Who & What was the Messiah?

Michael Heiss January 18, 2014 Who & What was the Messiah? Good morning, everyone! It s always a pleasure to be with you. I ve got about 30 minutes to cover a subject that s been a favorite of mine, and hopefully I can give it to you with a slightly different angle. It s on the Messiah: Who and what the Messiah is or was? Why, when Jesus came, did the Jews not accept Him? What He had to do to become our Messiah? Why did He have to die at all that way? We re going to have to put on our theological caps, but don t worry, we re up to it; we ll get the job done. What is Messiah? Messiah comes from the Hebrew word Mashiach. The Greek counterpart is Christos the Christ! So, we have Jesus the Christ. From Christ we have Christianity. If you want to translate that into the English we have Messianism which is true, because what is the New Testament all about? Jesus Christ the Messiah! It all fits! Mashiach to be set apart, one who is anointed. Everyone who is anointed is a messiah. I don t always look at it that way, but if you were to write down Exo. 29:4-7 & 21 you ll find that this refers to the first high priest Aaron. He is anointed. When you are anointed, you are a messiah. 1-Sam. 9:27 thru 1-Sam. 10:1 we have the story of Saul. He had a very adventurous day. He starts out in the morning looking after some donkeys that his father had lost, and before it s over he winds up being crowned or anointed king of all Israel. That s what I call an adventurous day. He was a messiah, but it didn t turn out too well. Saul didn t quite cut the mustard, sorry to say. We know what happened; he was not up to the job. 1-Sam 16:1-13 is where Samuel is sent to anoint David King of Israel. David is a messiah. Not only are kings of old Israelite kings and priests anointed, believe it or not God calls Cyrus the king of the Persian Empire, His anointed. You can read that in Isa. 44:28 thru Isa. 45:1-5. He says of Cyrus, I know you; I ve called you by name. You don t know Me, but I know you, and I ve established your kingdom, and you shall, indeed, take Babylon. He was God s anointed. Normally, I don t think of Cyrus as God s anointed, but he was. Let s come to the first century A.D. and we come to Jesus of Nazareth, and He becomes God s anointed. But the whole surrounding people the Jews, I know, I m from that tribe didn t accept Him. Why not? For good theological reasons! What was the Messiah supposed to do? What was His primary function in their eyes? Re-establish the sovereignty of the nation of Israel! Establish a king! At His first coming, did He do it? No! If the Messiah is supposed to establish the kingdom and doesn t do it, then He can t be the Messiah. What s worse, He s hanged on a tree! This cannot be! Deuteronomy 21:22: And if a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and if he is put to death and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree. But you shall surely bury him that day (for he that is hanged is accursed of God) (vs 22-23). Theologically speaking, believe it or not, Jesus Christ the Christ was accursed of God. He truly was, and we ll see why He was. I said that the Jews were looking for the Messiah to overthrow the Roman government. All Jews were hoping for this. We have the story shortly after the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. He spent 40 days with His disciples, teaching them, edifying them. On the last day, when He s about to ascended to heaven, we find this conversation: Acts 1:6: So then, when they were assembled together, they asked Him, saying, Lord, will You restore the kingdom to Israel at this time? And He said to them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father has placed in His own authority (vs 6-7). I like the William s translation for this particular verse: It s not your business Colloquializing it, it would be: It s none of your business when I m coming back! When the Father says, Go, My Son, establish the kingdom. Your job is to go preach the Gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth. Unfortunately, too often, the Churches of God did not take that advice. They always had to set dates. It s so tempting to set dates! But Jesus warned us that it s not our business. The problem that the Jews had and still do is pretty much summed up by the Apostle Paul. Romans 10:1: Brethren, the earnest desire 1

of my heart and my supplication to God for Israel is for salvation. For I testify of them that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For they, being ignorant of the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking to establish their own righteousness (vs 1-3). They didn t understand the reason He had to come in the first place. They didn t get it. Now we re going to look at some Scriptures and think theologically; we have to. Jesus Christ had to come to get rid of sin, no question about it. What is sin? 1-John 2:4: Everyone who practices sin is also practicing lawlessness, for sin is lawlessness. The King James Version reads: for sin is the transgression of the Law. What s the importance of that? What is the result of sin? Ezekiel 18:4: Behold, all souls are Mine. As the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son, they are Mine. The soul that sins, it shall die. Verse 20: The soul that sins, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, nor shall the father bear the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him. Pardon me for saying, but that doesn t sound too good. Not at all! Who wants to die? But if you sin, you re dead! The Apostle Paul took these verses, plus a few others, and made his definitive statement in the book of Romans. Remember, we re thinking theologically here. Romans 6:23: For the wages of sin is death How do we get around it? How do we avoid this death? What are we going to do? God gave us the answer to that. Believe it or not, He gave it to us in the book of Leviticus. All too often we read right over it a most profound verse: Leviticus 17 the context here is blood: don t eat blood; don t drink the blood of animals the life of the flesh is in the blood (vs 10-14). The definitive verse is: Leviticus 17:11: For the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for yourselves; for it is the blood that makes an atonement for life. We have to have shed blood. In those days you brought your bullock, or your lamb, or your goat and you sacrificed it. That took away sin right? The Apostle Paul says, no way. Hebrews a very theological book, if there ever was one. Very profound! Paul is talking about sacrifices and that they couldn t purify people (Heb. 10:1-4). Hebrews 10:4: Because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. All right, I don t get this. It takes blood, the animals were sacrificed, but they re not good enough. Read very carefully what God is saying Leviticus 17:11: For the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I have given it to you Do we understand the significance of this? This is what is called the prophetic perfect in the Hebrew language. When God says something is going to be done, He often times says it in the past tense. With God, if He says He s going to do something, it s as good as done period you can t stop it! What He s saying here is that the blood of bulls and goats can t do it, He s telling us there s going to come a day when I Jehovah, the God of Israel, am going to become a man; I m going to be God manifested in the flesh (1-Tim. 3:16); I am going to give you My blood I am giving it! That s whose blood He s talking about. It had to be the blood of the Son of man/the Son of God, because only His blood would be enough to cover the sins of all men [mankind] who have ever existed, and all men who ever will exist. Only His blood would do it. He came to do it, and in a way, I call this mission impossible! How do you get to the point where you have a member of God reduced to a pinprick of human life, put into an egg, grow up, live a perfect life sinless, not one flaw, never stumble and makes it to the end? This is really mission impossible! Except, with God all things are possible! We re going to see this. He had to die! So, let s look at some of the mechanics of it. Let s see what Peter says in talking about the Christ: 1-Peter 2:21: For to this you were called because Christ also suffered for us He suffered! He was fully human; not this Catholic doctrine and the doctrine of others that He was fully God and fully human. No, He wasn t! He wasn t fully God. He was God, yes, but God manifested in the flesh with all the attributes of the mind of God, but He was human and didn t have the knowledge that He used to have. He didn t have the power that He used to have. He said, I, of Myself, can do nothing! The 2

Father in Me, He does the works. Jesus was limited. Verse 22: Who committed no sin; neither was guile found in His mouth; Who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return; when suffering, He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him Who judges righteously; Who Himself bore our sins within His own body on the tree, so that we, being dead to sins, may live unto righteousness (vs 22-24). All the sins devolved upon Him. That s why He was accursed. He was sin! The Apostle Paul says it slightly differently, but the same thing. We ll see that the Apostle Paul corroborated exactly what Peter said. 2-Corinthians 5:20: Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ; and God, as it were, is exhorting you through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, Be reconciled to God. For He made Him Who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. At what point did He become sin for us? At what time did that happen? The Jews had knowledge, but not the knowledge of Who and what the Messiah was to really do. They didn t! They had the cart before the horse. The Jews said this is why it s called a religion of works By doing good deeds we are put in right standing with God. Works and faith: you ve got to have both. But the problem with Israel was that they had it backward. They had the cart before the horse. Long centuries later along came Martin Luther. He got it half right. He understood that it s faith. You have to have faith in Jesus Christ. In Rom. 1:17 he inserts the word alone in there. He got the faith right, but unfortunately he disengaged the works from faith. It doesn t work! Ephesians 2:8: For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this especially is not of your own selves; it is the gift of God, not of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto the good works that God ordained beforehand in order that we might walk in them (vs 8-10). So, you ve got faith and the works. But it is the faith in Christ that puts you in right standing! Then comes the works. They didn t understand that, but James got it right faith without works is dead (James 2). We were talking about, theologically speaking, sin, when Jesus Christ became sin. At what point did that happen. You can find the same thing in Mark 15:2, but we are going to read Matthew 27:45: Now, from the sixth hour until the ninth hour, darkness was over all the land. And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? That is, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? (vs 45-46). What is this? Jesus said again and again especially in the Gospel of John You may do this to Me, but My Father is always with Me. I am never alone, the Father is with Me. What is He saying here in Matt. 27? He s saying that the Father is not with Him! At this point, somewhere very close to the final end, God turned away. Why? Why did Jesus have to do this? Why did the Father turn away? Leviticus 19:1 God makes a most definitive statement: And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel and say to them, You shall be Holy, for I the LORD your God am Holy (vs 1-2). Sin is the polar opposite of Holiness. Sin is the rejection of, and the rebellion against, God and everything God stands for! God cannot abide sin! He cannot do it! The Jews have said, What a bloody God you have. Remember in Exo. 4, the story of when Moses forgot to circumcise his children, and God is attacking him? And Zipporah the wife comes to the rescue? She cuts off the foreskin and throws it at Moses feet and says, What a bloody husband you are to me. I have been in readings where rabbis have said of the crucifixion of Jesus and Christianity, The world cannot endure such barbarism. This is human sacrifice. You know, they re right! It is human sacrifice! It is human sacrifice because God had to become a human being in order to cover the sin. God is Holy and He cannot abide sin! In a sense, if you want to think of it this way, God is a Pharisee of Pharisees; He out Phariseed the Pharisees. The rule of the law has got to be fulfilled. The penalty is there; it must be paid! To a Jew, You don t need that, God forgives you. You say, God, I m sorry, I m sorry. Now you go and do good works. God doesn t require blood. The animal was a substitute to make you think and realize that you deserve that. But God isn t actually going to do that to you. But to expose sin for the sinfulness of sin, the penalty had to be paid! That penalty was being paid (Matt. 27) right there when at that hour, very close to the end, Jesus of Nazareth cries out, My God, My God He knew that God wasn t there 3

anymore the way He was. Jesus sensed it! For the first time in His adult human life, He no longer felt the closeness of God. In His mind He knew God was there. He knew it, and He knew that God would not forsake Him really. Remember in John and elsewhere where Jesus said, It is finished? Into Your hands, Father, I commend My spirit. He never lost faith, but for the first time that horrible feeling of not having the Father right there with Him; He went through that! He had to go through it or sin would not have been wiped out. He came as a human being! Philippians 2 here we see some of the mechanics of it. This is marvelous and incredible. I know that sometimes I don t think of it enough. I m talking to myself here. Philippians 2:5: Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus; Who, although He existed in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God (vs 5-6). Remember, that s what the Jews said, You make yourself equal with God. Well, in a sense He was, He was God! Verse 7: But emptied Himself, and was made in the likeness of men, and took the form of a servant; and being found in the manner of man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (vs 7-8). Again, I don t understand the mechanism, and I don t think anybody anywhere does. How God managed to take one of Them and put Him in the form of a human being, and you know that God had many angels around Him day and night! Nobody was going to get to His Son until the day of the crucifixion. He made sure of that. No postpartum depression, no problems with giving birth. God manipulated that very carefully. Yet, it was done, and then God had to teach Him through His mind. We re not told exactly how He did it, but you can look in Isa. 50: Morning by morning you awaken Me. God was instructing Him from God the Father to a human being but His knowledge was not complete. Remember, He was walking and the woman with the issue of blood touched Him. What did Jesus say? Who touched Me? If He s God, didn t He know? No, He didn t know, because He was human! He was limited! He had to have faith in God. He had to cry out to God day and night. But He did it! That s why I call this mission impossible! I haven t been able to accomplish that. I know I m looking at some righteous people but I don t think any of you have every done that. Hebrews 4:14: Having, therefore, a great High Priest, Who has passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, we should hold fast the confession of our faith. For we do not have a high priest who cannot empathize with our weaknesses, but One Who was tempted in all things (vs 14-15). Remember that! Human! Tempted in all things! according to the likeness of our own temptations; yet, He was without sin. Therefore, we should come with boldness to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (vs 15-16). Hebrews 2:9: But we see Jesus, Who was made a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor on account of suffering the death, in order that by the grace of God He Himself might taste death for everyone. Every human! Notice, He didn t taste death for the angels or demons. Human blood, shed blood is not going to save the demons. It saves us! Verse 10: Because it was fitting for Him, for Whom all things were created, and by Whom all things exist, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the Author of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He Who is sanctifying and those who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren (vs 10-11) that s us! He calls us brethren. Verse 12: Saying, I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the Church I will sing praise to You. Verse 14: Therefore, since the children are partakers of flesh and blood, in like manner He also took part in the same, in order that through death He might annul him who has the power of death that is, the devil. Verse 16: For surely, He is not taking upon Himself to help the angels [demons]; but He is taking upon Himself to help the seed of Abraham. For this reason, it was obligatory [Why did He have to do it?]: for Him to be made like His brethren in everything that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, in order to make propitiation for the sins of the people (vs 16-17). Only the shed blood of the Messiah, God manifest in the flesh, could accomplish this. Only God could pull this off. Verse 18: For because He Himself has suffered, having been tempted in like manner, He is able to help those who are being tempted. Hebrews 5:5: In this same manner also, Christ did not glorify Himself to become a High Priest, but He Who said to Him, You are My Son; today I have begotten You. Even as He also says in another place, You are a Priest forever according to the order of Melchisedec ; Who, in 4

the days of His flesh, offered up both prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears to Him Who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because He feared God (vs 5-7). Without the Messiah doing this, without Him crying out to God day and night Again, I emphasize: He was human He was not God in glory He was not God in spirit Verse 8: Although He was a Son, yet, He learned obedience from the things that He suffered. Again, testimony to His having suffered. Verse 9: And having been perfected, He became the Author of eternal salvation to all those who obey Him, after He had been designated by God as High Priest according to the order of Melchisedec (vs 9-10). Remember, that crucifixion if you use a football analogy from the beginning up to that point, God the Father and Jesus Christ marched that football from one end to the other, to the final yard line. After you ever seen a football on the oneyard line and this mass of 22 players 11 on each side trying to squash each other to move that ball one yard? That s the longest yard! It s easier to march the ball down there, but when you re on the goal line, that s tough. Jesus of Nazareth, by Himself, had to take that ball that final yard and put it over into the end zone! He did it! Hebrews 10:12: But He [Jesus], after offering one sacrifice for sins [He offered it Himself] forever, sat down at the right hand of God. He did it! He says to us, Lo, I am with you always unto the end of the age. All I can say is: WOW! What a Messiah we have! Anytime you get discouraged or feel like you re down in the dumps and everything is against you, remember what a Messiah you have! He ll never forsake us! He s with us always unto the end of the age! Never forget that! 7) Leviticus 17:11 8) Hebrews 10:4 9) Leviticus 17:11 10) 1 Peter 2:21-24 11) 2 Corinthians 5:20 12) Ephesians 2:8-10 13) Matthew 27:45-46 14) Leviticus 19:1-2 15) Philippians 2:5-8 16) Hebrews 4:14-16 17) Hebrews 2:9-12, 14, 16-18 18) Hebrews 5:5-10 19) Hebrews 10:12 Scriptures referenced, not quoted: Exodus 29:4-7, 21 1 Samuel 9:27; 10:1; 16:1-13 Isaiah 44:28; 45:1-5 Leviticus 17:10, 12-14 Hebrews 10:1-3 1 Timothy 3:16 Romans 1:17 James 2 Mark 15:2 Exodus 4 Isaiah 50 MH:bo Transcribed: 3-2-14 Scriptural References: 1) Deuteronomy 21:22-23 2) Acts 1:6-7 3) Romans 10:1-3 4) 1 John 3:4 5) Ezekiel 18:4, 20 6) Romans 6:23 5