December 26, 2010 - Christmas Celebration Message
Searching for a Match to a Personal Description
Matthew 1:18- 2:23
“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call Him Immanuel”—which means, “God with us.” Matthew 1:23 NIV
As we read our sermon text, I want to particularly draw your attention to Matthew’s emphasis on the fulfillment of specific prophecies. There are 5 references to what was said by our Lord through a prophet. From those 5 prophetic statements, I will be drawing your attention to 9 specifications that God’s Messiah must meet to qualify as the true Messiah. Then, I will be asking you this one simple question: How many people in all of history could claim to be the fulfillment of all 9 of these specifications?
Join with me as we read this passage together. As a statement to God that we are taking Him seriously when He speaks to us, would you stand as we read together, please.
Matthew 1:18- 2:23 NIV
18 This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.
20 But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins.”
(1) 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”—which means, “God with us.”
24 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave Him the name Jesus.
2 After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem 2 and asked, “Where is the One who has been born king of the Jews? We saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”
3 When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. 4 When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born.
(2) 5 “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:
6 “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of My people Israel.’”
7 Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. 8 He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find Him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship Him.”
9 After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with His mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped Him. Then they opened their treasures and presented Him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.
13 When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and His mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill Him.”
14 So he got up, took the child and His mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15 where he stayed until the death of Herod.
(3) And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.
(4) 17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
18 “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”
19 After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt 20 and said, “Get up, take the child and His mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.”
21 So he got up, took the child and His mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, 23 and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth.
(5) So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: “He will be called a Nazarene.”
Have you ever lost someone in a large crowd, maybe in at a huge mall? Let's say that you need help from others to find your lost friend. For the people who come to your aid to find your friend, it will be helpful that they have a precise description of the person.
You might start with hair color, gender, height and age. Add a description of the clothes your friend was wearing and some unique facial or body features, like mustache, scar or style of shoes. There may be some telltale signs like something your friend was carrying. Oh, and, let's not forget your friend's name. We're not above shouting out his or her name, or even using the public address system or megaphone to find your friend.
In this search for your friend, what is one thing that happens as we become aware of each additional feature of your friend's profile? Certain people are eliminated from our search with each added detail. When we learn that your friend's gender is male, we eliminate all females from our search. Likewise, when the feature of blond hair is established, we eliminate all brown, black, and red haired men. Therefore, each feature helps us narrow the field of our search.
If any of you have searched for something on the internet, you know how valuable it is to be able to narrow the field of your search.
Just think how we can narrow the field by answering the questions of gender, birthday, country, color, genealogy and name.
Let’s try it among ourselves. I am searching for a person. That eliminates all the inanimate objects, as well as all the animals.
The person I'm looking for is signed up to attend our winter retreat at Buttercreek Lodge this weekend.
The person I'm searching for is a sr. higher by the standards of the local school districts. That would be someone in the 9th – 12th grades.
The person I'm looking for is female in gender.
The person I'm searching for has a name that means bee or honey and is of Greek origin.
Now we’d all like to have a book of baby names to find girl’s names that mean bee or honey. I think we can narrow our options even more with these last two identifiers: She is present in this room and she has one sister and one brother who are also in this room. Yes, it is Melissa Olson.
Approximately 2010 years ago, some wise men or Magi from the east were following a unique star to find a newly born king. When they arrived in Jerusalem they probably assumed that the present king would know the whereabouts of this new born king. So these wise men asked King Herod where they might find the infant king of the Jews so they could go and worship Him.
This all caught King Herod off guard. So he gathered a group of religious leaders and teachers and inquired about a baby that was born king of the Jews. Finding out that indeed the Scriptures spoke of a king who was to be born in Bethlehem, he sent the Magi to make a careful search for this baby under the pretense that when they returned with the information of His location, He would go and worship the baby king. His real intent was to do away with Him.
That action on Herod’s part is just a sample of many prophesies that were fulfilled in the life of Jesus. In our text for today, Matthew 1, beginning at verse 18 through chapter 2, there are 5 Old Testament prophecies, giving 9 specifications of identification. They point to Jesus as a certain kind of leader, associated with at least three locations, and coming from a specific lineage.
Just 9 features of a person's profile eliminate a ton of people from the list of possibilities of who could be the new king of the Jews. Think about this. How many people could you find who fit just these 9 specifications found in these five Old Testament prophecies?
So, let’s go in search of this King/Messiah in 3 categories:
Prophecies that identify Jesus as the Unique Messiah1. His Uniqueness as a Leader
2. His Uniqueness in Locations of Residence
3. His Uniqueness Derived from His Lineage
His Uniqueness as a Leader
The prophets are asking us to find a leader from Judah who leads with compassion like a shepherd, yet stirs up violent reactions. Have we yet found such a leader? Let’s see if we have.
In Matthew 2, verses 5-6, Matthew quotes from the prophet Micah. 5 “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written: 6 “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of My people Israel.’”
Micah 5:2 (NIV)
2 “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for Me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.”
Micah specifies that the person we are searching for is a ruler or leader (1 – Micah 5:2) who leads like a shepherd (2 – Micah 5:4). Micah tells us, therefore, not only that Jesus will be a leader but that He will lead with compassion, just as a shepherd leads his sheep.
Micah 5:4 (NIV)
4 He will stand and shepherd His flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God. And they will live securely, for then His greatness will reach to the ends of the earth.
A few verses later, in Matthew 2:18, Matthew quotes the prophet Jeremiah from Jeremiah 31:15 to indicate that there was a segment of society who feared the political implication of Jesus and lashed out in cruelty on the Jews, leaving Jewish mothers weeping for their children, children who have died.
The prophecy goes as follows:
2:17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
18 “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”
The text from the OT prophecy: Jeremiah 31:15 (NIV) 15 This is what the Lord says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, mourning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because her children are no more.”
The jealousy of Herod in response to the news of a baby born to be king of the Jews twisted his mind to kill all the baby boys in the region under two years of age. This outrage was seen in advance by the prophets.
Two prophecies, three identifying features, (1) a leader or ruler, (2) leading with compassion, (3) stirring up violent reaction. How many people are eliminated by these features alone? We probably can’t narrow it to just one person yet. So, let’s search on.
The first leg of our search is for a leader. The second leg of our search is for His Uniqueness in Locations of residence.
The prophets are asking us to narrow the field of possibilities for this leader to at least three locations of residence.
The prophets tell us that this leader’s place of birth, Bethlehem, was not his hometown or where He grew up. They tell us that during His earliest childhood, He lived as a refugee, in a land of exile in Egypt. Further, they indicate that, for the greater portion of His childhood, He lived a relatively calm life in His parent's hometown of Nazareth.
The prophets referred to in our Matthew text see three different locations being significant to this person's life.
We read of the first location in Matthew 2:6 as Matthew quotes from Micah's prophecy.
2:5 “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written:
6 “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel.’”
Micah 5:2 (NIV)
2 “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for Me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.”
So, the leader we were looking for (4) will come from Bethlehem.
If God prophecies something we can be confident that God takes responsibility for fulfilling His prophecies. In this case, God worked through Caesar Augustus and his decree for all the people to register in a census at their home of their ancestral origin. That meant that Joseph and Mary needed to leave Nazareth where they were living and travel to Bethlehem, about 80 miles to the south, in order to register.