A Word about the Greatest Revelation

Today I want to share a word about the Greatest Revelation as I comment on Hebrews 1:1-3. 

We are begin a series of sermons I am calling the Greatest of All Time. That’s the assertion of the writer of Hebrews: Jesus is the Greatest of All Time.

Have you ever been the Greatest of All Time at something? I haven’t, though I might have had the opportunity. The main process by which this came my way was through my service as an Army chaplain. Consider these numbers:

• In a nation with a population of 330 million, I was one of a million members of the Armed Forces when I retired.
• I also was one of 3,000 chaplains across the three components of the US Army.
• I was one of 700 National Guard chaplains.
• I was one of 54 state chaplains.
• Before that I was one of 7 Special Forces Group chaplains.
• At that time I was one of only two National Guard Special Forces Group chaplains.

So, I was blessed, but was I the greatest ever? No! By some measures I wasn’t even the greatest chaplain among those with whom I served in the Alabama National Guard. Two of the chaplains who were junior in rank to me were chosen to attend the US Army War College and I was not. I was good enough for government work, I guess, but was I the greatest? No, not at all.

Even if someone is the greatest of all time at something, that doesn’t mean you want to be the greatest at it. The Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Phillip, gave up a very promising naval career when Queen Elizabeth took the throne. Reportedly that was a difficult pill for him to swallow, but Prince Phillip threw himself into his royal duties with diligence, including being present at the unveiling of thousands of plaques during the dedication of untold numbers of buildings and the like. In fact, he claimed to be the greatest unveiler of plaques in the world.

In our text for today, we will see that Jesus is the Greatest Revelation of God. Let’s read Hebrews 1:1-3.

Long ago God spoke to the fathers by the prophets at different times and in different ways. In these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son. God has appointed Him heir of all things and made the universe through Him. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of His nature, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After making purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

The Revelation of God:

The writer of Hebrews begins matter-of-factly with what is an amazingly bold statement: God has spoken to us!  What an amazing blessing!

Conversation has a powerful impact on our lives because it reveals what is in our hearts. When conversation fails, communication fails.

My dad was a powerful influence on my life, but he was not a great conversationalist. I have ridden with him for hours, side-by-side in a car, and he never said a word. Often, when I would call home, he’d answer the phone, and almost immediately say, “Here’s your mother,” and hand her the phone. Still waters run deep, but they also can obscure what is at the bottom. I always knew my dad loved me, but I rarely knew what he was thinking or what he was feeling in his heart.

The Mandinka people of West Africa have many pithy sayings, and one of them goes something like this,

When two people converse, everything hidden under the bed is revealed.

Not only does God speak with us, He works hard at it! In Romans 1, Paul taught us that there is enough revelation in the natural world to tell us that God exists, and that right and wrong exists. That’s probably why, many, many years before the Mosaic law was given, that we see that Job made offerings to God for His family. God had revealed Himself through the natural world to Job.

This same thing happened within my family. I have a brother-in-law who is literally a genius. He qualified for membership in the Mensa Club, but he didn’t bother with applying. He had not been raised in church, and if he was not an atheist, he was at least an agnostic. That is, until he witnessed the birth of his first child, after which he said that there must be a God. Then he became a professing Christian.

Yet, our God leaves nothing to chance. He not only speaks by His actions, but also through His words.

• He spoke with Adam and Eve face-to-face in the Garden.
• He spoke with Abram in the Ur of Chaldees.
• He spoke with Sarah and with Hagar about their children.
• He spoke to Moses from a burning bush.
• He spoke to Elijah in a still small voice.
• He spoke to Samuel in a dream and to Isaiah in a vision.
• He spoke to Mary through an angel.

If we want to know what is on God’s mind and what is on God’s heart, He will not hide from us. James 1:5 tells us.

Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives to all generously and without criticizing, and it will be given to him.

God speaks, and things happen. God speaks and He challenges us. God speaks and He comforts us. God speaks, and He reveals Himself to us in a personal way. 

The good news for us is that we don’t have to wonder about what’s on God’s mind and what’s on God’s heart. He tells us!

The Radiant Representative of God:

How can we come to know someone?  One way we can learn about someone is through their writing. When someone writes, they reveal what they want us to know. The subjects that they write on, the words they use, how they turn a phrase, all of these things give us insight into a person. It is a limited insight, but it is insight.

We also can learn about someone through what other people say about them, but that’s not always reliable. James Corden said,

Sometimes you can have a reputation for not being relatable and nice because you had a bad day once.

Coach John Wooden said,

Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think that you are.

Historians often have the last word, so much so that one military historian reportedly told a general he was interviewing to be careful what he said, “Because what I write will make you or break you.” To another officer he reportedly said, “What I write about you will follow you for the rest of your career.”

We can learn about someone through observing their work. Scholars will study the paintings and sculptures of artists, and they make conclusions about them. Sadly, this is the same thing that retired Federal Bureau of Investigations criminal profiler John Douglas has said about serial killers. To know the mind of killers, he studied their work at the scene of the crimes.

We can learn about   through their pattern of life. This is the way that hunters find deer to harvest. They observe where and when the deer move, and then they ambush them. Again, the same is true in warfare. That’s why when I was in Iraq, I never felt I was in any real danger, even though we would go “outside the wire,” or leave our secure base, several times a month. We never knew when our commander needed to go see one of his units, and if we didn’t know our own schedule, the insurgents couldn’t know it either!

In today’s world we can watch people on television, or on the internet, and we can hear them speak and interact with others. This can make us think we know them and even think that we have a relationship with them. That’s what John W. Hinckley Jr. thought about actress Jodie Foster, and that’s what prompted him to shoot President Ronald Reagan to get her attention. Of course, he was deluded, and we delude ourselves if we think that we can truly know someone by watching them on video.

The best way to know someone is to meet them in person. I once did a funeral for a former US Marine who was a Vietnam veteran, and to my surprise, Dale Dye, a former Marine and actor was in attendance, He was not nearly as big of a person as he seemed to be on video. On the other hand, I once met a National Football League offensive lineman. I have always been a big boy and one of the tallest people in the room, but this fellow was massive!  Now I know why football officials look so small. They are just normal sized people!

Jesus came so that we might see God more fully. Philippians 2:5-8 tells us about this.

Make your own attitude that of Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be used for His own advantage.  Instead He emptied Himself by assuming the form of a slave, taking on the likeness of men. And when He had come as a man in His external form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death— even to death on a cross.

Because God wants to know us and to be known by us, He sent His very best to us so we could see Him in person. He sent us Jesus, who the writer of Hebrews said was the exact expression of God’s nature.

From the fall of Adam and Eve to the first Christmas, only a few people ever saw God face-to-face. All that changed when Jesus came, and God Himself walked on the earth. In John 10:30, Jesus said, “The Father and I are one,” and in John 12:45 He said, “If you have seen me, you have seen my Father who sent me.”

Because Jesus was the exact representation of God, He was radiant. 

I remember nervously standing at the altar with my pastor on the day of my wedding and waiting to see my wife-to-be enter the chapel and walk down the aisle. I have never before or ever since seen such a beautiful sight. In our lives together, we have seen many wonderful vistas of God’s creation, from rainbows in Hawaii to the deep blue waters of the Caribbean Sea to the mountains of Scotland, yet even such stunning sights as those pale in comparison to the radiance of God, as witnessed through Jesus.

Acts 1:8 tells us we will be witnesses to Christ, in much the same way that Christ was the witness to the nature of God. The question for us is, are we radiant representatives the way that Jesus is? That’s a tough question.

The good news for us is that we don’t have to wonder about what God is like. All we have to do is look at Jesus!

The Reliability of God:

It is comforting to know that God reveals Himself to us and that what He reveals about Himself is wonderful. But God is not all show and no go. We can rely upon our God to be present with us and active in our lives

Some theologians recognize a creator God, but that is as far as their understanding of God takes them. These people ascribe to the theology of Deism, which says that God made the world and then took His hands off it, the way a child will spin a top, and then stand by to see where it goes and how long it stays up right. This is not an accurate understanding of the God who reveals Himself to us through His creation, His Word, and His Son.

Our God is intimately involved in our world, and He has demonstrated that throughout history. For example:

• He personally walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden and He protected them from eating of the Tree of Life and living forever in sin.
• He confused the languages of people at Babel, and He purified the earth by the Flood.
• He, by His own hand, closed the door of the Ark so that Noah and his family could be saved.
• He called out Abraham, and He walked with Isaac and He wrestled with Jacob, and He made Joseph the prime minister of Egypt.
• He called Moses from the burning bush and sent him to deliver the Children of Israel from slavery and to take them to the Promised Land.
• He gave Moses the Law so that the people would know how to live blessed and attractive lives together that honored God.
• When His people turned against Him, God sent judges to save them from themselves, and prophets to teach this His Word and His way.
• He even allowed His people to have kings, though that had very mixed results. That’s not God’s fault; it wasn’t His idea!
• He sent His Uniquely Begotten Son to save us from our sins, and He sent the Holy Spirit to write His law on our hearts.
• He created the church to finish the job of blessing the world that He started with Abraham, and He promised to be with us until the end.
• Finally, He promised to come for His people and to create a New Heaven and a New Earth for us to live with Him in eternity.

So, is our God distant and detached from His world and His people? No not at all. Just thinking of the partial Biblical record above is exhausting! Yet, God is still active, and He is still with us, sustaining His creation until the end.

What about us? Have we not seen God working in our lives? Of course we have, and what the writer of Hebrews tells us, and what the Bible record tells us, is that we can count on that to continue!

The good news for us is that we don’t have to wonder if God is with us. All we have to do is look at Jesus!

The Restitution of God:

Have you ever searched for a solution to a problem but were frustrated at every turn?  Few of us have the positive attitude that Thomas Edison had when he struggled to invent the light bulb. He famously said,

I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.

Have we tried to solve our spiritual problems and found 10,000 ways that won’t work?  Of course we have. 

Have we tried to solve our relationship problems and found 10,000 ways that won’t work?  Of course we have. 

Have we tried to solve our emotional problems and found 10,000 ways that won’t work?  Of course we have. 

What we need is someone to help us, someone to guide us, someone to solve our problems. Jesus reveals to us that He is the one who can do that, and in fact He is the only one who can. As the lyrics to the worship song go,

God will make a way where there seems to be no way,
He works in ways we cannot see, He will make a way for me.
He will be my guide, hold me closely to His side,
With love and strength for each new day He will make a way. 
He will make a way.

Notice that Jesus is sitting down. That means His work for us was completed. This is revealed in His last words from the Cross in John 19:28-30,

After this, when Jesus knew that everything was now accomplished that the Scripture might be fulfilled, He said, “I’m thirsty!” A jar full of sour wine was sitting there; so they fixed a sponge full of sour wine on hyssop[a] and held it up to His mouth. When Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, “It is finished!” Then bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.

A little later in Hebrews we will see this fact again. Hebrews 4:9-11 says,

Therefore, a Sabbath rest remains for God’s people. For the person who has entered His rest has rested from his own works, just as God did from His. Let us then make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall into the same pattern of disobedience.

The good news for us is that we don’t have to work to earn the forgiveness of God or wonder if we have done enough to appease Him. All we have to do is embrace what Jesus did for us!

Conclusion:

Do we want to commune with God? Do we want to see God act in a personal way in our lives? Do we want to find rest from our cares, and fears and sorrows? Do we what to find healing and forgiveness? Then we should look to Jesus! We will see all of these things and much more in Him!

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about the Son of the Covenant

Today I want to sahre a word about  Jesus as the Son of the Covenant as we look at 2 Samuel 7 and Psalm 89.

Sometimes people have ideas that just don’t work out. In the Army we decided that those folks had been inspired by “the Good Idea Fairy.” The Good Idea Fairy often had “great ideas” that caused a lot of work for people and a lot of drama but then turned out not to be great ideas after all. Those inspired by the Good Idea Fairy have the best of intentions, but their ideas just don’t work out as planned, like the story about the Boy Scout.

This young Scout was walking down the street one day when he saw an elderly lady standing at the corner of an intersection. Seeing an opportunity to do his good deed for the day, he waited with her there until the traffic light changed, grabbed her elbow, and then helped her across the street. When they got there, she started hitting him with her umbrella. Fending off her blows he asked her, “Why are you hitting me?” She replied, “I was just waiting for the bus!

In our main text for today, we will see David being inspired by the Good Idea Fairy, and we will also see God setting him straight. God did not hit David with an umbrella, but He did give him clear guidance, guidance which applies to us also. Let’s read 2 Samuel 7:1-6.

When the king had settled into his palace and the Lord had given him rest on every side from all his enemies, the king said to Nathan the prophet, “Look, I am living in a cedar house while the ark of God sits inside tent curtains.” So Nathan told the king, “Go and do all that is on your heart, for the Lord is with you.” But that night the word of the Lord came to Nathan:  “Go to My servant David and say, ‘This is what the Lord says: Are you to build a house for Me to live in?  From the time I brought the Israelites out of Egypt until today I have not lived in a house; instead, I have been moving around with a tent as My dwelling.

God Does Not Need a House:

We have to give David some credit here, because his intentions were good. On the other hand, we can see two clear mistakes being made here. 

First, David fell prey to mirror-image thinking. Mirror image thinking in national intelligence and spying involves the tendency to perceive the intentions and actions of others based on one's own cultural or experiential biases. This can lead to misinterpretations and false biases, which were on full display when American leaders misjudged the capabilities of the Japanese fleet before its attack on Pearl Harbor. In counseling, this tendency is called projection, in which people ascribe to others what they, themselves, are feeling or thinking. 

David was thinking like a person. People need shelter from the elements and to be safe from robbery, theft, and physical assault. People also want attractive, comfortable shelter. People also view their shelters as status symbols, which has given rise to the Mc Mansion phenomena in some fast-growing cities in the USA. Because he failed to think like God, he decided that what was right for David, was right for God. Well, not really.

David wanted to bless God, but he forgot that God Is above the physical. He created our world; He could build His own temple if He wanted one. He did just fine for 40 years in the desert, and many years after. He really doesn't need our help to make Him comfortable. 

The second mistake that was made here was on the part of Nathan. In his role as prophet, Nathan was to stand between God and man. He was a channel of communication, taking the concerns of the people to God and bringing God’s Word back to the people. The mistake he made was that he didn’t do either, He got ahead of God and assumed that he knew things that he didn’t know.  If anyone should have been hit with an umbrella during this event, it should have been Nathan.

God is gracious, however. He interrupted Nathan’s rest with a clear message, and to his credit, Nathan, beginning in verse 17, told David exactly what God had told him.

So, what can we take away from these verses? First, it is a good thing to want to bless God, however, we must not project our human reasoning and human needs and desires onto Him. Next, we must not get ahead of God and ask Him to bless our human ideas. Last, we need to ground ourselves in God's word and let that guide us!

Next, let’s review verses 7-9:

In all My journeys with all the Israelites, have I ever asked anyone among the tribes of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd My people Israel: ‘Why haven’t you built Me a house of cedar?’ Now this is what you are to say to My servant David: ‘This is what the Lord of Hosts says: I took you from the pasture and from following the sheep to be ruler over My people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have destroyed all your enemies before you. I will make a name for you like that of the greatest in the land.

God Does Not Want a House:

Our God is an intentional God. When we use the phrase plan of salvation when we speak of the Gospel, we imply the truth that our God is intentional and that He does plan. We see that throughout the Bible, including in the parable about the man who built his house on the sand, as well as in the parable about the man who didn’t count the cost and could not complete his house. That trait of God is also reflected in Paul’s admonition to the church in Corinth that they should do things “decently and in order.”

Because God is an intentional God, He does not hold onto things that are not a part of His plan. Many of us are pack rats. We save everything, regardless of how useful those things are. Others of us never save anything. It is almost impossible for people to find that balance. 

One example of this occurred when I led an association of Baptist churches in south Alabama. The leadership of one of our churches decided that they would no longer have a choir, and they also decided to dispose of a van load of sheet music. They called our office manager who told them that they could bring the music to us, and we’d find churches that wanted to use it. And so they brought us dozens of boxes of materials.

Soon we had a pile of boxes full of sheet music in our meeting room. It turned out that not only did the original church not want the sheet music, but no one else did either! After several months with no interest from churches, we finally had to take that van load of boxes to the dump ourselves. We never should have taken possession of that sheet music, but it seemed a good idea at the time, at least to our office manager. I think that the Good Idea Fairy may have paid him a visit!

Since God does not need a building, He saw no need to encumber Himself with one, because He knew things about buildings that humans often overlook. Things like:

• Once you own them you discover that they own you.
• They tend to become a focus of activity and emphasis.
• It is easier to change walls than to change people.
• A y’all come attitude can prevail.

Ancient peoples believed in territorial gods. The god of the land was not the same as the god of the ocean. The god of one country is not the god of another. The god of the highlands is not the god of the coastlands. That is not the way it is with the Lord God Yahweh. Not only does He not need a house, He also can’t be contained in a house.

I have worshipped God in many different places, from using the tailgate of a truck as an altar, to holding a prayer meeting in a stair well, to worshipping in Haiti in an open-air church, to preaching in two different Church of England churches in the UK. In all those places, and in infinitely more places than that, God was there.

This is why my wife and I are not afraid to go where God has called us. He has led us many places, and what we have always found when we arrived at that new place is that God was already there.

So, what can we take away from these verses? We know that buildings are useful, and God does not prohibit them in this passage. He simply wants us to have the right attitude about them!

Next, let’s see the rest of God’s message to David, which is in verses 10-17.

“I will establish a place for My people Israel and plant them, so that they may live there and not be disturbed again. Evildoers will not afflict them as they have done ever since the day I ordered judges to be over My people Israel. I will give you rest from all your enemies. ‘The Lord declares to you: The Lord Himself will make a house for you.  When your time comes and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up after you your descendant, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He will build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him, and he will be a son to Me. When he does wrong, I will discipline him with a human rod and with blows from others. But My faithful love will never leave him as I removed it from Saul; I removed him from your way. Your house and kingdom will endure before Me forever, and your throne will be established forever.” Nathan spoke all these words and this entire vision to David.

God Wanted to Make David a House:

We have seen that God didn’t need a house. We have also seen that God didn’t want a house. In fact, God wanted to make David a house!

Have you ever heard the saying, “If a deal is too good to be true, it isn’t”?   A corollary to that in the 21st Century is the saying about free on-line services, “If something on the internet is free, then you are the product.” This is because these free on-line services sell your customer data. If all of that sounds cynical, it is also true, with one exception: the covenants made by God with His people.

God’s focus is on the relationship between His people and Himself. To cement this relationship, God has created covenants with us beginning with His promise never to flood the world again, continuing with His covenant with Abraham, and extending through this covenant with David.

These covenants were designed to be a mutually blessing relationship, although, to be honest, God is the one who does most of the blessing, because what thrills God is to bless His people. Sadly, we have never fulfilled our part of those covenants.   

Psalm 78:10 says,

They did not keep God’s covenant and refused to live by His law.

God’s response to this failure by His people was to double down on His commitment to us. Jeremiah 33:31-34 tells us,

“Look, the days are coming”—this is the Lord’s declaration—“when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. This one will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant they broke even though I had married them”—the Lord’s declaration. “Instead, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days”—the Lord’s declaration. “I will put My teaching within them and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be My people. No longer will one teach his neighbor or his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least to the greatest of them”—this is the Lord’s declaration. “For I will forgive their wrongdoing and never again remember their sin.”

God has blessed us physically, simply by creating the world and letting us live here and enjoy it. His best blessings, however, are spiritual. David already had a physical house. It was spacious and beautiful. He didn’t need another. What Daivid needed was a spiritual house, and God was going to give him one!

So, what can we learn from these verses? 

• Buildings are tools, not ends. 
• Buildings don't bless, but what goes on inside them should bless.
• God wants us to focus on spiritually blessing His people.
• It is harder to change people than walls, but that is our mandate!
• We should thank God for His physical blessings, and we should commit ourselves to bless Him by how we use them.

Next. Let’s turn to Psalm 89:3-4 and 19-29,

The Lord said, “I have made a covenant with My chosen one; I have sworn an oath to David My servant: ‘I will establish your offspring forever and build up your throne for all generations.’” Selah . . . You once spoke in a vision to Your loyal ones and said: “I have granted help to a warrior; I have exalted one chosen from the people. I have found David My servant; I have anointed him with My sacred oil. My hand will always be with him, and My arm will strengthen him. The enemy will not afflict him; no wicked man will oppress him. I will crush his foes before him and strike those who hate him. My faithfulness and love will be with him, and through My name his horn will be exalted. I will extend his power to the sea and his right hand to the rivers. He will call to Me, ‘You are my Father, my God, the rock of my salvation.’ I will also make him My firstborn, greatest of the kings of the earth. I will always preserve My faithful love for him, and My covenant with him will endure. I will establish his line forever, his throne as long as heaven lasts.

God Made David a House:

When we talk about a royal household, the most important issue is to have an heir. That’s why King Henry VIII had six wives. Without a prince or princess to follow in the king’s footsteps, chaos would occur. And, because child mortality has been high among royal households, the goal for a king is to have “an heir and a spare.” 

We know David had physical children, and that Solomon became king after him. But God was speaking of a spiritual household, so who might that person be? Jesus of course. He was the Son of the Covenant that came to sit on the throne of the House of David forever.

Remember what Isaiah said about David's line in Isaiah 9:6-7,

For a child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will be on His shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. The dominion will be vast, and its prosperity will never end. He will reign on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish and sustain it with justice and righteousness from now on and forever. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this.

God, in His zeal to bless His people, committed Himself to fulfilling His promises to them. He did this with clear-eyed determination.

God knew what it would cost Him to establish His Son on David’s throne. It cost Him everything, yet He did it anyway, because we were so important to Him. Psalm 15 says that the blameless person is the one who keeps an oath, even when it hurts, and it grievously hurt God for His Son to take upon Him the sins of the world. 

Jesus told the parable of a man who found a priceless pearl in a field. He went and sold all that he had to purchase that field so that he could have that pearl. This is what God did when He sent Jesus to us. We are priceless to Him and He paid everything to keep His promise to us.

Conclusion:

So, what have we learned today from these verses?

First, no one can out-give God.

Second, God has everything that He needs or wants, except the hearts of people.

Third, God will do anything it takes to save us from our sins and restore us to full fellowship with Him.

Also, we learned that God always keeps His promises, even when we don’t!

Finally, God deserves all the love, obedience, and praise that we give to Him, and more!

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbtt

A Word about the Son of Salvation

Today I want to share a word Jesus as the Son of Salvation as we consider Jeremiah 33.  Let’s begin with verses 1-7:

While he was still confined in the guard’s courtyard, the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah a second time: “The Lord who made the earth, the Lord who forms it to establish it, Yahweh is His name, says this: Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and incomprehensible things you do not know. For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says concerning the houses of this city and the palaces of Judah’s kings, the ones torn down for defense against the siege ramps and the sword: The people coming to fight the Chaldeans will fill the houses with the corpses of their own men that I strike down in My wrath and rage. I have hidden My face from this city because of all their evil. Yet I will certainly bring health and healing to it and will indeed heal them. I will let them experience the abundance of peace and truth. I will restore the fortunes of Judah and of Israel and will rebuild them as in former times.

Christmas is a time when we give gifts, following the model of the gifts that the Magi gave to the Baby Jesus. Sometimes people receive gifts that they may need, but don’t really want. For example, this story: “I gave my friend a book on how to accept gifts gracefully… He handed it back and said he didn’t need it.” Or this one: “I bought my roommate a laundry basket. He said, ‘I don’t need that.’ His floor said otherwise.” Another one goes: “I bought my friend a portable phone battery. He said, ‘Thanks, but mine is always charged.’ His phone died halfway through that sentence.”

On a more serious note, author Phillip Yancey discovered how much we can grow in our faith through the trials of life. He wrote an article in Christianity Today about that fact called, “Suffering: The Unwanted Gift.” Jeremiah, the prophet, was a man God sent to Israel to give them His Word. The problem that Jeremiah had was that no one really wanted to hear it, even when it was welcome news.

The Promise of Salvation:

When you have dug yourself a hole, the first step towards getting out is to stop digging! Then you need to find someone to help you out of that hole. This is exactly the situation that Israel was in when God sent Jeremiah to them with some good news.

The problem that Israel had was the problem that we all have.  The first part of Isaiah 53:6 tells us that,

We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way . . .

Israel was in rebellion. They had dug themselves a hole, but they were not wise enough to stop digging!

God sent Jeremiah to them with a message of hope. God promised to bring salvation to His people, but His people rejected His messenger, and they rejected Him. In fact, they threw Jeremiah into prison, as if to say, “Out of sight, out of mind.” They may have silenced His messenger, but God’s message was not silenced.

We must avoid the mistakes of Israel. God’s judgment is real, but His salvation is promised to those who turn to Him!

Next, let’s consider verse 8,

I will purify them from all the wrongs they have committed against Me, and I will forgive all the wrongs they have committed against Me, rebelling against Me.

The Purification of Salvation:

When Jeremiah told Israel how God would help them out of the hole that they had dug for themselves, he explained that God would do that through purifying them. The importance of purity is something that cannot be understated. Even in a mundane thing like car tires, impurities can cause great difficulty. 

I remember as a child when my father took me with him to get some new tires put on our car. This was an older car that had tires with tubes in them. My dad took great pains to tell the workers who were installing the tires to clean out the inside of the tire before they put the tube inside it. He specifically asked them to use compressed air to purge the inside of the tire before installing the inner tube. I remember him saying that even something as small as a cigarette leaf could puncture that inner tube when it was under pressure. A cigarette leaf may not be as small as a mustard seed, but it is an exceedingly small object. Still, something that small could ruin an expensive tire.

The same is true, but even more so, for our spiritual lives. Even the smallest of impurities will spoil our relationship with God. Remember, God‘s perspective on holiness is very digital: either you are holy or you are not. 

Isaiah 53, as well as many other passages of scripture, told us plainly that we are not holy and that we are not righteous. We are far from perfect. In fact, Isaiah goes on to say that all our righteousness is as filthy rags before God. In Isaiah 64:6-7 we read,

You welcome the one who joyfully does what is right; they remember You in Your ways. But we have sinned, and You were angry. How can we be saved if we remain in our sins?  All of us have become like something unclean, and all our righteous acts are like a polluted garment; all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities carry us away like the wind. No one calls on Your name, striving to take hold of You. For You have hidden Your face from us and made us melt because of our iniquity.

Therefore, we need to be purified, but who can do that? The other half of Isaiah 53:6 tells us who that person is. Let’s begin reading at Isaiah 53:1.

Who has believed what we have heard? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?  He grew up before him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He didn’t have an impressive form or majesty that we should look at him, no appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering who knew what sickness was. He was like someone people turned away from; he was despised, and we didn’t value him. Yet he himself bore our sicknesses, and he carried our pains; but we in turn regarded him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced because of our rebellion,  crushed because of our iniquities;  punishment or our peace was on him, and we are healed by his wounds. We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished him for the iniquity of us all.

We must avoid the mistakes of Israel. God’s standard is perfection, but He has promised to purify those who turn to Him!

Next, let’s see what God’s purification through the Son of Salvation produces in our lives. We can see that in verses 9-12.

This city will bear on My behalf a name of joy, praise, and glory before all the nations of the earth, who will hear of all the good I will do for them. They will tremble with awe because of all the good and all the peace I will bring about for them. “This is what the Lord says: In this place, which you say is a ruin, without man or beast—that is, in Judah’s cities and Jerusalem’s streets that are a desolation without man, without inhabitant, and without beast—there will be heard again a sound of joy and gladness, the voice of the groom and the bride, and the voice of those saying, Praise the Lord of Hosts, for the Lord is good; His faithful love endures forever as they bring thank offerings to the temple of the Lord. For I will restore the fortunes of the land as in former times, says the Lord. This is what the Lord of Hosts says: In this desolate place—without man or beast—and in all its cities there will once more be a grazing land where shepherds may rest flocks.

The Praise for Salvation:

Whenever someone achieves a goal, a natural response is to celebrate. The ones who celebrate the most, however, are the ones who just managed to make the grade.

During university commencements, some students graduate with honors, such as cum laude, magna cum laude, or summa cum laude. The ones who celebrate the most however, are the ones who graduated “Thank the Lordy!” 

Do you know what they call those folks who just made the grade to receive their diplomas? Graduates!

When we are unexpectedly blessed, our response is to celebrate. When someone unexpectedly blesses us, our response is to thank them and praise them. I recently experienced that desire to praise and give thanks for a very mundane, but very welcome, blessing.  I was excited to discover that the parking lot at a local hospital had been restriped to allow easier access to the parking places. That seems like a small thing, but for a pastor, or a patient, or a patient’s family, that was a real blessing!

Only God could purify us and only God could restore our wrecked lives. When that happens to us, our natural response should be to praise Him. For God deserves all the praise for every good thing in our lives!

We must avoid the mistakes of Israel. We are only saved by God’s benevolence, so those who turn to Him should celebrate their rescue!

Next, let’s look at verses 14-17.

“Look, the days are coming”—this is the Lord’s declaration—when I will fulfill the good promises that I have spoken concerning the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a Righteous Branch to sprout up for David, and He will administer justice and righteousness in the land. In those days Judah will be saved, and Jerusalem will dwell securely, and this is what she will be named: Yahweh Our Righteousness. For this is what the Lord says: David will never fail to have a man sitting on the throne of the house of Israel. The Levitical priests will never fail to have a man always before Me to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings, and to make sacrifices.”

The Person of Salvation:

Our God is a personal God. Too often, our society today embraces the concept of spirituality instead of faith. Like The Force in Star Wars, spirituality is amorphous, and like Jello, it is hard to nail down. Often, spirituality descends into vague concepts or feelings, which differ depending on the person or even the time of day. That is not what we find in the Person of Salvation. 

Jesus was a real person, who came as a real baby, to a real mother, and who lived a real life among us. 

Jesus fed real people and He healed real people, and in the Garden, He shed real drops of blood. 

Jesus, for us, underwent a real and brutal Roman execution. 

Jesus showed Thomas the real wounds in His hands and feet, and His side. 

Jesus also has definite qualities which we have seen throughout this entire series, but which are reinforced for us here:

• He is good
• He is faithful
• He is righteous,
• He is just
• He is powerful to save and to sustain His people
• He is the perfect sacrifice for our sins.

We must avoid the mistakes of Israel. God sent His Uniquely Begotten and very real Son to give His salvation to those who turn to Him! 

Finally, let’s read verses 19-22.

The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “This is what the Lord says: If you can break My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night so that day and night cease to come at their regular time, then also My covenant with My servant David may be broken so that he will not have a son reigning on his throne, and the Levitical priests will not be My ministers. The hosts of heaven cannot be counted; the sand of the sea cannot be measured. So, too, I will make the descendants of My servant David and the Levites who minister to Me innumerable.”

The Permanence of Salvation:

Stubbornness is not usually considered to be a positive trait. In fact, we often say that intransigent people are “stubborn as a mule.” We certainly would never want to offend God by comparing Him to an animal that He never created! And yet, we do know that God is stubborn, though it might be better to use the term, determined, instead.

God loves His creation, and until the Last Days, He will not give up on us. Psalm 136:1 tells us,

Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His loving kindness endures forever.

Isaiah 54:10 also says,

Though the mountains move and the hills shake, My love will not be removed from you and My covenant of peace will not be shaken,” says your compassionate Lord.

The Hebrew word often used for God’s enduring love in the Old Testament is chesed, and some have translated that term as God’s stubborn love. When all else fails, when all plans are defeated, when all friends abandon you, when there is no hope, when you have come to the end of the line, one thing always will remain solid: God’s love.

We must avoid the mistakes of Israel. Instead of looking for help elsewhere, or instead of giving up, we must look to our faithful God who loves us with an everlasting love.

Conclusion:

When Jeremiah was sharing God’s message of salvation, Israel’s back was to the wall, and they had no way out. Despite this, they ignored God’s way and they chose their own way. This, sadly, led to their destruction.

What we may not realize is that, spiritually, because of our sin, our backs are to the wall also, and we, too, have no way out. We must avoid the mistakes of Israel, and we must choose to embrace the message and the work of the Son of Salvation for our lives.

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about the Son of Peace

Today I want to share a word about ther Son of Peace as I comment on Isaiah 9:2-7.  This passage reads:

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; a light has dawned on those living in the land of darkness.  You have enlarged the nation and increased its joy. The people have rejoiced before You as they rejoice at harvest time and as they rejoice when dividing spoils. For You have shattered their oppressive yoke and the rod on their shoulders, the staff of their oppressor, just as You did on the day of Midian.  For the trampling boot of battle and the bloodied garments of war will be burned as fuel for the fire. For a child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will be on His shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. The dominion will be vast, and its prosperity will never end. He will reign on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish and sustain it with justice and righteousness from now on and forever. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this.

Usually, the best way to tell a story is to start at the beginning. Sometimes, however, a different process is required. Going in reverse is not aways comfortable but is often the best technique.  It is very common for military people and first responders to back into a parking place. The idea is to do your backing up when you have time and not when you need to respond quickly. Also, when my dad was ready to go somewhere, he’d tell us, “If you are waiting on me, you’re backing up!” 

Today, I think the best way forward for us is to take this passage of Scripture in reverse. Let’s begin with verse 7 which tells us that,

The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this.

The Priority of Peace:

Some people love chaos and don’t feel comfortable without living in it. They are the ones who never plan ahead, or who can’t ever make up their minds, or who have the habit of throwing verbal grenades into a conversation. I recently saw a meme in which a person at a holiday party managed to insult both sides of the family at the same time, and while they all started arguing, the instigator left and went outside to enjoy the peace and quiet there.

Spontaneity is refreshing, but chaos can be upsetting and dangerous.  Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crashed at the San Fransico airport in July 2013. During the chaos and confusion after the crash, one of the responding fire trucks ran over and crushed a young girl who had been ejected from the airplane. In their desperate efforts to save lives, they took one by accident.

During the January 1968 Tet Offensive in Vietnam, US-backed forces fought a battle with insurgents in the village of Ben Tre. The community suffered much damage during the battle, and reporter Peter Arnett quoted an unnamed American major who said, "It became necessary to destroy the town to save it." Although the truth of the original quote has been challenged, it has often been paraphrased as, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."

Our God is a God who does things decently and in order. He wants to bless His people, and He wants to give us abundant life. He won’t destroy us, in order to save us! In fact, God has a zeal to bring us peace!

God’s zeal to bless us means that He will take extreme measures to bring us peace. Zeal is like obsession, but different,

I remember once being obsessed with the theme song from a movie, and I wanted a copy of it on my mixtape I played in my car. My wife had a Parent Teacher Association meeting that night at school, and so I was left unsupervised. I pulled out cassette tapes, a tape recorder, our video cassette recorder, and a box full of audio cables. By the time she got home our living room looked like an explosion had gone off in it, but I had a fresh mixtape including that theme song. That is obsession.

Zeal is like obsession, but it has an ethical and moral element that obsession is missing, Our God will do, would do, and did do, whatever it took to bring us peace. He would even come to the earth as a baby boy. He would even die on a Roman cross.

In His zeal, God made our peace His priority. In doing so, He sent us the Person of Peace. Let’s review verses 6 and 7:

For a child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will be on His shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. The dominion will be vast, and its prosperity will never end. He will reign on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish and sustain it with justice and righteousness from now on and forever. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will accomplish this.

The Person of Peace:

In human culture two poles of life exist. First, we have the pole of principle. Principles are ideas and concepts to which we ascribe truth and efficacy. These are ideas in which we invest ourselves, like the slogan from the television show Superman. Superman fought for “truth, justice, and the American way.”

The problem with principles is that they are words, and words can have different meanings for different people. For years now, many church leaders have prescribed that Christian ministry must be “relevant.”  In fact, I have seen a number of churches with that very name. But the question is, “Relevant to whom?” A ministry might be relevant to me, but not to you.

Because principles incorporate the element of belief, they often devolve into dogma and legalism. 

The other pole of life in human culture is personality. Instead of investing in principle, we invest our belief and trust in an individual. This is problematic because, far too often, people are not trustworthy.

During World War Two, every German military officer swore a personal oath to Adolph Hitler as the Fuhrer of Germany. Many of them obeyed his orders to commit war crimes and other atrocities. When they were charged with these crimes after the war, their defense was, “I was just following orders.” Most were found guilty and hanged because of their commitment to an evil person.

Because personality involves devotion to a person, it often devolves into licentiousness.

Humans struggle to keep our lives in a proper balance in all areas of our lives. Politically, liberals confuse indulgence with compassion, and conservatives confuse freedom with liberty. Finding the balance between principles and personality is particularly difficult. Jesus, on the other hand, is perfect in every way, including balance.

First, let’s look at his personality.  He was born for us, and He came to us. He is wonderful, and mighty, and eternal. He came as a child, so we can relate to Him as a human, but He is our Father, who guides us and watches over us. He promotes both peace and prosperity.

Next, let’s look at His principles. He reigns with justice and righteousness, and He rules over His Kingdom. As a counselor, He understands our hearts and minds, and He understands our emotions, and our motives as well. He will never tire of administering God’s will, and He is eager to establish it and sustain it.

Also, we must remember that Jesus directs His people to look for people who are like Himself.  When Jesus sent out the 70, He told them to look for the “son of peace.” Paul told the Corinthians to follow him as he followed Christ.

What we need in our lives is someone we can trust who knows what they are doing. Once, when I was a child, my dad had to do some work on our roof, and he allowed me to go up with him. When it was time to descend the ladder, my dad went first, but I froze at the top, afraid of making a misstep and falling. Dad climbed back up and asked me to hold the ladder with my hands and extend a leg to him. When I did, he placed my foot on a rung of the ladder, and said, “There you are. Now, come on down.” And I did.

God knew that for us to have peace, He’d have to send the right person, to do that job the right way. He sent us the Person of Peace, His Son, Jesus. 

Finally, let’s see what God’s zeal, along with God’s Son, produces in our lives. We can see that in verses 2-5.

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; a light has dawnedon those living in the land of darkness.  You have enlarged the nation and increased its joy. The people have rejoiced before You as they rejoice at harvest time and as they rejoice when dividing spoils. For You have shattered their oppressive yoke and the rod on their shoulders, the staff of their oppressor, just as You did on the day of Midian.  For the trampling boot of battle and the bloodied garments of war will be burned as fuel for the fire.

The Product of Peace:

The effects of what the Son of Peace will produce in our lives are almost too many to mention, and they are amazingly powerful in transforming our lives. 

First, in Him, we find light for our dark spiritual lives. Light drives out fear and insecurity, and it illuminates the truth for us. Not only does it inhibit bad things from happening, but it also points the way towards all the good things that God has in store for us.

Next, in Him, we find joy as God expands our spiritual lives. We know that He has sent the Holy Spirit to help us grow-up in God. The Spirit also gives us spiritual gifts that equip us to be “laborers together with God.” As we grow in the Lord, and as we participate in His good and perfect work, we experience joy, the joy of the Lord, which is our strength, as well as the joy of serving Him and watching His Kingdom grow.

Finally, in Him, we find salvation in the Son of Peace. In the same way that God delivered the Children of Israel from slavery in Egypt, God sent the Son of Peace to deliver us from our slavery to sin. 

In the same way that God won the battle of Jericho for the Children of Israel, God sent the Son of Peace to win all of our spiritual battles for us, but also all of our mental battles, all of our emotional battles, and all of our relational battles, as well. 

In the same way that God gave the Children of Israel a land flowing with milk and honey, He send the Son of Peace to give us an abundant life as we live for Him.

In the Son of Peace, we don’t just benefit from the absence of strife, we also benefit from a full and meaningful life as well.

Conclusion:

During this Christmas aseason are you searching for peace? If you are, the place where you find it is at the manger, in the Son of Peace.

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about the Son of Redemption

 Today I want to share a word about the Son of Redemption as I comment on Micah 5:1-9.

Today we will continue in a series that I am calling “An Old Testament Christmas.”  In this series we first looked at Psalm 2, and we saw that Jesus was the Son of Laughter. In Malachi 3, we also saw Jesus as the Son of Judgment, not only coming to execute God’s righteous wrath on human sin but also coming out of God’s love to refine us and make our offering suitable to God. Today, we will see Jesus as the Son of Redemption.

One of the most common tropes in literature is the redemption story arc, in which a character, typically initially villainous or morally ambiguous, undergoes a transformation and becomes a hero or better person through significant selfless acts or moral choices. A great example of this is Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. Another is the Grinch in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The character of Buttercup in The Princess Bride is a third, and Coach Bill Yoast in Remember the Titans is a fourth.

The fact is, it is very difficult, even impossible, for an evil or callow person to change their ways. That’s why Jesus said it was easier for a camel to pass through an eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter heaven.  Jesus, however, is the Son of Redemption, and He specializes in redeeming impossible circumstances. Let’s read Micah 5:1-9.

Now, daughter who is under attack, you slash yourself in grief; a siege is set against us! They are striking the judge of Israel on the cheek with a rod. Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are small among the clans of Judah; One will come from you to be ruler over Israel for Me. His origin is from antiquity, from eternity.  Therefore, He will abandon them until the time when she who is in labor has given birth; then the rest of His brothers will return to the people of Israel. He will stand and shepherd them in the strength of Yahweh, in the majestic name of Yahweh His God. They will live securely, for then His greatness will extend to the ends of the earth. He will be their peace. When Assyria invades our land, when it marches against our fortresses, we will raise against it seven shepherds, even eight leaders of men. They will shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword, the land of Nimrod with a drawn blade.  So He will rescue us from Assyria when it invades our land, when it marches against our territory. Then the remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples like dew from the Lord, like showers on the grass, which do not wait for anyone or linger for mankind. Then the remnant of Jacob will be among the nations, among many peoples, like a lion among animals of the forest, like a young lion among flocks of sheep, which tramples and tears as it passes through, and there is no one to rescue them. Your hand will be lifted up against your adversaries and all your enemies will be destroyed.

Redemption Prescribed:

Redemption stories begin with a character who is evil or morally ambiguous. In each of the movies I mentioned the character who was eventually redeemed fits that mold.

In terms of evil characters, Scrooge and the Grinch were plainly evil. Scrooge was what we would call a money grubber. He was greedy for material possessions, but he never learned to enjoy them. Too much was not enough for him. Of course, the Grinch had a very small heart, and he hated seeing anyone expressing joy.

In terms of morally ambiguous characters, Buttercup was a self-absorbed and self-important young woman. Coach Bill Yoast had been replaced by the character played by Denzel Washington, for whom he now worked. It would have been just fine with him had the Denzel character fallen flat on his face.

Here’s the issue we must understand. It doesn’t matter if you are wholly evil, or just a little evil. It doesn’t matter if you are a Hitler-like figure, or just a corrupt local politician. It doesn’t matter if you try to destroy a rival’s life or simply find delight when that one stumbles and falls. It doesn’t matter if you are a cold-blooded murderer, killing another’s body, or just a cold-hearted betrayer, killing another’s soul. All of these are sinful, and all of them show that we have fallen far short of God and His righteous perfection.

We are all familiar with the volume dial on a radio. An analogue dial can be adjusted infinitely, from a small whisper to an overwhelming din. Many people see their sin that same way. From this perspective, even if maximum volume is too much, there is a setting on the volume dial that is comfortable, not too soft, and not too loud, but just right! A little white lie here, or a little indiscretion there, doesn’t hurt anybody. It’s all good, right? Well, no. it isn’t.

In God’s sight, and in God’s economy, evil is a digital fact. Either you are evil, or you are not evil. No in-between state exists. And, if you are evil, you are banned from God’s sight and banned from His favor. Micah 5:3 is just one of many Bible verses that describe how hopeless we are in our natural, sinful state. God turns His back on those who refuse to repent of their sin.

When we are sick, and especially when we are sick to the point of death, we go to our medical doctors, and we hope and pray that they have a prescription for what ails us. Most of the time they do, but those medicines only work if we take them as prescribed. The answer for our spiritual sickness, which is, without a doubt a sickness unto death, is the prescription of redemption, which is applied to our lives for us. Unlike our drug prescriptions, God’s redemption prescription works every time when it is applied to our spiritual ills!

Redemption Predicted:

In our last time together, we saw that God gave us plenty of warning about the coming judgment. Angels, prophets, the world around us, the scribes of God’s Word, and even God Himself in person, all revealed to us the truth of judgment for sin in the face of God’s perfect righteousness. This is not the case in most redemption stories. 

Usually, a redemption story arc devotes much, if not most, of the plot to establishing how evil or how callow a character is. Their redemption is found over a long period of time, incrementally, again like the analogue volume dial of a radio, little by little. God’s plan for redemption was predicted from the very beginning of our need for redemption.

Genesis 3:14-15 says,

Then the Lord God said to the serpent: Because you have done this, you are cursed more than any livestock and more than any wild animal. You will move on your belly and eat dust all the days of your life. I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.

Most evangelical theologians point to this passage, in the earliest chapters of the first book of the Bible, as a prediction of what happened on Calvary. This, of course, was not the only prediction of the Son of Redemption. We see another prediction in our focal passage today, a very specific prediction that came true when Jesus was born in Bethlehem. 

In fact, the Old Testament contains over three hundred prophecies about Jesus coming for the redemption of His people. Some of these prophecies are found in our Scriptures for today but there are many others:

• Genesis 3:15 – The “seed of the woman” crushing the serpent’s head.
• Isaiah 7:14 – Born of a virgin, called Immanuel.
• Micah 5:2 – Messiah born in Bethlehem.
• Zechariah 9:9 – Triumphal entry on a donkey.
• Psalm 22 – Pierced hands and feet, casting lots for garments.
• Isaiah 53 – The Suffering Servant, “pierced for our transgressions.”

Professor Peter Stoner of Westmont College had his math students calculate the odds of one person fulfilling the eight most well-known Messianic prophecies, and the result was 1 in 10 to the 17th power, which is 1 followed by 17 0’s. To help us understand this number, Stoner gave us an illustration:

• Imagine 10^17 silver dollars spread across the state of Texas. They would cover the entire state two feet deep.
• Mark one coin, mix the coins thoroughly, and ask a blindfolded person to pick one.
• The odds of picking the marked coin are the same as one person fulfilling those 8 prophecies.

And that was just eight prophecies, not three hundred!

Our God does not hide from us, and from the very beginning we see redemption predicted, from Gensis to the birth of God’s Son in Bethlehem to the Cross and to the Second Coming of the Son of Redemption.

Redemption Personified:

Most often in a redemption story arc, the positive changes that occur in the evil or callow protagonist are the result of an intervention by a person. In A Christmas Carol we see that part played by the ghosts of Christmas. The Grinch’s heart grew three times when he witnessed the true Christmas Spirit of the citizens of Whoville. Buttercup was rescued and was redeemed by Wesley, and the leadership skill of the Denzel Washington character had a positive impact on Coach Bill Yoast.

Note how none of those characters were changed by a self-help program or by self-reflection, or by any other circumstances of life. They were all changed, they were all transformed, they were all redeemed by their interaction with persons. This same thing is true for us when we confront our own need for redemption. 

Like all those characters I mentioned, we can’t do it alone. We need a redeemer. So, who might that redeemer be? 

Why, the Son of Redemption, of course!  Isaiah 7:13-14 says,  

Isaiah said, “Listen, house of David! Is it not enough for you to try the patience of men? Will you also try the patience of my God? Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive, have a son, and name him Immanuel.

When our God looked down upon our lives, He saw our sin, and He saw our troubles. He also saw our inability to change for the better and He saw our inability to overcome our own limitations. He decided to act.

We have all heard the saying, “If you want a job done right, you have to do it yourself.” This is certainly true when it came to redeeming humanity from the mess we made of our lives. God Himself came to do the job rightly.

How do I know God came as the Son of Redemption? Isaiah just told us. The name Immanuel means, “God with us.” Our God comes to be with His people, and He always has done so.

• God was with Adam and Eve in the Garden.
• God was with the Children of Israel in the cloud of smoke and the pillar of fire.
• God was with Elijah in the still small voice, and He was also with Him on Mount Carmel.
• God was with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace.
• God was with Daniel in the Lion’s Den.
• God came to be with us and save us through the Son of Redemption
• God will be with us when He comes back for us on the Day of the Lord

We probably all know the song by Bonnie Tyler with the chorus that says, 

I need a hero

I'm holding out for a hero 'til the end of the night

He's gotta be strong, and he's gotta be fast

And he's gotta be fresh from the fight

I need a hero (hero)

I'm holding out for a hero 'til the morning light

He's gotta be sure, and it's gotta be soon

And he's gotta be larger than life, larger than life

We all need a larger-than-life hero to save us, and that hero came in the form of the Son of Redemption!

Now, let’s remind ourselves of what happened with the Son of Redemption came to us. Micah 5:4-9 tells us, 

He will stand and shepherd them in the strength of Yahweh, in the majestic name of Yahweh His God. They will live securely, for then His greatness will extend to the ends of the earth. He will be their peace. When Assyria invades our land, when it marches against our fortresses, we will raise against it seven shepherds, even eight leaders of men. They will shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword, the land of Nimrod with a drawn blade.  So He will rescue us from Assyria when it invades our land, when it marches against our territory. Then the remnant of Jacob will be among many peoples like dew from the Lord, like showers on the grass, which do not wait for anyone or linger for mankind. Then the remnant of Jacob will be among the nations, among many peoples, like a lion among animals of the forest, like a young lion among flocks of sheep, which tramples and tears as it passes through, and there is no one to rescue them. Your hand will be lifted up against your adversaries and all your enemies will be destroyed.

Redemption Provided:

First, redemption is provided by the shepherd who was sent by God. There is only one Good Shepherd: Jesus, as John 10:7-18 tells us,

So Jesus said again, “I assure you: I am the door of the sheep. All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep didn’t listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. A thief comes only to steal and to kill and to destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired man, since he is not the shepherd and doesn’t own the sheep, leaves them and runs away when he sees a wolf coming. The wolf then snatches and scatters them. This happens because he is a hired man and doesn’t care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know My own sheep, and they know Me, as the Father knows Me, and I know the Father. I lay down My life for the sheep. But I have other sheep that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will listen to My voice. Then there will be one flock, one shepherd. This is why the Father loves Me, because I am laying down My life so I may take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down on My own. I have the right to lay it down, and I have the right to take it up again. I have received this command from My Father.”

When we yield to the Good Shepherd and become a member of His flock many good blessings come our way. Our passage today reveals just a few of them to us.

First, the Good Shepherd stands up for us in the strength of Yahweh God. 

Few of us will ever be like David, having to stand in the face of a literal giant, but all of us have giants in our lives that oppress us. Some of them come from within, issues like doubt and fear, or medical problems. Others come from our families, like relationship issues or a loved one’s own problems. Many of them come from outside our lives and families, like economic or legal issues, or from living in a culture hostile to our beliefs and our way of life based on those beliefs. We look around and cry “I need a hero,” but what we need is a shepherd who will stand up for us. We need the Good Shepherd.

Next, when we yield to the Good Shepherd and become a member of His flock, He brings us peace because He becomes our peace. 

Peace is not a state of mind, peace is a commitment to a person, the Good Shepherd. We will see more of that on Christmas Eve, but again, let me remind you about what Jesus had to say about peace. In John 14:27, He said to His disciples,

Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Your heart must not be troubled or fearful. 

Lastly, when we yield to the Good Shepherd and become a member of His flock, we enjoy an abundant life. This abundant life comes to us because of the peace provided to us by the power of the Good Shepherd.

As you may remember, my family served as missionaries in Africa, which is a place rich in natural resources and labor, but which has a sadly underdeveloped economy. The reason for this is that Africa is an unstable place, politically, militarily, and socially. Few corporations are willing to invest large amounts of money or effort there, because of that instability.

Spiritually, in our natural state, we are as unstable as the African economy. We need someone to come into our lives, stabilize us, and give us the chance to have an abundant life. The only One who can do that is the Good Shepherd, who is the Son of Redemption.

Conclusion:

We may not realize it, but the story of our lives is a redemption arc. The question is not whether we need to be redeemed, but to what or to whom we are looking for that redemption. 

The Old Testament tells us that the only one who can provide us redemption is the Son of Redemption, and the New Testament agrees. The question is do we?

Merry Christmas!

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about the Son of Judgment

Today, as we continue in a series that I am calling “An Old Testament Christmas”  I want to share a word about the Son of Judgment from Malachi3:1-6.

The last time we were together, we looked at Psalm 2, and we saw that Jesus was the Son of Laughter. God laughed at the feeble rebellion of the nations of the world, and He sent His son not only to judge the sin of humanity, but also to redeem us, and to guide us into living righteous and abundant lives in a daily relationship with God. Today we will continue to unpack what the Bible tells us about Jesus as the Son of Judgment. 

No one looks forward to the moment of judgment, and so we often try to make light of it. For example:

• A mother told her son who was being naughty, “You’re in big trouble. Wait until your father comes home.” The son replied, “Good, then you’ll have someone else to yell at instead of me!”
• Why don’t lawyers have a fear Judgment Day? Because they’ve been practicing for it their whole lives.
• They said Judgment Day would be a final exam. I asked, “Is it open book?” The angel replied, “Only if your book is the right one.”
• Why was the math student sad during the exam? Because it had too many problems.

The fact is, God’s judgment is a fearsome thing, and it is nothing to look forward to. On the other hand, God is love. How does He balance those characteristics? Malachi 3:1-6 gives us insight to that this Christmas.

See, I am going to send my messenger, and he will clear the way before me. Then the Lord you seek will suddenly come to his temple, the Messenger of the covenant you delight in—see, he is coming,” says the Lord of Armies. But who can endure the day of his coming? And who will be able to stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner’s fire and like launderer’s bleach.  He will be like a refiner and purifier of silver; he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver. Then they will present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. And the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will please the Lord as in days of old and years gone by. I will come to you in judgment, and I will be ready to witness against sorcerers and adulterers; against those who swear falsely; against those who oppress the hired worker, the widow, and the fatherless; and against those who deny justice to the resident alien. They do not fear me,” says the Lord of Armies. “Because I, the Lord, have not changed, you descendants of Jacob have not been destroyed.”

Announcing Judgment:

Few people enjoy taking tests, but it helps if the tests are fair. No one wants to take a test when the answers to the questions were not covered in class. This does happen from time to time, however. In fact, this happened to my wife. Twice, in fact.

The first time was when a professor in her master’s program included questions on a test that came from the captions of photos and diagrams in the textbook. Yes, everyone was supposed to read the textbook, but her professor never pointed out the importance of those images to the class.  She did well on that test, but to her, taking questions from captions seemed unfair, and rightly so.

The second time this happened was when my wife was taking her comprehensive exam to graduate with her Educational Specialist (six-year) degree. The instructions she was given was to study all her notes and textbooks and then take the exam. Several questions on the exam had never been covered by any of her classes or professors, and she had no clue how to answer them. Again, she did pass her exam, but she was very frustrated about this as a professional educator. To her, that procedure was a glaring failure of educational theory from an institution which was supposed to be teaching her educational theory!

Our God is a just God, and He will never hold us responsible for something we have never heard about. In fact, God has sent us many messengers to tell us how to avoid judgment.

In the beginning, He walked with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day and taught them directly, face-to-face. He instructed them about the things that they could enjoy in the garden and the things which they must avoid. God taught them, perfectly, but they failed the test and faced judgment.

God also sent angels to teach people right from wrong and how to avoid judgment. In fact, the word “angel” means “messenger.” In the Bible, angels are always awesome figures, and they should be, because they are the ambassadors of God, revealing to people the message that God has for them. Some people, like Mary, the mother of Jesus, received the message of angels with humility and obedience. Some, like Jacob, were so arrogant that they wrestled with the messengers of God and resisted their word until the angels literally “put a hurting on them.”

God also revealed His Word to people. In our first message in this series I quoted my father, who had given me advice I had ignored, whereupon he said, “If you had done it like what I told you to, it would have worked!” He was also known to say, “If all else fails, read the instructions.” God gave us instructions about how to avoid judgment, but He would not read them for us! That was our responsibility!

Finally, and most often, God sent prophets, the men and sometimes women, who were sent to us with God’s message. They told us what God had told them, and they warned us heed their instruction. The last of these was John the Baptist, who Malachi 3:1 refers to. 

John was the last prophet of the Old Covenant, and his job was to prepare the way for the Messiah to come. Isaiah 40:3-5 describes it this way,

A voice of one crying out: Prepare the way of the Lord in the wilderness; make a straight highway for our God in the desert. Every valley will be lifted up, and every mountain and hill will be leveled; the uneven ground will become smooth and the rough places, a plain. And the glory of the Lord will appear, and all humanity together will see it, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

God has given us the answers to the test! We just need to pay attention!

Executing Judgment:

For judgment to be executed, words and actions must match. One of my favorite sayings about this comes from Alcoholics Anonymous: “If what you say and what you do don’t match, then what you say is a lie and what you do is the truth.”

If accountability without warning is wrong, then warning without accountability is also wrong. In addition, it is also ineffective. A story from my son’s work in television news is a great example of that.

A television station he once worked for was notorious for asking its field staff to work overtime to report on breaking news events in the city the station covered. At the end of every financial year the station leadership would announce that their overtime pay was too expensive, and that in the new fiscal year, overtime would be greatly curtailed to the point that it would become non-existent. That pronouncement would usually last a week or two at the most, and then the overtime assignments would return, as it nothing had ever been said. What they said, was “No more overtime.” What they did was just the opposite!

God’s actions and His Word are totally congruent. He had made a covenant with His people, beginning with Abraham. God would bless His people, and they would become a blessing to the world by taking God’s message to all peoples. 

God’s people were happy to have His blessing, but they were shy about taking His Word to the world. Therefore, God sent His Son to uphold God’s covenant with His people. He not only came to judge us, but He also came to purify us.

Being purified or refined is an excruciating process. I remember as a child having a cut or scrape that my parents would treat with Metholiade or Mercurochrome or iodine. Those treatments stung worse than the original cut or abrasion, but none of them ever became infected, either. 

Another example of the truth that the things that are good for us can be painful on the front end was the first time I received an injection for pain in my back and hip. When my doctor hit the nerve with the needle, it was like riding the lightning! I squealed like a little girl, and I almost came off the table! Once the injection was complete, however, I was pleased with the results. Not so much during it, however! 

Jesus did come to correct us, but out of God’s love for us, not out of His wrath. Proverbs 3:11-12 says,

Do not despise the Lord’s instruction, my son, and do not loathe his discipline; for the Lord disciplines the one he loves, just as a father disciplines the son in whom he delights.

Jesus came to make us like silver and gold. He also came to make us suitable to give offerings acceptable to God and pass God’s test of holiness!

Witnessing Judgment:

Have you ever heard the phrase, “If you see something, say something”? This was a phrase coined in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks to encourage people to report any potential acts of terrorism that they might see. Few people in the United States would ever be in a position to witness such an event, but if someone did, advance notice to the authorities could be vital in preventing a disaster.

A group of people much more likely to witness acts of violence is the humanitarian aid group, Doctors Without Borders. This is the group that sends medical personnel into war-torn areas of the world and into places where humanitarian disasters are happening. From the beginning, one of the major emphases of Doctors Without Borders has been to bear witness and to publicize what their personnel have seen as they responded to crises. This has led many governments around the world to condemn them as a political group; in some ways that is correct, and what they intend to be.

When our God looks down upon our lives, He sees them as they are. He does not avert His eyes from our sin, nor does He avert His eyes away from our troubles. Exodus 2:23-25 says,

After a long time, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned because of their difficult labor, they cried out, and their cry for help because of the difficult labor ascended to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the Israelites, and God knew.

It is one thing to see and to know, but it is another thing altogether to be able to act, and then to take action. Our God doesn’t just see, but He also acts! Isaiah 59:1 and 17-20 says,

Indeed, the Lord’s arm is not too weak to save, and his ear is not too deaf to hear . . .  He put on righteousness as body armor, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and he wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak. So he will repay according to their deeds: fury to his enemies, retribution to his foes, and he will repay the coasts and islands. They will fear the name of the Lord in the westand his glory in the east; for he will come like a rushing stream driven by the wind of the Lord. The Redeemer will come to Zion, and to those in Jacob who turn from transgression.” This is the Lord’s declaration.

Jesus came to redeem us from our slavery to sin and from our oppression! God always passes the test when it comes to watching out over His people!

Enduring Judgment:

One issue people must deal with is that few things are actually guaranteed in our world. We are familiar with concepts like “a limited warranty” or “terms and conditions apply.” We often take those factors into consideration when we buy a product. For example, the length of a warranty may help us to decide to purchase a particular automobile. Sometimes, these deals are not as good as you might expect them to be.

Early in our marriage, we had the brakes replaced on our car by at a shop which presented itself as being part of a national auto repair chain. This chain was famous for providing a life-time warranty for parts and labor if anything went wrong with a car’s brakes. They even gave us a very impressive certificate to document this “life-time warranty for as long as you own your car” which I carefully stored away if needed in the future.

Later, after we moved to another state, we had problems with our brakes, and we took our car into local shop from that same nationwide chain. To our chagrin, we found that our warranty was not valid in that state. It seems that the franchisee in the previous state did not have an agreement with the franchisee in our current state, and our “nationwide life-time warranty for as long as you own your car” was worthless.

We have very few things we can rely upon in our world, and only one thing we can rely upon in this world and the next. That one is God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The Holy and Unchangeable God of the Universe. Hebrews 13:5-8 tells us,

Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation.  Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever.

The coming of Jesus, His sinless life, His atoning death, His victorious resurrection, and His triumphant return for us on the Day of the Lord clearly demonstrate that God passes the test of time and that we can trust Him with our past, our present, and our future!

Conclusion:

The Day of the Lord will come and none of us will be able to stand in our own right and on our own works on that day. As Malachi 3:2 asks, 

“But who can endure the day of his coming? And who will be able to stand when he appears?”

Malachi answered that for us, but we can also see that answer expressed this way in Isaiah 4:28-31,

Do you not know? Have you not heard? Yahweh is the everlasting God, the Creator of the whole earth. He never grows faint or weary; there is no limit to His understanding. He gives strength to the weary and strengthens the powerless. Youths may faint and grow weary, and young men stumble and fall, but those who trust in the Lord will renew their strength; they will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not faint.

The Day of the Lord will be a horrible day for many, but not for those in Christ! Praise His name for that!

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt