Tag: Messiah

Would you recognize God’s voice?

On By AaronIn Uncategorized2 Comments

“The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers (Joh 10:3-5).”

We were responsible for a stretch of road between Kirkuk and Tikrit.  It wasn’t the most dangerous in terms of the number of roadside bombs, but it was potentially the most dangerous in terms of the size of the bombs encountered along its length.  That size increased the lethality of the explosion.  In an effort to mitigate that risk we would search villages on both sides of the road looking for those responsible for setting these devices.

On one particular day we were searching multiple villages.  As a staff officer most of my work was finished before the operation and wouldn’t increase again until after the operation.  But I was bored so I hitched a ride out to one of the villages.  I knew the commander responsible for this portion of the operation, but he still wasn’t happy to see me.  He had a lot on his plate, and I remember I could stay but in his words, “don’t expect me to baby sit you.”

It didn’t take long until I was bored.  I didn’t have anything to do, and I didn’t want to get in the way.  Then I saw a flock of sheep being led by a twelve-year-old boy.  I’m guessing this particular shepherd saw the soldiers and was curious as to what was going on.  I remembered a passage in the Bible about sheep knowing their shepherds and not following another voice and I knew I had an experiment to run.  After about an hour of following this little flock trying to get the sheep to follow me and not their shepherd, I knew the truth in Jesus’ words.

In order for a parable to be a parable I suspect that it has to be true at the shepherd level.  That level of life in which the pragmatic is central.  This is the blue-collar level of the parable. I have no doubt that Jesus’ audience would have been familiar with this level although I also suspect that Jesus’ audience may not have been shepherds and, at least in regard to the Sadducees and the Pharisees, were probably above the blue-collar level.  However, I suspect that there was much more to Jesus’ parable than the truth that sheep are not likely to follow a shepherd that they don’t know.

At the time of Jesus’ arrival there was a fervent expectation for a messianic king.  The expectation was held by both the lower and upper strata of that society and culture.  But the teachers and the scribes of Israel would have been looking for something specific that would identify their messiah.  These specifics were hidden throughout their scriptures, what we today call the Old Testament.  “In Ezekiel 34:11–16 “shepherd” is an image describing God’s gathering his scattered people; it also seems to be a messianic term in the context of Zechariah 9–14 (especially 11:4–17; 13:7) (Scott 1995, 319).”

In Ezekiel the LORD specifically admonishes the shepherds of Israel accusing them of willful neglect of His sheep (Eze 34:1-4).  The sheep, “were scattered, because there was no shepherd, and they became food for all the wild beasts. My sheep were scattered; they wandered over all the mountains and on every high hill. My sheep were scattered over all the face of the earth, with none to search or seek for them (Eze 34:5-6).”  Jesus’ claim to be the good shepherd would have been an encouragement and good news but to the leaders of Israel it would have contained a little sting.  Their shepherding of Israel was not to different than the shepherds in the days of Ezekiel.  As a result, God promised Israel of Ezekiel’s day that He would become their shepherd (Eze 34:11-16).  One verse of that passage says, “…I myself will make them lie down… (Eze 34:15)” similar to that of a famous Psalm, “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures… (Psa 23:1-2).

This got me thinking.  Why didn’t Jesus just say, “I am the good Shepherd?”  That would have been significant enough to bring His audience the context they would have known for them to recognize that He was identifying Himself as the Messiah of Israel.  I think the answer is in the accusations against the shepherds of Israel in Ezekiel’s day.  They had been feeding themselves (Eze 34:2)!  Israel had been set aside as a witness to the nations.  God’s plan of redemption and salvation had been foreshadowed and revealed through the nation of Israel.  The savior of mankind would be the Jewish messiah.  And yet, the shepherds of Israel in the days of Ezekiel were using all that God had provided to ensure that message’s integrity and survival through the ages, even until you and I could read about it, for their own gain.  They were reading God’s words and interpreting them before God’s people in such a way that they could retain power and profit.

I don’t think this bodes well for the prosperity gospel but for me personally it is also convicting.  Am I looking into God’s word with the intent of finding what God says or am I looking into God’s word looking for what I want to find?  I am listening for the voice of God in the first and I am looking only to justify my own selfish desires in the other.  But what if one day God wanted to tell me something important?  If I hadn’t been listening to His voice, I would probably not recognize it. There is no difference between us and the Israelites of Jesus’ time. I think Simeon in Luke’s Gospel is a good example. “This man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel (Luk 2:25).” When Jesus was presented in the temple he heard the voice of his shepherd in the person of the Holy Spirit and he declared, “my eyes have seen your salvation, that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel (Luk 2:30-32).” I suspect Simeon spent time both in the Temple and in the scripture.

Those who know the voice of the shepherd know it because they have spent time in His presence listening to Him.  How many hours had those sheep in Iraq spent in their shepherd’s presence?  They weren’t born into that knowledge; they grew into it over time.  The difference is that you and I get to choose our shepherd.  A shepherd that has given his life for us (Joh 10:11) demonstrating that He cares.  The only way we get to know His voice is by spending time in His word.  Don’t neglect that discipline.

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Who is John the Baptist (John 1:19-28)?

On By AaronIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Who is John the Baptist? Not only is this our question today but it was the question of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Scribes back in the day.  Everyone wanted to know… but we will get to that.

John’s story begins with his father Zechariah.  He had been chosen to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense (Luk 1:8).  Both he and his wife Elizabeth were righteous before the Lord (Luk 1:6).  John was born into a good Jewish family with parents who were earnest in their desire to obey the Lord and who eagerly awaited God’s next move.  Interestingly, although they were considered righteous before the Lord, they were childless.  “Barrenness was often considered a sign of God’s displeasure and judgment (Stern 1992, Lk 1:7).”

“Everyone would know about John.”

To be chosen to burn incense Zechariah had to be a priest.  The priests serving in the temple had to be descendants of Moses’ brother Aaron and the primary duty for which they were most known was to offer sacrificial animals on the altar (Stern 1992, Mt 2:4).  The priests were organized into twenty-four groups and each served in the Temple for one week (Stern 1992, 1:5).  The duties of the individuals in those groups were then determined by lot and in this case, Zechariah had been chosen to burn the incense (Clarke 1810-1826, 356).  While I find this all interesting none of it is critical to understanding what is going on in the Gospel of John except to answer why John’s testimony would be significant.  “The incense for which Zechariah was responsible symbolized the prayers of the entire nation. At that particular moment Zechariah was thus the focal point of the entire Jewish nation (Walvoord and Zuck 2004, 203).”  Everyone would know about John.

So, Zachariah goes to the altar of Incense and while he is there an angel appears.  Naturally he was afraid, but the angel tells him not to worry, “your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John (Luk 1:13).”  The angel gives some instructions and then prophesies that John will, “go before [the Lord their God] in the spirit and power of Elijah (Luk 1:15-16).”  Zechariah though, he doesn’t really believe the angel and asks, “How shall I know this (Luk 1:18)?”  He wants a sign.  As if an angel by the altar isn’t enough.  That’s about all this angel could take and he responds, “I am Gabriel.  I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news.  And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place (Luk 1:19-20).”  And so, Zechariah did not say another word until John was born.  I am pretty sure, that would have been talked about among the priests… and if it was talked about among the priests it was talked about in all of Israel.

John the Baptist is not The Christ

Now, did you catch that.  The angel said that John the Baptist, would come, “in the spirit and power of Elijah.”  That is the second identity that the priests and Levites asked about, “What then?  Are you Elijah (Joh 1:20)?”  But first, the Christ.  In the Greek, Χριστός or Christŏs, (pronounced khris-tos´) which means anointed, i.e. the Messiah (Strong 1890, 78).”  John’s birth was so extraordinary that it was quite possible he could be the expected Messiah.  While the Messianic expectations of Jesus’ day were probably more diverse than any other part of Jewish thought at the time there was an expectation none the less (Scott 1995, 307).  Before the writer of the Gospel of John can introduce Jesus as the Messiah it must be shown that John the Baptist was not.  And by John’s own testimony he is not the Christ and/or the Messiah.

John the Baptist is not Elijah

Now, back to Elijah.  Not only was there an expectation at the time of a Messiah but there was an expectation that, “the coming of the Messiah and the final age [would] be announced by a prophetic forerunner, frequently identified as Elijah (Scott 1995, 288).”  The expectation was the result of Malachi’s prophecy at the closing of the Old Testament.  “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes.  And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction (Mal 4:5-6).”  If John weren’t the Messiah, he could be the preliminary Elijah.  But John also says that he is not Elijah.  Now there is a subtle difference here.  While John is not Elijah, because he has come in the power and spirit of Elijah Jesus declares him to be the “Elijah who is to come (Mat 11:14).”

John the Baptist is not The Prophet

They now ask John if he is the Prophet.  This was in reference to the Prophet spoken of in Deuteronomy; another messianic expectation.  “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brother—it is to him you shall listen— (Deu 18:15).”  When they separated the identity of the Prophet from the identity of the Messiah the Levites were showing their confusion.  Peter, speaking about Jesus, would later set them straight, “The Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers.  You shall listen to him in whatever he tells you.  And it shall be that every soul who does not listen to that prophet shall be destroyed from the people (Act 3:22-23).”

“…the voice of one crying out in the wilderness…”

John 1:23

So, who does John say that he is?  His response is that he is, “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said (Joh 1:23).”  This was a call to repentance but it was also an allusion to the glory of the LORD.  John the Baptist is quoting from Isaiah 40:3 the allusion comes when we read all the way to verse 5.

3    A voice cries:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4    Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5    And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken (Isaiah 40:3-5).”

John was saying that he was not the Christ, he was not Elijah, and that he was not the Prophet.  But in his response to the Levites he was saying that the, “the glory of the Lord” was about to be revealed in Jesus. The “glory of the Lord” was the expected Messiah. The writer of the Gospel of John was establishing right up front that John the Baptist was not that expected Messiah.

Thanks for reading and do not forget to subscribe to my e-mail below.  I am working on some great things and I would hate for you to miss out.  Jesus’ Baptism isn’t described in the Gospel of John but if you would like to know my thoughts on baptism I posted them in a blog here. 

Photo by Thomas Vogel on Unsplash

Clarke, Adam. Adam Clarke’s Commentary On The Bible. Public Domain, 1810-1826.

Scott, J. Julius. Jewish Backgrounds Of The New Testament. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1995.

Stern, David H. Jewish New Testament Commentary. Clarksville: Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc., 1992.

Strong, James. Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance. Abingdon Press, 1890.

Walvoord, John F., and Roy B. Zuck. The Bible Knowledge Commentary. Dallas: Cook Communications Ministries, 2004.

These resources are available in the Faith-Hope-Love (Life) Store.

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The Anticipation of a Wedding

On By AaronIn Uncategorized1 Comment

     On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.  Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.  When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”  And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.”  His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”

Now there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.  Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim.  And he said to them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast.” So they took it.  When the master of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom and said to him, “ Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now (Joh 2:1-10).”

This passage is so much fun!  There is so much symbolism here.  Jesus’ miraculous ministry begins in the context of the Jewish wedding.

“This context screams messianic prophesy associating the Messiah’s first coming with the purchase of His bride and His second coming with the celebration of the consummation of that which He has purchased.” 

In the days of Jesus, a wedding was a protracted affair.  First, the groom would travel from his father’s house to the house of the bride’s father.  He would pay the purchase price, in order to establish the marriage promise or covenant, and then he would return to his father’s house.  During the next year he would stay at his father’s house making the living arrangements for his bride.  His bride, although she knew he would return, did not know exactly when he would return.  When the groom returned the marriage would be consummated amid a celebratory seven day wedding feast.  This context screams messianic prophesy associating the Messiah’s first coming with the purchase of His bride and His second coming with the celebration of the consummation of that which He has purchased.  Jesus chose this context to point his audience to their own messianic expectations.  They were anticipating a messianic wedding.

“The feast that Jesus is pointing to will be a celebration larger than any other because the cause of the celebration is the eternal end of death and tears, the eternal end of sin.”

In Isaiah (25:6-9) we read,

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples
a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine,
of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.

What Jesus’ contemporary readers didn’t know was that feast mentioned here was to be a wedding feast.  They knew that they lived in anticipation of this feast, but they didn’t know it was a wedding feast.  Note the rich food and wine.  Jesus will, over the course of His ministry, associate himself as both the food and wine of this feast.

And he will swallow up on this mountain
the covering that is cast over all peoples,
the veil that is spread over all nations

That veil, that covering, is the shame that is the result of our own sins; our own failings.

He will swallow up death forever;
and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces,
and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth,
for the Lord has spoken.

The feast that Jesus is pointing to will be a celebration larger than any other because the cause of the celebration is the eternal end of death and tears, the eternal end of sin.  This will come at a price, the purchase price of a bride.

It will be said on that day,
“Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us.
This is the Lord; we have waited for him;
let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

Jesus chose the context of a wedding feast to be the context of His very first miracle.  But this wedding, the wedding that Jesus and His disciples had been invited, was about to fall apart.  The wine had run out!  I cannot imagine that even a small version of a Jewish wedding in these times would have been inexpensive.  The very presence of the stone washing jars, associated with the purification rituals of devout Jews, testifies that this was a wedding hosted by a family of devout observing Jews.  They would have had a social interest in maintaining their status before the community and they could not afford the wine at their own wedding.  Oh, the scandal!  And all that scandal would have been captured in Jesus’ mother’s statement, “they have no wine.”

Jesus’ response immediately commands his mother’s attention.  “Woman, what does that have to do with me?”  Now, I do not believe that Jesus was using the condescension that this phrase would have generated in our own generation.  But he has changed the formality of his address for an intentional purpose.

As a leader of soldiers, I have subordinates that I would often address simply by their last name.  In doing so I am denoting a level of familiarity within the context of military protocol.  Conversely, when I address them by their rank such as private, sergeant, or lieutenant I am changing the level of familiarity and thus the tone of the conversation.  This is especially true if I use their rank in the absence of their last name.  Jesus was not referring to his mother as mother nor did he use her proper name.  He addressed her as woman to bring her and those in His audience to a higher level of attention in order to highlight his next statement, “My hour has not yet come.”

“Now that Jesus has their attention, He is declaring that the hour of their Messiah is close.”

John, the author of the Gospel, has already declared Jesus to be “the Word,” “the Light,” and “the Life.”  He narrated how John the Baptist was confronted by the priests and Levites who wanted to know if he was the messiah and recorded that John the Baptist not only denied being the messiah but identified Jesus as “the Lamb of God.”  The earliest disciples recognized that reference as a reference to their expected Messiah and as a result decided to follow Jesus.  Andrew even went and found his brother Simon, later renamed Peter by Jesus, and told him, “we have found the messiah (Joh 1:41).”  Now that Jesus has their attention, He is declaring that the hour of their Messiah is close.

I picture Mary, Jesus’ mother, struck dumb in that moment.  Locked, eye to eye with her son.  She meant to communicate her sympathy for the family that was about to lose standing socially and Jesus responded with, “Woman, the hour of the Messiah has not yet come.”  In that moment she may have recalled the night the angel appeared to her saying, “you will conceive in your womb and bear a son… He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High (Luk 1:31-32).”  Perhaps her mind jumped from there to her visit with her cousin Elizabeth who when pregnant and carrying John the Baptist declared as the baby John leapt in her womb, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb (Luk 1:42)!”  She must have considered the shepherds, the star, and the wise men.  How Simeon had declared her son to be the Christ saying, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed (Luk 2:34-35).”  And, when Jesus was twelve, how they had lost Him only to find Him in the temple.  How everyone was amazed by His understanding.  “Do whatever He tells you,” she responds.

What is the hour of the messiah?  In the days of Jesus, the opinions of both the learned and the unlearned were diverse (Scott, 322-323).  “The Messiah was expected to be at the center of the great eschatological drama of the final age… He was to be the inaugurator of that age, the one to bring it into existence (Scott, 322-323).”  The diversity of opinion on the subject comes from the implications each of the titles used of the Messiah in the Old Testament had on contemporary thought in Jesus’ days.  The Suffering Servant, Son of Man, The Prophet like Moses, The Lamb of God; each of these carried with it a messianic task (Scott 322-323).  But rest easy Jesus is about to provide some clarity.

He commands the servants to fill some ceremonial jars with water and then to take that water to the master of the feast.  I mentioned earlier that I could not imagine even a small wedding to be an inexpensive affair.  One of the ways they would reduce the expense was to serve the best wine first so that discerning pallets would discern the high quality of wine.  As those discerning pallets became less discerning or as the evening wore on and the more prominent guests had gone the master of the feast would bring out the lower quality wine.  Usually the best wine precedes the poorer wine but in the case of this wedding the poorer wine preceded the higher quality wine.

“What this miracle is announcing is that the Messiah is going to inaugurate a new covenant that will be better than the old.”

In the context of the wedding covenant celebration Jesus was bringing attention to the wine of that covenant.  What this miracle is announcing is that the Messiah is going to inaugurate a new covenant that will be better than the old.  Jesus was pointing to the prophet Jeremiah’s words.

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more (Jer 31:31-34).”

Jesus was pointing to the day in which a better covenant was coming.  His hour would inaugurate that covenant.  And although it was not yet His hour, He took advantage of the context of this Jewish wedding to tell them, with authority, that the hour was almost on them and to provide a little clarity about what that meant.

Today, if you are reading this know that the hour described by Jesus has already come.  It is the hour for which all creation was created and has eternal significance for you and your loved ones.  If you don’t know what Jesus has done, I would encourage you to find a local church and sign up for a Bible study or Sunday school.  Learn about Him.  In earlier blogs I wrote about the morality and sovereignty of time.  They present the reality that time is not eternal and that you are accountable for what you do with it.  Don’t wait.

If you are not yet ready to find or commit to a local church and you have more questions.  Feel free to contact me.  Good questions are the source material for good blogs 😉

If you are already counted among His own and want to grow a deeper more resilient faith then continue to learn and get to know Him.  I would specifically encourage a study through Hebrews.  There you will find Paul’s explanation of the superiority of the New Covenant over the Old Covenant.  But there is also so much more to discuss in regards to this passage in John; that the servants knew where the wine came from when the master did not and the significance of the stone jars and the rites of purification.  Why the third day?  Discovering what they mean starts with a question.  He, through the Spirit, will reveal Himself to you.

Thanks for reading and do not forget to subscribe to my e-mail below.  I am working on some great things and I would hate for you to miss out.

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Scott, J. Julius, Jr. Jewish Backgrounds of the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2000. Find this resource in the Faith, Hope, Love (Life) Store

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