In the Fulness of Time/Part 3

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Just suppose you were a Jew living in Israel 2000 years ago. You would have avail­able as your spiritual resource the entire Old Testament. Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament would have been written 400 years before that time.

What would your expectation have been of a Jewish Messiah? From the Old Testa­ment, what information would you have to determine what a Messiah would be like; and if a Messiah should fulfill all the hopes and prophecies concerning His Person, what plan would you expect Him to present, and how would this program be put in operation, and how soon? What, if anything, would all this have to do with the phrase “In the fulness of time” which has been the title of our monthly articles? How would it help to answer the tantalizing question, “What’s next in the plan of God?”

Of the four New Testament Gospels, it is the unique approach of the Gospel of Matthew which includes answers to many of these questions. It begins by taking us back to Genesis 12 when God appeared to Abram (later named Abraham) and made a covenant with him (which is called “everlasting” in Genesis 17:7). This covenant included the promise that in Abram all the families of the earth would be blessed (Genesis 12:3). Matthew 1:1 also names David as the ancestor of Jesus Christ, so that Abraham’s seed is narrowed down to the family of David. Later, in Matthew 1:20 the New Testament Joseph is spoken of as the “son of David” showing that Jesus is a legal descendant of David through his foster-father Joseph. It can be proven from the second chapter of Luke that Jesus is a biological descendant of David through his mother Mary, though that is beyond the scope of this article.

What then would some of your questions be concerning the Jewish Messiah, once you have learned that he was to be born of Abraham’s lineage through the family of David? Well, why not allow the Jews who actually lived at that time to share their questions?

First, concerning the origin of Messiah: “Then said some of them of Jerusalem, Is not this he, whom they seek to kill? But, lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him. Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ? Howbeit, we know this man whence he is: but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is” (John 7:25-27). These Jews were surprised that the rulers had not silenced Jesus, who had just healed a man on the Sabbath, breaking Moses’ Law. Their question which was put in the negative translates: “Surely the rulers do not believe that this is the very Messiah, do they?” They answered their own question, but not completely accurately. In Matthew 1:22-23 the ances­try of Messiah is traced back into eternity, as the angel quotes the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14, “Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.”

Definitely, therefore, the Messiah is God manifest in the flesh. Nor is this the only proof of His Deity; Isaiah 9:6 asserts: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Isaiah presents both the Person and the Program of Messiah; He is God, and He will re-establish the Davidic Kingdom.

Second, there is one very important thing in Matthew 1:21, which has caused no small consternation within the Jewish interpretation of Messiah: “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.” This is in fulfillment of Isaiah 53:6 “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all.” Some of the rabbis through the ages have seen the difficulty in the Messiah being put to death and bearing sin in His own body and then being spoken of as reigning as King. This has prompted some to stipulate that there must be two Messiahs.

In his excellent volume, Messiah: His First Coming Scheduled (1939), Dr. David L. Cooper of the Biblical Research Society, Los Angeles, California quotes Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai, who thought that the Messianic Kingdom would be set up immediately after 750 C.E. (Common Era, or as we would put it, 750 A.D.):

Following the death of Merwan II, the angel announces that a cruel king will rule over Israel for three months, and the wicked kingdom (Byzantium) will rule over Israel for nine months….Then the Messiah ben Joseph will appear and restore the Jews to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple….But the cruel king Armilius (Antichrist) will wage war upon Messiah ben Joseph…and Israel will be driven into the wilderness…where Messiah ben Joseph will die. The Messiah ben David will then appear….He will thereupon slay Armilius. God will then assemble all Israel unto Jerusalem….The heavenly Jerusalem will descend from on high … and Israel will dwell in peace for two thousand years” (Cooper, p. 519).

Obviously this did not happen; but the main point of interest for this discus­sion is that there were Jews who struggled with the Old Testament prophecies which were seemingly contradictory concerning the advent of Messiah. Had they accepted the teach­ings of Jesus Christ, they would have known that the so-called contradiction is solved in His two advents; one was fulfilled in 33 A.D. and the second is yet to come. Thus far we know that the plan of God included two advents of Messiah, and that the first has come to pass. What further information in Matthew will be helpful in answering the questions con­cerning the time and sequence of events surrounding the second advent of Messiah? Next time we will consider how Christ presented Himself to Israel as their King.

Read Part 4