The birth of Jesus Christ is
heralded by Matthew in his Gospel in chapter 1 and verse 18 with
the following words. Now the birth of Jesus Christ
was on this wise. When as his mother Mary was espoused
to Joseph, before they came together she was found with child of the
Holy Ghost. Then Joseph, her husband, being
a just man, and not willing to make her a public example, was
minded to put her away privily. But while he fought on these
things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in
a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take
unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her
is of the Holy Ghost. and she shall bring forth a son,
and thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his
people from their sins. Now all this was done, that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophets,
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. Then Joseph, being raised from
sleep, did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him. and took
unto him his wife, and knew her not till she had brought forth
her firstborn son, and he called his name Jesus. She shall bring forth a son,
and thou shalt call his name Jesus for he shall save his people
from their sins. Now all this was done that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet. Now what I'd like to draw your
attention to this morning is not so much the account of
Christ's birth for you but the fact that his birth, his entrance
into this world, and everything concerning him, and concerning
what he did in his lifetime, in his ministry, and in his death,
was an exact fulfillment of all that had been spoken by the Lord
through the prophets for hundreds and thousands of years concerning
the coming of Christ the Messiah God's Son. Now all this was done that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet. Not only was Christ born in Bethlehem
at this time, but everything concerning his birth had been
prophesied. He came exactly as God said he
would. God promised the coming of Messiah
and no matter that men may have ignored God's word, or disbelieved the prophets. No matter that men in their apathy
may have gone about their daily lives and their business as though
every day would come and go and nothing would change. Behind
all the comings and goings in this world, behind all the busyness
of men, scuttling around like little ants on the surface of
the world, so intent on their own little world and their own
little business, above them, Almighty God was watching the
passing of time. until that day when he in the
person of Jesus Christ should come into this world, born at
Bethlehem, raised the son of Joseph and Mary, grown as a man,
in order that he, named Jesus, should come and die for his people. for thou shalt call his name
Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. On the
day Joseph heard in a dream of the birth of Jesus, men and women
around this world slumbered in sleep and darkness, blind, dead,
and dumb to the work of God and the momentous events about to
take place in the world around them. On the day Jesus was born,
people scurried about, staying in the inn in Bethlehem, busy
about what they were there to do, unaware of what was coming
to pass in their midst. In the days when Jesus walked
upon the earth there were those who heard him and saw him and
saw his miraculous miracles and heard his speech who knew not
who he was and why he came. And there were those elsewhere
going about their business seeking their own ends filling themselves
with their own desires blind and dead and dumb to the momentous
work of God occurring at that very hour and at that very time. And yet He came. This was done
that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the
Prophet. Not only did these events happen,
but mankind had been told told hundreds and thousands of years
before, look and wait for his coming. God will send a redeemer. Messiah will come. These things
which matter to you more than anything shall come about. Look and wait. Today, we live
in similar days. where people go about marrying,
being given away in marriage, having children, working, studying,
busy about the affairs of their day, blind, dead and dumb to
the work of God in their midst. Blind, dead and dumb to what
goes on in heaven's glory above them, to what the maker, the
creator, the sustainer of this earth, the power that gives them
life, is doing at this very hour. They scurry about like ants in
the dust, for that's all they are, whilst almighty God is watching
and working and bringing about His purposes. Each day, a day
closer to the day that God, by His prophets, by His preachers,
has declared that His Son will return in almighty power. Just as the prophets were fulfilled
with the coming of Christ at His birth, so the prophets will
be fulfilled at the second coming of Christ, when this earth, This
world is brought to its conclusion and we are warned by those prophets
to watch and wait for the days and the hours are short. What
are you doing? Where are you going? What are
you seeking? Are you watching and waiting
for the Lord as some did at his birth? Will you rejoice at his
coming? Or are you racing around like
the little ant that you are, scurrying about your business,
waiting for that day when a foot will crush you underfoot? Now all this was done that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet. Throughout Matthew's Gospel,
a repeated theme are these references to the fulfilment of the prophets
with regard to Jesus Christ. In these first two chapters we
have several references. This exact phrase, it might be
fulfilled. that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken is repeated in just chapters 1 and 2 three times. But we also read regarding the
Prophets in other ways. In verse 17 we read that, Then
was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet,
saying, In Ramah there was a voice heard, lamentation and weeping
and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not
be comforted because they are not. in response to the slaughter
of all the young children in Bethlehem and the coast thereof
from two years old and under by King Herod who sought to slay
Jesus Christ. Such was his hatred and enmity. He would not have this rival
to his throne being born in the midst of Israel. He sought with
all his strength and power to slay Christ. How dare he come
and take my throne? And in so doing, he fulfilled
Jeremiah's prophecy concerning him. And his response to the
birth of Jesus Christ is the same response that you have by
nature. The coming of Christ and the
acceptance of Christ as Lord and King demands that you must
vacate your throne. You sit upon the throne of your
own heart and your own world and your own life. You say it's
my life. How dare anyone dictate what
I do with my life. and my world and my things like
it's yours when it isn't yours your life is not your life and
what you have in this world is not yours and your body is not
yours your soul is not yours God created you God gave these
things to you and to God you are accountable then how dare
you sit upon the throne of your life and dictate who rules it
when it is God's. It is Christ's to sit upon. You are His creation. You are
His servant. You are born to worship Him. And when He comes, Your heart's
response by nature is to seek to put him to death because you
will want and you desire to take your life and use it for your
ends and your glory and your fulfillment of your own selfish
pride. How dare you say it's my life? we see this in the children,
little children as they grow up to adolescence and young men
and young women, how they rebel, how they rebel against all authority,
the authority of parents, the authority of teachers, the authority
of the law, all authority and ultimately the rebellion against
the parent is the rebellion against their maker Almighty God, because
they say it's my life, And how dare you tell me how to live
it and where to go and what to do. It's mine. And yet it's not
yours. It's not yours. All that you have from your parents
is not yours. And all that you have from almighty
God is not yours. Yet the same spirit of Herod
is in all of us. that we will put Christ to death,
we will shut our ears to his gospel, shut our ears to all
that he would say because we want to rule. Yet God has spoken by his prophets
and Christ came in fulfilment of those prophets. He was born
in Bethlehem as God said he would. 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. He came and even
the religious in his day who had read the words of the prophets
knew what the prophets said. Herod gathered the chief priests
and scribes of the people together, and he demanded of them where
Christ should be born. And they said unto him, In Bethlehem
of Judea. For thus it is written by the
prophet, And thou, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art not
the least among the princes of Judah. for out of thee shall
come a governor that shall rule my people Israel. They knew that
Christ should be born in Bethlehem. They knew that he should rule
Israel. And when he came, and when he
was born, they, like Herod, rejected him and sought to slay him. because like Herod, he came and
took away their authority. Herod wanted his throne and his
kingdom. They wanted their throne as chief
priests and scribes in Judea, and their little kingdom of religion. And here, Christ, born in Bethlehem,
as the prophets told them, was a threat to them and their ways. yet they knew. They knew from
the prophets where he would be born and they rejected when he
came. And you know from the scriptures
the testimony concerning Jesus Christ and what all the prophets
and what all the apostles and disciples have preached concerning
him. You know And you know He came
as promised. You know He lived as promised. You know He died as promised. You know He rose again as promised. You know He ascended to glory
as promised. And you know what the prophets
say regarding the fact that He will come again to take His people
to glory and to judge this world forevermore. Yet you, by nature,
bury your head in the sands. as these did because that's a
threat to what you desire. This phrase that it might be
fulfilled in its exact phrase and is repeated three times in
these first two chapters and nine times in total in Matthew's
whole gospel It's the only gospel to use this exact phrase because
Matthew is presenting Christ as the promised Messiah. His
presentation of the person and work of Christ in his gospel
is to show that this is the one of whom the prophets spake. He
is the King of Israel. He is the promised Messiah. He
opens with a genealogy. right back to the beginning,
right back, saying that this is the book of the generation
of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. He goes through
the generations, 14 generations, 14 generations, 14 generations,
and then Christ is born. He shows his birth and origin,
he shows he's of the lineage of David as prophesied. And then
throughout his testimony to the life and work of Christ in his
Gospel, repeatedly he will recount and say, this happened, this
was done, that it might be fulfilled, what the prophets said should
be. This is the only Gospel to use
this phrase. And how notable it is even in
Chapter 2, that it is the fulfilment of the words of prophecy which
we see unfolding here. We don't just read an historical
account of the fact that Christ was born, that Christ lived,
that Christ said this and did that, but we read how these accounts
were the fulfilment of prophecy and we can turn back in the scriptures
to the prophets quoted and read the very passages and see that
what Matthew's saying is true. We see how that Christ came into
the world, when it was promised He should come, how it was promised
He should come, and where it was promised that He should come.
Thou Bethlehem in the land of Judah art not the least among
the princes of Judah for out of thee shall come a governor
which shall rule my people Israel. He did what was promised. He
fulfilled all that was written of Him. And even, as we've noted,
the scribes and the priests knew these prophecies. They knew where
Christ should be born. Yet they didn't recognise Him
for who He was at His coming. And yet, all the prophets' words
were all fulfilled. Consider them. Consider these
prophecies. Consider these nine occurrences
of this phrase, that it might be fulfilled. They are grouped
essentially into three groups of three. There are three references
that it might be fulfilled in these first two chapters. These
are followed in later chapters by three references specifically
to the prophecy of Isaiah. That it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by Isaias the prophet. Three times. Chapter 4, chapter
8 and chapter 12. And then finally there are three
more references to a prophet that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by the prophet. There are three groups of three.
This is a triune testimony of triune speech by the Lord through
the prophets. God the Spirit, God the Son,
God the Father spake concerning the coming of Christ. And he
spake three times concerning his birth. three times by Isaiah
concerning his life and ministry and death, and three times by
the prophet. He emphasizes with divine authority
that Christ is the fulfillment of my prophecy concerning him. Firstly, in these first two chapters,
We read this divine declaration to mankind from God himself by
the prophets that his son is entering the world. Note the
wording in verse... 22 of chapter 1 as we've read
now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was
spoken of the Lord by the prophets saying behold a virgin shall
be with child and shall bring forth a son and shall call his
name Emmanuel which being interpreted is God with us to herald such
an important event the birth of his son and Matthew states
that it was fulfilled, that it might be fulfilled, which was
spoken of the Lord by the prophet. He doesn't just use the phrase
that it was spoken by the Prophet as though this is a fulfilment
of what a man said, but he emphasises that the Prophet's speech is
of the Lord, the Lord spake by the Prophet. Whenever we read
that it's a fulfilment of the Prophet, of the words of the
Prophet, those words come from God. And Matthew is at pain in
his first references to emphasise that the Lord spake by the prophet. And this is the fulfilment of
that. The Lord spake by the prophet
that a son should be born called Emmanuel. Which being interpreted
is God with us. What happened in Bethlehem God
was born in human flesh. God is with us. This is a momentous event in
the pages of scripture, in the annals of history. God was born
in human flesh. God himself is incarnate. Born as a man, born the Son of
God, Jesus Christ. God the Creator, what in the
midst of men, as a man. An almighty God, the great Creator
of heaven and earth, who sustains all things by His almighty power. was contracted to a span. He was born, he was conceived
in Mary's womb of the Holy Ghost. She encompassed Almighty God
in her womb. How humble, how meek of Christ
to come, not just as a man, but as a babe. and as a seed of the
Holy Ghost in the womb that grew and formed as a child and was
born. In the weakest point of humanity,
where his life depended upon his mother, God was born. God was conceived in Mary and
born as a babe, dependent on his mother's care. and yet almighty
God in fulfilment of what the Lord had spoken by the prophet. As we read on in chapter two,
we read as we've said of Herod's inquiry of the scribes and the
priests and how they referenced the prophet saying that he would
be born in Bethlehem. We read then of the wise men
coming to worship Christ and how, leaving, Joseph is warned
of the hatred of Herod. that Herod should seek to destroy
him, and warned of God in a dream to flee into Egypt. And we read
that he was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of
Egypt have I called my son. The Lord spake by the Prophet
concerning the birth of the Son of God. And he spake by the Prophet
to say that this Son should come out of Egypt. Not only should
He come into the world, but He should be taken and brought out
of that place in the world, Egypt, which is a picture of the world
in its worst sense. the world in captivity, the world
in oppression, that prison from which God delivered his people,
the Hebrews, by the hand of Moses, that place from which he delivered
them in times gone by. Oh, how this prophecy and this
message should have resonated with the Jews at this time. They
knew their history, they knew what it was to be brought out
of Egypt, they knew how their great Forerunner Moses had delivered
them and had appeared before Pharaoh and spoken to Pharaoh
the word of the Lord and how that people had been brought
forth by God's mighty hand. And here their great saviour
Christ is taken. He goes down to Egypt as Moses
went down to Egypt and he's brought out of Egypt to bring his people
forth from all captivity to be a saviour, a deliverer. Thou shalt call his name Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins. Finally, Herod
slays the children in a fulfilment of that word by Jeremy the prophet. And having slain them when he's
then dead, Joseph and Mary return to Israel, but they're warned
by God in a dream again to head into Galilee. And they came and
dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by the prophets, he shall be called a Nazarene. He dwelt in Galilee, not in the
city, not in Jerusalem, but cast out in the back parts of the
country, a Nazarene. Separated unto God, as Samson
was separated unto God. Devoted unto the service of God
Almighty. He came not for his own ends,
but he came to save his people from their sins. He walked before
God the Father every day in communion with God, seeking the glory of
God, seeking the salvation of his people. These three references, this
multitude of references to the prophets come one after another
in these first two chapters of Matthew's Gospel. As if the herald,
the coming of Christ and its importance with several references
to the fact that he came in fulfilment of the prophets. Then as Christ
grows and becomes a man and goes forth in his ministry and we
read of his ministry, his life and his words throughout Matthew's
Gospel, we continue to read references to the prophets but they spread
out. We have three references in the first two chapters. These
are then followed by three references from Esaias in the next eight
chapters. And then there are three references
with this exact phrasing that it might be fulfilled in the
next 14 chapters. But throughout, we see constantly
Matthew coming back to the prophets and saying, this happened, that
it might be fulfilled. In chapter four, we read Esaias'
prophecy fulfilled of the person and the work of Christ. That it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, the land of Zabulun and
the land of Nephilim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan,
Galilee of the Gentiles, the people which sat in darkness
saw great light, and to them which sat in the region and shadow
of death, light is sprung up. Isaiah wrote years before the
coming of Christ that in Galilee the people which sat in darkness
should see great light. The people which sat in the region
and shadow of death should see the light of God in Jesus Christ. And Christ came was born in Bethlehem
as promised, was taken down to Egypt from whence he came forth. Out of Egypt have I called my
Son, and came into Galilee, where the people that sat in darkness
saw great light. In Matthew chapter 8, we read of those who were brought
unto Christ who was sick of many diseases. When he even was come,
they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils, and
he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that
were sick, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the
prophet himself, saying, himself took our infirmities and bare
our sicknesses. Esaias prophesied of Christ,
that He would take the sicknesses and the infirmities of His people,
that He would bear them. He would come to take away our
sicknesses. He would come to take away our
sin. Thou shalt call His name Jesus,
for He shall save His people from their sins. He came to deliver
us. from our sins. And here he comes
as a picture of the forgiveness of sin, healing all the sicknesses
of those that came under him. Taking those sicknesses, taking
that sin off those that suffered and taking it upon himself. He bare our sicknesses. Isaiah of course. Isaiah in his
prophecy had great visions of the suffering and the death of
Christ. Great visions of how Christ should
come and bear our iniquity. Great prophecy of the death of
Christ upon the cross when he bore our stripes. When he bore
our iniquity. and was whipped and was beaten
and was bruised because of our sins. He was judged because of
our iniquity. In chapter 12 we read this third
reference to the prophecy of Isaiah. That it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by Esaias the prophet saying, Behold my servant
whom I have chosen. my beloved in whom my soul is
well pleased. I will put my spirit upon him
and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive
nor cry, neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets.
A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not
quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. And in his name
shall the Gentiles trust. This is Ayers writes concerning
Christ and his rejection by all men, his suffering, his death. In chapter 12, in context, we
read of the opposition of the Pharisees. The Pharisees went
out and held a council against him, how they might destroy him. But when Jesus knew it, he withdrew
himself from thence, and great multitudes followed him, and
he healed them all, and charged them that they should not make
him known. The Pharisees sought to destroy
him. But Jesus' response to those
that hated him was to go forth to those who were sick and heal
them. That it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Behold my servant whom
I have chosen. Look at my son. Look at my servant,
my chosen. Look at how he reacts, look at
how he walks, in the midst of great opposition, in the midst
of persecution, when all the world around him hated him and
rejected him, when the Pharisees sought to destroy him, he went
forth to the needy and healed them all. Behold my servant,
whom I have chosen, My beloved in whom my soul is well pleased,
I will put my spirit upon him, and he shall show judgment to
the Gentiles. He shall not strive nor cry,
neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. A bruised
reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench,
till he send forth judgment unto victory. And in his name shall
the Gentiles trust. The Jews may have sought to destroy
him, the Pharisees may have cast him out, but he went forth to
the weak, those that needed help, the broken, the wretched, the
lost, and he had compassion upon them. He would not break. that bruised Reed. He'd not quench
the smoking flax. He had compassion on those who
were bruised. He had compassion on those who
had no strength. He had compassion on those who
were lost. He had compassion on those who
cried out for help. And he would come to deliver
them and to save them and to heal them of all their sicknesses. Oh, what a fulfilment. of the
prophecy of Isaiah. What a Saviour this was. He walked
amongst a people that hated Him. And all that could be seen in
Him and from Him was the love, the mercy and the compassion
of God. And He may stand before you this
day in the Gospel. Christ may stand before you as
presented by the prophets whose words he fulfilled, and you may
look upon him with hatred. and the response of your heart
to him and his message, this gospel, this word which you hear
this day, you may sit and listen, and your heart might go forth,
you might take counsel within like the Pharisees did, to destroy
him. Your heart might say, I don't
want to hear, I don't want to know, I don't care, I don't care
about Christ, I don't care about the Gospel, I don't care about
God, I don't care, it doesn't matter, it's irrelevant. And
in so speaking, you are destroying him. You are putting him to death
in your heart. You're casting him out. and in
the face of your hatred, your rejection and your opposition,
he stands forth and God speaks from on high by his prophet and
says of Christ unto you, behold my servant whom I have chosen. my beloved in whom my soul is
well pleased. I will put my spirit upon him,
and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive
nor cry, neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets.
A bruised reed he shall not break, and smoking flax shall he not
quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. God's response
to your hatred is to set forth His Son and say, My Son has come
to die for sinners such as you. He's come to heal the sick of
all their ailments. He's come to forgive sins. And He's come to stand in the
place of judgment at the cross. He says of his son to you and
I, either sin will be taken away through his blood. Either he
will suffer in your place and take your hatred, take your rejection,
take your unbelief upon himself and suffer my judgment against
it and wash you clean and forgive you and heal you. or that judgment
will come down upon you. The Pharisees sought to destroy
him and God judged and he slew his son and he slew the wicked
that knew him not. How do you stand before Christ? when he stands before you. And God says unto you, behold
my servant. You can bury your head in the
sand. You can say I don't care. But
one day you will care. Because one day you will be brought
up from the grave the other side of time in eternity and you will
stand before almighty God and his son and God will say unto
you behold my servant and you will have to give an account and he says unto us now in his
gospel behold my son Hear ye Him, will we hear. In the latter chapters of Matthew's
Gospel, we read three more references to the prophets with this exact
phrase, that it might be fulfilled. Matthew goes on to present Christ's
ministry, His sovereignty as the Son of God, the King, of
kings and his death. We read and see
the king's speech in the gospel, the king's entrance into the
city of Zion, and the king's garments by which he clothes
his people in righteousness. In chapter 13, verse 35, we read
that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying,
I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter things which have
been kept secret from the foundation of the world. Christ, when he
went forth preaching and teaching his gospel unto sinners, spake
with parables because these parables were revealed unto little children
and hid from the wise and the prudent. You may scoff at the
truth because it seems too simple to you. Because it doesn't touch you.
Because it doesn't seem to impact you. And the parables and the
truth which Christ spake are hidden from your understanding. But God's children, whom he loves,
under whom Christ comes in his gospel, are brought to see the
meaning. Another parable Jesus spake unto
them, the kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman
took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened. All these things spake Jesus
unto the multitude in parables, and without a parable spake he
not unto them, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken
by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables, I
will utter things which have been kept secret, from the foundation
of the world. Are these things still kept secret
from you? Are they still hidden? Are they
still mysterious? Or has Christ come and said unto
you, the meaning of the parable is thus. as He pointed you to
Himself and His death and His mercy unto sinners through His
blood. In chapter 21, as the time goes
by, leading unto that day when Christ would be crucified in
Jerusalem, we read of His entrance into Jerusalem We read of the
ass which was found, the cot which was taken and given to
the Lord to ride upon into Jerusalem on that day. All this was done
that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying,
Tell ye the daughter of Zion, Behold, Thy king cometh unto
thee, meek and sitting upon an ass, and occult the foal of an
ass. We've seen the king's speech
in parables. Now we see the king's entrance
into Zion, into the city of God, meek and lowly. He doesn't come
in pride and pomp and circumstance. He doesn't use the feeble tools
that mortal men do to decorate themselves in glory. He doesn't
try to make himself appear great like you do when you as a little
ant decorate yourself before other ant and say, look at me,
look what I've done, look what I say, look how great I am. He doesn't try to dress himself
up as something mighty. He doesn't need to. He is mighty. He is almighty, he's all glorious. But he does the very opposite,
he comes in meekness, humility, lowliness. The great king of
kings, lord of lords, comes in meekness riding upon an ass and
heading to a place of execution. This king rides into Jerusalem. Later, He's taken and betrayed
into the hands of the scribes and Pharisees. His own betray
Him. Judas, who'd walked and talked
and lived with Him for so long, who pretended to be a friend,
turns against Him and reveals who He is. to the scribes and
Pharisees, he takes them to him and says, here he is and they
take him and they capture him and they create that mock trial
for him and the people all cry out, away with this man, we will
not have him reign over us. And they took him and they made
him carry his cross up that hill to that place of execution to
the place of a skull, Golgotha to a filthy place an awful place
where he was crucified with thieves where the world took he who is
light and in their darkness they tried to put out the light that
they could squabble around in the darkness Like you do, like
I've done. We try to take the light and
we try to stamp it out. I don't want to hear. I don't
want to see. I don't want to know. Crucify
him. And they crucified him and parted
his garments, cast in lots. that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by the Prophet. They parted my garments among
them and upon my vesture did they cast lots. They slew him
and they took his garment and parted it among them. But what
garment was this that they took Ignorant of what the prophets
had written concerning it. Ignorant that they were fulfilling
the word of God. Ignorant of the truth, they took
his garment which was sewn without seam, an endless circle, an eternal
garment, a picture of eternal everlasting righteousness. They
took it and they parted it among them. and in their rejection
of God in their rejection of His Son in their rejection of
Christ in their slaying of Christ they were actually taken that
which would cleanse and heal them they were as it were taking
the blood taking the righteousness and sharing it among them in
His death He saved his people. It's his people's rejection of
him that put him to death. It's his people's crucifixion
of him that led to his death. It's his people's part in his
garments that led to the shedding of his blood and the washing
of their sins. What they did was hate God in
the person of Jesus Christ. What he did was take their sins
upon him, take their sicknesses upon him, take their infirmities. As the prophet Isaiah said, himself
took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses, he bore their
sin. and suffered under the righteous
outpouring of God's wrath to take those sins away and to clothe
that people in righteousness. When he bore the sins of those
that hated him in love he shed his blood and washed them in
his blood. and clothed them with a garment
of righteousness which has no beginning and no end. And he did this that it might
be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet. In all of this
we see the king's speech, the king's entrance into his kingdom. into his city, unto his people. And we see the garments with
which he clothed that people for whom he came. Thou shalt
call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. He came unto us The King came
unto us. He comes unto us in his gospel,
speaking mercy and grace and forgiveness. God says of him
in his gospel, behold my servant, behold my son. He comes with
his garments of righteousness, his shed blood. And he says,
be forgiven of thy sins through my blood. He comes in fulfillment
of every prophecy which God spake by His prophets concerning it. And He comes to you this day, this day at this hour, and He
says, I am the Son of God who gave Myself for the sins of my
people. I am Jesus because I take away
the sins of my people. And God says of him, hast thou
heard? Hast thou heard the words of
the prophets? Hast thou seen the fulfilment
of every word concerning my son? Dost thou? hear his voice in
the gospel. Are you listening? Have you heard? Do you believe? That it might be fulfilled, which
was spoken by the Lord through his prophets, concerning the
person and the work of his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.