The Great Messiah – Evansville Bible Church

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Luke 1:31-33, “And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. 32 “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; 33 and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.”

Imagine if there were no Christmas lights. No Christmas cheer. No birth of Jesus to celebrate. Only darkness on Christmas Eve. No manger scenes or any reason to rejoice in the birth of a Savior. If Mohammed had never been born, it would make no difference. Or Joseph Smith or Charles Taze Russell or Mary Baker Glover Patterson Eddie or any other religious leader. It would make no difference. But imagine waking up on December 25 with no memory of the birth of Jesus Christ. That is almost unbearable. It is unbearable.

But He did come – He was born! He lit up the world and we do rejoice and celebrate His birth. J. C. Ryle wrote, “The announcement of the most marvelous event that ever happened in this world, the incarnation and birth of our Lord Jesus Christ…we should always read with mingled wonder, love, and praise.” For the infinite, eternal, and unchanging second Person of the Godhead to unite with a woman’s ovum, be conceived, and then born as the God-Man, fully God and fully man, is simply astounding.

Next week we’ll rejoice in the Great Miracle of the virgin conception. On Christmas day we’ll visit Bethlehem and find Great Joy in the actual birth of our Savior. This morning we want to be amazed at this birth announcement of the coming Great Messiah. This announcement is all about God fulfilling His promises to Israel throughout the Old Testament of a coming Messiah, the Son of David, the king of Israel. We think of Christ coming to die for sinners, rise again, and ascend to the Father’s right hand, but this announcement goes far beyond that to the Messiah taking his seat on David’s throne and ruling over the entire earth. May God give us minds and hearts to realize this amazing truth.

AN UNEXPECTED VISIT

Luke 1:26-27, Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city in Galilee called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the descendants of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary.

Gabriel, which means “strength of God,” appears twice in Daniel and twice in Luke 1. He is the angel who brings Israel the assurance that God will keep His promises to His ancient people. Gabriel first came to Zacharias in the temple in Jerusalem to announce the birth of John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Messiah. Now, six months later, he comes to a rural village to this young girl, probably just a teenager, and gives her a message from God she would never have dreamed of in a million years – a dazzling revelation from God Almighty that changed world history.

Nazareth was about 100 miles north of Jerusalem. In that day it was about the size of our close by area of Yankeetown with a population of about 200-400 people. This little village was despised even by other villages of Galilee. Nathanael was from Cana of Galilee, and he asked, “Can any good thing come from Nazareth?” (John 1:46). The elitists and rulers of Judea and Jerusalem regarded these illiterate country-people with utter contempt. They could not conceive of the Messiah coming from the likes of people like Mary and Joseph.

But God’s ways are not man’s ways. God is never impressed by size, wealth, human power, nor prestige. When God gets ready to reveal Himself, He comes down to this humble little village in the foothills of Galilee.

The fullness of time has come. Those 483 years based on Daniel 9:24-25 have arrived, so God calls this angelic ambassador Gabriel and says, “Go down to Nazareth to a young girl with my message.” Zoom! He immediately soars right through the galaxies into the Milky Way past Jupiter and Mars to this small rolling blue-green globe into the region of Galilee and appears in Nazareth with a message that will change everything.

Verse 27 tells us this young girl is a virgin named Mary who is engaged to Joseph, a man in the line of David. His Davidic ancestry is crucial. If he was not in the line of David, Gabriel would not have stopped at Mary’s house. Humanly speaking, this girl was quite ordinary. God could have chosen a wealthy Jewish scribe’s daughter, but no, He chose this unknown young girl. We don’t even know who her parents were. There she was, going about her daily routine, maybe finishing up a fig pudding served with lamb chops for supper, when suddenly her life changed forever.

A PERPLEXING SALUTATION

Luke 1:28-30, And coming in, he said to her, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.” 29 But she was very perplexed at this statement and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. 30 The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God.

Verse 29 tells us she was perplexed and kept pondering, wondering what is going on. She has probably never seen an angel before, let alone been addressed by one. She needs assurance and comfort, and Gabriel gives it. “The Lord is with you. Don’t be afraid, Mary.” Do you know how often God says “Don’t be afraid” to His people in the Bible? He knows our weakness and tendency to be fearful when we don’t have control of what’s going to happen next.

Then before informing her of the message, he assures her, “You have found favor with God. God is looking on you with special grace. God has chosen you to bring His Son, Israel’s Messiah, into the human race.” There was Mary, an engaged teenage girl living in a village the world never heard of, hearing the words, “God has chosen you.” This is God’s way. He chooses the nothings and the nobodies to be great in grace (see 1 Corinthians 1). I’m sure you’ve wondered why God chose you in eternity past to be His child. “Why me?” But then all we can say is, “Thank you, Lord.”

Before we go on, let’s clarify a few things about Mary, who she was and who she wasn’t. First, Mary was a sinner. She was not born without a sin nature, which is what the teaching called the immaculate conception says. No, she was a sinner and sinned. Second, she was not a perpetual virgin. Roman Catholicism teaches Mary was a virgin before, during, and after the birth of Christ. The Bible tells us Jesus had at least four brothers and several sisters (Matthew 13:55-56), so it’s clear she did not remain a virgin after Jesus’ birth. Third, Mary does not have an excess of grace or merit that others can pray for. She does not pray for us sinners or intercede for us. We don’t pray to Mary; she’s not God. She is not the Mother of God or “Mater Dei” (except in the sense that her child was both deity and humanity). Fourth, she did die and awaits the resurrection of her body just like the rest of us. The teaching of the assumption of Mary’s body was declared dogma by the Catholic Church in 1950, but it is pure myth. We should think highly of her as a godly young lady chosen by God to bring the Messiah into the world, but we should not worship her. Mary was a common engaged teenager unknown in her time, but well known in heaven!

THE PROMISE OF THE GREAT MESSIAH – vss. 31-33

Gabriel begins with an attention getter – “Behold!” Look, listen, and pay close attention because what Gabriel’s about to reveal will blow your socks off! “I’ve got something amazing to tell you!” As J. I. Packer says, “The more you think about it, the more staggering it gets.” So, let’s look at Seven Amazing Descriptions about this child whom Mary will bear.

He will be a son, a true man but untainted by original sin. “You’re going to conceive in your womb,” that sacred place God designed in women to bring His little image bearers into the world. A man could not conceive in his womb for one big reason – he doesn’t have a womb! Duh! Do we have to say this? “And bear a son.” He will be a real human being in every way, conceived, gestated, born, and grow through all stages of human life. However, He will be free of original and actual sin, and yet a true human being, a male child.

His name will be Jesus. “You’re going to name your son Jesus,” because He is going to become the Savior of all God’s people. This part will be hard for Mary later. She’ll weep when she finds out how this is going to happen, but for now she’s told to call him Jesus, which means “Jehovah saves.” God told Joseph the same thing in Matthew 1:21, “You shall call His name Jesus for He shall save His people from their sin.”

He will be great. I love this. He is in His own class of greatness. No human being will come close to His greatness. He’ll be great in every way, in holiness and love and power. He’ll do what no other man has done, go where no other man has gone. He will be a great teacher, a great healer, a great sufferer, a great Savior, a great Shepherd, a great conqueror of Satan and sin and death, a great high priest, a great King and Lord, and a great judge of all human beings. He will be infinitely great.

He will be the Son of the Most High God. Mary will give birth to a little human baby. But Gabriel adds, “He’ll be the son of the Most High” – equal in essence with God the Father. This means He will also be deity. This is the incarnation. Here’s where this announcement gets super-fascinating. He will be fully man and fully God. He will have two natures but be one person. They got this all mixed up in the early centuries of the church and required council meetings to clarify Christ’s identity. The Council of Chalcedon in AD 451 set the record straight in their explanation of the incarnation: He is not two persons – He’s one person. His two natures were not mixed together like scrambled eggs so as to produce a third nature. Some denied His humanity and others His deity. Some said He was the highest created being, like the Arians and JW’s today. The Gnostics said He really wasn’t there physically, but just appeared to be there.

So, He has two natures: sinless humanity and undiminished deity in One Person. This is called the hypostatic union. Do you understand this? No, you don’t. This is why Paul described the incarnation as a great mystery (1 Timothy 3:16). Is it scientifically provable? No. Has it ever happened before or since? No. The incarnation is a truly unique event. The eternal deity or God united with sinless humanity, Christ. This is what Gabriel is describing to Mary. Her real human son, who will gestate in her womb for nine months and then be born, is also the son of the Most High God, undiminished deity.

He will be the promised Davidic King. “The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David.” He’ll be the fulfillment of God’s promise to David that one of David’s descendants will sit on his throne forever: “Your house and your kingdom shall endure before Me forever; your throne shall be established forever” (2 Samuel 7:16).

He will rule over the house of Jacob. As the description unfolds, it just gets better and better. This is a lot to take in. Perhaps Mary is taking notes like ladies do, writing feverishly while the men just sit there thinking “Uh huh. Wow.” This promise that He will rule over the house of Jacob brings all the Old Testament prophecies about the coming Messiah together into one Person. The prophets are peppered with promises of this King to come, their land restored, and their nation brought to repentance. As Israel’s King sitting on David’s throne, this child of Mary is going to rule over the house of Jacob, the people of Israel, forever! It will happen just as Daniel prophesied in Daniel 7:13-14. All the kingdoms of the world will be crushed and ended, and this King will establish a worldwide kingdom. God has a great plan for Israel. This great Messiah will be cut off at the cross according to Daniel 9 but will return and sit on the Davidic throne in Israel and rule the nations in righteousness, as Isaiah’s great prophecy assures Israel.

Isaiah 9:6-7, For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. 7 There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, On the throne of David and over his kingdom, To establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness From then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this.

What good news this is to us who live in a time of godless totalitarianism and corruption and moral perversion and persecution and abuse around the world. We can look forward to this mighty event. All the pride and arrogance of the nations will end in a whimper and Christ will become ruler of this entire world. Matthew 25:31 says He will sit on his glorious throne. Zechariah 14:9 puts it simply and clearly with this prophecy about Christ’s future Kingship, “And the LORD will be king over all the earth; in that day the LORD will be the only one, and His name the only one.”

This is Israel’s great Messiah described and promised to Mary. This is the Christmas child we worship and celebrate. Did Mary understand it all? Probably not. But she knew God had promised to restore His people Israel some time. This great King, the Son of David, will one day bring a vast number of Jews to believe in Him. Zechariah 12:10, “I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.”

J. C. Ryle, who took God’s promises to Israel seriously, wrote, “The literal fulfillment of this part of the promise is yet to come. Israel is yet to be gathered. The Jews are yet to be restored to their own land, and to look to Him whom they once pierced, as their King and their God.”

Don’t you just love that? Mary is going to give birth to this great King and rightful heir to the throne of David promised hundreds of years before. Jews today don’t realize that we believers in Christ celebrate not only the Savior but Israel’s future king who will sit on David’s throne in Jerusalem and rule over the entire world!

His kingdom will endure forever. When this will be? We don’t know. We’re looking for the rapture next, and then the world will go through the seven-year tribulation period. Then He will return to earth and destroy all God’s enemies according to Revelation 19 and set up the throne of David in Jerusalem and rule out of Jerusalem over a restored nation of Israel and over the entire globe for a thousand years followed by the Great White Throne Judgment based on Revelation 20. Then in the new heavens and earth in Revelation 21-22, He’ll still be known as the root and descendent of David (Revelation 22:16) ruling over the unending eternal ages with all who believe in Him forever and ever.

Handel’s exhilarating Hallelujah Chorus put it perfectly:

And he shall reign forever and ever
King of kings forever and ever
And Lord of lords hallelujah hallelujah
And he shall reign forever and ever.

When you think about that baby lying in that manger in Bethlehem, look closely and see more than a personal Savior. See the God-Man, the incarnation. See the Son of David. See the coming King of kings and Lord of lords, someday coming to sit on David’s throne and rule this world in righteousness. What an amazing birth announcement. What a great Messiah.