Acts Intermission

[0:00] Even though you do not have a corrected sheet regarding the incarnation, you have half of it, and that's the first page, so we can deal with that together. And I just want to remind you that we are, of course, dealing with the most unique individual who ever lived.

[0:19] There has only been one God-man in the history of the universe. And what we are talking about has to do with God becoming flesh.

[0:34] And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, John says, and we beheld His glory. John says, we looked upon Him. The glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

[0:45] But it is a stunning thing to consider that within the context of the triune nature of God, an agreement was made in eternity that the Father would send the Son to be the Savior of the world, and that the Son would be willing to be sent, and that He would be offered through the eternal Spirit without spot to God.

[1:12] So we have all three members of the triune Godhead active in the provision that was made for mankind. Through the incarnation, it is perhaps the most glorious thing that anybody could consider, that God became man and took upon Him the form of a human being.

[1:35] It's just absolutely stunning. In fact, I submit there is no way that we would or could believe it were it not for the fact that the Scriptures clearly reveal it.

[1:47] So in this incarnation, as our author, who is Marv Rosenthal, states, at this Christmas season approaches, men and the world over will look back 2,000 years to the incarnation of the Son of God.

[2:03] And of course, the word incarnate simply means infleshing. The incarnate and the carne in Latin, C-A-R-N-E, simply means flesh.

[2:22] When you buy a can of chili con carne, it simply means chili. It means beans with flesh. Beans with meat.

[2:32] We call it chili con carne. So here in the incarnation, we have the enfleshment. We have the attaching or the making of the deity of the universe into flesh, into human flesh, and born as that babe in the manger.

[2:52] But we read, But for more than 4,000 years, men living on the other side of the incarnation, that is prior to it, looked forward to that same event.

[3:06] The birth of the eternal Son of God was no accident. It was not the result of unforeseen or uncontrollable events. Jesus was the Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world.

[3:22] God does not respond to human events. He superintends them. Nowhere is that more clearly seen or more profoundly delineated than in the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

[3:38] Down through the Old Testament period, there were definite prophecies concerning the ancestry of the Messiah. And of course, the word Messiah simply means the anointed one, the chosen one, the selected one.

[3:54] The Messiah who was to come and the conditions that must be fulfilled. For instance, he must be of the seed of Abraham.

[4:04] Genesis 12.3 and 22.17. We won't take time to look these references up, but they are there for you to consider at your leisure. It is through Abraham that this seed was to come.

[4:20] And when God said to Abraham, Through you and your descendants shall all nations of the earth be blessed. He was thinking, of course, of that Messiah who was to come.

[4:31] And by the way, we could even predate this because it goes back further than Genesis 12. And we've already noted in Genesis 3 and verse 15, which is referred to as the Proto-Evangelium, that is the first evangelism or the first announcement of an evangel, is when God spoke to the serpent and said, The seed of the woman will crush the head of the serpent.

[4:59] That the serpent will bite the heel of this Messiah who was to come, inflicting injury on him. And that's exactly what Satan did.

[5:13] But then the text goes on to say in verse 15, that he, the seed of the woman, will crush the head of the serpent. And that means deal a death blow, a finality to the serpent.

[5:28] And that's what exactly happened when he gained victory over death itself and came back from the grave. So first of all, the Messiah must be of the seed of Abraham.

[5:38] He must be of the tribe of Judah. There are going to be 12 tribes of Israel. Only one of them will be the royal tribe. And that's the fourthborn son.

[5:50] His name is Judah. And he must be of the house of David. That is, not only of the lineage of David, but we could say of the, what's the word I'm looking for?

[6:06] The dynasty. The dynasty of David. The house of David means the dynasty of David. Because David was the beginning, or actually, he was the beginning of the throne, of the royal throne.

[6:25] But the tribe through which David came goes again all the way back to Judah. Yet, it wasn't until Saul, who was of the tribe of Benjamin, became the first king that Israel even had a throne.

[6:47] Because prior to that time, they had the judges and then the Lord was their king. But when they demanded a king like all the other nations, God gave them Saul, who was of the tribe of Benjamin.

[7:01] But we know that Saul eventually died and was replaced by the king who was of the tribe of Judah. And that would be David. So David began, David the shepherd lad, began the Davidic dynasty, or the house of David.

[7:21] And if you look at the genealogies in both Matthew and in Luke, you will see that they have some similarities, but some dissimilarities, because they are not identical.

[7:34] And you look at the lineage that is given in Matthew 1, and compare it with that which is given in Luke 4, and you say, they don't match.

[7:46] These don't seem to coincide. And yet, they are both ancestral accounts, or lineages, of Jesus the Messiah. And the explanation is, if you look at them carefully, you will see that Mary's genealogy, the virgin Mary's genealogy is given in Luke.

[8:08] And it goes all the way back to David the king. But David had multiple sons, and one of David's sons was named Nathan.

[8:21] And it is David the king, and then Nathan his son, and then all of those that come after, coming down to Mary the virgin.

[8:33] She came out of David through Nathan. But when you read Matthew's account, we are told that Joseph, who was not the biological father of our Lord, but he was the legal father of our Lord.

[8:49] We would say he was Jesus' stepfather. And you trace his genealogy all the way back to David the king as well. But, not through Nathan.

[9:04] Joseph came through Solomon, who was probably David's firstborn, or one of David's firstborns. So, we have both Joseph and Mary, direct descendants of David the king, but through two different sons of David.

[9:21] One, Mary through Nathan, and Joseph through Solomon. And it's a beautiful picture. So, item number three, he must be of the house of David. Four, he must have legal right to the throne of David.

[9:36] It's depicted in Isaiah 9-7. And he must be born of a virgin. Isaiah 7-14. And behold, the Lord himself shall give you a sign.

[9:47] A virgin shall conceive and bear a child, and thou shalt call his name Emmanuel. Which being interpreted means, God with us. And this is very, very important.

[9:59] Because you see, if Jesus Christ was not born of a virgin, then he was born morally and spiritually contaminated, just like you and me.

[10:13] So, he would not have been qualified to be our redeemer. And we do not know how, but the Spirit of God made it very clear, and very clear to Joseph and to Mary, that the power of the highest shall overshadow thee, and that holy thing which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God.

[10:36] And the Spirit of God, literally, somehow, we do not know how, impregnated the womb of the Virgin Mary, so that the seed that was planted in her was not Joseph's seed, because she had not even had relations with Joseph.

[10:55] Although probably, just about everybody thought, probably that she did. We know that she did not. And Joseph certainly knew that she did not. So, that virgin birth became absolutely essential, because if Christ was not born of a virgin, then he was born just like you and me, and he would have been disqualified for the same reason that we would be disqualified.

[11:18] We are all contaminated with the sin factor, and he is not. And it was his innocence of sin, and his freedom from sin, that enabled him to pay the penalty for those who were.

[11:31] So, he must be born in Bethlehem, according to Micah 5.2. And it's interesting that this is a prophecy that was given 500 years before Christ was born.

[11:43] But thou, Bethlehem, Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee, Bethlehem, out of thee shall he come forth unto me, whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting to everlasting.

[11:58] So, he had an origin before Bethlehem, and that's what is so stunning about it. And then, he must be God. He must be deity.

[12:08] Very God of very God. Isaiah 9 and verse 6. We cannot see in the Trinity any superiority or any inferiority.

[12:19] There is perfect equality and perfect harmony within the Trinity, and that is an absolute necessity because each of the beings of the Trinity is an infinite being.

[12:31] And infinity cannot have any superiority or inferiority. We've got an equality between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Yet, each of them fulfilled a different role.

[12:44] And the Son made himself subservient to the Father in order to come to the earth, etc. So, during Old Testament times, let's move on.

[12:56] During Old Testament times, there were many determined efforts on the part of man, inspired by Satan, to interrupt the bloodline of the Messiah. Among them, the decree of Pharaoh to kill all the newborn male children among the Israelites, recorded in Exodus 1.22, the attempt of Athaliah to exterminate all of the seed royal, 2 Kings 11, and the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities with the attendant danger of assimilation.

[13:26] It often appeared that the promise of a divine deliverer who would meet the required conditions had been rendered void. But God overruled man's wickedness and actually made it serve his purposes.

[13:41] God made two unchangeable and irresistible promises to David. Psalm 89, you can read these at your leisure. First, that the throne of David would endure forever.

[13:53] 2 Samuel 7 and verse 12. Secondly, that his seed, that is his actual descendants, would sit upon the throne. 2 Samuel 7.

[14:05] In other words, David was unconditionally assured that lineal descendants of his would be preserved to sit upon the throne. These promises, of course, looked forward to the coming of the Messiah.

[14:21] Now, David had several sons, but the right to sit upon the throne passed to only one of them, namely Solomon. 1 Kings 1.30 Only those who were of the kingly line inherited throne rights.

[14:39] In other words, one could be a descendant of David and yet not have a legal right to sit upon the throne. And, of course, David had many sons.

[14:51] The list of David's descendants to whom was given the right to sit upon the throne of Israel is given in Matthew 1. And this genealogy terminates with Joseph, the betrothed husband of Mary.

[15:07] The genealogy, beginning with Solomon, is as follows. And I'm not going to read all the names, but they are there in Matthew 1. And you can see how they play out. It begins with Solomon and it ends there with Joseph.

[15:22] So, now you will notice, says he, that number 14 in the list was Jeconias, whose name also was Jeconiah or Coniah.

[15:37] And that's found in Jeremiah 22. It pronounces a curse on this king because of his sin. And here is the curse. Thus saith the Lord, Write ye this man childless.

[15:54] A man that shall not prosper in his days. For no man of his seed shall prosper sitting upon the throne of David and ruling any more in Judah.

[16:08] In other words, this Jeconias and his seed written disqualified. They are taken out of the race. They are not going to be able to sit on the throne.

[16:18] This curse did not mean that Coniah would never have any children, but rather that none of his descendants would sit upon the throne of David.

[16:31] Those who had the legal rights to the throne were thus barred from occupying it. Now, I'm sorry that you don't have the follow-up material that I have here, but I'll see that you get it next week.

[16:42] In Matthew 1, it is recorded that Joseph, the espoused husband of Mary, was a direct descendant of Coniah.

[16:55] This means that although Joseph inherited the legal right to the throne of David because descended through the kingly line of Solomon, yet he could not sit upon that throne because he came under the curse upon Coniah, that is, that no man of his seed would ever sit upon the throne.

[17:16] Now, this is really significant and it just seems to be like a roadblock, like everything is stopping there. So, let's go on. But it means something else of far greater importance.

[17:29] It means that if Jesus had been the real son of Joseph, that is, the biological son of Joseph, if Joseph was actually Jesus' father, then he too would come under the curse pronounced on Coniah and would not have been able to sit upon the throne of David.

[17:49] You follow the logic here? He would have been in that line and thus as disqualified as Jeconiah. Now, this poses a real problem. Jesus must be a lineal or direct descendant of David in order to fulfill God's promise to David that his seed would sit upon his throne.

[18:12] Secondly, he must also be the legal son of Joseph in order to inherit the right to sit upon the throne of David.

[18:23] Three, yet, he cannot be the real son of Joseph without coming under God's curse on Coniah. So, it looks like there is an insuperable roadblock here.

[18:38] What is the way around this? How is God going to resolve this problem? And, we continue. Could such a problem ever be solved?

[18:50] Yes. And God solved it by the miracle of the virgin birth. Notice carefully. the genealogy in Matthew 1 traces the kingly line from David down to Joseph.

[19:09] Jesus was not the real son of Joseph. At the same time of the Savior's birth, Joseph had never known, that is, never had sexual relations with Mary as his wife in Matthew 1.25.

[19:25] But Joseph adopted Jesus as his son, and thus the Lord inherited the legal right to the throne of David.

[19:37] Jesus became the legal son of Joseph, even though he was not his real son. This leaves one condition unfulfilled, however.

[19:48] It was prophesied that the Messiah would be a lineal descendant of David. So was he. The answer is found in Luke 3 23-28 where Mary's family tree is recorded.

[20:07] Mary was a direct descendant of David, not through the kingly line of Solomon upon which the curse of Kaniah fell, but through another son of David named Nathan.

[20:21] Thus, the curse of Kaniah did not affect her or her child. To summarize then, Jesus was the actual son of Mary, and thus a direct descendant of David.

[20:39] In him, God's promise to David that he would always have a son to sit upon his throne is fulfilled. Jesus was the legal son of Joseph by adoption and thus inherited the legal right to sit on the throne of David, but he was not the real son of Joseph and thus escaped the curse of Kaniah.

[21:01] Now, the question must be asked, who worked out this wonderful interweaving of circumstances? Does not such design spread out over centuries of human history demand a designer who spans the centuries?

[21:19] It is clearly the work of God. No human mind could ever trace the bloodline of the Messiah in such a way as to fulfill all the promises and yet escape the curse through the miracle of the virgin birth.

[21:35] And so, in the fullness of time, God sent forth his son, born of a virgin, born under the law, to redeem lost mankind.

[21:46] The gift of Christmas is the gift of God's Son, a living Savior for a dying world. Wow! Isn't that something?

[21:59] Only God could put together something like this. It all began with David. And you know, the observation has been made. The nation of Israel has not had a king to sit upon its throne ever since what was his name?

[22:23] Zedekiah was carried away into Babylonian captivity in 586 BC when his sons were executed before him and he was forced to watch to witness their execution of all of his sons.

[22:39] and then they put out his eyes and led him in chains off to Babylon. That was the last king of Israel.

[22:54] And the monarchy in Israel has never been reestablished during the lifetime of our Lord 400 400 500 years after the Babylonian captivity.

[23:08] there were kings in Israel but none of them was the son of David. There were puppet kings on the throne like Herod who was the king during the time Christ was born but he wasn't of the royal line.

[23:26] In fact he wasn't even a Jew. He was an Idumean. So Israel has never had a king. And the question has been asked if Israel today as a nation decided to reestablish the monarchy now today they've got a Knesset and they've got a prime minister but if they were to go back to a monarchy and establish a throne of Israel again how would they go about finding the one who would have the legal right to sit on that throne of Israel and as you search the genealogical records you come up with just one name Yeshua Hamashiach Jesus the Messiah is the only one who would be eligible and could legally sit on that throne and that just sends a shiver up my spine that is incredible to realize that and the time is coming of course when he will sit upon that throne and we see this reflected in numerous passages but perhaps none so clearly as in

[24:38] Matthew 19 when Peter asked the question what are we going to realize out of this and Jesus said verily I say unto you you who have followed me in the regeneration when the son of man comes into his glory and into his throne you also will sit upon twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel when Christ comes into his throne and that eventually is going to happen so the throne of Israel now is just held in limbo it's in abeyance it is under postponement in the same way that the establishment of the kingdom is under postponement and we are now in the church age which is an entirely different thing so it's a beautiful picture and we see the coordination and the unmistakable hand of God through all of this behind the scenes orchestrating these things and bringing to pass what needed to be done and it is just an absolutely amazing thing someone has made the observation that and I don't know the exact numbers but Josh

[25:40] McDowell has the figures in his book on evidence that demands a verdict in the chapter dealing with the Messiah and he says a man by the name of Peter Stoner who is an outstanding mathematician figured the odds of the 50 some prophecies that are given regarding the Messiah and who he would be and where he would be born and who he would be born from and what he would accomplish and all the rest of it if you eliminated most of those and just took 8 or 10 of the most obvious and prominent prophecies regarding the Messiah what would be the mathematical probability of any individual fulfilling all of those prophecies in detail as recorded what would be the mathematical probability of it just being a coincidence isn't that amazing someone could say here is

[26:46] Jesus of Nazareth and he fulfilled all of these things not that that means anything it's just a coincidence the mathematical probability of that being fulfilled would be something like the equivalent of taking however many silver dollars it would take to cover the state of Texas three feet deep and have one single silver dollar in the whole mix of all of those silver dollars covering the state of Texas have one with the mark on it and you wade into the state of Texas and pick up that one silver dollar what would be the odds well I rest my case it's pretty phenomenal and it is proof positive for anyone who is really looking for objective proof to identify

[27:49] Jesus of Nazareth as God's promised Messiah what this gives real meaning to Christmas this is this is what the plan and program of God is all about questions or comments anyone and again I apologize for fouling up on the sheet I'll see that you get one next week the right one Roger well we don't know but we don't know but at any rate any of any of Joseph's descendants would likewise be under the curse of Jeconiah so any of them would be disqualified regardless and we do not know we do know that Jesus had brothers and probably sisters too half brothers half sisters we do not know how many Roman Catholic tradition says that

[28:54] Joseph's half brothers were all children perhaps of Joseph maybe by a previous marriage or something like that although the scriptures don't say anything at all about that but they feel that this is necessary in order to maintain what they call the perpetual virginity of Mary because the traditional Roman Catholic theology says that Mary was not only a virgin when Jesus was born but that her virginity remained intact after Jesus was born that she never did have relations with Joseph so but the scriptures do not say that do not allude to that at all and frankly theologically and doctrinally I cannot see any reason at all why Joseph and Mary could not have had additional children and it would have had absolutely no effect at all upon the virgin conception of Christ or of his sinless condition wouldn't have made any difference it's not necessary for

[30:01] Mary to have been perpetually a virgin any other questions or comments yeah Dan what exactly was the sin that Jeconias committed it says Jeremiah pronounces a curse on this king because of his sin yeah in order to where are we here it's in Jeremiah what 22 30 yeah I don't know that the sin is specified but whatever it was it was probably probably a combination of things I don't know verse 24 I would go back to Jeremiah 22 and 24 as I live declares the Lord even though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were a signet ring on my right hand yet I would pull you off and I shall give you over into the hand of those who are seeking your life yes into the hand of those whom you dread even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of

[31:12] Babylon into the hand of the Chaldeans I shall hurl you and your mother who bore you into another country where you were not born and there you will die but as for the land to which they desire to return they will not return to Nebuchadnezzar a despised shattered jar or is he an undesirable vessel why have he and his descendants been hurled out and cast into a land that they had not known oh land land land hear the word of the Lord thus says the Lord write this man down childless a man who will not prosper in his days and so on so it does not specify that except to say that he seems to have been king when the culmination of all of their idolatry came to a head and that's probably the best thing that I can offer right off and you know the whole reason the whole rationale for their being carried into captivity was their idolatry and the reason that that stood out so much is because up until this time

[32:13] Israel had always established itself as monotheistic as a belief in one God and when they fell into idolatry and adopted the gods of the nations around them that's when God brought the hammer down and led them into captivity and from that captivity 70 year captivity in Babylon one thing that they were cured of as a nation and that is idolatry and they have been ever since fiercely monotheistic okay anything else yes this list two lineages in the two gospels were there other lineages in the Bible also besides these two oh yeah yeah there are lots of genealogies given in in Genesis and in I think Deuteronomy and and and the Chronicles yeah there are lots of other lineages given you know in detail yeah you you