Good morning, friends, and welcome to Sabbath School Study Hour. We're glad to see you all here again on this beautiful Sabbath morning, as we're going continue our study together in God's Word. Our lesson is dealing with the book of Matthew. It's a brand-new quarter - brand-new study. For those of you who might be joining us across the country and around the world, this is what the quarterly looks like for this next thirteen weeks' study time period.
If you don't have a copy of the lesson quarterly - we're going to be looking at lesson #1 today - you can go to the Amazing Facts website and you could download lesson #1. And today's lesson is entitled The Son of David and it gets into our study of the book of Matthew. We have a free offer we'd like to let you know about. It's a book entitled down from his glory and this is our free offer today. If you call our resource number it's 866-788-3966 and you can ask for offer #701.
We'll be happy to send this to anybody (in North America) who calls and asks. Again, that number is -788-3966 - ask for offer #701. We'll be happy to send that to you. If you're outside of North America and you'd like to get the offer, just go to the Amazing Facts website. You can actually download a pdf version of the book for free at the Amazing Facts website - just amazingfacts.
org. Now, instead of our usual singing together at the beginning of our Sabbath School Study Hour, we're very happy to have the weimar choir joining us today and they're going to be bringing us a special musical item at this time. O Lord, my God o Lord, my God how great thou art. O Lord, my God, when I in awesome wonder consider all the worlds thy hands have made; I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder, thy power throughout the universe displayed. Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee, how great thou art, how great thou art.
Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee, how great thou art, how great thou art! When through the wood and forest glades I wander and hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees when I look down from lofty mountain grandeur and hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze then sings my soul, how great thou art. And when I think that God his son not sparing sent him to die - I scarce can take it in then sings my soul, how great thou art. That on the cross my burden gladly bearing he bled and died to take away my sin then sings my soul, how great thou art then sings my soul, how great thou art my God, how great thou art! When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation and take me home - what joy shall fill my heart! Then I shall bow in humble adoration and there proclaim, my God, how great thou art! Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee, how great thou art, how great thou art. Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to thee, o Lord my God, o Lord my God, o Lord my God, how great thou art! Amen! Amen. Thank you so much weimar choir.
Beautiful song. Well, from time to time we try to give you a little mission update of some activity - some outreach - that's been happening amongst some of our church members - also from Amazing Facts. Today we're going to be sharing with you a little update on a mission trip to thailand. Carissa is going to be coming forward - and ostap - and they're going to be sharing an afcoe outreach program that took place, oh a couple months back - I think it was December. Thank you, we're looking forward to hearing what you have to share.
Good morning. Happy Sabbath. We want to share with you, briefly, here a little mission spotlight about the work that just occurred this past December in thailand. We had a massive missionary endeavor - again, we were going to a very predominantly buddhist country - thailand. For many people that we were ministering to, they had never heard the name Jesus Christ before.
We had the privilege of working with an incredible australian team there in thailand that organized this entire event, working closely with chuck holtry, our afcoe director. We took a team of 14 afcoe graduates and over 20 medical personnel to go and work in thailand and make an impact for Jesus Christ. Our focus while we were there was children's evangelism, medical evangelism, and then also conducting six prophecy seminars. That's a lot of work, isn't it? Many of the church members here at Granite Bay were a part of that missionary endeavor. The nakabayashis, janelle, many others were involved, and we just so appreciate that support.
Ostap was one of our speakers there in thailand - one of the afcoe graduates. Ostap, what was your experience like as a speaker in thailand? Thailand, for me, was a very unique country. It's my first time in thailand and the people were so welcoming and warm and just greeted us and accepted us. And I saw, every night, how faithful they were to travel long distances - having to walk by foot - and they were coming out every night to listen to the Word of God. Amen.
Amen. Was there one moment that was particularly memorable during your time in thailand? We had an opportunity to go with the pastor to do house visitations and to talk to people and to get them ready for baptism - to see if they have any questions - and this family had welcomed us in. We had the opportunity to go into their very small, I would say, hut - it's not even a big home - and, as we were sitting there on their floor with our legs crossed and - we were just amazed with the hospitality and the love that they shared with us because we had taken the time to come and share the Word of God with them. And one of the gestures that they wanted to do for us was to send their kids off to a little village store and to buy us some drinks. And The Father was stumbling in his pocket to find some change for these drinks and he didn't have any money with him.
And so the young girl remembered that she had some change in her room and she ran to her room, grabbed some loose change and ran down to the village store to buy us something to drink. It was really, really hot. That's special. Yeah. ExcEllent.
Those little moments where, again, they show their love and care towards us. Ostap, again, is an afcoe graduate and a church member here at Granite Bay and now he has committed his life to full-time evangelism and foreign mission work. So we just praise God for the impact that these experiences make. How beautiful it is when, by the grace of God, we show true love to others. And, when we do, again, Christ's method truly does break and win hearts.
You know, the work is going forward in thailand. There is a need of financial support. There is a need of prayers for the teachers and the missionaries that continue there. And so, of course, we encourage you to pray with us. But even more so, I believe there is a work here in North America.
I believe that there is a work wherever we are. God is calling us to truly demonstrate the love of Jesus in our circle of influence today. And now, as we transition into our lesson study with Pastor Doug, would you just bow your heads with me for a word of prayer? Heavenly Father, God, Lord, we just thank you for how you work. We thank you, father, that we get the incredible privilege of being an ambassador for Jesus Christ. Thank you, father, for these experiences that remind us that you are real.
What a joy it is, father, to see someone accept Jesus Christ - to hear his name for the very first time. And father, I pray that that same joy and passion may burn in our hearts today. And now, father, as we open Your Word, I pray that you speak through Pastor Doug and open our hearts to receive your message today. We thank you and we pray in Jesus' Name, amen. Amen.
Thank you very much, carissa and ostap. And I take it that ostap is wearing clothing from thailand. And I want to also thank the weimar choir for singing - that was beautiful. Amen. Appreciate that.
I think they're going to also be treating us during our church service a little later. Welcome to our Sabbath school class that is studying with us around the world. Now, I promised our friends in south africa that when we got back home we'd wave to them, so I just want to - I'll give you the princess wave here. I want to wave to our friends and tell them we haven't forgotten them. And it's always exciting as we travel, we meet people that are studying with us each week from around the world on the various networks and the internet.
And some of you who are members of the Granite Bay church - some of our online members, we welcome you as well. I think Pastor Ross mentioned, we do have a free offer called down from his glory, and you can just call the number on your screen - ask for offer #701 - we'll send you that and read it - share it with your friends. It will encourage you. That's an appropriate study for where we're going today because today we're entering into a brand-new study dealing with a new quarterly on the subject of Matthew. And, for our friends that - some are watching this streaming live - you might be thinking, 'why are you three weeks ahead of the rest of the world church in their study?' It's because when we broadcast this program, by the time we edit the programs and, in some cases they're translated, and then we put closed captioning on, it just takes three weeks to get that done and sent to the various network studios.
And so, we study the lesson here - we're living in the future here at Granite Bay. We study three weeks in advance, if you're visiting today. I am really excited to be delving into the book of Matthew, and we're going to be dealing with lesson #1, of course, today, which is called The Son of David. And there's a memory verse. The memory verse comes to us from the book of Matthew chapter 1, verse 21.
And if you would like to read that with me, Matthew 1, verse - and I'm doing the whole verse here - you ready? "And she will bring forth a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." In their sins? No. Or from their sins? Now this is - the memory verse in the lesson's only got about half of the verse, but I think that we could all do the whole thing. 'She'll bring forth a son, you'll call his name Jesus, and he will save his people from their sins.' This sort of summarizes the mission of Jesus. Now, I thought it would be appropriate, before we delve into the book of Matthew, that we talk a little bit about the book. We're starting, really, not only a new quarterly, but this is the first book in the new testament and just maybe talk a little bit about the background.
First of all, who is Matthew? We've got a few verses that give us a clue. You can look in the book of Matthew, chapter 9, verse 9, and it says, "as Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office. And he said to him, 'follow me.' So he arose and followed him." And the tax office means that he was a publican. Now it says a little different account if you look in Luke :27, "after these things he went forth, and saw a publican, named levi," - one place it says his name's Matthew, the other place says his name is levi - "sitting at the receipt of custom:" - that's tax. Luke is speaking as a gentile would - "and he said unto him, 'follow me.
' And he left all, rose up, and followed him. And levi made him a great feast in his own house: and there was a great company of publicans and of others" - the pharisees tell us who the others were, it says they were publicans and harlots and sinners. The publicans are the tax collectors in Jesus' day. It wasn't a reputable job. They were, sort of, part of the underworld.
They were authorized by the Romans to collect tribute and taxes from their own people. And they were given some - a contingent of soldiers to help - like the police - to help enforce when they would levy certain taxes on the caravans and the people buying and selling. If you started to argue too much, they'd have you roughed up - they'd have you arrested. And they were the mafioso and they hung out with the off-scouring of society. And so, when Matthew levi, which is what we call him, when he was so honored that Jesus would accept him to be part of his inner circle, he made a feast for him and that's when all the scribes and pharisees began to murmur to the other apostles and say, 'look, your master has gone to be a guest of them that are sinners.
And Jesus overheard this and he said, 'haven't you heard that it's not the well that need a physician, but it's the sick?' This all happened in the context of Jesus calling Matthew. Now, why does one Gospel say his name was Matthew and the other Gospel says his name is levi? Well, it was very common to have more than one name. I mean, Jesus was called Jesus, The Son of Joseph, or Jesus of nazareth. When it says 'Matthew', that was probably his proper name. 'Levi' meant that he was from the tribe of levi.
Keep in mind, there were really three principle tribes left in the land of Israel in the time of Jesus. Long before Jesus was born, during the time of king hezekiah, the assyrians carried away the ten tribes from the north. That's when you have ephraim and mannaseh and issachar and zebulon and so forth. The three tribes of the southern kingdom were judah, Benjamin, and levi. And so, Paul, what tribe was he from? He says, 'from the tribe of Benjamin.
' And others were - Judas may have been from judah. Matthew was a levite - he was, at least, descended. So he had gone a long way from the priestly family of levi to becoming a tax collector for the Romans. And so, he was sort of a fallen angel. And in the same way that Jesus, after he invited zaccheus, who was a publican, to come to him, he said, 'I must abide at your house.
' Now there's only five records in the Bible of people who were called to follow Jesus - well, six - I'll get to that in a minute - five that accepted. You've got Peter - the call of Peter is recorded in the Bible - and andrew - they were fishing. James and John, likewise, fishing. And the only other one is Matthew. Now there was another man, we don't know his name, a rich young ruler.
Jesus said, 'sell what you have, give it to the poor, and follow me.' And he didn't. But he said the same thing to him that he said to the others, 'follow me.' And it says Jesus loved him. But he didn't. We don't even know his name. So Matthew is one of them whose name was recorded.
He was probably a galilean from - as with the other apostles - and a jew. When was his Gospel written? Well, I tell you, you know, I've done some homework this week. I've learned a lot. One thing I learned is that the scholars don't agree with each other. And I just wanted to try and pin down, you know, an approximate date.
And I'll just tell you, they are all over the map. When you say, 'when was the book written?' It goes all the way from 45 a.d. To 100 a.d. That's a pretty big scope. I'm inclined - I read several scholars - I read their arguments.
I'm inclined to think several things: first of all, that the book of Matthew was first written in Hebrew. Let me give you some reasons for that. We do have some documentation in history. Irenaeus - now most of the new testament was written in Greek - Matthew, a jew, wrote his Gospel to appeal to jews, probably first was written in Hebrew. Irenaeus, second-century bishop writes, "Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect.
" And then papias, another second-century bishop - he refers to this belief - he says, "Matthew put together the oracles of the Lord in the Hebrew language." This was also quoted by eusebius in his book on church history. "Origin: assumed that Matthew penned his Gospel originally in Hebrew." So a number of the early church fathers believed that the first thing that Matthew wrote was in Hebrew. It probably wasn't the first Gospel, again, the scholars - or the jury - is still out about which was first. Most agree it was Matthew or Mark. If you read the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, you'll find there's many similarities.
Matter of fact, it's pretty clear that one is quoting the other. Many of the discourses and the outlines are the same. Matthew's longer - Matthew's more thorough. And probably, in my opinion, and I've spent many years getting to know these guys, reading their books, my opinion is Mark wrote first. His is shorter.
Mark is speaking to the gentiles. Probably 40 - 45 a.d. He wrote his Gospel because he was concerned people were beginning to obscure and change the teachings of Jesus and to twist the stories. He said, 'look, you guys are getting it wrong. That's not what happened.
Let me write it down.' You know, whenever there's a risk of something being misunderstood, you write it down. So Mark wrote his down. He's got 16 chapters. Mark's is the shortest and it's the quickest Gospel. When you read the Gospel of Mark, notice how many times it says, 'immediately', 'straightway' - it's talking about Jesus is just going fast - in the book of Mark.
Matthew, wanting to write a Gospel that would appeal - Mark's was probably written in Greek because the early church, by 45 a.d., It was exploding through the gentile world. There were more gentile Christians, by the time Mark wrote, than there were Jewish Christians. Matthew, not wanting the jews to be left out, they were concerned that 'Christianity is abandoning the law'. Matthew writes his Gospel to appeal to the Hebrews. Nobody speaks more than Matthew about the Messiahship of Jesus.
That's why his Gospel begins, as our lesson titled, The Son of David - he is showing Jesus is the fulfillment of prophecy. There is no Gospel writer - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John - Matthew does the most in pointing back to the old testament to prove - and he quotes the old testament again and again - to prove that Jesus was the Messiah. He probably wrote it first in Hebrew. It became very popular and they said, 'we need a Greek version.' Matthew, himself, may have written the Greek version. We have no records in existence anymore, of the original Hebrew but, based on these early church fathers, it was probably first written in Hebrew, then he wrote it in Greek and Matthew, being a tax collector, was probably conversant fluently in Hebrew, aramaic, Greek and latin.
And so - he was exposed to just all these - this traffic from the roman empire and you would need to be able to converse with these people. So, something else - Matthew, being a tax collector, he thinks more in financial terms. More is said about finance in the Gospel of Matthew - take a look. The two parables about talents, they're in Matthew. When you read the Lord's prayer in Luke he says, 'forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
' How does Matthew say it? Debts. Debt - he's thinking in the financial terms. 'Forgive us our debts' - this is an accountant. This is a tax collector. And so you'll notice, as you go through Matthew, that he - there are more illustrations and parables about money in Matthew than any other Gospel - and I'm sure we needed that too.
Well, the other interesting thing is Matthew summarizes the writings of Jesus. The book of Matthew has five discourses of Jesus. I'll tell you where they are if you want to know. It's Matthew chapters 5 through 7, Matthew 10, Matthew 13, Matthew , Matthew 24 and 25. The book of Matthew has five principle teachings of Jesus.
Some wonder if he wrote it this way because it's an echo of the pentateuch that has the law summarized and Jesus sort of gives the renewing of the law. And they've divided the teachings of Matthew into five parts. You've got the first part - the preparation of the King - that's chapter 1 through chapter 4. The second part - the presentation of the Kingdom - chapter 4 through chapter 16 - the message and so forth. Second - or the third part - sermons - that's 16 through 25 - Matthew 16 through 25 - the sermons of Jesus.
Then the fourth part is the sacrifice of Christ - the fifth part, the resurrection. So the whole book, sort of, is divided into these five sections. Anyway, I've just learned a lot reading, sort of, the introduction to Matthew. I'll read you something that was written by dr. Adam clarke, on the book of Matthew.
He's a great, great Bible commentator. You've heard me quote him many times because he's one of the best. You know, he hails back 200 years ago, but this guy, he knew the Bible in several languages - was just brilliant. He was the right-hand man for John wesley. Here's what he says about the book of Matthew: "there is not one truth or doctrine in the whole oracles of God, which is not taught in this evangelist" - Matthew - "the outlines of the whole spiritual system are, here, correctly laid down.
Even Paul, himself, has added nothing." - In other words, everything Paul said is first approached in Matthew - "he has amplified and illustrated the truths contained in this Gospel. Under the inspiration of the holy ghost, neither he nor any other apostles have brought to light one truth that the prototype of which has not been first found in the words of our Lord as related by Matthew." In other words, there's nothing in the new testament that you don't find at least the prototype for it first in Matthew. So it is a very powerful book. And, again, not sure if Matthew wrote first or Mark. I think Mark wrote first.
Matthew then wrote his Hebrew version shortly after, maybe 50 - 55 a.d. And then soon after that it was written in Greek. And the only fragments we have of the Gospel are in Greek today. Anyway, that was all an introduction. Let's go to the first verse.
Matthew chapter 1 - and this is under the section the book of Genesis. And it says, "the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ The Son of David, The Son of Abraham." Now who comes first, Abraham or David? Abraham does, but he mentions David first. We're going to deal with Abraham first. Something interesting you'll also find, he starts out by saying, 'the book' - you know how you say 'book' here in Greek? It's 'biblos' - or 'biblios'. My understanding is there was an island in the mediterranean somewhere - one of the Greek isles called biblos and they had a tree there and they were able to use the bark of the tree to make paper and that's where you get the word for 'book'.
And so, when we talk about the Bible, the Bible is a collection - the word 'Bible' comes from the same word. You don't, technically, find the word 'Bible' pronounced in the Bible, but you do find the word 'book' - biblos - and that's what Bible means. He says 'the biblos', and then he says, 'of the genealogy'. Now what he's saying there in Greek, 'it's the biblos of Genesis.' Now when you go into Genesis and you start to read - look, for instance in Genesis 5 - early in Genesis 5:1, this is the book of the genealogy of adam. In the day that God created man, he made him in the likeness of God.
" And he begins to go through the genealogy - the chronology - of adam there. It's interesting that you've got the Bible and then the genealogy. It's almost like Matthew is saying, 'I'm starting the new testament as a second Genesis. The old testament - you know, the first few chapters, when it starts here in chapter 5 - it brings you to the genealogy of Abraham. What Matthew does is he takes you from Abraham to Jesus.
Now Luke's genealogy goes all the way back to adam. Matthew's genealogy really starts with Abraham and goes from Abraham to Jesus. And so he's proving that Abraham and David were related to Jesus and they both foretold Jesus. Now, in what way were all the families of the world going to be blessed through Abraham? That - it doesn't specifically say the Messiah would come from you, but they all understood that that meant that the promised one would come through your descendants. Further proof for that would be, if you look in Galatians 3:16 - here Paul says, 'now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring.
' - It doesn't say 'offsrings' referring to many, but offspring - it's in singular in the Hebrew, referring to one. There would be a special blessed offspring - "and to your offspring who is Christ. So Paul makes it very clear. They all understood that there was this promised offspring that would come through Abraham that would be the Savior of the world. And, of course, things almost got messed up when he told Sarah, 'look, we're not doing very good at having that first baby.
We've got to get hagar involved.' And God said, 'no, you're going to have a miracle child, through Sarah. Was Jesus also a miracle birth? And so there's some analogies there, as well. You can read in, for instance, the Gospel of John. It talks about the beginning of Jesus - John 1:3 - "in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God.
All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made that was made." Now John, in the beginning of his Gospel - his first verse - what is he talking about Jesus? What is he emphasizing? The divinity of Christ. But what is Matthew emphasizing in the beginning of his Gospel? The humanity of Christ. He tells you right away he came from Abraham and he came from David and here's his family tree - and we'll get to that in a minute, it's very interesting. In the book Desire of Ages page 19, there the author says, "by coming to dwell with us, Jesus was to reveal God both to men and to angels. He was the Word of God.
God's thought made audible." And you can read in Hebrews, in chapter 1, "God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to The Fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his son, whom he had appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds;". Alright, here's a question for you: what percentage of Jesus was divine? A hundred percent - is what I'm hearing. What percent was human? A hundred percent. Hundred percent. Now what accountant would add that way? (Laughter) doesn't that come up with two hundred percent? So how could Jesus be a hundred percent divine and a hundred percent human? It's called a mystery.
Amen. There are things about God that are mysteries that we can't understand, but we do believe that he was a hundred percent divine and a hundred percent human. Alright, let's get to the next section here, talking about the royal line. Someone's going to read for me, in a moment, psalm 132, verse 11. I'm going to read 2 Samuel 7:12.
Now, God makes a promise to David. You'll also find this, I think, in 1 Chronicles 17 - it's almost repeated verbatim there. Samuel 7, verse 12, nathan the prophet tells David, "when your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you, who will come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom." Now who is that talking about? It's about Jesus. Why - why can't you argue that nathan is making, sort of, a broad prophecy here that your descendants would stay on the throne - all of your descendants? Because he says, 'of your sons' - 'his kingdom' - there's a singular again, just like God did with Abraham. There would be a particular son of David.
Now, unlike the tribes of the north - you realize the Kingdom split after Solomon? You only had three united Kings of Israel. Well, if you count abimelech you could say four, but there's really Saul, David, Solomon - kingdom split. Interesting: Solomon reigned 40 years, David reigned 40 years, Saul reigned 40 years - a total of 120 - period of Moses' life. It's very interesting those three phases. Moses spent 40 years in Egypt, 40 years in the wilderness, 40 years leading them from Egypt to the promised land - it's like three 40s.
Now I'm getting into numerology. I'm sorry. Anyways, so you've got those three segments, those three Kings, and then after that the Kingdom split. The northern kingdom - who was the first king of the northern kingdom, do you remember? Jeroboam. Testing - jeroboam, very good.
Jeroboam was The Son of nebat who made Israel to sin. Was it jeroboam's royal line that took over the northern kingdom or did it change every few generations? Changed. They kept assassinating each other and they picked different Kings and it was jeroboam and it was ahab and it was baasha and it was - oh, I can't even name them all. They had all these different Kings and there was no consistent royal line. Whoever could assassinate and take over was in charge.
They were from different tribes. But once Solomon died, his son rehoboam came to the throne and, until the Babylonians carried them away, it was only The Sons of David that were on the throne of the southern kingdom. Some were good, some were bad, but always The Son of David. That's why queen athalia wanted to destroy The Sons of David. She tried to kill all the babies.
It's also interesting that in Bethlehem - where was David born? King herod killed all the baby boys and so there was - it was very clear to them that the Messiah would come through this royal line. Why don't read for us another prophecy - psalm 132:11. "the Lord had sworn in truth to David; he will not turn from it: 'I will set upon your throne the fruit of your body." And there you have another promise and this is in the Psalms. Probably this psalm - not all the Psalms are written by David, you know. Some were written by asaph and a few others.
This one was probably not written by David. You have 2 Samuel, 7:16, "and your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you. Your throne shall be established forever." Now what happened to the throne of David? Is it in power today? Does Jesus rule? Yes. So when he said 'your throne to be established forever', the only way that can be fulfilled is if one of The Sons of David was the Messiah who would rule forever and ever. And so, in that way, in 1 Chronicles, nathan says there, 'your son, which will come from you, he will build me a house that will last forever.
' Did the temple of Solomon last forever? David did have a son named Solomon, who built a temple, but it didn't last forever. We talked about that on our message about the sanctuary. But Jesus said, 'I'll build a house' and his house, the body of Christ, you are the temple of God, it was to last forever. And so that did come true. Alright, let me look at a few other prophecies about David in this royal line.
Isaiah 16, verse 5, "in mercy the throne will be established; and one will sit on it in truth, in the tabernacle of David, judging and seeking justice and hastening righteousness." Here is a prophecy about the Messiah. Did the jews in Christ's time understand the prophecy about David being the Messiah? Yes. They did. Matthew 21:9, "then the multitudes who went before and those who followed cried out, saying: 'hosanna to The Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!'" They all believed the Messiah would be The Son of David. Now what did they think the Messiah would do, this son of David? What did David do? David came from a lowly position and he became a soldier and they were being oppressed by the philistines and David killed the philistine giant and David beat the philistines in many battles and he beat the ammonites and he beat the edomites and he beat the syrians and David never lost a battle.
You show me one place in the Bible where David lost a battle. He always won. And so they thought, 'the Messiah is going to come. What's he going to do to the Romans? What's he going to do to the parthians and the Egyptians and all these forces? He's going to make us an international empire.' So they were disappointed when Jesus didn't take up the sword. Christ said, 'no, that's a different kingdom from what you're thinking - it's an inner kingdom.
' But they all were looking forward to The Son of David who would be the Messiah. They just didn't know what the Messiah would do. And even the apostles, did they misunderstand? Yes. Even after three and a half years of Jesus' close one-on-one contact, you know what they say to Jesus after the resurrection? 'Will you, at this time, restore the Kingdom? You know, now, is now the time?' And just - in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said, 'now he that doesn't have a sword, sell your garment and get one.' He was talking about the Word of God. Peter said, 'we've got two swords.
We're ready to start. That's all we need. Like jonathan and his armor bearer - we'll take on the Romans - two of us.' And Jesus said, 'it is enough.' People think that means he was saying two swords is enough. He was saying enough meaning, 'you don't get it.' It's like when he was in the boat on the sea of Galilee, he said, 'beware the leaven of the pharisees.' And they said, 'oh, we forgot to bring lunch.' He said, 'don't you guys get it? I'm not talking about bread.' So sometimes they totally misunderstood Jesus' analogies. Alright - but - so he was The Son of David.
Another one, Matthew 21, verse , after the - when he did the triumphal entry and they called him The Son of David, it says, "then the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children" - even the children - "crying out in the temple and saying, 'hosanna to The Son of David!'" Did the children - no, every child was taught that some son of David would come to the throne and deliver them from their enemies - the Messiah. And when the scribes heard them calling Jesus The Son of David, they were indignant and they said, 'do you hear what they're saying? This is blasphemy. They're calling you the Messiah.' They knew who The Son of David was. So when Matthew says, in the beginning of his Gospel, even before he says 'The Son of Abraham', he says, 'The Son of David.
' There's no question who he's calling Jesus. It's interesting, he says, 'Jesus Christ - the Gospel - the book of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.' How does the new testament end? Does the new testament end with the name of Jesus? "Even so, come Lord Jesus." What's the book of Revelation? How does it begin? The Revelation of - Jesus. Jesus Christ. And so Christ is the central theme, obviously, of the whole new testament. Someone's going to read for me Revelation 22:16 - you have that sam? I've got another one before I get there.
I'm going to read Mark 12:35. "The jews answered and said, while he taught in the temple, 'how is it' - no, I'm sorry, Jesus answered and said to the jews, "while he taught in the temple, 'how is it that the scribes say that the Christ is The Son of David?'" Now Jesus is quoting what their religious leaders were teaching - that the Messiah - the Christos - the Christ - was The Son of David. He would be a descendant of David. And Jesus is saying, 'how is that?' And yet David calls him Lord. So I just want to make it clear, that was the teaching.
The scribes were right. Acts chapter 2, verse 29, Peter's preaching at pentecost. Who's he talking to - jews or gentiles - at pentecost? Talking to jews - there were devout jews gathered out of every nation under heaven - Peter preaches, "men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, he would raise up the Christ" - there, again, you have it. They knew that The Son of David would be the Christ.
Peter uses that in his sermon and then he points to Jesus. This is what Matthew does at the beginning of his book. Read for us - last chapter in the Bible - Revelation 22, verse 16, please. "I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star.
" So you've got the testimony of Matthew and Peter and Paul and all the apostles understood that the Messiah would be from the house of David. Bartemaeus - you remember blind bartemaeus? Jesus is going through Jericho and this blind man, he says, 'what is it?' And they said, 'it's Jesus of nazareth.' Bartemaeus chases after him and he doesn't say, 'Jesus of nazareth' he says, 'son of David, have mercy on me.' Son of - because bartemaeus needed a miracle. Christ said, 'what do you want?' 'That you might open my eyes.' 'What makes you think I can do this?' 'You're the Messiah. You're The Son of David.' And so he kept - and they said, 'be quiet.' And he called louder, 'son of David, have mercy on me.' So they all understood who that was going to be. And here's another prophecy that tells you why: Micah 5:2, "but you, Bethlehem ephrathah," - now the word 'Bethlehem' means 'house of bread.
' I understand there were more than - there was more than one town in the promised land called Bethlehem. It was a common town. You know, I don't know how many there are - how many portland's are there in North America? Yes, I know portland, Maine; you've got portland, Oregon - there's like three or four portlands. How many farmingtons? I know - I've run into two or three farmingtons. There's several towns - centerville - several towns have a centerville.
And there's several towns in North America you have a repeat. Bethlehem was like that because anywhere that you ground bread or made bread, and you did a lot of it, they called it the house of bread. They had a lot of ovens - they called it the house of bread. But this one is very specific. It says, "Bethlehem ephrathah.
" This is where rachel died. This is where David was born. It's specifying which Bethlehem - it's being very specific. And listen to what Micah prophesies long before Jesus was born: "though you are little among the thousands of judah," - it was a little town - "yet out of you shall come forth to me the one to be ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting." It goes back to what John said, "in the beginning was the word." And so this Messiah, this son of David existed before David was born. Isn't that - that's what Jesus was saying when he tried to - he placed a riddle for the scribes.
How did David call him Lord and yet he's his son? This one who is going to be the Messiah, is The Son of David yet his goings forth are from before David. It's talking about Jesus. And then he begins to recite the genealogy - we'll get to the genealogy - and he divides the genealogy of Jesus into three sets of 14. Did you - have you read chapter 1 of Matthew? And there are 14 generations from Abraham to David; 14 generations from David to the Babylonian captivity; 14 generations from the Babylonian captivity to Christ. Now why did Matthew do that - three sets of 14? Two times what equals 14? Seven.
Seven. Now does seven - is that an interesting number? So what he's doing is he's saying there are six sets of seven before you get to the Messiah and then Jesus preaches for one prophetic week - three and a half years in person - three and a half years through the apostles. You know about the 70-week prophecy in Daniel? Did I already mention that Matthew was an accountant? So here he is, he's counting the generations and he's dividing them up for us and he's showing that there's a pattern here. So I thought that was very - oh, you know how when you add up different names - we don't do it so much in english, but in Greek, in Hebrew, in latin - letters had a numerical value. When you calculate the Mark of the beast, people often take like the title of the pope vicarius filii dei and it's fascinating that that adds up to 666 because roman numerals - we all know roman numerals have a value.
The v is what? Five. It's five, you know, and you get - an I is one and the x is ten and so forth. Jews had that too. What do you think the numerical value of David's name is? - It's interesting. So can you see the big emphasis on David that Matthew is making? The Son of David - 14, 14, 14.
He's saying, you know, that's at least - I'll tell you again, the scholars are wondering why is he emphasizing 14 generations? The only thing they came up with is the numerical value of David's name is 14. I also think it's really six sets of seven that he's emphasizing there. You still with me? Yes. Alright, let's go to the next section talking about Jesus' early family tree. Oh man, I've got four minutes left.
Just amazing to me, it highlights just some very interesting characters. Now it talks about tamar. Do you know who tamar is? Tamar is the canaanite lady - she was a young lady - married one of The Sons of judah. the Lord said he was evil and he slew him. So, because he had no seed, as the custom was, judah's brother - judah's son's brother - took tamar and he died.
Now judah had another son, shelah and he thought, 'I'm not giving - she's bad luck. I'm not giving' - he said, 'just you go wear your widow's garments and, you know, when shelah's grown up - he's still pretty young - and I'll give him to you and you can have children and all will be well.' But he grew up, you know, he went from to 18 - whatever it was - and that was old enough to marry back then - and nothing happened. And she was waiting and waiting and she realized 'he's never going to do it and I'm going to die wearing widow's clothes. I'll have no one to take care of me in my old age.' So she did something very - creative. She dressed up like a prostitute - she knew that judah's wife was dead - she had died - that he maybe was getting lonely and she caught him alone on the road between the sheep shearing - she knew he'd be traveling by himself.
At a fork in the road she dressed up like a prostitute, she seduced him - she had probably painted her face in such a way that he didn't recognize her - wearing her garments and she said, 'now,' - he said, 'I don't have any money on me.' And she said, 'well, give me a pledge that you'll pay me.' 'Here's my signet ring and a bracelet and a staff.' And he gave her some things that were very personalized and he said, 'I'll send someone back with a calf and we'll pay for our love affair and then you give me back those things.' Well his friend goes to pay for it and she's gone. He said, 'where was the prostitute that was around here?' 'There's no prostitute around here.' Several months later word comes to judah, 'have you heard the word? Your daughter-in-law is with child.' Judah, indignant, says, 'well, that floozy. Bring her forth and burn her.' That's what he said. He didn't say 'floozy', he said, 'bring her forth and burn her.' She comes forth and says, 'now, before you burn me, I just thought you should know that I am with child by the man who owns these things.' You know those - there's a few moments in the Bible when God says, 'thou art the man.' (Laughter) and judah goes, 'ooh. She is more righteous than me.
' So this whole story is in there. Just talk about soap opera. And tamar's name - it doesn't mention the women's name unless they factor into the story in some prominent way and all the women who are mentioned and the women you have mentioned in this story: you've got tamar, rahab, Ruth, and bathsheba. At least three of them are gentiles. There's some question about bathsheba - she's the granddaughter of ahithophel, the wife of uriah the hittite - whether she was jew or not was not clear.
Could have been either but certainly there was a very famous affair and some bad behavior that happened in that story. And then Ruth was a moabitess and then you read about rahab who was a harlot and it's mentioning some - and they talk about The Sons of David that are in this story. You've got wicked abijah, who's The Father of good king asa, who's The Father of good king jehoshaphat, who's The Father of wicked king joram. And then you go through the family tree - not all The Sons of David, the Kings, were good. There's good and bad in that tree.
So why - why would Matthew go through the trouble of tracing this genealogy? He's emphasizing, first of all, that Jesus is directly related to the house of David. He's also saying, 'and though he was human, he was sinless and he will save us from our sins.' And he was tempted - and actually, I think I'm stealing somebody - you've got the last verse we're going to read. Why don't you read for us, let me see here, Isaiah - oh yeah, you're going to read Isaiah , verse 6 for us, please. Go ahead. "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
" And so here it says that Jesus, he will save his people from their sins. All of us have sinned. And you look through the family tree. One more question before we conclude our lesson today, there's a genealogy in Luke that's a little different from the genealogy in Matthew. Why is that? Do you know the answer? One is through Joseph the husband and through mary.
That's right. Let me repeat it so people hear at home. The genealogy of Matthew is going through The Father. The genealogy of Luke is going through The Father-in-law, which is the mother's - both Joseph and mary were of the house of David. That's why they went collectively to Bethlehem, to register for the tax.
And so I'm really excited - looking forward to getting more into the book of Matthew. I want to remind our friends at home we just barely got into lesson #1. I'll back up and try and cover some of what we missed in our next study. And we do have a free offer. I want to remind you called down from his glory - it talks about the incarnation of Jesus.
Was Jesus like us? And ask for offer #701. Call 866-788-3966 - that's -study-more - we'll send you this book. Read it, please, share it with others, and God bless you until we get together and study His Word together again. Friends, have you ever heard of the bowhead whale? This enormous leviathan is the second-largest creature in the world. Dark and stocky, it roams the fertile arctic northern waters.
These massive creatures can be more than 65-feet long and weight more than 75 tons. That's heavier than the space shuttle. Yet, in spite of their titanic size, they're able to leap entirely out of the water. Can you say 'belly flop'? The bowhead whale gets its name from its bow-shaped skull - and they've got one ginormous noggin. Matter of fact, their heads are about 40 percent of their body size, which comes in handy when you find out how they use their heads.
They've got very thick skulls. Sometimes they get trapped under the surface and they use their heads to ram the ice. They can break a breathing hole in the ice that is a foot and a half thick. Friends, you have to just imagine what it would be like to be walking around on the arctic ice and all of a sudden have the ground beneath you crack and split and rise as one of these sea monsters pushes its head up to breath for the first time in 90 minutes. Because bowheads make their home in the coldest part of our world, they have the thickest blubber of any whale.
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Friends, I'm always amazed by the creatures God has made. This bowhead whale is able to dive to the deepest oceans. They can break through the ice and move mountains with their head and completely leave the water and fly through the air. And yet, they do all that by gaining strength from almost microscopic organisms. It helps us remember that we survive through the little promises in God's Word.
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