Seder 15: Jeremiah 33---God's Faithfulness to His Covenants

 In the final days of the kingdom of Judah, with Jerusalem falling to the Babylonians, God sent a message through the prophet Jeremiah giving assurance that he had not abandoned his people.  Restoration would come, with spiritual cleansing and the rebuilding of Jerusalem (Jer 33:6-11).  The Messiah would come to rule over Israel (vv 14-16).  

God affirms his commitment to his covenants, including the Davidic covenant (2 Sam 7:16) and his covenant with Phinehas (Num 25:11-13).  These things, God says, are as sure as the rising and setting of the sun (Jer 33:20-21), which is guaranteed by God's covenant with Noah (Gen 8:22).

Christians believe that Jesus is now the eternal occupant of the Davidic throne.  Jesus' connection with David is emphasized in the Gospels, beginning in Matthew 1.  Luke's genealogy in Luke 3 traces Jesus' legal ancestry---the ancestry of Joseph---back to David (and ultimately to Adam) by a different route. 

How God's commitment to the Levitical priesthood might play out in the future is as yet unknown.  We know that a future role for Levites is also part of Ezekiel's visions (Ezek 40:46; 43:!9; 44:15; 48:11). On the other hand, we don't know for sure that there will ever be another earthly temple.  In their commentary on Jeremiah, Walter Kaiser and Tiberius Rata ask, "Is this language, then, using older liturgies to make the future understandable to those in Jeremiah’s time? This is one suggestion as to how we are to understand such contrasting ideas" (p. 470).

Seder 62: Exodus 23, Malachi 3, Luke 7---the Prophetic Role of John the Baptist

In Luke 7:27, Jesus made a statement about John the Baptist's key role in God's plan:

"This is he of whom it is written, 'Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.' "

In a sermon at Church of the Messiah on July 3, 2021, Kyle Kettering noted that Jesus' scriptural reference combined elements of both Exod 23:20 and Mal 3:1.  

Exodus 23:20-22 describes an angel that God would send to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land.  (The description suggests that the angel was a visible manifestation of God, perhaps a Christophany.)  But leaving aside the identity of this angel, in what way did John the Baptist resemble him?

Verse 21 says concerning this angel, "Do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him."  Kyle mentioned a Jewish tradition, later recorded in Exodus Rabbah, that the angel represents "strict justice."  He pointed out that John the Baptist brought a message of imminent judgment, calling upon Jews of his day to repent  (Luke 3:`7-18).  

Mal 3:1 predicts the coming of a messenger that would prepare the way for the appearance of the "messenger of the covenant"---i.e., the Messiah.  Judgment and repentance are also themes in Mal 3:1-7.  

 There is a continual call in the Bible for the people of God to return to him, a call that is just as relevant today as it was 2000 years ago.

Seder 4 Sermon: Generations

Genesis 5 begins, "This is the book of the generations of Adam."  The book of Genesis is punctuated by a number of statements of this form.  (The next one appears in Gen 6:9.)  According to one theory, much of the book of Genesis may have originally consisted of a series of clay tablets, with these statements appearing as either the headers or footers for the tablets.  Sometimes these statements seem to be summarizing what has just been said; sometimes they seem to summarize what comes next; and sometimes both. 

In his sermon on Seder 4, Rob Wilson makes the important observation that the New Testament begins with a statement of the same form:  "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham" (Matt 1:1).  In fact, the Greek words for "the book of the genealogy", biblos geneseos, are the same words used in the Septuagint translation of "book of the generations" in Gen 5:1.

As with the statements in the book of Genesis, we might view Matt 1:1 as both a summary of what has come before (the entirety of the Hebrew Scriptures) and a summary of the New Testament.  Both are, fundamentally, the story of Jesus the Messiah.

Rob also emphasizes that we are all part of this story (see Ps 139:16).

Matthew 1 gives one of two genealogies of Jesus recorded in the New Testament.  The other appears in Luke 3.  The two genealogies lead to Jesus' legal father Joseph by two different routes, and there are multiple ideas about how to explain the differences between them.

Rob pointed out that the two genealogies send two different messages.  The Matthew 1 genealogy focuses on Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, while the Luke 3 genealogy emphasizes Jesus as son of God and savior of all mankind.    Both are important messages.