesitating he had said, “It means a very violent form of death. It could be something like beheading or even some other form of death not known at the time.” So, the next day I made sure, sitting next to him in the guide’s seat, that both he and our tour guide understood the significance of this passage. It could certainly be a reference to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. It cannot be denied, just as in Isaiah 53 that the Messiah must come and pay the penalty for sin, not His own sin, but the sin of the people.

So after Christ was cut off, the prophetic clock stopped, but there is yet one week of 7 years which is yet to come. It will begin when the world leader, the Antichrist, makes a covenant with the people of Israel who have regathered in their promised land. This is chronicled in verses 26 and 27, which continue Gabriel’s message to Daniel.

“And after the sixty-two weeks

Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself;

And the people of the prince who is to come

Shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.

The end of it shall be with a flood,

And till the end of the war desolations are determined.

Then he shall confirm a covenant with many for one week;

But in the middle of the week

He shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering.

And on the wing of abominations shall be one who makes desolate,

Even until the consummation, which is determined,

Is poured out on the desolate.”

So the Book of Daniel gives us a sweeping and panoramic view of history that ends with the Coming Kingdom of Christ.

Arnold J. Toynbee, in his monumental work, A Study of History,⁴ devotes one entire chapter to the subject of saviors. He breaks them down into four categories: The Savior with a Scepter, the political savior; the Savior with the Book, the philosopher, teacher, theologian; the Savior with the Sword, the military type; and the Man-God, or Roman Saviors, those of Greek and Norse mythology. Then he mentions that each of these saviors ultimately capitulated to the great enemy, death. Politicians, kings, military leaders, philosophers, and the demi-gods all die. They all succumbed to the same enemy. Then he concludes this significant chapter with these words:

And now as we stand and gaze with our eyes fixed upon the farther shore, a single figure rises from the flood and straightway fills the whole horizon. There is The Saviour.

Toynbee’s conclusion is compelling because Jesus is the only one who conquered death.

HOSEA

The Twelve Minor Prophets

The twelve minor prophets have many prophesies that were ultimately fulfilled or are yet to be fulfilled when Christ comes again. They are all filled with the EXPECTATION that Christ the Messiah is coming.

A Picture of Christ’s Faithfulness

Hosea gives us a portrait of a man who was commanded to marry a harlot. He loved her with an everlasting love even though she was unfaithful to him. This was a portrait of God’s love for Israel which was rejected on numerous occasions, and of Christ’s everlasting love for His Bride, the Church, in spite of her unfaithfulness. Israel would suffer the severe discipline of God but ultimately would be restored:

“I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for my anger has turned away from him. I will be like the dew to Israel; He shall grow like the lily, and lengthen his roots like Lebanon. His branches shall spread; His beauty shall be like an olive tree and his fragrance like Lebanon.”

This is a picture of abundance and beauty.

JOEL

The Day of the Lord (Christ)

The prophet Joel gives us a number of prophesies relating to the Day of the Lord, the coming time of judgment. All judgment is given to Christ according to John’s Gospel. One passage that has experienced partial fulfillment at His First Coming was quoted on the Day of Pentecost. In Joel 2:28-32 we read:

“And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions, and also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth; Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

No doubt part of this prophecy was fulfilled at the Crucifixion of Christ and later on the Day of Pentecost, but the real and complete fulfillment will come at His Second Coming.

AMOS

Restoration Promised

The prophet Amos is for the most part a declaration of God’s coming judgment on all of Israel. But then, as in other O.T. prophetic books, we have a message of hope at the end. Israel will be restored. It will come about in this way:

“On that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David which has fallen down, and repair its damages; I will raise up its ruins, and rebuild it as in the days of old; that they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the Gentiles who are called by My name,” says the Lord who does this thing. “Behold the days are coming” says the Lord, “When the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him who sows seed; the mountains shall drip with sweet wine, and all the hills shall flow with it. I will bring back the captives of My people Israel; They shall build the waste cities and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and drink wine from them; they shall also make gardens and eat fruit from them. I will plant them in their land, and no longer shall they be pulled up from the land I have given them,” says the Lord. (9:11-15)

Israel has a glorious future following her time of judgment and repentance. It will all come about through the resurrection of the tabernacle of David. This house of David may be in shambles today and unable to bring deliverance to the people, but one far greater than David or Solomon will one day make His presence known, and Israel will dwell securely in her land never again to experience exile.

The prophets proclaim the message loud and clear that Christ is in the restoration business. As it is with Israel, so it is with us. He loves to take the broken pieces of our lives and make something beautiful out of them. He will in time if we are willing to turn from self and sin to Him and trust Him completely.

JONAH

Jonah: A Type of Christ

Jonah may give us the best picture of Christ in all of the prophetic books. This book in literature is often referred to as predictive typical history. Jonah is a type of Christ in several ways. Jonah was from near Nazareth in Galilee. Jesus was the great Galilean from Nazareth. Jonah was called of God and tested and failed. Jesus was called of God, severely tested and succeeded. Jonah entered the jaws of a great fish. Jesus entered the jaws of death. Both were kept there for three days. Both were raised up by the Father. Jonah was asleep on a ship during the storm. Jesus was asleep on the boat for very different reasons. Jonah’s preaching led to the conversion of a city. The preaching of Jesus leads to the conversion of many from every tribe, tongue, people and nation. As Jonah looked towards the great city of Nineveh, the prophet remained silent. As Jesus looked out over the great city of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives some seven centuries later, He wept over it (Luke 19:44).

Of course the words of Jesus come to mind in Matthew 12:38-42. The setting is this. The scribes and Pharisees wanted a sign of a miracle from Jesus:

“Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.” But Jesus answered and said, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

Christ’s Resurrection: The Sign of Jonah

Again in Matthew 16:4 Christ spoke:

“An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of Jonah.”

Jesus reached back to 700 years before Him and in one brief statement gave authenticity to the existence and historical accuracy of Jonah being swallowed by a great fish. To deny the story of Jonah is to repudiate the words of the Creator who may well have created a very special fish for the moment it was needed.

Jonah is a reminder to us that when God calls us we must respond with obedience or suffer the consequences. But we also know that God is the God of second chances. Jonah 1:1 begins “Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah…..” After his horrible experience in the depths of the great fish and in the depths of the earth, we read again in 3:1, “Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time….”

So you feel like you have been so disobedient that you are finished, beyond redemption? Just know that God will meet you in your repentant state. He yet has plans for you. I have a feeling that Jesus might well have shared Jonah’s experience with the two disciples on the Emmaus road. After all, this was the third day following His crucifixion and they knew not what had become of Him.

MICAH

Micah 5:2: Christ’s Birthplace

Micah also was prophesying some 700 years before Christ. Several passages speak of the future triumph of Israel when the Lord reigns over them in Mount Zion. One of the most remarkable prophecies in all of the Minor Prophets occurs here in Micah 5:2 where the very birthplace of the Messiah was revealed.

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting.”

It was some two years after the birth of Christ that an entourage of wise men, king makers perhaps, came from the east to worship Him, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?” The religious leaders missed it. God put a clear clue in front of that generation. Watch Bethlehem! As the NKJV Study Bible reminds us:

Micah’s invitation still rings true. But our response must be different from that of the people of Jerusalem. The people in Jesus’ time were waiting for something to happen, but they missed it because of unbelief. We can look back at Jesus’ death and miss it just as seriously through our own unbelief. A crucial chapter in God’s story of salvation begins in Bethlehem. God gave more than a hint of that salvation in Micah. (p. 1423)

We can also have full confidence that every O.T. and N.T. prophecy relating to His Second Coming will be fulfilled to the minutest detail. From a personal standpoint it was a study of the prophecies of the O.T. that were fulfilled at His coming that motivated me to become a student of His Word and ultimately a lifelong proclaimer of it.

NAHUM

Comfort God’s People

As we continue our journey through the Minor Prophets we see many messages of hope and comfort. Nahum himself has a name that means comfort and may well be a foretaste of the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus said He would send to His disciples after He would leave them.

“And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper [Comforter] that He may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you” (John 14:16-18).

And He did return to them in the form of His Spirit. But He will yet come visibly, physically and bodily at the end of this age, as stated in Acts 1:8-11.

HABAKKUK

Christ’s Reign Ahead

Habakkuk sees the reign of Christ at the end of this age where we read:

For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea (2:14).

ZEPHANIAH

Messiah’s Glorious Reign to Come

Zephaniah ends with a brief glimpse of the coming glorious reign of Messiah:

“At that time I will bring you back, even at the time I gather you; For I will give you fame and praise among all the people of the earth, when I return your captives before your eyes,” says the Lord (3:20).

HAGGAI

Christ to Fill the Temple with His Glory

In Haggai we see references to the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem. Then in 2:6, 7 we read:

For thus says the Lord of hosts; “Once more (it is a little while) I will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land; and I will shake all nations, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory,” says the Lord of hosts.

Christ came and manifested His glory in the temple. When He was there it was filled with glory. And He spoke of His own body as being the real temple in John 2:19.

ZECHARIAH

Christ’s Identity

That brings us to Zechariah, perhaps the most significant of the Minor Prophets, certainly as it relates to the Messiah. Zechariah presents more Messianic prophecies than any other prophet except Isaiah. Zechariah foretells the identity of the Savior more than any other prophet except Isaiah. Christ the Branch in 3:8, Christ my Servant in 3:8, Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem on a colt in 9:9, Christ being the good Shepherd in 9:16, 11, the betrayed Shepherd (for 30 pieces of silver) in 11:12, 13, and the pierced Shepherd in 12:10; along with the Shepherd being wounded in the house of His friends in 13:6. He is also depicted as the stricken Shepherd in 13:7.

Christ Returns in Battle to Deliver

The glorious good news is that the Great Shepherd returns, and will descend to the Mount of Olives just as He was taken up from them at His Ascension in Acts 1:11 following His First Coming and Resurrection.

Zechariah 14:1-4 reads:

“Behold, the day of the Lord is coming and your spoil will be divided in your midst. For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem; the city shall be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished. Half of the city shall go into captivity, but the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as He fights in the day of battle. And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, from east to west, making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north and half of it toward the south. Then you shall flee through My mountain valley; For the mountain valley shall reach to Azal. Yes, you shall flee as you fled from the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Thus the Lord my God will come, and all the saints with You.

This entire section in chapters 12 through 14 depicts a coming time when all of the nations of the earth will become hostile to Israel and will gather against her to annihilate the Jews once and for all. The Messiah will return to the Mount of Olives; and on the day of His return, the mount will be split by a deep east-west valley. This will allow a way of escape for the beleaguered and defeated people. In 12:9-11 we read:

“It shall be in that day that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn. In that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning at Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo.”

This place was where the Godly King Josiah was slain by Pharaoh Neco II. He was the last hope for the weakened Judean nation. When the Jewish people see the appearance of their Messiah and recognize Him as the one they pierced at His First Coming there will be the kind of mourning that one hears when his firstborn son dies. It is an inconsolable kind of sorrow.

All Nations to Worship the King

Following this time of suffering all of these hostile nations will have been brought to humiliation in defeat and they will acknowledge and worship the King Jesus. In 14:16-19 it reads:

And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain. If the family of Egypt will not come up and enter, they shall have no rain, they shall receive the plague with which the Lord strikes the nations who do not come up to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt and the punishment of all the nations that do not come up to keep the Feast of Tabernacles.

This passage describes life during the Kingdom age after the King has been inaugurated. He will rule and reign. If we endure in persecution we too shall rule and reign with Him according to II Timothy 2:12, and not lose our reward. Knowing that Jesus is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords ought to motivate us to go all out for Him, to hold nothing back knowing that our labor is not in vain in the Lord (I Cor. 15:58).

MALACHI

Prepare a Way for Christ

Malachi is the concluding book in the O.T. Again, by way of reminder, the prophetic books are all about the EXPECTATION of His coming. This book has been called the bridge between the O.T. and the N.T. A silence of 400 years lies between the voice of Malachi and “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord and make His paths straight’” (Mark 1:3):

“Behold, I send My messenger, and he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple, even the Messenger of the covenant, in who you delight. Behold, ‘He is coming,” says the Lord of hosts.” (Malachi 3:1)

The name Malachi means “messenger of the Lord.” John the Baptist, known as the forerunner, would one day appear upon the scene, He would pave the way of and point the way to Jesus. Of course John the Baptist spoke of himself as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord.” Matthew 3:3 In that day when the king was visiting another village or city, often the roads were quite rough and almost unnavigable. Before the king would make his trip in his royal chariot, the roads would have to be made smooth. This is what John the Baptist, the Messenger spoken of here in Malachi 3:1, did in providing for the arrival of King Jesus. John was preparing the hearts of the people to hear the message of repentance and prepare them for the acceptance of their Messiah. In 3:2 Malachi takes us to Christ’s Second Coming with the question:

“But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when he appears? For He is like a refiner’s fire and like a launderer’s soap.”

These images speak of the purifying process that all of humanity will go through at His coming.

This concludes our survey of Christ in the O.T., with a reminder that so much more can be said about Him. One unknown author put this truth into poetic form:

I find my Lord in the Bible wherever I chance to look,

He is the theme of the Bible, the center and heart of the Book;

He is the Rose of Sharon, He is the Lily fair,

Wherever I open my Bible, The Lord of the Book is there.

He at the Book’s beginning, gave to the earth its form,

He is the Ark of shelter bearing the brunt of the storm,

The Burning Bush in the desert, the budding of Aaron’s Rod,

Where ever I look in the Bible I see the Son of God.

The Ram upon Mt. Moriah, the ladder from earth to sky,

The Scarlet Cord in the window, and the Serpent lifted high,

The smitten rock in the desert, The Shepherd with staff and crook,

The face of my Lord I discover wherever I open the Book.

He is the Seed of Woman, The Savior Virgin-born;

He is Son of David, whom men rejected with scorn,

His garments of grace and of beauty, the stately Aaron deck,

Yet He is High Priest forever, for He is Melchizedek.

Lord of eternal glory whom John, the Apostle saw;

Light of the golden city, Lamb without spot or flaw,

Bridegroom coming at midnight, for whom the Virgins look.

Ah yes, wherever I open my bible, I find my Lord in the Book.”

Questions for Reflection:

How does Isaiah 53 point to the Messiah?

In what way was Jeremiah most like Jesus?

What is the comforting message for us today coming from Daniel 3?

Looking at Amos, what is the two-pronged message that gives us hope today?

In what ways is Jonah the most complete picture of Christ in the O.T.? What is the great truth that we learn about God when it comes to His patience with us?

What is the greatest prophecy relating to Christ in Micah?

What can be said about the prophet Zechariah that cannot be said of any other Minor Prophet?

So far in our study we have seen how the first five books, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy known as the Law, the Torah, or the Pentateuch, give us the FOUNDATION FOR HIS COMING. Sin enters the picture and God has already provided the remedy which would come when He first came. The historical books, Joshua thru Esther provide us the PREPARATION FOR HIS COMING. The failure of man is recorded from Joshua through the judges and the kings. Both the northern and southern kingdoms of Israel were taken into captivity and exile. The poetical books are five in number: Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon which echo the ASPIRATION FOR HIS COMING. That brings us to the fourth division of the O.T.: The EXPECTATION OF HIS COMING.

Christ will come. What the prophets did not fully understand was that this would require two journeys of the Son of Man to earth, first to die for sin, and the second time to do away with sin once and for all.

Jesus REVEALED in the New Testament

The Manifestation of Christ’s Coming

As we move to the N.T. we might bridge the two testaments in this way. In the O.T. He is concealed. In the N.T. He is revealed. In the O.T. He is foretold. In the N.T. He is fulfilled. In the O.T. we have Him in pictures. In the N.T. we have Him in person.

The Four Gospels – Christ in the Flesh

In the first four books, known as the Gospels, we have the MANIFESTATION OF HIS COMING. Here He is finally, God manifest in human flesh. Many of us remember the year 1969 and that incredible moment when our astronauts first set foot on the moon. Richard Nixon, who was then president, in his excitement lauded the event in this way: “It’s the greatest day since Creation.” It was Billy Graham who reminded him of Christmas and Easter. Yes, at Christmas we celebrate the coming of the Christ child, God Himself, born of a virgin and clothed in human flesh. The greatest moment in history was not when man stepped upon the moon but when God stepped down to earth.

The four Gospels are good news coming from four different perspectives and written for different target audiences. Matthew presents Christ as the King of Israel to the Jews. He has the right to sit upon the David throne. Mark is writing to the Romans who knew what the master-servant world was, and portrays Christ as the Model Servant. Luke, a Greek, wrote with the Greeks in mind, and presented Jesus as the Perfect Man. He used the title Son of Man more than any other. John is writing to the whole world and focuses upon His deity. Christ is the one and only Son of God. I must give credit to J. Sidlow Baxter in his monumental, far-reaching volume Explore the Book,⁵ for bringing many of these observed differences and comparisons to my attention.

THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

Christ, King of the Jews

Matthew writes to show the Jewish people that Jesus is their king, promised to David back in II Samuel 7:12-14; therefore, Matthew’s Gospel begins with the genealogy of Christ. Luke has one at the end of chapter 3. Luke begins with Joseph and goes all the way back to Adam, because he is emphasizing Christ’s humanity. Matthew begins with Abraham and traces His lineage on through to Mary in verse 16. In his genealogy he proves that through His adopted father Joseph, Jesus was legally in the royal line. In every way possible, Jesus had the right to rule them, which is why Matthew begins in this fashion.

Of the fifteen parables recorded in Matthew, all but three begin, “The kingdom of heaven is like….” The Jews fully understood that this expression applied to them and to their nation. The expression “kingdom” occurs 55 times in Matthew. The phrase “kingdom of heaven” occurs 35 times here and nowhere else in the other three Gospels. Clearly the Book of Matthew has a ring of royalty about it. The kingdom of heaven is the future glory of Israel. The kingdom of God is God’s rule over all.

Christ, The Lamb of God

When God gave Israel King David, He promised that someone “greater than David” would one day come, sit upon his throne and establish a kingdom that would be forever. The angel even refers to Joseph as the son of David in Matthew 1:20. Matthew begins in chapter one by saying as such: “Here He is, the one greater than David has arrived. His name shall be called Jesus, (Savior} (v. 21) and Immanuel (God with us)” (v. 23). We have the primary reason for the King’s coming: to save His people from their sins. He would not be a political savior. He would not deliver them from their servitude of the Roman emperors. He would save His people, the Jewish people, from their sin.

Again we see the Jewish side of Matthew’s writing. If we had Matthew’s Gospel alone, we might wonder if Christ died for the sins of the whole world. Only when we get to the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20 do we have “all the nations” emphasized. The Gospels make it clear that He died for the sins of all. John 1:29 is a clear declaration of that: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the whole world.”

Only Christ could qualify to die for our sin, because He was born of a virgin (v. 23) and therefore without our sin nature. Many years ago, Larry King, the man who made a career out of interviewing people, was being interviewed by David Letterman. Dave asked him, “If you could interview anyone from history, who would it be?” There was not a moment of hesitation. King answered, “Jesus Christ.” Dave looked stunned, but he recovered, “What would you ask Him?” King looked into the camera and said, “I would ask him if he was really born of a virgin.” Turning to Dave, King continued, “The answer to that question would define history for me.” Ravi Zacharias then writes that when he requested permission through a common friend to quote Larry King, King sent word saying, “And tell him I was not being facetious.” And I say the answer to that question has defined history. Sin is our greatest problem. Sin leads to death, which is our greatest enemy. We live in a world that is diseased with sin. That is the very thing that Jesus came to save us from.

Billy Sunday, the great evangelist back in the early 1900s said:

I am against sin. I’ll kick it as long as I have a foot. I’ll fight it as long as I have a fist. I’ll bite it as long as I have a tooth. And when I’m old and foot-less, and fist-less and tooth-less, I’ll gum it until I go home to glory.

If we all had that attitude toward sin this world would be a much different place.

Only Matthew records the visit of the Magi (the wise men from the East) in chapter 2. These wise men had come to worship the newborn King. They came some two years after Christ’s birth, led by the star, and asking, “Where is He who was born the king of the Jews?” This newborn king of Israel posed a threat to King Herod, and Herod set out to destroy Him after he was deceived by the Magi. He sent forth and put to death all of the infant boys two years old and younger born in Bethlehem and its surrounding districts. However Jesus and His parents were miraculously protected. God’s ultimate purposes cannot be thwarted.

The King’s person is presented in chapters 1 through 4:12, and His program is defined in 4:12-to the end of chapter 25. In 4:17 we read, “From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’” This phrase, the kingdom of heaven, or more precisely the kingdom of the heavens, is a term descriptive of any type of ruler-ship that God may assert on earth at a given period. Here it refers to the kingdom as it relates to the nation of Israel. Jesus never explained what the kingdom of heaven was to His hearers because they already knew.

In Acts 1:6b, after His resurrection, and just prior to His ascension, Christ was asked by His disciples, “Lord will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” Jesus answered them that it was not for them to know the times or the seasons which the Father had put in His own authority (v. 7). Christ then said:

“But you shall receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you: and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (v. 8)

Notice that Jesus never denied that there would be an earthly kingdom over which He would one day preside as king. It would not be right then, but He will yet reign as King over all from the earthly throne of David.

Christ, The King to Come

The kingdom of heaven, God’s rule on earth through their Messiah, was now being offered to Israel. Many of His parables in chapters 18 through 25 centered around the teaching of the King and His kingdom. In chapter 21 we have the Triumphal Entry of the king into Jerusalem. He came lowly, riding upon a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey, all in fulfillment of Zechariah 9:9. But the Jewish authorities missed that prophecy. They expected their king to come riding in on a big, white stallion, the symbol of a real conqueror. White stallions were the symbols of war, a donkey was a symbol of peace. Christ came to bring peace between God and man. Merrill Unger, the Bible scholar, summarizes it this way:

The failure of the nation to repent even with its true King in their midst, would lead to the necessity for the King’s atoning death as a prerequisite for the future establishment of the kingdom.⁶

This rejection in turn led to the passion of the King. In 27:11 Pilate asked Him, “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus answered him, “It is as you say.”

In 27:29 the soldiers “twisted a crown of thorns, they put it on His head….and they bowed the knee before Him and mocked Him, saying ‘Hail, King of the Jews.’” They made a mockery of His Kingliness and His kingdom. Then in verse 37 the inscription that was put on the cross over His head stated: “THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.” They continued to berate and mock Him as the king of the Jews. Throughout His passion we see many allusions in Matthew to Jesus being Israel’s king.

Christ, Victorious Over Death

As in all four of the Gospels, Matthew ends with Christ’s power being demonstrated over death. He was rejected by men but accepted by His Father, and His resurrection was proof of that acceptance. His resurrection also proves that He has all power. After His resurrection, “when the disciples saw Him, they worshiped Him: but some doubted” (28:17). Then He commissioned them with these words:

“All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you and lo, I am with you always even to the end of the age.” (Matt. 28:18b-20)

King George V of Britain once paid a visit to the city of Leeds. Elaborate preparations were made for his coming. Excited crowds filled the streets to wave and welcome the king. The train carrying the king approached. The king came outside the royal coach and stood on a small platform where all could see him. He wore no crown, nor purple robe, but was dressed in a plain suit, just like an ordinary man. From his jacket pocket he plucked a bright handkerchief with which he waved to the cheering children. The train disappeared out of sight in what seemed like seconds. One little girl stood and sobbed bitterly. One of the teachers asked her, “Why are you crying so, dear?” The little girl sputtered through her tears, “I wanted to see the king and I only saw a man.” The Jews, likewise, wanted to see a king, but all that they saw was a man. What do you see? How do you see Him?

THE GOSPEL OF MARK

Christ, The Model Servant

Mark’s portrait of Christ is noticeably different from Matthew and the other two Gospels. Mark presents Jesus as the model Servant. The Sovereign King became a servant. What a contrast between a king and a servant. Kings have servants. But Jesus was both a king and a servant. Mark writes his Gospel for the Roman mind. It is the Gospel that contains a sense of urgency. The Roman mind was a practical mind. They were the achievers, rather than the thinkers or philosophers. They built things that would serve the people, such as the Roman roads, buildings and bridges. This is why the Greek word “euthos” meaning “immediately” occurs so often, over 40 times. Look at 1:9-13. At His baptism it occurs two times. You can sense the urgency from the very first words.

In the first 10 chapters of the Gospel of Mark we have THE SERVICE OF THE KING. There is no genealogy. Kings require them. Servants do not. The Romans were not into genealogies. I guess I would have fit right in with the Romans because even with all of the accessibility to genealogical records today I have had little interest in discovering much about my ancestors. I am not sure what that says about me. I guess I am more interested in where I am going than where I came from.

Mark’s is the Gospel of action. Whereas Matthew is filled with O.T. quotations to confirm that Jesus was their King, Mark has only a few direct O.T. quotations. Two occur here. Mark 1:2 is taken from Malachi 3:1 and Mark 1:3 come from Isaiah 40:3, both relating to John the Baptist:

“Behold, I send My messenger before Your face,

Who will prepare Your way before You. (Mark 1:2)

The voice of one crying in the wilderness:

‘Prepare the way of the Lord;

Make His paths straight.’” (Mark 1:3)

The Servant’s Awesome Power

While Matthew puts emphasis upon the King’s parables and words, Mark puts emphasis upon the King’s works and actions. Twenty miracles are recorded in the 16 chapters in Mark, often in greater detail than we have in the other Gospels, but the Sermon on the Mount and the Upper Room discourse are not included. Mark’s purpose is to show the awesome power of the Servant over the following:

Demons, 1:21-18,

Disease 1:29-39,

Leprosy, the most feared and hideous disease, 1:40-45,

Paralysis 2:1-12,

The Sabbath, 2:23-28,

Deformity, 3:1-6,

Demons, a couple of more times in 3:7-5:20, and

Sickness and death in 5:21-43.

Mark shows in 6:30-44 Christ’s power that could take five loaves of bread and two small fish and feed 5,000 hungry men plus women and children. He had authority over the water in 6:45-52 and was the only one in history who has ever walked on it. Those who needed healing could touch the border of His garment and be made well. He had power over deafness and blindness. Now when we get towards the end of chapter 10 we come to 10:45, the key verse in Mark.

The context of 10:45 is that the disciples are vying for the top spot in Christ’s coming kingdom. James and John came to Him with this request. Actually, according to Matthew, it was their mother who came on their behalf. They desired greatness, but they were going about it in the wrong way. Many think that greatness comes from bullying one’s way into authority or by jockeying into position over others. This is the way it happens among the Gentiles, in the business and corporate world. It is dog eat dog, a cut-throat kind of approach. Somewhere I read this:

Do you know what it means to go to an office where you are respected as a human being; where your opinion is appreciated; where your superiors treat you as an equal? It means you’ve gone to the wrong office.

Jesus answered their question about who would be in the top spot in verse 42

“You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all.”

Then comes the key verse, 10:45:

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many.”

Mark reminds us that greatness comes through serving. Did you know that Mark is the only one who tells us that Jesus was a carpenter (6:3)? Matthew says only that He was the son of a carpenter. Christ was born in humility, and raised in obscurity. A popular newspaper columnist known simply as “Dear Abby” once had an article in her column that said, “There are two kinds of people in the world---those who walk into a room and say, ‘There you are’ – and those who walk into a room and say, ‘Here I am.” In Mark, Jesus is portrayed as walking into this world and saying “there you are,” then humbling Himself, putting on His apron and serving us.

The Sacrifice of the Servant

The sacrifice of the Servant is described in chapters 11 through 15. The one distinguishing fact in Mark is that he gives a disproportionate amount of space to the last seven days of our Lord’s earthly ministry, about 40 percent of the book. This would be the ultimate act of servanthood, giving His life as a ransom for many. As you read through this section you will be reminded of the great Servant passages in the Book of Isaiah, from chapters 42 through 53, depicted 700 years before the coming of Christ. Mark portrays Him as the Perfect Servant in His suffering.

Then we see the superiority of the Servant in chapter 16. This was proven by His resurrection from the dead. He had once and for all defeated death. One cannot read through Mark without thinking of the great Servant passage in Philippians 2:5-11:

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of God did not consider it robbery to be equal with God but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond-servant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

An unknown poet put it this way:

“Father, Where shall I work today?” And my love flowed warm and free.

Then He pointed out a tiny spot, and said, ‘”Tend that for Me.”

I answered quickly, “Oh no! not that, why

No one would ever see

No matter how well my work was done

Not that little place for me!”

And the word He spoke, it was not stern,

He answered me tenderly,

“Ah, little one, search that heart of thine

Art though working for them or me?

Nazareth was a little place,

And so was Galilee.

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE

Christ, the Perfect Man

Luke gives us a whole different perspective on the life and ministry of Christ. Luke, probably a noted Greek doctor, wrote to the Grecian world. He portrays Christ as the perfect man, the Son of Man. We would refer to Him today as a Man’s man. There is so much confusion about authentic manhood today. What does it mean to be a real man? There are so many stereotypes today in our culture. With so many of our young men growing up in homes where the father is absent, we see them struggling to come to grips with manhood. This has resulted in great confusion for both sexes and has made the women’s movement what it is today. An old Burma Shave advertisement back in the Midwest went like this: “A peach looks good with lots of fuzz, but man’s no peach and never was.”

There is no better way to get a real grip on what manhood is than to study closely this third Gospel, the Gospel of Luke. He portrays Christ’s real humanity. Jesus was a real man. He was the perfect man. He was also the God-Man. The key verse in Luke is 19:10: “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” There are two ways of understanding that. Either he is referring to individuals who are lost and need to be found, or it could be a reference to the fact that real manhood has been lost. We often kiddingly say to someone who has lost a lot of weight, “You are only half the man or half the woman that you used to be.” The truth is that without Jesus Christ in your life you are not even close to being half the man or half the woman that God designed you to be. The secret of manhood is locked up in Christ. The phrase “Son of Man” occurs 25 times in 24 chapters. It has an obvious connection with the Book of Daniel. “I was watching in the night visions and behold, One like the Son of Man, coming in the clouds of heaven” (Daniel 7:13a).

Christ’s Manhood

In the first section of Luke, from 1:1 to 4:13 we have His Manhood emphasized. Luke was a physician, and it would be expected of him that he would give us more information about the miraculous birth of the Christ Child. Mary did not understand how she could get pregnant with a child since she had never been intimate with a man. Luke alone records the answer of the angel in 1;35:

“The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you, therefore also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God.”

It would be a miraculous conception. This child would be conceived by the Holy Spirit. These are very delicately chosen words. This would be the one and only God-Man. It is Luke alone who records how the conception would take place and Luke alone who records the actual birth in Luke 2. Matthew skips over the birth and begins with the appearance of the Magi in Matthew 2. Mark begins with the baptism and ministry of Christ. John goes way back into the reaches of eternity before time ever began. In addition to emphasizing the miraculous birth of Christ, Luke also gives a detailed account of how He ended up being born in Bethlehem, and how the Christ Child was born in a lowly manger, perhaps even a cave, a setting unfit for a future king.

Luke gives us the only glimpse into the childhood of Jesus in 2:42-52. Christ ends up being lost from His parents, but found in the temple astonishing the religious leaders by His understanding and answers in verse 47. The great conqueror Napoleon supposedly once said:

Everything in Christ astonishes me. His spirit overawes me, and His will confounds me. Between Him and whoever else is in the world, there is no possible term of comparison. He is truly a being by Himself. I search in vain in history to find the similarity to Jesus, or anything which can approach the Gospel. Neither history nor humanity, nor the ages, nor nature, offer me anything with which I am able to compare it or to explain it. Here everything is extraordinary.

This emphasis upon Christ’s manhood helps us to understand why in His genealogy in chapter 3 Luke goes all the way back to Adam, the beginning of man. The reason was to show that Jesus was the last Adam, the perfect man. Where the first Adam failed, the last Adam would succeed. This is further brought out in Romans 5:12-21. When Adam and Eve were tempted they failed. When Jesus was tempted by the Devil in the wilderness for forty days, recorded in chapter 4, He succeeded. Hebrews 4:15, 16 stresses the importance of Christ’s testing for us today:

For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

A wonderful song by John W. Peterson put it this way:

No one understands like Jesus.

He’s a friend beyond compare.

Meet Him at the throne of mercy.

He is waiting for you there.

No one understands like Jesus,

When the days are dark and grim;

No one is so near, so dear as Jesus,

Cast your every care on Him.⁷

We have in Christ Jesus one with whom we can identify, who knows our hurts. He’s been there. He knows what severe temptation is and He can help us when we are severely tempted.

Christ’s Ministry as the Son of Man

The ministry of the Son of Man begins in Luke 4:14 and goes all the way to 19:48. This section is where we see the real humanity of Jesus in action. He is not someone high up on a throne who is unapproachable as most kings are. Rather, He is One who has come down to the dust of the earth and is waiting and willing to call us friend, receiving us just as we are and believing in us and seeing in us what we can be. For me, a great summary passage on this entire section is in 14:12-14 where He said to one of the Pharisees in whose house He was eating,:

“When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor your rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

These were the outcasts of society, the handicapped, the physically challenged, the beggars, the homeless, and street people. As the perfect man He took a profound interest in those who were the least fortunate in society, and He commanded us to do likewise. As the Perfect Man He was always willing to identify with the less fortunate people in the midst of their problems to give them hope and the will to carry on. And He is still doing this today. As Napoleon said, “Leaders are dealers in hope.” Jesus personified that.

Mistreatment of the Son of Man

The Mistreatment of the Son of Man begins in chapter 20 and goes all the way through to 23:56. Luke gives us more details about the prayer life of the Son of Man, simply because he is stressing the human side of Christ. For instance he gives us additional details about His struggle in Gethsemane. Jesus was praying: “Being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood, falling down to the ground” (v. 44). Nothing draws attention to His manhood more than this description of Christ in agony. He went to the Cross willingly. He died as a man. He understands death. Ron Mehl in his book Surprise Endings: Ten Good Things About Bad Things⁸ summarizes his chapter on death like this:

But isn’t it just like our loving Lord to never send us anywhere He hasn’t gone Himself? Isn’t it just like Him to go into the shadow ahead of us? He went there and came back. He looked death in the eye and tied both hands behind our old enemy’s back.

We still have to make the journey, but it’s a very short way to go. We’ll still have to pass through the shadow, but we won’t have to walk that way alone. We’ll still have to say goodbye to dear ones in Christ, but they’ll be along before we know it. We’ll still have to walk around a dark corner, but just around that corner there’s an ocean of light. The bad thing, after all, is having to leave. The good thing is that we’re going Home.

The Son of Man’s Mastery over Death

In chapter 24 we see the mastery of the Son of Man over death. This chapter begins with a clear record of Christ’s Resurrection and then ends with His commissioning of His disciples and His Ascension back to heaven. “They worshiped Him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God” (vv. 52, 53).

There is the story about the little boy who knocked at the studio door of an Italian artist. When it opened, he explained, “Please Madam, will you give me the master’s brush?” The lady placed the brush in the boy’s hand and invited him to try. He made a supreme effort but soon found he could paint no better with that brush than with his own. The woman then said, “Remember, you cannot paint like the great master unless you have his spirit.”

Likewise, we can never live like the Master in His perfect humanity until we have the Master’s Spirit in us. And this is why He commanded them in 24:49: “Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you, but tarry in Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.” That would come a few days later on the Day of Pentecost.

An old chorus from years ago put it like this:

Tell it to Jesus! Tell it to Jesus!

He is a friend that’s well-known.

We’ve no other such a friend or brother.

Tell it to Jesus alone.⁹

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

Christ the Logos

That now brings us to the Gospel of John. While Luke writes to prove the humanity of Jesus, John writes to show the deity of the Son of God. Matthew begins with a genealogy that goes back to Abraham, Mark begins with His baptism, Luke begins with the announcement of His coming birth, but John takes us way back before time began. In fact, according to the opening verses of John, Christ is the One who was there before time as we know it even began:

In the beginning was the Word (Christ) and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.

In the Gospel of John, there is no genealogy, no birth, no boyhood, no growth, no baptism, no temptation, and no Gethsemane. Everything is directed to the end in view: to prove that Jesus was and is the Son of God. There is no lack of clarity as to the purpose for which John wrote. It is clearly stated in 20:30, 31:

And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciple, which are not written in this book: But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.

John uses the Greek word pisteuo, which literally means “to place one’s trust in another,” according to Strong’s concordance, over 90 times. His Gospel has been referred to as the Gospel of belief. John wants to bring the simplicity of the Gospel, and of trusting in Jesus, to the whole world. John uses seven miracles of Christ to show that He is worthy of our trust. These seven miracles prove that He is God.

The PRESENTATION OF THE SON OF GOD comes in 1:1-4:54. He speaks of Christ as the very source of Life and Light in the opening verses. He is the Light of the world as we will see in 8:12 and 9:3, 4. He is also the Life of the world as we see in 10:28-30. If you are looking for life and light then you need look no further than Jesus.

John is the only one who refers to Jesus as the Logos both here in 1:1, 2 and later in 1:14:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Remember that Matthew was writing for the Jews, Mark for the Romans, and Luke for the Greeks, but John was writing to the whole world. In John 1:29 we see John the Baptist pointing to Christ and saying,, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” In 3:16 we read, “For God so loved the world…..” In 4:42 after Christ’s encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well, many believed her testimony about Him back in the town. They responded to the woman:

“Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”

In fact John uses the word “world” approximately 78 times in his Gospel. Matthew uses it 11 times, Mark uses the word only 4 times and Luke, in 24 chapters, uses it only 5 times. Since John was writing from Ephesus he would have been familiar with the Greek philosophers of the past. It was the Ephesian philosopher, Heraclitus, in 560 b.c., who came up with the idea that everything is in a state of flux. Everything is changing from day to day and from one moment to the next. His famous illustration was that it was impossible to step into the same river twice. The river is ever changing. We are ever changing. There is a world of change going on around us. I have heard that our bodies go through a cellular change every seven years. If so, I have been married to seven different women, even though it has been the same wonderful woman all of these years!

Now the Greek philosophers asked that since all things are changing, what is it that holds things together and keeps the very fabric of our lives from flying apart? What is it that holds the changing universe together? What is it that keeps the stars in their courses, that keeps the days and nights and seasons of the years constant? What is the controlling principle or power behind it all? The Greeks referred to this as the Logos. John tells us that the Logos is the very Son of God, the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth (v. 14).

Proofs that Christ is the Son of God

The proofs that He is the Son of God are convincing. His miracle of changing the water into wine in Cana of Galilee was to manifest His glory. 2:11, Then we have recorded the Healing of the nobleman’s son 4:45-54, healing of the man of Bethesda in chapter 5, the feeding of the 5,000 in 6:1-14, walking on water in 6:15-21, the healing of the blind man in 9:1-41 and His greatest miracle, the raising of Lazarus in 11:1-57. This was proof of His power over death and a prelude of His own Resurrection following His laying down of His own life in death.

Not only do we have these seven great miracles of Christ, but we also have the seven great I AM statements of Christ to confirm His deity.

In 6:35 He announced “I AM the bread of life…”

In 8:12 “I AM the light of the world…”

In 10:9 “I AM the door…”

In 10:11 “I AM the good shepherd.”

In 11:25 “I AM the resurrection and the life.”

In 14:6 “I AM the way, the truth and the life….”

In 15:1 “I AM the true vine…..”

In 8:58 Jesus said, “Before Abraham was, I AM.” The Jews could not miss these obvious claims from Jesus as to His deity. They would have made the connection with how God revealed Himself to Moses in the burning bush according to Exodus 3:13, 14. Moses said to God:

“When I come to the children of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they say to me, ‘What is His name?’ What shall I say to them?” God responded to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.”

This statement was a declaration of God’s dynamic and active self-existence. It means that I AM and no one else is. It is an exclusive statement. He has no beginning and no end. He has always been and will always be. He is dependent upon no one. Jesus was claiming this for Himself, and we can just as surely believe that He is the great I AM for us. He will always be there for us, whatever we need and whenever we need it. Just as He provided for Moses and for the children of Israel, He can provide for us. Are you looking to Him? Are you trusting Him to be all that you need for both the present and the future?

Christ’s Prevailing Power as Son of God

Finally we see the prevailing power of the Son of God in 18:1-21:25. John is the only one who records the scene in 18:1 where the soldiers (a detachment of about 600), plus officers of the chief priests and Pharisees, all led by Judas who betrayed Him, came with lanterns, torches, and weapons to arrest Jesus. He asked them, “Whom are you seeking?” Jesus said, “I AM He.” When He said that, they all drew back and fell to the ground.” This event clearly shows us that Christ was in charge from this moment of His arrest right up through His trial, death and resurrection. He was the One who was in control of the events and the timing.

John is the only one who records one of the seven last statements of Christ on the Cross, “It is finished!” The Greek word tetelestai was a common word in that day. Papyri receipts for taxes have been recovered with this word written across them. It was a term that was equivalent to today’s phrase, “Paid in Full.” When we paid off our house we wrote on the final payment “Paid in Full.” The debt was fully paid. I owed a debt I could not pay. He paid a debt He did not owe.

Jesus paid it all.

All to Him I owe.

Sin had left its crimson stain.

He washed it white as snow. ¹⁰

Yes, God does have a Son. His name is Jesus and He is the Savior of the world. There is a well-known story about a wealthy man who found great joy in collecting fine art from all over the world. The man had a son. The son also grew to enjoy great art, and the father and son spent many pleasant years collecting famous paintings for their mansion. But, one day war broke out in their country and the son went off to fight. A few weeks before Christmas the young man was reported missing in action. The old man was filled with anxiety awaiting news of the status of his son. And then it came. Only days before Christmas, the news arrived that the son was killed, but he had died a hero. He had been trying to help a fallen comrade when he himself had been shot.

The old man didn’t think that he could survive his grief. He had loved his son more than life itself. He couldn’t bring himself to celebrate Christmas. But a knock on the door aroused him from his grief. The young soldier in the doorway introduced himself as the one whose life had been saved by the old man’s son. He had come to express his appreciation and to give him a gift. The soldier explained that he too, was an artist, and he had painted a picture of the man’s son. The father was amazed at the life-like quality of the painting. He hung it on the mantel of his study, and there it brought him great comfort. It became his most prized work of art.

A season passed and the father died. Other art collectors around the world were excited to learn of the old man’s death, for it meant that his collection would be up for sale. The day of the auction people crowded into the mansion, eagerly awaiting the chance to bid. A sigh of disappointment escaped the crowd when they realized that, per the old man’s will, the picture of his son would be the first piece to be auctioned. The other collectors called out impatiently that they had come there to bid on the real art, not some sentimental piece. No one would make a bid. Finally, a friend of the family bid ten dollars for the painting. He had been fond of the son, and he knew how much that piece meant to the father.

When his bid was accepted, all the other collectors cheered. Finally, they would get to bid for the important stuff. Just then, the auctioneer put away his gavel and announced the bidding closed. The collectors were furious. Was he crazy? All they had sold was a worthless picture of the old man’s son. What about the rest of the art?

The auctioneer pulled out a draft of the old man’s will and said, “It is very simple. According to the will of the father, whoever takes the son gets it all.”

This captures the portrait that John gives us of Jesus. When we receive the Son we get it all. Nothing is withheld from us. In John 14:6, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life”

Questions for Reflection:

How does Matthew portray Jesus and how does that relate to you?

How does Mark portray Jesus and what does that mean to you personally?

How does Luke portray Jesus and how does that relate to you?

How does John portray Jesus and how does that relate to you?

How do we find the four Gospels differ in the way they each begin?

The fact that all four Gospels conclude with detailed accounts of the crucifixion and resurrection means what?

What do the great “I AM” statements mean to you personally?

To summarize, in the four Gospels we have the MANIFESTATION of Christ. That brings us to the sixth of the seven divisions. In the Book of Acts and the Epistles we have the REALIZATION of Christ now living in us.

The Realization of Christ’s Coming

The realization of His Coming is Christ now living in us. In the Book of Acts and in the Epistles, we have the interpretation of all that happened in the Gospels.

ACTS

The Book of Acts was written by the same physician who wrote the Book of Luke. It was presumed that he was a Gentile because his name appears in Colossians 4:11 after he mentions those of the circumcision. He writes to a Gentile by the name of Theophilus:

The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, to whom He also presented Himself alive, after His suffering, by many infallible [demonstrative evidences], being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. (Acts 1:1-3)

Receiving Christ’s Spirit

Christ clearly instructed His disciples that they were to wait in Jerusalem. There would come a day when He would return in Spirit to indwell them and empower them. In His own words:

“But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

This verse becomes the outline of the Book of Acts. The first seven chapters, concluding with the stoning of Stephen at the end of chapter 7, are pretty much centered in the preaching and persecution of the Apostles in Jerusalem, culminating with the death of the first martyr of the Christian Church. The Jewish people were seeing the power of Christ echoing out from the lives of the Apostles who could not be silenced. In 4:18-20 we read:

So they (the Jewish authorities) called them and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.”

And speak they did. They prayed for boldness and “they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness” (4:31). The world around Jerusalem was now experiencing men who were full of Jesus, performing miracles and preaching the Gospel of repentance to the Jews, before the Good News would go out to the Samaritans and Gentiles. These were the Acts of the Holy Spirit operating in and through the lives of His Apostles, who were fully convinced that He was alive. He was seen by them, and they heard Him and touched Him and ate with Him before He ascended. And because they were fully convinced that He was living, He could now come down and live in them. That is the message of the Book of Acts.

Preaching Christ to the World

In Acts 8 we have the second division of the book. Saul leads led “a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles” (8:1). God has often used persecution and adversity in the Church over the years to bring about a greater work around the world. He no doubt used the stoning of Stephen to perhaps do a preliminary work in Saul that would lead to his own conversion in chapter 9. “The witnesses [to Stephen’s death] laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul” (7:58). The Holy Spirit had that comment recorded because it must have been an important fact leading to Saul’s own conversion. Saul heard Stephen pray, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.” St Augustine said of Stephen, “If Stephen had never prayed, Saul had never preached.”

I was a 13-year-old boy in 1956 when I heard the news reports of the tragic killing of the five missionaries in Quito, Ecuador. It was hard for me to understand why God would allow five young men so full of passion for Him to meet with such a sudden and brutal death. But today that killing tribe is all Christian. The head of the tribe, the one who speared Nate Saint, is now an old man in the village and a believer in Jesus Christ. Asked what he is going to do when he gets to heaven and meets Nate Saint, he replied, “I’m going to run and throw my arms around Nate Saint and thank him for bringing Jesus Christ to me and to my people.” He then added, “And Nate Saint will throw his arms around me as well, and welcome me home.” I can picture Stephen and Paul in such an embrace. These are truly the Acts of Jesus Christ, empowered by His Spirit and operating through the lives of His followers.

At any rate, the believers were now scattered out from Jerusalem and ended up in the regions of Judea and Samaria. According to the words of the woman of Samaria in John 4, the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans. The average Jew would go out of his way to avoid encountering a Samaritan, but now the Holy Spirit was taking the Gospel to the Samaritans through these believing Jews. Christ is preached in Samaria, and the preaching is accompanied by many miracles. In 8:5-8 we read that:

Philip went down to the city of Samaria and preached Christ to them and the multitudes with one accord heeded the things spoken by Philip, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did. For unclean spirits, crying with a loud voice came out of many who were possessed; and many who were paralyzed and lame were healed. And there was great joy in that city.

There could be no mistaking that this was the working of the Holy Spirit, the indwelling life of Christ. Whenever Christ reigns and is in the hearts of His people there will be great joy, even in persecution. Acts 5:41 reminded us of that after Peter and John were beaten, “They departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name.”

Warren Wiersbe has written: “The salt was now leaving the Jerusalem saltshaker to be spread over all Judea and Samaria.”¹¹ These believers were scattered like seed. It is even a Greek word that is used for the scattering of seed. Two great benefits would come from this scattering. First, it was His means of getting the Gospel out beyond Jerusalem. Secondly, it was His way of getting the Jewish believers out of Jerusalem before the judgment that would fall in a.d. 70. Had they remained in the city, who knows what would have happened to these believers and the Church?

The remainder of chapter 8 records how Christ was preached among the Samaritans, and even to an Ethiopian in the latter part of the chapter.

Paul Encounters Christ

In chapter 9 we have the conversion of Saul of Tarsus. He was a persecutor of the Church. He was like a raging bull in a China shop, intent on destroying Christianity. I often think of the two brothers who had terrorized a small town for decades. They were unfaithful to their wives, abusive to their children, and dishonest and deceitful in their business with others. They were both morally corrupt. The younger brother died unexpectedly. The surviving brother went to the pastor of the local church. “I’d like you to conduct my brother’s funeral. But it is important to me that during the service, you tell everyone my brother was a saint.” The pastor responded that he would have great difficulty doing that. The older brother responded, “Reverend, I’m prepared to give $10,000 to your church. All I’m asking is that you publicly state that my brother was a saint.”

On the day of the funeral the pastor began his eulogy this way: “Everyone here knows that the deceased was a wicked man, a womanizer, and a drunk. He terrorized his employees and cheated on his taxes and was morally bankrupt.” Then he paused for a moment and said, “But as evil and sinful as this man was, compared to his older brother he was a saint!” Saul was certainly no saint when it came to his treatment of the saints.

When Saul encountered the Living Christ on the way to Damascus he was struck to the ground with blindness. He asked the two most important questions that can be asked, “Who are you Lord?” (v. 5). And He asks, “What do You want me to do?” Saul later became the great defender of the faith and took the Gospel to the ends of the earth as promised by our Lord back in 1:8.

Paul and Peter Preach Christ to the Gentiles

In chapter 10 God uses Peter to reach the first Gentile convert, a man by the name of Cornelius. Peter was thinking of evangelism as primarily related to the Jews. He was the apostle to the Jews. Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles. Peter’s vision was more local. Paul’s vision was global. God had to stretch Peter through the vision of the great sheet let down out of heaven in order that he might think more globally.

Peter begins to fade out and the Holy Spirit shines the spotlight on the Apostle Paul. We have the recording of Paul’s first missionary journey in Acts 12, and Paul ends up under house arrest, preaching the Gospel as far away as Rome in chapter 28. He was simply experiencing the living out of the Living Lord Jesus. Years ago some nuns from different orders came to Mother Teresa and they asked her what the secret of her effectiveness was. She responded, “I give them Jesus.” They asked about the wearing of habits and the rules of the order. She responded, “I just give them Jesus.” They wanted her to be more specific. She again responded “I just give them Jesus.” The nuns ran out of questions and Mother Teresa said, “I give them Jesus. There is nothing else.” This can be said of the entire Book of Acts. It is the story of His followers giving Jesus to the nations because there is nothing else.

Question for Reflection:

In what ways do you find the Book of Acts inspiring in your faith?

ROMANS

That brings us to Romans. Romans is all about righteousness, being in a right relationship with God. This can only take place through the One who was without sin, becoming sin for us. And we must trust Jesus and Him alone to bring us into that right relationship with the Father. Paul writes about how that righteousness was revealed at a point in time:

But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. (3:21-24)

Chapter 5 gives us the benefits of this righteousness received.

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God (5:1, 2).

We can even glory in our tribulations because God brings something good out of them.

Righteousness Realized in Christ

In chapters 6 through 8 it is all about Christ now living in us, which is righteousness realized. We are dead to the old life and alive unto the new life. We are to “reckon ourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (6:11). Chapter 7 details the life that is bound by the law, which gives in to sin. But chapter 8 records the victory that comes through allowing the Holy Spirit to control us. We are to be walking in the Spirit with the realization that nothing can ever separate us from the love of Christ (8:35).

Christ’s Initial Rejection by the Jews

Righteousness was rejected by the Jews in chapters 9-11. In 10:1-4 we read:

Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

Paul is like a doctor giving his spiritual diagnosis and prognosis of the Jewish people. They are ignorant of the righteousness that is in Christ. And they continue to this day to try to establish righteousness on their own. All of that will change when according to 11:25-26, their Messiah returns.

For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come out of Zion and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.”

Translation: When Christ returns, the remnant in the land will turn to Christ and trust Him as their Messiah and receive the benefits of His righteousness just as we have.

“Put on Christ”

In chapters 12 through 16 we see that righteousness reproduced in the lives of His followers. We are to put on Christ, as 13:14 reminds us. “But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.” The epistles mention several times the putting off of the old life, or way of living, and putting on the new life and the new way of living, like the putting off of the old clothes and the putting on of the new. Call it the exchanged life, Christ now living in me.

Question for Reflection:

How would you define the word righteousness, and how do we receive it?

I CORINTHIANS

The Christ-Centered Life

As we move on to I and II Corinthians we see that the Christian life is a Christ-centered life. In fact Jesus Christ is mentioned by name 14 times in the first 17 verses of I Corinthians 1. The Church at Corinth had become quite dysfunctional. It had all kinds of problems within, including divisions and disorders and even the abuse of spiritual gifts in chapters 12 through 14. Paul emphasized the greatness of the gift of love. Chapter 13 is called the Love chapter. It is a portrait of Christ.

Christ the Only Foundation

In 3:10-15 we have Christ singled out as the only foundation on which to build your life:

According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. For no other foundation can anyone lay that that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.

We can build our lives on many different things, but the only sure foundation is that of Jesus Christ.

One of the most remarkable men of the 20th century was Ernest Hemmingway, the great literary writer who thrilled people with his writings. He abandoned his evangelical upbringing. Both his parents and grandparents were pillars in the Wheaten and Oak Park Illinois communities. He turned to multiple marriage partners, marrying four times. He became the boozing man of the world. His drunken antics became the subjects of newspaper and magazine stories. He trotted the globe making it his “persona oyster” in his own words. He tried everything and found nothing that would provide a sure foundation. He never made peace with his father or mother.

Towards the end of his life he wrote, “I live in a vacuum that is as lonely as a radio tube when the batteries are dead and there is no current to plug into.” At age 61, in 1961 he lamented, “Life consists of one damn thing after another.” He then shot and killed himself.

We have a better alternative. The old hymn said it best:

On Christ the solid rock I stand,

All other ground is sinking sand.

All other ground is sinking sand.¹²

There is only one sure foundation on which to build your life, your marriage, your family, your ministry and everything else that is important to you, and that is Jesus Christ. Paul is calling the carnal Christian believers back to refocusing and rebuilding on that one sure foundation.

Question for Reflection:

Have you discovered Christ to be your only foundation, and does your life back up that assertion?

In what ways?

II CORINTHIANS

Christ Is Sufficient

In II Corinthians Paul is further building on that sure foundation by communicating to the Corinthian believers the sufficiency of Christ when it comes to ministry. Paul was a man who suffered much for Christ, but at the same time found Christ to be His main source of comfort. He wrote in 1:5: “For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ.” But as you read further in the book you will discover that Christ is so much more than that to Paul. In 3:1-3 He writes of the greatness of the ministry in proclaiming the new covenant of grace versus the old covenant of the law. The old covenant was written on stone. The new covenant is being written in the hearts of men. This is a great ministry of changing hearts. Man cannot do that. Only God can change hearts.

Paul writes in 3:4-6:

And we have such trust through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

The Amplified Bible translates v. 5 this way: “

…not that we are fit (qualified and sufficient in ability) of ourselves to form personal judgments or to claim or count anything as coming from us; but our power and ability and sufficiency are from God.

Paul is answering the question he raised in the previous chapter in verse 16: “And who is sufficient for these things?” Every one of us will struggle with inadequacy at some time in our lives. I often think of the man who felt inadequate and inferior. He went to see a psychiatrist. He said to him, “Doc, I feel terribly inferior. Can you help me?” The doctor ran a whole battery of tests on him and called him back into his office for a consultation. He looked at the man and said, “I have some bad news for you. You are inferior.” That is true of each one of us. We are all inadequate when it comes to ministry. Christ even becomes our strength in our weakness as Paul states it in II Corinthians 12:9. We cannot live the Christian life. Major Ian Thomas said it so well:

I can’t! He never said I could.

He can! He always said He would.

Paul discovered that Christ was there for Him during the greatest trials in his life.

Question for Reflection:

Who is really sufficient to proclaim this glorious Gospel of Christ?

GALATIANS

Justified by Faith in Christ

Galatians is an entirely different subject, written by the same author Paul. The Galatian believers had begun with faith in Christ but somewhere became sidetracked back into a system of works. Paul refers to this as a perversion of the Gospel of Christ (v. 7). The law results in bondage. The Gospel of Christ produces freedom. Paul emphasizes the essential N.T. truth that man is justified by faith in Jesus Christ---by nothing less, nothing more, and nothing else. We find that 2:16 is a key verse:

Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.

We have already spoken about the exchanged life of Christ. No verse better states it than 2:20:

I have been crucified with Christ: It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

We are to live out the crucified Christ who lives within us.

One of the other key verses occurs in 4:19 where Paul exhorts them in this way:

My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you.

Again, the Amplified gives us a better understanding in this way:

My little children, for whom I am again suffering birth pangs until Christ is completely and permanently formed (molded) within you.

Christ Revealed in Our Lives

Seeing Christ formed in the lives of His people should be the goal and heartbeat of each one of us. It is experiencing the reality of the living Christ living in each one of us to the point that people see Christ in us. There is a true story coming from World War II. In the city of London a little homeless boy was spotted one day standing outside of a bakery, looking in the window and craving something to eat. Along came an American soldier who went inside and bought the boy a whole sack full of goodies and came out and handed them to the boy. As the soldier started on his way the little boy stopped him and said… “Mister, are you Jesus?” I often ask myself, “Does the world see anything of Christ in me? How about in us? 5:22-25 reads like this:

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.

There can be no doubt that experiencing Christ is the theme of the Book of Galatians.

Question for Reflection:

What are the key verses in Romans proclaiming the exchanged life of Christ?

EPHESIANS

The Believer’s Blessings in Christ

Ephesians is so Christ centered that we find the phrase “in Christ” or “in Him” some 90 times. It is all about discovering what we have in Him. For example we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ Jesus according to 1:3: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” Paul then goes on to enumerate all that has been given to us by the Father because of the work of the Son. The story is told how, many years ago, a young man was about to graduate from college. His dad was very wealthy and the young graduate wanted a new car as a graduation gift from his father. He went with his father to some car dealerships and finally laid eyes on the car of his dreams. The father made no promises to him. Graduation time drew near. The son was more and more excited as he thought about his new car.

The day of graduation finally came. There was a celebration. The son anxiously opened all of his gifts awaiting news from his father concerning the car. Finally the father brought out a package that was all wrapped up. The son excitedly opened it only to discover that it was a Bible. He tried to hold his disappointment inside. Before long his disappointment turned into anger. He ended up breaking off his relationship with his father, and in time the father died. The son decided one day to pick up the Bible which his father had given him. He had never even opened it in the intervening time. As he was leafing through the pages an envelope fell out. He opened the envelope and discovered the title to the car that he had wanted but never appropriated. It had been there all of these years, but he had never bothered to look.

Many Christians are like that. They have never bothered to discover the great spiritual blessings that are freely given to them for all eternity. He has given us everything that we need this side of heaven including all of the spiritual armor that must be put on in order to be able to stand up against the wiles of our enemy, the Devil, according to Ephesians 6:10-18.

Christ Dwelling in Our Hearts

Twice in Ephesians Paul gives a moving prayer for the Ephesians. In 3:17 he prays that they “might be strengthened through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your [their] hearts through faith.” The idea here is that Christ might find it easy to be at home in His followers. The Amplified Bible renders it: “May Christ through your faith actually dwell—settle down, abide, make His permanent home—in your hearts!” He resides within us. But, does He feel at home in us? That is a good question to ask ourselves on a regular basis.

Question for Reflection:

What is the key phrase in Ephesians and what does this mean to you?

PHILIPPIANS

Christ, Our Life

Moving on to Philippians we find Christ presented in a unique kind of way. Again I must state that I owe much to J. Sidlow Baxter and his tome entitled Explore the Book. In chapter 1 of Philippians, we see Christ is our life. The key verse is 1:21, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” To have the very life of Christ is to have the same interests as Christ, to be drawing upon His life, just as the branches draw life from the vine.

Christ, Our Mind

In chapter 2 Christ is to be our mind. The key verses here are in verses 5-11:

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of God did not consider it robbery¹³ to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond-servant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also, has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Christ humbled Himself and the Father exalted Him. This principle is taught throughout Scripture. If we humble ourselves we will be exalted. If we exalt ourselves we will be humbled. Christ (the Creator of all things) set the supreme example of humility by stepping out of eternity into time and became the model Servant.

Christ, Our Goal

In chapter 3 Christ is to become our Goal. In the first nine verses Paul speaks about his own background and the things which he pursued and on which he placed great importance. But when he was encountered by Christ his life was turned upside down. He writes in verse 7: “But what things were gain to me (which I considered important), these I have counted loss for Christ.” His goal, now that Christ had found him, was to get to know Him. 3:10 is the key verse that gives us this new pursuit of Paul. This is the rendition of the Amplified Bible:

(For my determined purpose is) that I may know Him --that I may progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and understanding (the wonders of His Person) more strongly and more clearly. And that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection (which it exerts over believers); and that I may so share His sufferings as to be continually transformed (in spirit into His likeness even) to His death…

Baxter summarizes this so well:

So Paul puts down loss after loss on the one side, while on the other there is but the one solitary item: “CHRIST JESUS MY LORD.” How much Paul has given up for his Lord! He has parted with the things dear to him as life itself. But now he has found more than all he has lost, and thrills to know that having given up so much, he is the more fully Christ’s and Christ is the more fully his own. How true it is that those who give up most for Christ love Him most dearly and possess Him most satisfyingly!

So Christ is to become the goal of our lives.

Christ, Our Strength

Finally as we come to chapter 4 we see how Christ is to be our strength, 4:13: “I can do (endure) all things through Christ who strengthens me.” It was in a Greek class while I was in college and pastoring a church that I learned this could be translated either way. We had an older man as our worship leader who had no solo voice. But every now and then he would feel “led” to sing a solo. He would quote this verse saying “I can do all things…..” I observed that we were seeing both renditions being manifested. What he was able to do the congregation was able to endure!

The word “strengthens” is a present active participle which means always drawing upon that strength that is available to us in Christ. We must remember that Paul was in prison when he wrote these words. He fully knew tough times. Hudson Taylor, the great missionary, felt that he was experiencing no joy or liberty in his ministry, even though he was faithful and felt that he was trusting Christ to meet his needs. Then a letter from a friend opened his eyes to the adequacy of Christ. “It is not by trusting my own faithfulness, but by looking away to the Faithful One.” He said that thought changed his life. Taylor began to draw upon the power of Christ for every responsibility of the day.

Philippians causes us to look away to the Faithful One. I challenge you that if you have yet to memorize a book of the Bible that you begin by memorizing this book. It will serve you well right up to the end of your life. I know from personal experience as well as seeing others changed in the process of memorizing it.

Question for Reflection:

How does each chapter focus on Christ, and are we finding Him to be real in our experience?

COLOSSIANS

Christ the Head of the Church

Colossians gives us a different approach. While Ephesians is the epistle portraying the “Church of Christ,” Colossians is focused on the “Christ of the Church.” Ephesians focuses on the body, but Colossians on the Head. The two books go together, both having been written by Paul while he was in prison.

In chapter 1 Christ is the creator and in Him all fullness dwells. And Christ is in us. He is our very hope of glory (v. 27). In chapter 2 we are complete in Him (v. 9) and nothing more needs to be added. He is all that we need: “For He is the head of all principality and power.” It is Christ plus nothing. In chapter 3:1-4 we are raised up with Him and therefore we are to set our minds on heaven where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. In the process we are to draw our very life from Him. In chapter 4 we are to represent Him well and:

…walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time, letting our speech be always seasoned with salt, that we may know how to answer each one (vv. 5, 6).

Question for Reflection:

What is a great summary statement about Christ in Colossians?

I THESSALONIANS

Joy and Hope in Christ’s Second Coming

I and II Thessalonians are most concerned with the Second Coming of Christ. In fact, each chapter in I Thessalonians ends with a reference to the Second Coming. Paul mentions how they were waiting “for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come” (v 10). In chapter 2 he ends by reminding them that they are his “hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, at His coming” (v. 19). In chapter 3 Paul concludes by admonishing them to abound in love to one another “so that He may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints” (v. 13). In chapter 4 we have one of the greatest and best known passages on His return. Because of the impact of this passage over the years I want to quote it in its entirety (vv. 13-18):

But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words.

I heard the story years ago about a visiting professor from the US, teaching on this passage in an African Bible school, and asking the question, “What do you think He will shout?” There was silence for a brief moment and all at once a man spoke up and said, ‘ENOUGH.” Enough sin, sorrow, sadness. Enough pain, crying and death. Enough bloodshed, conflict, and warfare. Enough hunger and disease.” Perhaps he had the idea. It is a shout of victory and it certainly is a victory over death. We shall all be caught up together with our loved ones who have preceded us in death and we shall be with Him. There is no greater comfort than this knowledge.

Chapter 5 ends with a blessing and an admonition, with a reminder of the Second Coming of Christ:

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it.” (Vv. 23, 24)

II THESSALONIANS

Christ Yet to Come

II Thessalonians continues the theme on the Second Coming and answers questions that might have arisen from Paul’s first epistle to them. Some wrongly assumed because of their suffering that the Day of the Lord (I Thess. 5:1-11) had already come and gone and perhaps Christ had already come. Paul wants them to know that His coming is yet in the future.

In chapter 2 there are certain events that will occur before the day of the Lord (time of God’s judgment) comes on this earth. That includes an apostasy, a falling away from the faith and revealing of the man of sin. The Thessalonians are encouraged to stand fast in their faith in Christ. In chapter 3 he encourages them to get on with their lives and be found working when He comes. Someone has said that we should “live as though He died yesterday, was raised again today and is coming tomorrow.” We need to live with that tension that He can come at any time but may not come in our own lifetime.

Question for Reflection:

What is the emphasis of I and II Thessalonians, and what would you change about your life if you knew that He was coming before the end of the year?

I TIMOTHY

Christ Our All-Sufficient Mediator

In I Timothy Paul is instructing this young pastor on the uniqueness of the Christian faith, for it had radically changed Paul’s life. He encourages Timothy to remain faithful to his calling. We see the all sufficiency of Christ when it comes to His mediatorial duties:

For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle—(2:5-7)

Not only is He the only Mediator, but He is the one and only God-man:

And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifested in the flesh, Justified in the Spirit, Seen by angels, Preached among the Gentiles, Believed on in the world. Received up in glory. (3:16)

This Scripture verse was considered by many to be an early hymn of the Church, and it captures well the essence of this One who clothed Himself in human flesh.

Christ, Source of True Contentment

Another great mystery is the fact that Christ can now indwell His people and empower them for daily living and witness. He is the very source of our lives in every area. We are to discover our true contentment in Him. Paul writes in 6:6-10:

Now godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

But Timothy was instructed to flee these things and remain faithful to Christ that he might be “blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ’s appearing, which He will manifest in His own time” (6:14).

Things do not make us happy or bring contentment. J. Ross Perot, the billionaire, supposedly said:

Guys, just remember, if you get real lucky, if you make a lot of money, if you go out and buy a lot of stuff—it’s gonna break. You got your biggest, fanciest mansion in the world. It has air conditioning. It’s got a pool. Just think of all the pumps that are going to go out. Or go to a yacht basin any place in the world. Nobody is smiling, and I’ll tell you why. Something broke that morning. The generator’s out; the microwave oven doesn’t work… Things just don’t mean happiness.

We have noticed in our many trips to Africa and other developing countries that those who seem to be the happiest have the least, and here in our country those who have the most seem to be least happy. The fact is that true contentment and happiness come from experiencing the indwelling life of Christ.

II TIMOTHY

Faithfulness to Live and Teach Christ

In II Timothy Paul continues to challenge the young pastor to “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2:1). He is to pass on what he heard from Paul to others. Paul uses three illustrations, that of a good soldier who endures all kinds of hardship, an athlete who disciplines his body but must compete according to the rules and then the hardworking farmer, who is the first to partake of the crops.

The farmer must work hard before he can enjoy the fruit of his labors. The same is true in the Christian life, but Paul wanted Timothy to know that he wasn’t on his own. He had plenty of help in the risen, living Lord Jesus. According to 2:8, 9:

Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead according to my gospel, for which I suffer trouble as an evil doer, even to the point of chains; but the word of God is not chained.

If it is possible that a hardworking young pastor can forget that Jesus is risen and there for him, then we can also forget. We must continually remind ourselves that He is alive, and seated at the right hand of the Father. And one of these days He will return for us.

In chapter 4 Paul describes the teaching and preaching ministry that needs to be the heart and soul of Timothy’s ministry. Then he concludes by sharing his own personal readiness to depart and be with the Christ whom he had been experiencing these many years (4:6-8):

For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved His appearing.

Years ago, when I was first beginning my ministry, I heard a story about a woodsman up in the great northwest, whose job it was to go through the forest and mark the trees that were later to be cut down. He had a little dog, his loyal companion, who always traveled with him. Usually, the dog would stay in one place and guard the master’s possessions. The man would come back at lunchtime and he and the dog would eat together. On one particular day, as the dog was guarding his master’s lunch and the master was out of sight and sound of the dog, a fire broke out in the forest. Near lunchtime the man looked up and saw the smoke and then the flames in the direction of his little dog. When he finally made his way toward the spot where he had left his dog and his lunch he found nothing but the charred remains of his little friend. That dog faithfully guarded what his master had entrusted to him, even to the point of death. Standing by the truth of God’s Good News was the legacy of Paul, and then Timothy. The Word has been passed down through all of these centuries. It is now entrusted to us. What are we doing with it? One day the Christ whom we can now experience in person will return in presence and power. Will I be found faithful and loyal?

Question for Reflection:

What is Paul’s main concern in each of these books to Timothy, and how relevant are these concerns for us today?

TITUS

Looking Up for Christ’s Appearance

Titus has passages similar to I Timothy on leaders and their qualifications for ministry, but the focus is still on the finished work of Christ and His coming glorious appearing. The highlight comes in 2:11-14:

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.

The NKJV Study Bible has a curious statement on this passage:

Twice in this context Paul speaks of Christ’s appearance in history. The first time Christ came in grace to save men from their sins, the second time He will come in glory to reign (p. 1937).

We are to be looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

Henrietta Mears says it so well in her book What the Bible is All About¹⁴:

Life with a capital “L.”

Leave the old life.

Live the new life.

Look for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of Christ. (p. 576)

By the way, Jesus is His human name. Christ is His Divine name, the anointed and appointed One who is none other than God Himself, our Messiah. We see a special link in verse 2:13: We should be “looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” Our great God and Savior is Jesus Christ. This is very clearly stated here. This is one of the greatest statements and defining titles in the N.T. on the deity of Christ.

Question for Reflection:

On what coming event should we be focused? Are you? What proof is there?

PHILEMON

Christ Our Intercessor and Redeemer

Philemon gives us a glimpse of Paul’s relationship with Onesimus, whom he brought to Christ in prison. In verse 10 Paul writes to appeal to Philemon on behalf of Onesimus:

I appeal to you for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten while in my chains, who once was unprofitable to you, but now is unprofitable to you and to me.

This is so much like our own story. We were unprofitable to Him, imprisoned in our sin; but Christ Jesus redeemed us, purchased us unto Himself and delivered us from sin. And we, like Onesimus, are new creatures in Christ. And as Paul appeals to Philemon (Onesimus’s master) on behalf of Onesimus, so Christ is interceding to our Father on our behalf. Romans 8:34 reminds us that “who (Christ) is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.” And Paul adds that absolutely nothing can separate us from His love. Paul clearly expressed his love for Onesimus as indicated in verse 18: “If he has wronged you or owes anything, put that on my account.” Our Savior put His righteousness to our account, and put our sin upon Himself. Yes, we cannot miss the centrality of Christ here in this little Book of Philemon.

HEBREWS

The Superiority of Christ

That brings us to this amazing book called Hebrews. The person who wrote it is never mentioned and therefore been highly debated since the N.T. era. We will never know for sure who wrote the Book of Hebrews. We may not know the person, but we clearly see the purpose. Far too many new Jewish believers were now suffering because of their identity with Christ, and the persecution was causing them to consider going back into Judaism. It was too hard and difficult to continue with Christ. So the whole book is written to show the superiority of Christ over every other entity and tradition.

Christ’s superiority is revealed in the opening verses (1:1-3):

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

So, Christ is greater than the prophets and has the final word. He is greater than the angels who are servants, 1:4 through 2:18. He is greater than Moses, the most revered of the O.T. prophets, 3:1-19. He is even greater than Joshua of whom it was said:

For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.” (4:8-10)

Christ, Our Rest

Our greatest need is to find that rest in Christ. We are like the little basset hound whose name was Tattoo. He did not intend to go for an evening run, but when his owner shut the dog’s lease in the car door and took off for a drive with Tattoo still outside the vehicle, he had no choice. A motorcycle officer noticed a passing vehicle with something dragging behind it: It was the basset hound picking up his feet and putting them down as fast as he could. He chased the car to a stop. Tattoo was rescued, but not before the dog had reached a speed of 20 to 25 miles per hour, rolling over several times. Too many of us are caught up in the frenzy of life, never coming to that place of complete rest in Christ.

I have a little ditty in the front of my Bible that goes like this:

This is the age of the half-read page,

and the quick bash, and the mad dash,

the bright night, with the nerves tight,

the plane hop, with a brief stop,

the lamp tan in a short span,

the big shot in the good spot,

and the brain strain and the heart pain,

and the cat-naps, till the spring snaps

and the fun’s done!

Hypothetically, you are a married woman and you come home one night at the end of an exhausting day at work and you discover that your husband did the laundry, cleaned the house and cooked the dinner and did it all. Once you come to, maybe with the help of some smelling salts, and get up off of the floor you can rest. You can rest because the work is all finished. When Jesus cried out on the cross “It is finished,” He meant that sin’s debt was paid in full. We can now rest in His finished work. We are either working for our salvation or because of our salvation. The writer of Hebrews wants the recipients of this letter to come to that place of rest in Christ.

The writer continues that Christ is greater than Aaron or the Aaronic priesthood and the whole O.T. sacrificial system. Hebrews 10:11-14 states it well:

And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

Then in chapter 11 we have the great reminder of past O.T. heroes who walked by faith and have now entered into their glory. And Jesus Himself becomes our supreme example in 12:1-3:

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God.

He was not looking at His own suffering on the Cross but rather on the wearing of the crown. They needed to follow His example and so do we. Christ is central and supreme to all that is written in Hebrews.

Question for Reflection:

How does this book encourage you to go on rather than going back to the world?

JAMES

Christ in Our Everyday Relationships

Now that brings us to the Book of James. Whereas Hebrews has Christ preeminent in every chapter and nearly every verse, James, the half-brother of the Lord Jesus, keeps Him more in the shadows. He refers to himself as “a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ” (1:1). Then in 2:1 we read: “My brethren, do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality.” James is more interested in seeing that the faith in Christ is lived out in everyday relationships, with the orphans and the widows in 1:27, with the poor in chapter 2, with damage control and the tongue in chapter 3, and with one another in chapter 4 as he begins by asking, “Where do wars and fights come from among you?”

In chapter 5 James is concerned with how the common laborers are treated by their rich employers. Then he admonishes them to be patient in the light of the Lord’s coming and at all times to pray: “The effective fervent prayer of a righteousness man avails much” 5:16.

James was totally committed to his brother who was also His Lord. I quote from Halley’s Bible Handbook,¹⁵ pp. 866-867:

According to the Jewish historian Josephus and Hegesippus, a Christian historian of the 2nd century, whose narrative Eusebius accepts, James ended his life a martyr for Jesus, his brother and his Lord. Shortly before Jerusalem was destroyed by the Roman army (a.d.70), Jews were embracing Christianity in large numbers. Ananias, the high priest, and the scribes and Pharisees assembled the Sanhedrin, around the year a.d. 62 (possibly a.d. 66), and commanded James, the brother of Jesus who was called Christ, to proclaim from one of the galleries of the temple that Jesus was not the Messiah. Instead, James cried out that Jesus was the Son of God and the Judge of the World. Then his enraged enemies hurled him to the ground and stoned him until a charitable bystander ended his sufferings with a club, while James was on his knees praying, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.”

What a testimony from one who grew up with the Lord and saw His sinless life. He was so convinced that He was the long promised Messiah and Savior that he was willing to give up his own life for Him. Yes, James clearly has his book built around the indwelling life of Christ and what this faith life looks like lived out in the context of daily relationships.

Question for Reflection:

How does this book speak of Christ even though He is only mentioned twice?

I PETER

Christ Our Living Hope to Endure Suffering

I Peter has some similarities to James. Like James, Peter has much to say about suffering and enduring temptation. And He points out that Christ Himself was their supreme example when it came to suffering because of their Christianity. They were not to respond to evil with evil. Christians will always suffer for Christ in one form or another. We need to be sure that we are suffering for the right reasons and not for the wrong ones. To say it another way, we must be sure that we suffer undeservedly rather than because we deserve it.

Before he addresses the subject of suffering, Peter reminds the believers of how God gave them new life:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (I Peter 1:3-5)

We have a living hope, an inheritance that nothing or no one can touch, and we are being kept by His power. It just doesn’t get any better than that. The resurrection of Jesus Christ changed everything. I think of all of the false christs over the years who raised expectation that when they died they would be resurrected, only to have their followers find that it was a dead hope. Their tombs are still occupied. But the tomb of Jesus was empty.

Peter was one of the first to see that empty tomb. Once he was convinced, he could not be silenced. The resurrection and many appearances of Jesus during those forty days turned Peter’s world upside down for the better. He was willing to suffer anything, including death, for the sake of Christ.

Just before his own death Peter made it to Rome according to tradition. According to Halley’s Bible Handbook (p. 872), it might have been by order of Nero or by his own volition:

…to help steady the Christians under the terrific blows of Nero’s persecutions. There is a tradition that says that Peter, giving in to the urging of friends to save himself, was fleeing from Rome when, in the night on the Appian Way, he met Jesus in a vision and said, “Where are you going Lord?” (Quo vadis, Domine?) Jesus answered, “I am going to Rome to be crucified again.” Peter, utterly ashamed and humiliated, returned to the city and was crucified upside down at his own request, feeling not worthy to be crucified as his Lord had been. This is only a tradition, and we do not know how much historical fact it may contain.

Jesus became the very reason for Peter’s living, and in I Peter Jesus becomes the very center and heart of the book. First Peter 5:1, 2 reads:

The elders who are among you I exhort, I who am a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that will be revealed.

Peter exhorted his fellow elders to be faithful because one day they too will share in His glory. Christ will suddenly someday appear and when “the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that does not fade away.”

We find in 5:11-12 a summary statement on suffering and glory. Peterson’s¹⁶ translation reads this way:

So keep a firm grip on the faith. The suffering won’t last forever. It won’t be long before this generous God who has great plans for us in Christ⎯eternal and glorious plans they are⎯will have you put together and on your feet for good. He gets the last word; yes, He does.”

And that is our last word on I Peter.

Question for Reflection:

How does First Peter inspire you to persevere in suffering?

II PETER

Finishing Strong in Christ

In II Peter the author is concerned that with his exodus (passing on) that all Christ’s followers remember some very important truths in order to live in such a way as to experience joy when we stand before Him for review. He wants us to go from feeling the flames of fire at the Judgment Seat of Christ, knowing that we barely made it, to having full confidence in being “supplied an abundant entrance.” 1:11 In that day “supplied” was used of a wealthy benefactor putting on a major theatrical performance, supplying the orchestra and choir and actors and actresses with more than enough, lavishly providing for them. Furthermore when an athlete competed in the Grecian games and won the Stephanos crown, a runner would go back to his village and notify the village leaders that they had a new hero in their midst. To celebrate they would breach the wall and make a new entrance for their soon coming celebrity. The bands would be playing. The flags would be waving. The horns would be blowing. The town dignitaries would give him the keys to the city. This is the kind of entrance that I want when I enter the gates. How about you? What will it take? Peter mentions seven things besides faith that must be added to faith in 1:5-7: virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. Be sure to research them. Jesus was the supreme example of each one of them.

Question for Reflection:

How does the “abundant entrance” in 1:11 encourage you to finish strong?

Christ’s Sure Return

Peter goes further, and in 1:16-18 he recalls the Transfiguration of Christ and how he was there and saw it with his own eyes, and heard it with his own ears:

For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory, “this is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.”

Oh yes, the King will return and the King shall reign and we too shall reign with Him. Nothing can thwart His plans, not the false teachers of that day or our own day mentioned in chapter 2, nor the mockers and scoffers of chapter 3 who ask, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.” Peter goes on to assure them that God intervened in history in the flood and He will intervene again in the future with fire. He is very patient. He will come and Peter wants us to know that and to live with that awareness of His soon coming.

Question for Reflection:

What does Peter want us to know about the Second Coming of Christ?

I, II, III JOHN

Witnesses to Christ’s Physical Appearance

Now taking I, II, and III John together, there are two major points that John is making to his readers. First, he is countering the growing movement of Gnosticism which claimed that Jesus did not really have a physical body. So he begins right at the start to address that issue:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life---the life was manifested and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us” (1:1-2).

Christ was not a phantom or a ghost. He had a real body of flesh and blood. He was both God and man.

Christ Is Love

Secondly, John wanted his readers to know that the very nature of Christ was and is love. He is light and He who loves his brother abides in the light (2:9). The opposite is also true. He who hates his brother is in darkness (2:11). Christ’s love is showered upon us: “Behold, what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called the children of God” (3:1). We are to love others with this incredible, inexhaustible love that He has given and will give to us. “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (4:11). John Calvin once reportedly wrote these words: “It is a false boast when anyone says that he loves God, but neglects His image which is before his eyes.”

II John, written to the elect lady and her children, continues to expound on those two themes. In 1:5 we read:

And now I plead with you, lady , not as though I wrote a new commandment to you, but that which we have had from the beginning: that we love one another.

Regarding Jesus having a real body John writes in 1:7: “For many deceivers have gone out into the world who do not confess Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.” They were to have nothing to do with those who peddled this error. III John also is concerned with their walking in the truth (v. 3). Of course John had already established that Jesus is the truth, as reflected in the great I AM statement of John 14:6: “And Jesus said, “I AM the way, the truth, and the life.”

Tradition has it that a monk of the Middle Ages, loved and respected by his people, announced that on a particular evening he would preach a sermon on the love of God. When the time for the service came, the cathedral was packed to capacity; and the people stood silently, waiting for their beloved teacher. As evening set in and the last rays of light faded from the sky, the monk lighted a candle and walked up to the life-size statue of Christ hanging on the cross. Without saying a word, the monk held the candle before the nail-pierced hands. He then showed the people the wound in the Savior’s side and lifted the candle high so they could see the thorns on His brow.

The monk then returned the candle to its place and left the cathedral. Not a word was spoken, but the people never forgot the monk’s sermon on the love of God. John, the apostle of love, doesn’t want us to forget how much God loves us and that we must love others in the same way that God loves us.

Questions for Reflection:

What two purposes does John have in mind when writing?

Should we have these same concerns today?

JUDE

Contend for Pure Faith in Christ

Jude is very similar to II Peter 2 in content. False teachers were creeping into the Church and were perverting the Gospel of grace (1;4):

For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.

So Jude exhorts them to “contend for the faith” (v.3) that body of teaching that was passed down in the Church by the Apostles. The word “contend” means “to agonize” for the faith. We must do all that we can to preserve and protect the historic truth embodied in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Judgment for False Teachers of Christ

Jude then illustrates how God dealt with false teaching and unbelief in the past, illustrated by those who died in the wilderness, the judgments of the fallen angels, and the judgments of Sodom and Gomorrah, Cain, Balaam and the sons of Korah.

Another judgment day is coming. Sin will be exposed and judged. Jude gives instructions for how to stand up against these false teachers and mockers:

But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life (vv. 20, 21).

Christ Who Preserves Us in the Faith

Everything is up: Building up on the most holy faith, staying prayed up in the Holy Spirit, keeping up the love of God, looking up for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, and lifting up others, with compassion or fear. And then we have that great reminder in the doxology:

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, And to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, To God our Savior Who alone is wise, Be glory and majesty, Dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen. (vv. 24-25)

Christ and Christ alone is able to keep, to present and to do it forever. To Him be all the glory, and honor and praise.

Question for Reflection:

How important to you is preserving the historic faith?

Now we come to the final section of the Bible, section number 7, the CONSUMMATION of all things in Christ. As a quick review, in the first five books of the law we have the FOUNDATION for the coming of Christ. In the next 12 historical books we have the PREPARATION for the coming of Christ. In the five poetical books we have the ASPIRATION for the coming of Christ. Then in the last 17 books of the O.T., called the prophetic books, we have the EXPECTATION of the coming of Christ.

In the N.T. we have the four Gospels which give us the MANIFESTATION of the coming of Christ. In Acts and the Epistles we have the REALIZATION of Christ now living His life in us. And finally we come to Revelation, the lone prophetic book of the N.T., and we have the theme of the CONSUMMATION OF ALL THINGS IN CHRIST.

The Consummation of All Things in Christ

REVELATION

Christ Unveiled

The opening words of the Book of Revelation clearly state that it is all about Christ. It is the Revelation of Jesus Christ. The word translated “revelation” simply means unveiling. The word “apocalypse” comes from this word. It is the unveiling of Jesus Christ at the end of this present age. The curtains will be pulled back, and the Son of Man will make His grand appearance and entrance. As verse 7 clearly states:

Behold, He is coming with clouds and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him. Even so, Amen.

This book can be the revelation from Him or the revelation about Him or both. Although the vision recorded was given to John, Christ is clearly the real author, the theme and hero of the book. I invite you to read my previous book called The Revelation to Remember: Keys for Understanding the Book of Revelation to see how it is about Him from start to finish. He is “the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty [Pantocrator].” The Alpha and Omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. Christ had the first word, and He will have the last word. He was there in the beginning, and He will still be there in the end. He is the Almighty One, the Pantocrator. This big word means that He is in control of all things.

Like the captain up on the bridge of the cruise ship, out of sight, guides the ship to its next destination while the passengers, oblivious to the captain, are each doing their own thing. Some don’t want the cruise to end. Others can’t wait to disembark. But the captain will prevail. He will inflict his will upon the ship full of passengers. Christ will bring it all to its consummation. Paul in Ephesians 1:10 speaks of how:

...in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth–in Him.”

Revelation is where He gathers it all together in Christ.

In 1:9-20 John sees this Almighty One in His ascended position of glory, standing as Judge over all men. He was dead but is alive forevermore and He alone has the keys of Hades and of Death (1:18).

Christ sits as the benevolent judge over all of the churches in chapters 2 and 3. He knows their (and our) true condition. He is sitting on the throne, being worshipped as the Almighty one (Pantocrator) in 4:9. He is the Lamb who was slain (5:6), who is now being worshipped in 5:11-12:

Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice; “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing!”

And in verve 13 this worship of the Lamb is “forever and ever.”

The Wrath of Christ, the Lamb

The other side of the loving Lamb is revealed in chapter 6 where we are introduced to a startling aspect of His nature: the wrath of the Lamb. As the seals are broken and judgments are poured out:

And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?” (6:15-17)

The answer to that question, “Who is able to stand?” comes in what John saw in chapter 7. He saw this crowd of 144,000 on earth and then a great multitude in heaven who “are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Those who are covered by the blood of the Lamb will survive the terrible judgments of this time known as the Wrath of the Lamb. One of the most comforting scenes involving the Lamb comes at the end of chapter 7:

And He who sits on the throne will dwell among them. They shall neither hunger anymore nor thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any heat; for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. (7:15-17)

Christ’s wrath continues to be poured out on the earth in chapters 8 and 9, but there is no sign of repentance according to 9:21. The next great statement made about Him comes when the 7th angel sounds the trumpet in 11:15: “And there were loud voices in heaven, saying, ‘The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever.’” This is a panoramic view of the rest of the book. Christ will reign over all nations.

All of these future events are seen as being already present. It is much the same idea as we have in Romans 8:29, 30 where Paul writes:

For whom He foreknew He also predestined, to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called, whom He called, these He also justified, and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

Though God’s glorification of the saints stated in the passage comes in the future, it is spoken of in past tense. We are already glorified. In Revelation 11 it is as though Christ is already reigning even though there is more judgment yet to be handed out on the earth.

In Revelation 12 we have a panoramic overview of the persecution of Israel and the attempt of Satan to stamp out the Messianic seed:

And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child as soon as it was born. She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her Child was caught up to God and His throne. (12:4-6)

Verse 5 does not mention Jesus’ life and ministry. The text moves quickly from His birth to His ascension. John’s vision then takes his readers from Jesus’ ascension to Israel’s yet coming, greatest persecution which is still future. So between verses 5 and 6 we have now completed 2,000 years of history. But the purpose of the writer is to show us that eventually the Male Child will overcome the dragon. His followers will overcome the dragon by the blood of the Lamb, by the word of their testimonies, and by not loving their own lives unto death (12:11).

In chapter 14 we have John seeing Jesus as the Lamb standing on Mt. Zion accompanied by 144,000 who are standing with Him and celebrating His coming victory. They are safe, secure and singing, fully surrendered to the Lamb. Voices are important in heaven. God created us with voices to praise Him. W.E. Sangster, a well-known preacher in the recent past, came down with a degenerative disease which in its later stages caused progressive muscular atrophy. His muscles would gradually waste away. His throat would become unable to swallow. His voice would be silenced. On Easter morning just before his death, he wrote to his daughter:

It is terrible to wake up on Easter morning and have no voice with which to shout “He is Risen.” But it would be even more terrible to have a voice and not want to shout.

Worshipping the Lamb with unified voices will be a very important and pleasurable experience in eternity. While here on earth one of the primary means by which we overcome the enemy and adversity is through singing. Remember Paul and Silas singing praise in the Philippian jail when God sent an earthquake and they became free men?

In the latter part of chapter 14, Jesus in judgment is depicted as the grim reaper of an overly ripe and wicked world. Two different harvests are depicted. The first one is that of grain in verses 15 and 16. The second harvest is that of grapes in verses 17-20. The grape harvest is interesting because the grapevine is a slender plant which trails on the ground or climbs on tendrils. Normally they are planted in rows, and pruned each spring. When the grapes reached maturity they were gathered into baskets and taken to the winepress which was generally hewn out of solid rock. They then were trampled underfoot by helpers who often shouted and sang as they trampled them. The juice then would flow into a lower vat and be put into containers to be consumed. The Battle Hymn of the Republic¹⁷ is a song that we often sing on patriotic days:

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored.

He has loosed the fateful lighting and His terrible swift sword.

His truth is marching on.

Nothing can stop that day of His wrath from coming.

Years ago there was the story of the farmer who used to have his field near a little country church. During planting season he would work the field day and night and that included Sundays. The services would be interrupted by the roar of the tractor’s engine, which would drown out the preacher’s voice time and time again. Yet when harvest time came in October this farmer had the highest yield of anyone in the countryside. He wrote an open letter to all Christians and had it put in the local newspaper. It read: “You Christians say that God will help you, God will bless you. Well I do not even acknowledge that there is a God and yet I had the highest yield per acre of anyone in the county. How do you Christians account for that?”

The editor who had a great deal of wisdom and biblical understanding put a little notation at the bottom of his letter. “Just remember, God does not settle His accounts in the month of October.” So true! Be assured, all accounts will be settled in the day of His unavoidable wrath.

Alleluia! Christ’s Judgment Ends

His wrath continues to be depicted through chapter 18. Then in chapter 19 there is a change of tone with a great celebration in heaven because the judgment is about to end. There are four different shouts of Alleluia from four different groups of people. The marriage of the Lamb and His bride, the Church, is about to take place. Actually the Greek tense indicates a completed act, showing that the wedding is now history. Years ago we participated in our niece’s wedding in Indiana. One of the more memorable moments took place about 30 minutes before the wedding began when one of the young junior groomsmen, about 8 years of age, all dressed up in his tuxedo, upon seeing the first guests coming in exclaimed, “I can’t believe it! People are actually showing up for this thing.” That is the perspective of an eight year old who would have rather been in anything but a tuxedo, and been any place but at a wedding!

But this is a wedding that you simply cannot miss out on attending. This wedding was announced 2,000 years ago. Preparations have been in the making since that time. The Lord has been preparing a place for His bride and preparing the bride for the place. One day, like the bridegrooms in the old Jewish culture, He will come and fetch away His bride to Himself.

The next great picture we have of Him comes in 19:11-21:

Now I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war.” (v. 11)

This is His coming in glory, depicted on the white horse, at the very end of the tribulation period. At His First Coming He rode a lowly donkey into Jerusalem. At His return in the clouds of glory He will be on a white horse, a symbol of royalty and power, such as victorious Roman generals would ride.

Everyone I know likes to follow a winner. I was reminded of this back in the mid 70s when a professional golfer by the name of Rik Massengale frequently attended our church. He decided that it was time for me to learn to play golf. He had just won the Bob Hope Desert Classic a short time before, and that being his 3rd PGA tour victory gave him some notoriety. I met him along with two others at a local country club. I had no golf clubs, no golf shoes, no golf gloves or clothes, and no golf game. That became obvious when I whiffed the ball twice on the first tee, swinging it like a baseball bat.

By the fourth or fifth hole I had the ball so hacked up that it looked like an egg. To make matters worse, word circulated through the clubhouse that Rik was on the course. Two carts of drivers came to be part of a gallery. The ultimate insult and humiliation came on about the second or third hole when one of the gallery smart alecks said “We just want you to know that we are not out here following your foursome because of you.” No, we all love to follow winners.

Jesus is the ultimate winner. The simple spoken word from His mouth will end it all. “Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations” (v. 15). The end result is one great feast on human flesh by all of the vultures in the sky.

Since there are no chapter divisions in the original Greek text, following the King of Kings making His presence known we have the establishment of His thousand-year reign, which is mentioned six times in the first seven verses. Nothing can stop His Kingdom from coming. Satan will be bound for that period of time; life on earth will be free from his tyranny.

We cannot begin to fully appreciate what a world would be like without the tempter, Satan, who is behind all evil. But his day of reckoning is also coming. He will get his just reward. First he is bound for that 1,000-year period. When it is finished he will be loosed again for a short period of time and then cast into the lake of fire and brimstone (v. 10) where he will remain forever.

I think of the story of the pastor who was preaching on the devil for several Sundays in a row. Right in the middle of his final sermon one disguised as the devil popped up out of the platform and people went scurrying everywhere. They went out the doors, and windows. Even the pastor jumped into the baptistery. One little old lady down front remained calm and collected. The devil went running over to her, got down in her face and shouted, “Aren’t you afraid of me?” “No, I am not afraid of you.” She responded. “Why not?” he asked. “I am not afraid of you because I have been married to your brother for the last 50 years!” All fear of what our ferocious enemy, the roaring lion, can do will be banished from memory in that day.

In 20:11-15 Christ will serve as the Judge of all humanity, the small and the great. They will be standing before Him. It is said that a judge in a large city was walking along near some water one day when he saw a young man drowning. He rushed to his rescue and eventually pulled him to safety. The judge saved him from death. A few months passed, and this same young man committed some crime against society and was brought before this same judge. The judge sentenced him to whatever the penalty was for the crime.

The young man said, “But judge, you remember me, don’t you?” Sternly the judge answered, “Sir, I don’t recall.” He said, “Your honor, several months ago you were walking near the water and I was drowning. You pulled off your coat, jumped in and pulled me to safety. You saved my life judge. Now you don’t want to send me to jail.”

The judge looked at him and said, with steely eyes, “Young man, that day I pulled you out of the water to safety I was your savior; today however, I am your judge.” Today Jesus, the Savior of all, is about the business of saving, but there will come a time when He will take His place on the bench as the judge of all who rejected His salvation.

Christ and the Eternal State

Following this thousand-year reign and great white throne judgment we have the eternal state described in the following two chapters. There is a new heaven and a new earth. The first heaven and the first earth are passed away. There is a new city coming down out of heaven, prepared as a bride, adorned for her husband. What beauty!

I clearly remember the day that Connie and I were married. It was one of the hottest days of that summer in N. Central Ohio. And it was one of the hottest days of my life, sweating for different reasons. If I had any doubts about what I was doing they were dispelled the moment I saw my bride make the turn down the aisle on the arm of her father. She had made herself ready to meet me. There is no word to describe what I felt in that moment. At the moment the bride enters, all eyes are focused on her. You hardly notice the groom. All eyes are on the bride. In heaven all eyes will be on the groom once the bride has made herself ready. Heaven is too wonderful for words.

A little girl who was blind from birth and only knew of the beauties of earth from her mother’s lips had surgery to try and restore her sight. The surgeon worked on her eyes, and at last his operations were successful. When the last bandage dropped away, she flew into her mother’s arms and then to the window and the open door; and as the glories of earth rolled into her vision, she ran screaming back to her mother and said, “O Mama, why didn’t you tell me it was so beautiful!” The mother wiped her tears of joy away and said, “My precious child, I tried to tell you; but I couldn’t do it.”

Years ago songwriter Don Wyrtzen wrote a wonderful song about heaven called Finally Home.¹⁸ It contains the words:

Just think of stepping on shore and finding it heaven!

Of touching a hand and finding it God’s!

Of breathing new air and finding it celestial!

O waking up in glory and finding it home.

With all of this beauty the focus of heaven is on the Lamb. Let me conclude by quoting Revelation 22:3-5:

And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there; They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever.

We find the source of illumination in 21:23: “The Lamb is its light.”

A personal note to you, the reader: Can you say that He has become your sacrificial lamb, who atoned for your sins? There is only one person who is the theme of this book and only one person who has the keys to eternal life. It is Jesus. He is your one and only ticket to heaven. He died for your sin and rose again the third day. He took our sin upon Himself and conquered death for each one of us. Why not receive Him now before it is too late for you?

Questions for Reflection:

What is the theme of the Book of Revelation?

How is Jesus depicted in this book?

What does the word Pantocrator mean, and why is that so reassuring?

What aspect of His attributes comes in chapter 6? How do you reconcile that with His endless love?

How is Jesus depicted in Revelation 19? What does that mean to you?

What about heaven means the most to you?

In chapter 22 Jesus speaks His final words to His followers. (22:7, 12, 20) What was it He said?

¹ Moody Press, Chicago: Illinois, 1975.

² Merrill Unger, Moody Press, Chicago, IL, 1992.

³ ©1969 Bud John Songs, Inc.

⁴ A Study of History, Volumes I-VI, D.C. Somerville, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1949, p. 547.

⁵ Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1983.

⁶ Unger’s Bible Handbook, Chicago, IL: Moody Bible Institute, 1966.

⁷ No One Understands Like Jesus, ©John W. Peterson Music Company, 1952, 1980.

⁸ Multnomah Books, Colorado Springs, CO, 1993.

⁹ Tell It to Jesus! by Edmund Lorenz is in the Public Domain.

¹⁰ I Surrender All, by Judson Wheeler Van DeVenter and Winfield Scott Weeden is in the Public Domain.

¹¹ The Wiersbe Bible Commentary, Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2nd edition, 2007, p 347.

¹² My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less, words by Edward Mote. This hymn is in the Public Domain.

¹³ Amplified Bible says here: “did not think this equality with God was a thing to be eagerly grasped.”

¹⁴ Regal Books, Ventura: CA, 4th edition, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, 1966.

¹⁵ Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000.

¹⁶ The Message, translated by Eugene H. Peterson, Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2002.

¹⁷ Words by Julia Ward Howe, 1861 (Public Domain).

¹⁸ Words and music by Don Wyrtzen, published by New Spring, a division of Brentwood-Bensen Music Publishing (ASCAP), 1971.