The King We Asked For vs. the King We Need

Transcript

Auto-generated from the audio. Click a timestamp to jump to that part of the video.

[0:00] Well, let's move into our sermon text for today is Isaiah 42, 1 through 4. We're not going to read it just yet because I want to get a little bit of introduction before we get to it. Again, we're in a, this is week four. Oh, wait, I need these handed out. We have, so the enterprise is growing here. And now instead of a half sheet, we have a whole sheet. So I apologize, I guess. I don't know. But, yeah. Oh, no, I have one in my pocket. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, no, I have one filled out here. Actually, give me one just so I can track along to make sure they look the same. Thank you.

[0:37] So we're in an eight-week sermon series called Rescue, the Bible in eight weeks. We're learning about the whole Bible in eight weeks. You're like, no, that's impossible. It is impossible. But here's what we've got so far. The first week was about the creation. The second week, the fall. Last week, the promised land. This week, the promised king. Next week, exile and return. Then week six is the life of Jesus. Week seven is Pentecost and the church. And week eight, the final week, is the future hope. So just as a quick, I'm going even faster now, sort of in our summaries of what has come before us. In the first week, we learn that God rescues us from nonexistence. And he creates us not because he has to, but because he wants to. And because he wants humans to care for the rest of creation in a meaningful way and to be creators themselves. In week two, we learned about the fall and into the beauty and goodness of what God created. Evil appears and deceives humankind and the consequences of that we are living with to this very day. No doubt about that. And then last week, week three, we saw God try to rescue the world through his covenant making with Abraham in the hope that calling a special people to himself, the descendants of Abraham, would make them a light to all other people.

[1:57] So in other words, he was going to save the world. He was going to save the world through one special people. And his hope was that they would be so good and so special that everybody else looking at them would go, what do they have that we want and we should get that too? Do you think that worked out? No, of course not. It didn't work out. And always we say God tries and these failures are not God's failures. They're always our failures, right? So this week, we're going to hear about the history from Abraham to Isaiah. It's very ambitious. And how the people wanted a king like other nations had. But how again, they didn't. And that didn't work out. So God had to find another way to rescue his people. And that, as Ellen alluded to, is the promised king that is always pointing forward to Jesus coming. So today, listen to the promise of God to finally bring a good and reliable king who will put an end to all the trying that God has been doing and to do some, well, what we would say doing. God, instead of trying, think of Yoda again, you know, don't try. You know, God's done trying. And he's going to actually start doing when he brings this promise. Right?

[3:07] Right? Right? Right? Right? Right? He will bring justice to all who have been wronged. He will not falter or lose heart until justice prevails throughout the earth. Even distant lands beyond the sea will wait for his instruction.

[3:45] So that sounds good. That's a different kind of king, isn't it? Think about that. He will not crush the weakest reed or put out the flickering candle. He will bring justice. So different from the kings and leaders we have in our world now. Well, we're going to try to start with a famous first sentence of a famous book. And I don't think anyone will get this, but this is from The Once and Future King, The Sword and the Stone by T.H. White, which is wonderful. Everyone should read this. It's so good. So heartbreaking. It's like a lot of drama, a lot of comedy. It's just really heartbreaking and great. All at the same time. But this is how that book begins. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, it was court hand and simulay logicalis. While the rest of the week, it was organon, repetition, and astrology. So this is what The Once and Future King was supposed to study every week. So he was learning, I think. But that's from The Once and Future King. And we're talking about The Future King, so I thought that would work out. So let's set that aside. But I want to point out one thing, and this is the challenge here, is that we're doing an eight-week sermon series, and the first three weeks are just in one book, Genesis.

[5:02] And this is not a problem, but it feels like a problem, okay? Because where's the rest of the book? Well, we're going to skim through about 20, 25 books today. It's a little unfair, but it just goes to show how important Genesis is. You've got to know Genesis. It's all laid out in Genesis. All of it. All of it. It's just all pointing to one direction in Genesis. So you've kind of got to know. You've got to know Genesis well. But we need to understand God as creator who has this original plan for humanity, and then sin enters the world and messes up that plan through the lies of evil and the bad choices of humans. And God sets off on a course to bring his people back. Even in Chapter 3 of Genesis, God is formulating a plan to rescue his people. Like this idea of rescuing his people is from Chapter 3. Genesis. All the way to the end of the book. So this idea of rescue is everywhere in the Bible.

[6:03] And so he says, I'm going to rescue them from the power and bondage of sin. And there's this concept that sin gets progressively worse over time. Each generation is a little bit more sinful than the one before. And so something has to be done to bring it in and sort of curtail it and deal with it in an effective way. So that's just Chapter 1 and 3 of Genesis. And then last week we saw Chapter. Chapter 15 where God says, okay, I made covenant not to destroy the earth anymore like I did in the time of Noah. He's not saying that was a mistake, but he says, I'll never do that again. That's not the way I'm going to deal with evil. Instead, I'm going to deal with the concept of sin and how to rescue my people by making a covenant where he promises to protect his people, give them a land and a heritage in exchange for their exclusive worship. So that's the deal that they make together. There's a shaking hands on that. You. You worship me exclusively, which doesn't sound that hard, but we must think about it. Then it must actually be that hard to worship God exclusively. This seems to be actually the hardest thing that God ever asked anyone to do. And it seems to be the one thing that humans, as the way we're wired now, are actually incapable of doing is just to worship God exclusively.

[7:19] You know, like going steady with somebody. Don't date anyone else. It's just that simple. And then when you're married, it's even more. Like formalized. Right. And often God compares his people to, you know, as like as if they were a bride, you know.

[7:33] But so God is even though this is very important. God is working through one family, the descendants of Abraham and one people. He does. He is not unconcerned about. You know, I think I missed. I'm going to go back. OK. He's not unconcerned about the rest of humanity. They're his children and his creation, too. So that would be all the people who aren't the descendants of Abraham. So his plan is, like I said, is for his chosen people in turn to rescue the rest of humanity by being a light to them and show them the personality and love of the one true God. And we need to remember this because then it becomes the role of the church.

[8:15] We need to see ourselves that way, too. We're taking on that mantle of being a light to the nations. And Jesus himself is very explicit about this. You know, let your light so shine before. Others that they glorify your father in heaven. This idea that we are then to be the light to the to the nations so that people who don't yet believe in God can meet him, too. Now, I realize this is always a challenge for me. I realize I missed the first thing. So this first one on your sheet is this sentence gets longer and longer every week. It's kind of fun. At the end, it'll be a paragraph. But this is how we would say it this time is the Bible. The Bible is a book about God. That's how we started us. The week two was the Bible is a book about God rescuing us from sin.

[9:03] And then last week it was God is the Bible is a book about God rescuing us from sin by the covenant. Because we're talking about covenant last week. And then how we're going to end it now is God is the Bible is a book about God rescuing us from sin by the covenant, comma, promising a new king to sacrifice himself for us. So a little bit longer. But there's. It goes promising a new king to sacrifice himself for us. So that's that's the first line. I'll try to stay on top of these. I get I get so excited about the preaching part. I forget the filling in the blank part. So if you think I've missed a blank, you raise your hand and tell me and I will go back and because some of you are blank fillers and you love that. And you're like, there's this part of your personality that's like unhappy if the blank is blank. Right. You know, where's the where's the answer to that one? OK.

[9:57] Yes. Yes, I should. I know it's very long. Promising a new king to sacrifice himself for us. That one was a bit verbose. I could have shortened it up, but it didn't happen. So let's go to. All right. So last we're still kind of talking about last week hidden in Genesis 15. This is important where we talked about in Genesis 15, we talked about the promise of God. Right.

[10:35] Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. many powerful ways. So for today, we're going to continue in the Old Testament. We're going to talk really about two, well, multiple kings, but really two kings. The one king that's asked for and the one king that's promised. And there's a difference between the two. And next week, we're going to finish the Old Testament. We look at the concept of exile and return, which bridges us to the time between the Old Testament and the New Testament and prepares us for the life of Jesus and then how God rescues us through his son. So I like you to kind of think of it this way, is that there's these sort of stages along the way where God is in a phase where he's rescuing his people through covenant. He's rescuing his people through the law. He's rescuing his people through the prophets and the kings. And eventually, as it says in Hebrews, in ages past is how Hebrews begins, you know, in days past, God, you know, spoke to his people through his prophets. But in these last days, he's spoken to us through his sons. This idea that this man, this whole covenant relationship moves from all these other pieces finally to the son. And we're not even there yet, but we're pointing forward. We're always pointing forward to us. We're pointing

[11:58] forward to it today. So I'm going to catch us up from Genesis 15 to the middle of the Old Testament. And so you can listen, just let these little bells ring in your head like, oh, that reminds me of something, but I want to kind of hold this all together. So there's a lot of Bible history that's coming up right now. I'm excited about it. But let's just start with the Bible. And I'm going to catch up from Genesis 15 to the middle of the Old Testament. So I want to reiterate that God tries to rescue us. That doesn't mean he's unable to rescue us. He limits himself in this because he does not want to take away our own agency as created creators ourselves. So we have a mind of our own and we now have the knowledge of good and evil. So to make us do things, to make us be righteous would be to take away the essence of his own creation in us. And he loves us too much to do that. So God, tries, but we fail. There's always an important distinction. There's God's, God's work is not bad. It's our response to it that's always messed up. So we should see the Old Testament from Genesis 15 to here as a series of episodes of God trying to rescue his people and it going about as well as you could expect, which is to say terrible, right? When people are rescued, they're very

[13:15] excited. They want to live into it. They, they swear. They're going to swear up and down. They're going to worship God exclusively all the rest of their lives, but pretty quickly they forget and they end up doing foolish things like they always did. So as God prophesied to Abraham, and this is the history now we're beginning, this would be Exodus. Abraham's descendants did go to Egypt for 400 years before they were rescued by God. And at first they were honored guests, but over time they were forced into slavery. So this is the story of Exodus. God rescued them in a very dramatic way by parting the waters of the sea. And then they were rescued. And then they were brought to the Red Sea and letting them walk across safely while the army that followed after them was drowned. So this is now the second point. The prophecy of captivity and rescue did come true. Simple. The captive, the promise of the prophecy, not a promise, the prophecy of captivity and rescue did come true.

[14:11] But then this is so interesting. They get out, they get past the Red Sea. They're in the wilderness. And it did not take long for them to forget what God had just done. And they saw it. They saw fire in the sky. They saw the water part. Like this should be pretty memorable. This should be pretty significant to them. But they began to grumble in the desert along the way. And they said, I wish we could go back to Egypt and eat all the melons and the onions that are so good there. So the old patterns keep coming back. This is number three, the third bullet point. The people grumbled and died. And they're like, is God with us or not? That's an actual quote from Exodus. Is the Lord with us or not?

[14:56] And how could you even ask that? But they did. It's very interesting. So he gave them another covenant at Mount Sinai, which I've been to on the back of a camel. I went to the top of Mount Sinai. Very cool.

[15:11] And the camel is very uncomfortable. So whoever is riding a camel every day, I don't know. Maybe you get used to it. But this was the covenant. This is the covenant of law. And it's one of the most significant things God has given his people. It gave them simple rules to live by that enhanced their lives in many ways. It's actually counterintuitive. Giving somebody a lot of boundaries and laws actually makes their lives better in so many important ways. It actually frees them up from worrying about all those, their own protection, theoretically. If they live in a culture, society that protects them from theft and murder. That frees them up. To go have the safety to go do all sorts of life-giving things. So, and the law is so good. And I would put this in the category of pretty good, but nowhere perfect. In the sense that it was perfect from God's point of view. But for us, it still failed. But it was still, I think, the best thing that ever happened to humans apart from Jesus. Was these really meaningful boundaries on life. That made life more full and more, just more sort of flourishing to it. And Paul talks about this. Paul has this very interesting relationship with the law. He talks about it. He says, the law is good all on its own.

[16:33] It orders life. It brings about human flourishing. And that tells us about the nature of sin. That the thing that helps us most apart from grace is a moral restraint on our lives. And so we don't abandon the law. We think about the law. We consider it. We consider the law. And the law teaches us to go back to the cross on our knees. Begging for grace. But it can order our lives. It can order our lives in really important ways. But Paul said, the problem with the law is, again, not that God made a mistake giving it. But that we're incapable of keeping it. And Paul says, even when we do keep it, we may still be sinning because we keep it for selfish reasons. Isn't that crazy? Even keeping the law can be done. In a sinful way. We have never stopped inventing ways to be sinful. That's another theme. We can keep the law to make ourselves look good. That's a sin. Do you get that? Because you're not doing it for God. You're not doing it for your neighbor. You're doing it for yourself. And you're exchanging this exclusive worship of God for the worship of your own self and your own reputation.

[17:47] So we make ourselves sinful. We make ourselves look good. Or, very importantly, we should not discount this, we make other people look bad by putting on a big show of how well we're keeping the law. And it seems to me that we are the most insecure people ever. Or the most insecure species of animals that ever exist. All the other animals seem pretty okay in their own skin. But we really want to let everybody else know how good we are. And how bad you all are.

[18:19] Right? Right? Right? Right? Right? Paul says. What's, yes, I know, I know. Thank you, Karen. Because that was, number four is, the law was life, and yet it brought, this is one word, the law was life, and yet it only brought death in the end. The law was life, and it was good life. So the law did help God's people as long as they kept it in front of them and kept their own egos out of it. So the law is good. The covenant of the law is very powerful. It's very important, and it's still with us today in some important ways, but Jesus comes to fulfill the law in ways that we can't. Super important. So let's catch us up to one of our readings where we discuss two kings, the asked for and the promised. And just before this sort of time where they ask for a king, we get another one of those passages similar to the preamble to the story of Noah, where God saw that, humankind was completely wicked all the time. This time we can read it at the end of the book of Judges. Very important. There's all these transitions in the Bible that kind of point to the Bible being really good literature. So there's these, there aren't these always these abrupt changes. There's sometimes these foreshadowing and all sorts of other literary

[20:05] devices that I think are there because they show that the Bible is sort of a complete and unified work in a lot of important ways, and thematically it all flows together. Right before the story of Noah, it says all the people were, all that God saw was the people being evil all the time and it grieved his heart. And that's a stopping place in a way, it's a transition point because the next thing that happens is the flood and a big change to how the world is ordered. Here in the end of Judges, it says, and this is really important, in those days Israel had no king, we're talking about the king, all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes. That's number five. So the end of Judges, everyone did what was right in their own eyes. That does, could sound good to you, but it actually means all sorts of terrible things happening. And if you read Judges, you read all of Judges, it's like the most terrifying. Book of the Bible. Really, it is the most terrifying book of the Bible, of the things that happen in that book. And they're not things that God does, they're things that God witnesses with tears, they're things that humans do to each other. So the people were doing whatever seemed right in their own eyes and it was not going well.

[21:30] So you would think then, just like right before the story of Noah, this would be sort of a literary transition point in the Bible. That something big has to happen after this. And indeed it does. So we get the story then where the people say, in essence, there's no king. Maybe the king will straighten all this out. Maybe the king will curtail our own behavior, which is so terrible. Never mind that the law was supposed to do that. The correct worship of God was supposed to do that. So they are still looking to some human source to make them better. And we know. So, and they, they're, another way that humans are sort of insecure is they look at what other people have and they want it for themselves, right? So the people of Israel looked around at their neighbors and they said, they have gods that are made out of marble or metal or statues or things like that. And you can see them and you can bow down to them and you can worship them. But our God is invisible. I wish we had some. We have no physical representation of our God. So they fell into idolatry. The other thing they looked around at all the nations around them and they said, those people have kings. He wears a golden crown. He wears nice robes. He seems strong.

[22:50] You know, he projects power across the border. He's somebody we can, we can have a treaty with, we can have negotiations with. And the people look up to him, hopefully. And so, but we don't have a king. All we have are these prophets and judges. And. And sort of this sort of a few priests and we don't have, we have this decentralized thing. God is our king, but we don't want God to be our king. We want a human being to be our king, right? So the people asked for the king and we read that passage.

[23:22] And the real crux of this week is we're kind of catching up to where we want to be now is the difference between the king that the people ask for and the warning about the king that they will actually get, which is bad. And the real king that God day will someday send as his way to stop trying to rescue the world and start doing the rescuing of the world. So the people ask and they're warned. You say you want a king, but you really don't. And this is a good reminder that to us not to have too many heroes, heroes, especially political ones. It doesn't work out. And as Samuel tells the people, the warning from God, the king you get will tax you. He'll take your sons for his army. They'll take all sorts of stuff from you. And in the end, though, because he's a fallen human being, he'll be corrupt. He won't actually be somebody that you could look up to. So number six, be careful.

[24:17] You guys can fill this out. Be careful what you ask for. God says, give it to them. If they're asking for it, give it to them. How else am I going to teach them unless they learn from their own mistakes? And so I think it's amazing what God says to Samuel. He says, Let them have it.

[24:38] What else can we do? And then when they come crying to me because the king is horrible, I won't listen, which is a tough one. That's a tough one to read in the scriptures. It's not actually true, though. I mean, he doesn't listen in one respect, but in the sense that he doesn't do something about it right away. But he does listen to it because he sends another king, a true king that we understand to be Jesus.

[25:02] So now begins a long history to get from this. From there to Isaiah, a long history that we don't need to go into great detail of the kings of God's people, starting with King Saul, as you understand it, King David, King Solomon. Did you know? I mean, how did this start?

[25:25] Terribly. Like the first king. Okay. Started off okay. But it did not take long for Saul to make mistake after mistake after mistake. So God said, okay, I'm going to replace him with this young, handsome shepherd boy, King David. Now here's a problem. David was made king by Samuel while Saul was still king. How does that work out?

[25:52] There's only one way that things like that work out. War, bloodshed. So this early, the first two kings warred against each other. It's crazy. Like this is how it starts. It doesn't start well. So if it doesn't start well, it's not going to work. It's not going to work well. It's like going into a job interview, you know, like 20 minutes late and you've got a big stain on your shirt and you're like, I'm going to nail this one. No, no. First impressions matter, you know. So the first impression with Saul was bad. King David was better, but not without his flaws. Okay. King Solomon sort of started out on a high note. Not so great. In the end. Not so great. A lot of mistakes.

[26:38] And Absalom, you get the rest. And it did not even take long for the problem with the succession of kingships to end up dividing the nation into two different nations. That did not take, that was just within the first few kings. So then we start talking about the southern kingdom, which was we call Judah and maybe the tribe of Benjamin, and the northern kingdoms, the ten kingdoms of the north, which end up being kings. And then the northern kingdom would end up being called Israel, which again is always so confusing because Judah is the southern kingdom, Israel is the northern kingdom, before that, Israel is all the people of God, and then in the sort of the New Testament time, Israel just means all the remaining people. So the word Israel gets a little bit of overuse. So if you hear me talk about it, what I'll try to say is the northern kingdom, the northern kingdom ended up having its own kings, the southern kingdom ended up having its own kings. So there's a lot of lopsided differences. books in the Bible connected to this. First and Second Samuel, First and Second Kings, First and Second Chronicles, that's six books right there that talk about the lineage of all these different kings. And you have to keep track of two kingdoms and all their kings. And a lot of these dynasties

[27:52] fail. They fall apart. So, okay, be careful what you ask for. All right. So, some kings are better than others. Some are extremely bad kings, and none of them are truly good. And even the ones we consider to be good, we put maybe David and Josiah at the top of the list of the best kings that Israel ever had. They both had pretty important flaws that we need to pay attention to.

[28:23] So, what's this whole time like? Bad king after bad king, political division, creeping idolatry, individualism, and then the next one. And so, what's this whole time like? Bad king after bad king, ill-conceived alliances. You don't have to write this down. Ill-conceived alliances with foreign powers, personal and sexual shortcomings. These are the kings. Not great. This is how it went. So, you know, I think what we have to remind people is, you know, some people will look at the Bible and say, the Bible's full of all sorts of terrible stuff. How can you believe in it?

[28:58] The terrible stuff, is what people do. And God responds to it by saying, I love them, and I'm going to rescue them. And so, we do say, yes, it's full of terrible stuff, but it's not a reflection of God. It's a reflection of people. And it's ultimately the most realistic view of humanity. If we really are honest about what humanity is like, the Bible is the most honest religious text there is about the nature of humanity. And so, at least the Bible tells the truth about how people are. Okay. So, in the geopolitical arena of this time, these bad kings are responsible for the destruction of their nations. It's kind of like a bus driver driving a bus off a cliff with all the passengers inside. The kings are at the controls. They're gonna, they're like, I'm gonna crash this plane with all the people on board. It's, this is what it's like. They run everything off a cliff. And so, the northern kingdom with its ten tribes are conquered by the Assyrians in the eighth century, B.C. And they essentially disappear from history. The southern kingdom falls to the Babylonians in 586 B.C. They do maintain their identity in part because it was in captivity that they systematically, this is important, set out to take all the oral and written traditions they had and to begin to

[30:19] commit to writing the Old Testament as we have it, at least up to that point in history. So, since we're talking about the Bible, it's important to know how the Bible came to us. And this time of captivity in Babylon was the time when the Babylonians were going to be the first to be captured alive. Right to about Isaiah. So then after that, and we'll talk more about this next week, Ezra and Nehemiah detail their return from the land. And we'll look at that more of that next week. But number seven then would be history repeats itself as the people are once again taken into captivity and need to be rescued. So that's if you want to pull that out. People, there's two captivities. We talk about the captivity of God's people. And one time it's from Egypt and back again. Another time is to Babylon and back again. But ultimately it's bondage and captivity to sin, death, and the devil, and idolatry. And God in a larger sense overall says, I'm going to rescue you from that whole problem that you have, the problem of sin. And God always has a plan. God has a plan. So this is a good place now to note that we could look at the struggles of the people of God, and this is what they are. They're in and out of faithfulness. They're falling into idolatry. They're trusting

[31:59] in worldly power. We want a king instead of God. They're making it about themselves. Oh, thank you, Krista. Oh, that's so nice. She either did that because she cared about me or because she was annoyed by my clearing my throat. No, I'm kidding. She was. All love. Now, trusting in worldly power instead of God. Get this, making it about themselves all the time. Do you know that saying, like, somebody sees some tragedy in the world, something going on, and they have to post on Twitter about it, which is how you get fired from your job. But they're like, and other people respond like, good job making that about yourself.

[32:44] Go ahead and make this about yourself. It's not about yourself, you know. So the law is not about, it's not about looking good, but I'm going to find a way to make it about myself. Importing their own sin into the worship of God and calling it holy. Wow. So we could look at that and say, oh, these are the problems of the people in the Old Testament. How quaint, how interesting, nice historical footnote. Think about it for a second, though. These are the minefields that the church in our time has to walk through every day. It's important to study the Old Testament. And the people of the Old Testament, because they're a reflection of us and our struggles, our failure to live into covenant, our lack of faithfulness, our falling into idolatry, our trusting in worldly power instead of God. Holy cow, right? Making it about ourselves all the time, importing our own sin into the worship of God and calling it holy. I've seen it. I've seen it happen. So there's an analog between every mistake we, we make now and the mistakes they made then. So the Old Testament is not some dusty book for some other people somewhere. It's our book if we read it with our eyes open. That's why the Bible, we're talking about the Bible in the next weeks, but the Old Testament is indispensable.

[34:04] Genesis is indispensable. The rest of the book is indispensable. This history between Genesis and Isaiah is indispensable. It teaches us so much about ourselves. So number eight says we, we need to see the struggles of the people of God in the Old Testament as, in the Righteous Right didn't move things forward on God's plan to rescue the world. In fact, instead of being a light to other nations, which was the goal, they brought darkness to their own people and other people were not impressed at all. In fact, they conquered them and tried to destroy them. So we'll get into that more next week when you talk about the exile and the return because there is some beautiful sort of hope and and messianic thinking when we talk about God speaking to his people in captivity. But the plan is that God will now bring a king that is in every way the opposite of the king they were warned about. And it's the opposite of all the kings that they got. And now we know who this king is. And here it's a good time to define one word that we will use from here on out and it's the word messiah. This is the king that's promised. And the word messiah it's a It's a Hebrew word. It literally means the anointed one. And it comes, the Greek root of that word, there's roots for words.

[35:52] And then when they get kind of changed by their various inflections and declensions and all sorts of things like that, they get changed into different words, but they have the same sound at the beginning of them. So the Hebrew root word is mashal, which means to rub oil on something. And so in one case in the Old Testament, it's used to describe somebody polishing their shield with olive oil to make it shiny and to keep it from rusting, right? So this idea of mashal is to rub something with oil. But like we see when David is made king, he's anointed by oil being poured on his head, and that makes him the mashaya. Like he's the one that has the oil poured on his head. And so this Messiah is the anointed one, the one that has God's... special favor to do something special in the world. The Greek translation of Messiah is Christos. So when we say Jesus Christ, we're saying Jesus the Messiah. And often you'll see in your Bibles, there's a footnote every time, especially in the NRSV where it says Jesus Christ. The bottom, it says Messiah. It says this is the Greek word for the word Messiah. When we say Jesus Christ, we're actually making a very important claim that Christ is the long-promised king. The Messiah.

[37:09] Jesus, like, Christ is not Jesus' last name. You know, like Bob Jones. Bob Jones, sorry, that was bad. Somebody else, like Hans-Erik Nelson, you know. Christ is not his last name. Christ is his title. He's Jesus the Christ. Jesus the Messiah. And it is a theological claim about who Jesus was. It is. And very interesting, once I said the word Jesus Christ in some casual conversation, and somebody asked me not to say it.

[37:42] Because they said, I just want to think of Jesus as just a man. When you call him Christ, you're implying that he's the son of God and the promised king. And I don't believe that. So please change how you talk to make me happy, I guess was what they were saying. And I was like, wow, so you actually understand that. You're just rejecting it.

[38:02] And I don't know if I did or not. I tried to be thoughtful. But I also felt like I was. I felt like it was one of those things where I was like, no, I feel like I kind of need to keep saying that Jesus is the Christ. Because I believe it. But maybe find a way to say it in a way that doesn't hurt their feelings. That was an interesting conversation. You kind of have to do two things at once in those. And that's interesting.

[38:27] So, oh, we're doing great. All right. We're going to stop there. How's that for history? I mean, that's just like the encyclopedia of history. Okay. So, what do we want to do? We're getting, yes, I know. I know. This is the next thing. Thank you for waving your papers at me. That's good.

[38:46] A little drink here. Think of this. I'm going to ask you this question. How is this lens on God's overarching plan to rescue the world with the promised king helping you to understand scripture? Because I want us to take this and go, okay. When we read the Old Testament. Especially about the kings. We're reading about us. I mean, that helps me when I read the Old Testament. When I'm reading the Old Testament, where is God at work rescuing the world from sin? Is it by his covenant? Is it by his law? Is it by the prophets? All the rest.

[39:24] And how is it always pointing towards Jesus? And then the Old Testament starts to come alive. And then all of the Bible comes alive. As this sort of grand story of how God is rescuing the world. And so, Eric's going to come around with the microphone. This way people at home can hear you. And I haven't said hello to everybody at home. Hello. I'm really glad you're with us. But if you're willing to share. Last week a few people shared. Maybe you can share again if you want to. Or this week new people share.

[39:52] Putting this all together. Are there any aha moments for you? Where you're like, ah, I can kind of see this larger narrative throughout the Bible. It's going to help me understand how all of this hangs together. And just raise your hand if you have any. And then if you raise your hand, Eric will come to you. Because we can edify each other by sort of sharing these ideas with each other. How is this helping you understand the Bible as we go forward? And if everybody says not at all, then I have more work to do. Clearly that's fine. No problem. But yes, Steve. And here comes Eric. So thank you. Thank you. I'm always nervous until the first person raises their hand. And then it's like an avalanche that starts. Go ahead, Steve. Well, as we're seeing in a big overview of the Bible. It's.

[40:36] It obviously glorifies what God is doing. But it's also very sad in terms of our own sinfulness. As you've been talking about it. This is what God tries to do. But he obviously gives us agency and also allows us to suffer the consequences of our own sinfulness. Is that God allows sort of people to do as they want. And we see the various. As I think about the various ways that God provides opportunity for us to turn to him. Through like Adam and Eve. Through the Garden of Eden. Through Noah. Through the Kings. But obviously we all fall short of that. And then we. That obviously shows the need for Jesus to come in. And provide the true sacrifice and redemption. So it's a nice overview of everything. Obviously. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. It's a great point is that, you know, the people come and say we want a king. And God could say no. By all. By no means. Don't. Don't anoint anyone. Same. Right.

[41:39] Right. Right. Right. Right. It reminds me very much of the Jesus Storybook Bible that talks about every story whispers his name. Exactly. And I love that. That was the concept in it. That little Bible, the children's Bible, opens up talking about how many people read the Bible thinking it's a book about good people. In actuality, it's a book about failed people. And yet how God still loves and rescues us. And so I think as we read the scriptures, it just reminds me to look for God even in the midst of disappointment. And even in our own daily life is to look for his fingerprints and recognize he's still in the story. We just have to look harder sometimes. Yeah.

[42:46] One more at least. I was going to call on Chris, but he spoke last week. He seemed so thoughtful, Chris. Let's go over to Chris real quick. There. I just saw him. You know, he had his hand on his chin. So I can sense when people are thinking. I could be wrong, though. Clearly, he's thinking. I think it's interesting because bringing me back to last week where I'm thinking about the end in mind, actually. Yes. Where this week I was in a Bible study and we were studying Acts. And the interesting part for Acts is it's the Great Commission. And all that thing's happening is this person who was talking was saying that it's, you know, the Great Commission is just the beginning of it all. It's essentially the next step is for you to. If Jesus starts one half of the project and it's actually if you read through additionally, the Bible starts talking that it's additional. There's an additional part that has to come specifically. I think it's like bringing peace to everything. It's like there's other. I didn't was very, very paying attention perfectly for that one. But. But in that context, it's interesting that that's still the other half of the covenant is still requirement. Try to think that's what was going in my head.

[44:06] But this is like it's always beginning of one half than the other half. And then this part with the idea of judges is it's the covenant is still being failed. God's still providing his half. And now we're here. Yeah. Then the other thing I was thinking about with Karen, this is like we're just to say we're not done till we're done. When we get to a week, we will talk about the Book of Revelation. And that's the only point at which we can really finally rest. Because until then, a lot of this is still the problem of God trying and us failing. It's even with Jesus. But Jesus does make a huge the biggest difference in all of it. And in some sense, you could say he does.

[44:42] He does solve it for all time. But we still have to we have to receive it. Yeah. Go ahead. Chris. Sorry. Yeah. And that was interesting. It was really funny with the part with Karen talking about, like, all the failings of people in the Bible. The Bible is full of terrible people. But then we always have these children book stories where it's like heroes. Of the Bible. Exactly. Yeah. And I'm like, Daniel, right? It's not a good book for you to share with the kids. But do not read the Bible to your children. No kidding. I didn't read the Bible to your children. Just do it the right way, you know? Yeah, there's that context as well. So those are some thoughts. Thank you, Chris. Anyone else? There's going to be time next year. Brian, go ahead. Yeah.

[45:27] I just think. that the Bible does contain stories of people who are listening to God, who are indwelt by the Spirit. So it's this odd combination of failure and success and Spirit-enabled life. Which makes for good literature, doesn't it? Complex people with difficult motivations that sometimes shine, sometimes fail. Yeah, it's great literature. Thank you. Yeah, and...

[45:59] Well, I'll stop talking. That's good. Well, let's pray and thank you everybody who shared. There'll be chances to share in future weeks. Oh, here's what I was going to say. That's what it was. The goal in all of this is God wants to get us back to the place where we're His created co-creators and that we do meaningful work in this world. He wants to bring us back to that place. That's His heart's desire, is to restore relationship with us. We're His people. Which He does do through Jesus Christ. And that sets us free to be a light to the world. So I think that's where we're always driving to, is that what does it mean for us in this world is this, when we come to Jesus and we're renewed and the Holy Spirit indwells us, then we start moving out into the world in a way that reconciles the rest of the world back to God too. So we're His ambassadors to this world, as the Apostle Paul says. So let's go ahead and pray. Lord, thank you again for your Bible. So big and so long. And so kind. And so complex. And so powerful. And so conflicted. And so full of joy and pain and victory and defeat. Father, help us to just love this word that you've given us.