Messianic Prophecies in Isaiah

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You'll turn your Bibles with me, please to Isaiah chapter 7 book of Isaiah chapter 7 before we
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Look to the Word of God. Let us ask one more time for the ministry of the Holy Spirit amongst us Our dear
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Heavenly Father we do thank you for this opportunity that we have the freedom that we have
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To possess your word to study your word And now we ask that you would help us to be obedient to your word that you'd help us to understand
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That you would help us to hear its message and rejoice in what it teaches us
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We can only do this if your spirit gathers with us your spirit prepares hearts and minds
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So be with us now to your honor and glory. We pray in Christ's name. Amen Just given the way that the calendar worked this year this
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Sunday falls right after Thanksgiving and that means the next time
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I have the opportunity to Minister behind the pulpit will be right after Christmas as well.
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So my plan today is to look forward and look backward
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Look forward this morning because I will not have opportunity to Speak on the subject of the coming of the
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Lord until after at least what's supposed to be the beginning of a season of Celebration and recollection unfortunately here in the
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West it's a single day and that's it you just Get it all taken care of one shot we have other things we need to do evidently that's how our society works but I Have the opportunity to address that subject this morning somewhat in an anticipatory sense
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And then this evening look back Upon the issue of giving of thanks.
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I don't know personally it looks to me if is in our society The Thanksgiving is simply being done away with Stores are opening on Thanksgiving Day now and and You know you got a rush to get to Black Friday on Thursday now
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And and let's be honest. What does a secular society? How does the secular society give thanks anyway?
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I mean giving. Thanks requires an object and You know giving thanks to nature or myself just isn't all that much of a reason for Celebration anyways, and so it's not overly surprising that that's taking place and makes me wonder if we if we shouldn't just sort of all ball it up together and Have just a nice long season of Thanksgiving going directly into the giving of the
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Sun I think that would be a good way of doing things But something tells me most the retailers are not going to be overly concerned about what
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I have to say I wear bow ties so It's sort of irrelevant to them but This morning what
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I would like to do. I think it's some time in the past Maybe on a Wednesday evening, maybe even a
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Sunday evening. We've looked at some of this material, but I remain absolutely fascinated especially being reminded of it at this time of year of the supernatural character of the celebration of The coming of the
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Son of God, what do I mean by that? I'm not saying that the day or something has been established by God, but the event
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Was prophesied and there is no question about this. I mean the most radical skeptic all they can do in light of the
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Historical and biblical evidence is To question the reality of the events of Jesus's life because it's just too painfully obvious That there were words written minimally hundreds of years before the birth of Christ That the
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Gospels record as being perfectly fulfilled in the birth ministry death
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Resurrection of Jesus Christ and so what the the radical skeptics do is they say well none of that actually happened
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What happened is the gospel writers looked at these ancient texts they looked at Isaiah And they looked at Zechariah And they looked at Jeremiah and they found these texts and they they cobbled them all together
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And then they wrote a story to match What was in these ancient texts so they have to they have to deny the reality of history they have to deny
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They have to turn history on its head in essence to get around the simple reality that even taking the most late dates for the writings of Isaiah We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that these words
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Existed centuries before to the time of Christ even if they don't accept 700 years before Christ which seems to be the best date for Isaiah even if they want to make it 400 years whatever it's still centuries before the fulfillment of these words and So the the anti -supernaturalist the secularist the materialist who who only believes that what you can measure and put on a scale?
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or see under a microscope or through a telescope actually exists has to come up with some way of dealing with the reality of the prophetic testimony of the scriptures and you and I live so much amongst
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The materialists and the secularists that whether you like it or not whether you like it or not you have been influenced by that way of thinking to where every one of us has a a tinge of embarrassment a tinge of hesitation in Making statements about the supernatural part of its because we're so embarrassed by some of the loons that inhabit the internet and YouTube and and quote unquote
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Christian television networks who Embarrassed themselves and everyone else by their constant reference to the supernatural even about things that are not supernatural at all
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I mean when you've got people who are preaching out of psalm 69 saying you need to send in $69 you know we we end up having a bit of embarrassment that there are people like that and we don't want to be seen like people like that and and then those of you who work for example in Engineering and the sciences and and teach at universities wherever else might be you know
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That there is a pressure upon you to to to not only not say anything about a belief in the supernatural
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Realm or actually confess you believe in such thing as prophecy that someone actually said what was going to happen in the future
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But you know that there's a real pressure to not even believe that even if you don't say it
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There's even a pressure to you know if you believe that and you know maybe you're not really in the right Area of work or something along those lines, and so I think it is it is good for us to be reminded of the fact that the
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New Testament writers leave us absolutely no escape from recognizing that what happened in the coming of Jesus Christ was exactly according to The eternal plan of God in fact it isn't interesting.
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We just read in Acts chapter 15 and And remember what James says known to God are
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His works from eternity past. I mean, it's not like God is is going. Oh well
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You know I've tried this and that's not worked out very well, and I tried plan B. I'm down to about plan
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D Let's see if we can we can make this one work. I'm gonna try another way. No that that's that's not the
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God of the Bible Just as in Acts 15 what James was saying was hey
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God has always said he's gonna do this here It is prophesied in the scriptures, and God's gonna bring in the
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Gentiles, and he's gonna bless the Gentiles, and it's right there It's been there the whole time not sure how he didn't see it very clearly
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But it's right there and in light of what God's done now. We see it well. I always remember
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What happens in Luke chapter 24? Remember when when
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Jesus is walking with the disciples in the road to a mass and he he explains to them And then he does it for the disciples themselves later on explains from Moses all the way through the prophets the testimony of the scriptures concerning him that it was necessary that he died and be buried and rise again and and We get just a little bit of a glimpse if we look carefully at Paul's writings really carefully
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Peter We look carefully at at at the book of Acts especially in the sermons.
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We get an idea of What that intense? Biblical training was all about what texts did
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Jesus bring the mind of the Apostles well You know he certainly did psalm 110. I mean, that's the one they they quote most often
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But there are all these others That we find scattered sometimes in strange places as we're going to see this morning scattered through the text and yet here we have an indication of the the threads that were woven through the tapestry of the
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Old Testament revelation that Jesus pointed out that that in light of the resurrection in light of the resurrection that Resurrection light provided the means to be able to truly see
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Those woven fibers of truth that light had not been there before To be able to see with the clarity of looking back
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You may have experienced something like this Not doing as much right now because it's it's cold in the morning
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But but especially during the the winter season the summer season
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I'll get up very very early and I've taken up running, and so I'll go running along the canal near my house, and and it's really interesting
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If I'm running away from the Sun Then the light that I carry it's pretty necessary to have where I'm going to be
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Stepping on rocks and turn my ankles or hitting cracks in them in the in the asphalt and things like that And even though you know
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I'll turn away from the Sun I'll be running along you know and and then all of a sudden I get to the end where I'm going to come back to The direction and I turn and all of a sudden.
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It's so much brighter, and my light just isn't really useful anymore But sometimes
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I'll get down to the side turn back around again, and I need it again the light Changes so radically during that period of time
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From that that's that early dawn where things are sort of blue And it's sort of hard to tell where something is you can your your sense of?
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Depth is really off, but then as the light changes all of a sudden you start to be able to see things
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You couldn't see before And in the same way the Old Testament prophets they wove
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These These fibers these beautiful fibers of truth But it's not until the light comes from another direction it comes from a direction that they did not have that you can actually
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See how they come together to form such a beautiful tapestry now
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How do I how do I prove this to you well? I want to look at a text all the way from Isaiah 7 to 12
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And I want to show you how the New Testament writers grabbed hold of these texts and use them in a
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Fascinating array of ways turn with me to Isaiah chapter 7 you know the first one chapter 7 verse 14 verses 14 and 15 now this is in the middle of And what's beautiful about this all these texts are
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Right in the middle of God dealing with his people in the days of Isaiah they had meaning for example
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The discussion of the child Emmanuel go back to verse 10 Then Yahweh spoke again to Ahaz saying ask a sign for yourself from Yahweh your
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God Make it deep as Shaol or high as heaven, but Ahaz says I will not ask nor will I test
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Yahweh Then he said listen now house of David Is it too slight a thing for you to try the patience of men that you will try the patience of my
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God as well? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign Behold a virgin will be with child and bear a son and she will call his name
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Emmanuel Emmanuel as you know means God is with us
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God is with us He will eat curds and honey at the time he knows enough to refuse evil and choose good for before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken so there is a historical context there is something going on with Ahaz and with the nations around and God is saying there is going to be a child born and by the time that child is
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Old enough to refuse evil and choose good the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken
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So there was an immediate Application we all need to recognize that sometimes when we make reference to prophecies the coming of Christ if we don't
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Recognize what the background was we don't recognize it had a meaning at that time Sometimes a skeptic will come along or an enemy of the faith will come along and say you're ignoring that it had a meaning at That time no we're not ignoring that had to mean it had a meaning at that time every single thing
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We're going to look at in Isaiah had a meaning at the specific time It was said that doesn't change the fact that we are able to trace those threads through these differing historical
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Situations that God ordained known to him are his works from eternity past that God ordained and yet Together they then produce
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Something greater than any one of them did as a singular event or singular prophecy
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And so here in this situation there would be one and and you'll hear if I say well, it doesn't necessarily the
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Hebrew term doesn't Necessarily mean virgin it could just mean a a young maiden or something like that And you know what the
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Hebrew can be taken that way however When the Greek Septuagint was translated the
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Greek translation of the Old Testament the Greek translators chose a much stronger word
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They chose a specific word Parthenos which can only mean a virgin and that is what is quoted by Matthew in the
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New Testament And when the application is made That's what the focus is and so when you hear somebody so it doesn't necessarily mean virgin
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That's not relevant to the point the point is that you had a historical fulfillment at that time and yet There's something greater
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Once you see how all of these texts are are connected together now I'd love to spend more time on it
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But I'm we're actually going to sort of look at a number of texts and see how this section of Isaiah Especially is extremely rich and unfortunately most of the time when we study these things
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We only look at one text and we go on to something else Instead of seeing the flow of thought and the connectedness that exists between these so there's your first one in chapter 7
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Then in chapter 8 we have another situation that takes place
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Looking at Oh Like it's beginning verse 5 again Yahweh spoke to me further saying in as much as these people have rejected the gently flowing waters of Shiloh and Rejoice in resin and the son of Ramallah Ramallah Now therefore behold the
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Lord is about to bring on them the strong and abundant waters of the Euphrates Even the king of Assyria and all his glory and it will rise up over all its channels and go over all its banks
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So here comes Assyria We know that Assyria comes down from the north and here's a prophecy of what's going on but then notice verse 8 then it will sweep on into Judah it will overflow and pass through it will reach even to the neck and The spread of its wings will fill the breadth of your land.
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And then what do you have at the last? Oh Emmanuel Oh Emmanuel Wait a minute.
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We just we just had Emmanuel back in chapter 7 and we know the phrase means
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God is with us and Now we have this this prophecy and and and and Assyria is coming.
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It's gonna sweep on into Judah It will overflow and pass through It will reach even to the neck and the spread of its wings will fill the breadth of your land and who is your land?
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The one with whom God is with Oh Emmanuel the people of Israel Okay, so we've got a manual again.
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That's interesting Continues on be broken Oh peoples and be shattered give ear all remote places the earth gird yourselves yet be shattered gird yourselves yet be shattered devise a plan that will be thwarted state a proposal that will not stand for Now, I'm not sure why all translations aren't consistent here
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But the Hebrew is the same and the new American stare says God is with us, but it's the Hebrew phrase
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Emmanuel Oh Emmanuel For thus Yahweh spoke to me with mighty power
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Instructed me not to walk in the way of this people saying you are not to say it is a conspiracy in regard to all
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This people call a conspiracy for you are not to fear what they fear or be in dread of it It is
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Yahweh of hosts whom you should regard as holy and he shall be your fear He shall be your dread then he shall become a sanctuary but but to both the houses of Israel a stone to strike and a rock to stumble over and a snare and a trap for the
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Inhabitants of Jerusalem many will stumble over them then they will fall and be broken They will even be snared and caught now if you are a person familiar with the echoes of The Old Testament prophecies the
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New Testament fulfillments. You're going there's a bunch in there Because you probably notice verse 13 it is
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Yahweh of hosts and you should regard as holy Where you heard that before? first Peter chapter 3 verse 15 but you shall treat
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Christ as Lord as Holy in your hearts always being ready to give an answer for the hopeless within you if anyone asks you it's that text about being
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Ready to give an answer and Peter's drawing directly from this text. Well this text was something about what's happening in Israel Yeah, it was but the point is he is able to pull from this text and to say that we as Christians are to treat the
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Messiah as Yahweh and Sanctify him in our hearts and he quotes directly from here
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And then what's the very next few lines is it not what Paul?
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Utilizes when he talks about a stone of stumbling That's a scandal on but to both the houses of Israel a stone to strike and a rock to stumble over a snare and a trap the inhabitants of Jerusalem many will stumble over them, then they will fall and be broken.
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They wouldn't be snared and caught This is the reference the fact that for example Paul says the
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Corinthians That the preaching of the message is a scandal on it's something they trip over it's something they they fall over elsewhere
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It talks about the rock that crushes This is what God's intention was to do was to crush because only in that crushing can there come healing
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So here you've got two different Apostles Peter and Paul Drawing from the same text making
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New Testament application in their day within this same concept of not only
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Emmanuel But we're going to start seeing is we're going to start seeing this remnant
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The remnant that God is going to draw back and here we start
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Reading the same thing about well God is with us But but God is going to be gathering together people and then look just down two more two more verses of verse 18 three more verses behold
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I And the children whom Yahweh has given me are for signs and wonders in Israel from Yahweh of hosts who dwells on Mount Uzziah Where we heard that one before that's from Hebrews chapter 2 there the writer applies behold
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I and the children whom Yahweh has given me is in reference to Jesus and the fact that he is our our elder brother in the sense that that he has entered into flesh and He is not ashamed to call us his brothers because he has truly entered into flesh and he has brought about the salvation of God's people and so Whoever wrote
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Hebrews if it was as I theorized a sermon from Paul Written down by Luke or or someone else the point is they saw this text as having rich Messianic meaning and yet it had meaning to the people of their day as well but only in that brighter light that that Unique light that comes from the incarnation and the ministry of Christ and especially the death burial and resurrection of Christ Are you able to see how these things relate to one another so without a question?
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We see that this section of Isaiah and especially this chapter here drawn from repeatedly by New Testament writers in what seemed to us to be very different contexts and Application made specifically to whom to to Jesus behold
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I and the children whom Yahweh has given me this is in reference in Hebrews chapter 2 to Jesus well
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Let's is this just well, maybe it might work out that way well you already know It's not it's not just fortuitous because if that's chapter 8 you already know what chapter 9 is right?
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pretty easy to remember chapter 9 verse 2 The people who walk in darkness will see a great light those who live in a dark land the light will shine on them
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Where do we hear that both Matthew and Luke? Quote that text in regards to what to the coming of Jesus the angelic visitation the announcement of the birth of the
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Messiah The the fulfillment of the prophecies the coming of the Messiah This great light that has has shined in the darkness and so here you have it in chapter 9
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And and it doesn't stop there because as you know it goes on to say in verse 6 For a child will be born to us a son will be given to us and the government will rest on his shoulders
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And his name will be called wonderful counselor mighty God eternal father prince of peace There will be no end of the increase of his government or of peace on The throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness
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From then on and forevermore the zeal of Yahweh of hosts will accomplish this one of the greatest messianic texts in the
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Old Testament I mean it it literally challenges our mind to recognize the depth of the
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Theology that is present in the titles that are given to this one this this child will be born to us
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That's the standard word for child the standard word for for a child being born and yet a son
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Will be Nathan Nathan means to give what will be given to us seems in the high context of Isaiah that you have a picture here anyways of the
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True humanity of Christ a child be born standard terminology of any other child that's ever been born and yet a son is
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Given the son given to us Father son and spirit all involved with that by the way and the prophecy of the fact that he will have a kingdom
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He will be called wonderful counselor. He will be called El Gabor Mighty God he'll be called eternal father never let yourself as we've said many times before get get tripped up by that Father son and spirit our
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New Testament revelations father in the Old Testament normally refers to the one who makes creates orders and So have we not all one father meaning have we not all one creator and so when the son is identified as eternal father
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That's not a confusion the person's the Trinity instead I see that as a fulfillment of Colossians chapter 1 for by him were all things made or other in heaven and earth visible invincible
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Principalities powers dominions or authorities all things created by him for him He is before all things and in him all things hold together
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That's the description of Jesus, and that's a very apt application of this Hebrew phrase avi ad the very father of eternity
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He is called the Prince of Peace, how is true shalom? provided to us
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Except in the work of Jesus Christ and justified by faith we have peace with God and there will be no end to the increase of his government and God is going to fulfill this the zeal of the
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Lord of hosts will accomplish these things and he will establish Justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore
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These are incredible descriptions of the work of the
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Messiah and Yet, they're found right here in chapter 9 and within just a few verses of the description of The coming of the
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Messiah in his birth and so it's it's Impossible for us to not recognize the connection child born son given light has dawn
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Here we clearly have 700 years before the birth of Christ the prophecy of not only his birth
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But of his character and what he would accomplish now do I need to even mention?
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that all of this requires us to have a fundamental recognition of God's sovereignty over human affairs and over time itself
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I Mean none of what I'm saying here would make any sense To an open theist remember what an open theist is an open theist is a person
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Who believes that God only knows what he's gonna do in the future, but he doesn't know what we are gonna do in the future so when
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God Created I always see people chuckle when I say that but if if some of the people
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I've debated including open theists They just they would just probably weep a tear if they saw you laughing at them, but that's what they believe and But they couldn't see that coming by the way because anyway
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Well because honestly They they honestly believe that when God created the heavens and the earth he did not know you would exist
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He did not know you'd exist. He couldn't have known you would exist because what are you you are the end result of Free choice
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Free decisions by free creatures over generation after generation after generation after generation
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And that's the one thing they can't say God could know because if God knows what free creatures are gonna Do then they're not really free from their perspective, and so he could not know that you would ever exist because you might not have
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And so the cross is something that God designed as a remedial device
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Only after trying numerous other things God's doing his best you might say but an open theist
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Can't even begin to enter into our conversation our discussion.
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They can't even go there you might say well Why would they want to? They're not Christians right? Oh, no there are many people who call themselves
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Christians who who present open theism in fact Just I don't know how many what a decade or so ago a little over a decade or so The Evangelical Theological Society tried to kick all the open theists out most of them had resigned already
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But they tried to kick them all out and failed they were unable to do it By vote so yeah, they're they're still out there and unfortunately.
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They're teaching in a lot of Seminaries, but they really can't enter into this They don't have a basis because unless God has a sovereign decree that he's accomplishing this world
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Everything we're talking about here. There's no basis for prophecy Or at the very least you have to say wow
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God was really lucky to make this all work because He could have messed up over and over and over again
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But the fact that he didn't mess up means that there is a divine decree
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And that is what is being refilled referred to in verse 7 the zeal of Yahweh of hosts will accomplish this so Chapter 7
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Emmanuel Chapter 8 Emmanuel Chapter 9 the mighty God the the
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Eternal Creator the Prince of Peace All right, so we have all of these and in Chapter 9 continues with further relevant prophetic words about what was happening in the days of Isaiah or coming after the days of Isaiah it had meaning at that time
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And then you know what happens in Chapter 10 Chapter 10 is that incredible section about God bringing a
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Syria against Israel and then judging? Assyria tremendous text on what's called compatibilism the appropriateness of God's sovereign decree and man's man's responsibility and And We've preached on that one a number of times before but then notice what happens after that section beginning in verse 20 now in that day
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Isaiah chapter 10 verse 20 now in that day the remnant of Israel and those the house of Jacob who have
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Escaped will never again rely on the one who struck them but will truly rely on Yahweh the
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Holy One of Israel a Remnant will return the remnant of Jacob to the mighty
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God for though your people Oh Israel may be like the sand of the sea only a remnant within them will return a
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Destruction is determined overflowing with righteousness now again There is an immediate fulfillment of this in history
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We know about the the taking of the people into captivity and the 70 years and Nebuchadnezzar And all the rest that stuff and then the what happens when they come back.
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We just went through Nehemiah recently We know all about that. We know about the historical fulfillment, but there is much more to that because notice says
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They will never again rely on the one who struck them, but will truly rely on Yahweh the
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Holy One of Israel How is there a true faith in Yahweh?
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What is the fulfillment of that? Well that phrase a remnant?
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Will return that's the exact terminology the Apostle Paul uses in Romans 9 and Romans 11 to describe the elect of God that remnant people that specific people that are the object of his grace his mercy
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This is the very terminology that is used and of course we know that the teaching is that in that?
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Revelation in the in the coming of the Holy Spirit in the in what we've seen in the incarnation of the
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Son of God You have something special taking place and and we come to know our
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God in a special way because he has revealed himself in and through Jesus Christ and So here in chapter 10 we continue to have these texts provided to us that use these this terminology
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And then chapter 11 verse 1 remember all the you know the chapter and verse divisions came much much later
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There weren't a chapter and verse divisions in the days of Jesus or the Apostles So we're just seeing these threads through this whole section chapter 11
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Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse and a branch from his roots will bear fruit
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The spirit of Yahweh will rest on him the spirit of wisdom and understanding the spirit of counsel and strength
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The spirit of knowledge and fear of Yahweh He will delight in the fear of Yahweh, and he will not judge by what his eyes see nor make a decision
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But what his ears hear, but with righteousness He will judge the poor and decide with fairness for the afflict of the earth
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And he will strike the earth the rod of his mouth and with the breath of his lips He will slay the wicked also the righteous will be the belt about his loins
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Righteousness will be the belt about his loins and faithfulness the belt about his waist who is this well?
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We're going to continue on in Isaiah later on and see this particular thread of truth become extremely clear in the destruction and in the instructions about the servant of Yahweh So much so that you end up with the servant where?
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beginning chapter 52 in the Isaiah chapter 53 and those explicit explicit prophecies about Crucifixion that we see over in psalm 22, but in Isaiah chapter 53
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Isaiah chapter 52 this servant and so we have righteousness And we have he will strike the earth the rod of his mouth who is the one who rules the nations with an iron?
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Rod in the book of Revelation it's Jesus Christ himself and we have him as as the judge of all people and He is the source of righteousness righteousness will be the belt about his loins
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Faithfulness the belt about his waist where do we come? Where do we even have divine saving faith it comes from the work of our
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Lord and Savior Jesus Christ? and so he is the shoot that springs from the stem of Jesse and the
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Jewish people in the enter in the Intertestamental period the two period between the old and new testaments
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They looked at Isaiah chapter 11, and they were looking for the Messiah here. They saw this as messianic
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There's a special one that the spirit of Yahweh will rest upon him the spirit of wisdom and understanding
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Counsel and strength was he was he not called wonderful counselor in the only two chapters earlier in chapter 9
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You see how these threads they are woven together these terms remnant faith
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Righteousness stem of Jesse this one who's going to come who's going to be mighty God, and I just realized that I I Skipped something
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I forgot. I was going to mention it to you But let me just mention back in chapter 10 verse 21.
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Just want you to see this connection It said a remnant will return the remnant of Jacob to the mighty
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God where have we seen mighty God before that's the exact same Hebrew term Al -gabor that is used prophetically of Jesus in Isaiah chapter 9, and why do
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I say that? well if you should happen to have a conversation at a bus stop or on the train or You're walking into your favorite grocery store, and and there's those folks and they're passing out their watchtowers and awake magazines, you know and They they want to you know maybe they want it.
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Maybe they bring up Isaiah 9. I don't know They might say to you well al -gabor Doesn't really it could be mighty warrior
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Well, I suppose you can stretch it that far if you wanted to it's just one little problem right here in Chapter 10, which is only one chapter later
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It says they will truly rely on Yahweh and in their translation the new world translation
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It will specifically say Jehovah the Holy One of Israel a
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Remnant will return the remnant of Jacob to the mighty God. Who's the mighty God Yahweh?
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So within one chapter you have the exact same phrase And it's not about some mighty warrior
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It's about Yahweh himself and of course as we're tracing this through And it's not like you necessarily have the time at a bus stop to start back in chapter 7 and start tracing these things through But you never know you'd be able to build a very strong case by saying do you see what's happening here?
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do you see they see the consistency of the terms that are being used here and Who knows that may be exactly what that Jehovah's Witness needs to?
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Needs to hear then back in chapter 11 verse 10 then in that day the nations resort to whom the root of Jesse who will stand as a signal for the
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Peoples and his resting place will be glorious then it will happen on that day that the
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Lord will again recover the second time of his hand the Remnant of his people who will remain from Assyria, Egypt, Pathos, Cush, Elam, Shinar, Hamath and from the islands of the sea and he will lift up a standard of the nations and assemble the banished ones of Israel and Will gather dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth now
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Again when we keep seeing even at the end of the chapter verse 16 and there will be a highway from Assyria for the who?
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Remnant of his people who will be left just as there was for Israel in the day they came up out of the land of Egypt again historical fulfillments
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Historical promises, but they clearly point to something much greater because you see the
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Consistency of the author tying together these themes God is with us
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Emmanuel the root of Jesse the one who will come who will be wonderful counselor mighty
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God father of eternity prince of peace the Gathering of the remnant from all over the world the fact that there is going to be righteousness established true peace established
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Is it any wonder? That the modern skeptic has to do everything he can
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To try to drive the biggest wedge possible Between what we know
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I am so thankful That we have the Dead Sea Scrolls.
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Have you ever thought have ever thanked God for the Dead Sea Scrolls? Somebody did good so that You know why
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I'm thankful for the Dead Sea Scrolls because up until their discovery The most ancient
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Hebrew text we had were about 900 years after Christ now What if we didn't have the
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Dead Sea Scrolls a can you imagine? What the skeptics the Bart Ehrman's of the world?
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Or others like them can you imagine what they would be saying about this they would clearly say?
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That well we don't You can't talk about prophecy here.
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We we don't know when these these words were written They could have been written contemporaneously they they would come up with conspiracy theories.
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I mean it is that time of year again. Yeah, it's it's it's already started I already saw my first one and You're gonna start seeing you know all the standard lame -brained
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Secularist explanations about the not -so -virgin birth and and you're gonna start staring at seeing stuff about us
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Osiris and and Dionysus and all the mythologies and you know it
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Few weeks before the Resurrection Sunday a few weeks before Christmas you get the same thing
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It's like they don't even bother to rewrite anything anymore. It's just cut and paste. Let's publish it again
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That's that's sort of how things work, and that's if we didn't have Something like the
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Dead Sea Scrolls because you see I Have right here on my on my iPad.
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I have the entire Isaiah scroll from the Dead Sea Scrolls the whole thing not just not just written out, but I pictures of it got the got the graphics the whole thing and There's no question
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There's none. I mean no even even the most radical skeptic is not going to say this was written after Jesus This was written hundreds of years beforehand and obviously the whole reason was written
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Then is because it had been written long before that I Mean there's no there's there's there's no reason to question a 700
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BC date But even if you do, it's always a BC date. It's before Christ and So you can see why this the the secularist the person is trying to to strip any
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Supernatural out of the scriptures has to try to create as big a chasm as possible between these
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Old Testament scriptures and the New Testament fulfillment of them because if you just treat them fairly if you if you just restrain your bias and your prejudice and your
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Rebellion for just a moment you have to stand back and go these words taken as a whole
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I either have to believe were fulfilled in an amazing manner in the life of Jesus of Nazareth in the presence of his enemies recorded by multiple different sources
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Or I have to come up. I I have to adopt the guilty until proven innocent radical skepticism of So many today and accuse all the
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New Testament writers of being liars and they're all getting together, and they're they're they're in cahoots with one another and They're there somehow for reasons
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We can't really figure out because it basically just got most of them prisoner death But but they still want to do this for some reason they've all gotten together and they've created this huge conspiracy where they they make up this life of Jesus and and and It just doesn't work
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It's it's it's pathetic and it speaks to the very nature of Unbelief, it's not just unbelief.
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It's rebellion Just as the New Testament says men know God's there They suppress that truth, and that's what they do with the revelation of God when it comes to them as well what we have are fulfilled prophecies in Scripture God said this is what
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I'm gonna do now. He didn't say it By saying this is what I'm gonna do and then give us on such -and -such a date
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This is gonna happen than to say that not that's not how how God gives us prophecy Because what he does what he's done since Moses You know the very beginning the prote
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Evangelium the fall of all of Adam You have that a little text about about the seed of the woman and the serpent you know all the way back then
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Why didn't he just go? I'm gonna send a Messiah in the home. Let's see you're about so 1 ,400 years
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You know maybe more than that a lot more than that actually I think about but Moses is time about 1 ,400 years
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That's not how God ever gave prophecy, and if he had I mean That's how we'd like you know we'd like it to be a printer manual type thing or a work of history
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You know nice and simple and straightforward. That's not how God has dealt with his people instead we find these golden and Silver and platinum threads of prophecy and truth woven into God's actions in dealing with his people in bringing judgment upon Israel for our idolatry in Fulfilling the blessings and cursings of Deuteronomy that we just read recently that were so difficult to get through we see him
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Giving this information in the midst of dealing with his people and only
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When the right light is available Only when the right light is available
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I Think there's a I think there is a monument. I think I saw it for Veterans it wasn't
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Veterans Day or the Memorial Day out is it in Fountain Hills where they've built it
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So that there are the holes in the monument are lined up.
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I saw this on Look, did you see the same thing where? The light comes through perfectly to form a particular
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Pattern on the ground only on that one day that is
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Memorial Day So the rest of the year, but I'm a Memorial Day It works perfectly and as I recall each section is like one for each of the armed services type things like that Clearly designed right and it's designed to make a point
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But it can only happen in one way when the Sun's at his particular point
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Well in the same way These prophecies the material it's right there the threads are right there
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But it can't really be seen with the clarity that we can see until the light is available
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Because it's easy for us to get on the disciples and say why didn't you guys see all this come on?
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You know all those two disciples. You know they're all sad walking along that we thought he'd be the
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Messiah and Jesus says He doesn't I suppose you could you know maybe some paraphrase translation would say you dummies
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I am That's not what he said, but but in essence he opened their minds
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And he explained to them here it all is here is what the fulfillments all were and you can just sense they're going
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It was it was right there the whole time How how could we have not seen that and then when
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Jesus comes to disciples? I mean he opens their mind to understand the scriptures. Can you imagine how?
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Passionate they were when they first they started preaching those sermons. They started quoting those texts and of course immediately started running into the resistance
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Of the Jews saying that's not what it means Because it's not just the light But if you close your eyes to the light, it's not going to help you
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So there has to be a spiritual removal of that veil that covers the face that covers the eyes that removes the blindness
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To be able to see but it's there and it's a beautiful thing to see
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Now I'm not saying this gives us warrant to just ignore all the historical fulfillments
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I hope you heard me say over and over again looking at every single one of these there was a historical context
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There was fulfillment going on we need to see that Because we got a lot of folks running around today that you know write books because they've figured out something no one ever else
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No one's ever else seen has seen this I've got it now and send me 3995 and you can read what
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I've come up with see that's way too common, but the reality is we have a treasure a
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Treasure in our hands when sometimes people say well, you know sometimes I struggle with having faith remember
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Remember that for hundreds of years these words existed the testimony was there and Then it's been preserved for us these thousands of years later
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So I don't know about you, but it excites me. I'm thankful for a reminder.
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I need a reminder about once a year To be amazed at the reality of the fact that God has invaded his own creation what an incredible thing to consider and We don't do that because we don't we don't get excited about that because some
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Roman Emperor 300 years later decided to coalesce Christianity and Paganism, that's ridiculous we do that because When we take the time to look carefully at what
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God has given us even in the prophetic word We find that testimony given to us.
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It is an amazing thing And I hope that it strengthens your faith the same way that it does mine.
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Let's pray together Indeed our gracious Heavenly Father we thank you for the preservation of your word
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We thank you first for the very gift of your word. You did not have to to weave this glorious tapestry of Scripture You did not have to give us these beautiful threads of prophecy that in the light of the resurrection glow with such
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Brilliant color and beauty, but you did you've given this to us and Lord so often we must confess as Believers we let the baubles and bangles of this world
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Distract us and capture our hearts rather than constantly being Amazed at the true treasures that you have given to us treasures that will last throughout all our lives and into eternity itself
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Forgive us for that Help us once again to thrill to your truth and in light of that may we be those who are quick to Give a testimony of your truth to those around us.
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We thank you for the coming of Christ We thank you for the Prince of Peace May we live for his honor and glory in this coming week.