The Mix: The Person and the Work of Christ

And, if you are a regular here, you'll know that means it's the mix. And, we do something a little bit different on the mix. We we have some teaching, adult size teaching in bikes like bite sized chunks, we call it. So we have teaching from the bible, and then, in between that, we have songs and prayers, and, and in the next few mixes, we're starting a bit of a new mini series, and, we are going to be thinking about the person and the work of Christ. The chances are, as we begin thinking about the person and the work of Christ, you you already know, quite a little bit about that, but how does the Bible describe the the role and the person of Jesus Christ?

What promises are made about him in the old testament, and, how does the new testament then draw on that language? And show us that Jesus is the fulfillment of the old testament prophecies. What what categories, what language does the bible actually give us so that we can talk about the person and the work of Christ. So that is gonna be our big subject over the next few months. And this morning, by way of introduction, I want to begin with a question.

Hopefully, this is neither too difficult or too easy. I want you to tell me what all these people have in have in common. Who thinks they know? What all these people have in common? Similar.

They're wearing what or wearing suits. Do you think? Yeah. Anyone know? Yeah.

Close. Sorry. Yes. They all have served as prime minister at different points in, in history. And, the interesting thing about the prime minister or the word prime minister is that it really describes 2 things, doesn't it?

So the prime minister is a person and it is a job. It is a someone and a something. If you call someone or know someone as prime minister, you know they're a person and they're called to a specific job. And when it comes to the word Christ in the Bible, that's a good way of thinking about it. So Christ is not Jesus' surname.

It's not Jesus Christ. It's not a surname. It's actually a title, and it comes from a very important Hebrew word which is Messiah, and that literally means the anointed 1. Okay? It means the anointed 1.

Can you get that 1? And, so the anointed 1, just like prime minister, is a person and a job. It is a someone and a something. Someone who has been anointed by god for a specific purpose. They've been set apart for a role, consecrated for a role by anointing.

And in the old testament, as you read through, there's actually quite a lot of anointing that goes on, but there are 3 main jobs which all required it. Okay? So it's not just pouring oil over someone's head. That's what we've gotta get. It's symbolic of being set aside for 1 of these 3 major jobs.

The first was king. So if you were about to become a king, a king over god's people, 1 of the ways of publicly recognizing your calling was to anoint you. You would be set apart as king. Here's an example from the from the bible. Samuel, the prophet Samuel is told by god, fill your hoard with oil and be on your way.

I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen 1 of his sons to be king. So Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed David in the presence of his brothers. He was publicly set apart as king. Priests were the next group of people who also had to be anointed.

They were set apart in the life of god's people to deal with blood and to deal with sacrifice and to deal with atonement. It's a very special important job and they needed to be set apart in order to do it. So Levitska's chapter 8, then Moses took some of the anointing oil and some of the blood from the altar and sprinkled them on Aaron and his garments and on his sons and their garments. So he consecrated Aaron and his garments and his sons and their garments. In other words, this job wasn't for everyone.

You couldn't decide that you wanted to be a priest. It was a it was a holy special job and you had to be anointed and set apart in order to do it. So we've got kings, we've got priests, and then lastly prophets. Okay? Now not all profits were probably anointed with oil in the same way the others were.

It was more of a symbolic thing, but the language of anointing is used for the prophets of God. Okay? Have a look at this famous verse from Isaiah. The spirit of the sovereign lord is on me because the lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor, set apart to proclaim the good news. So you can see when it comes to anointing in the old testament, prophet, priest, and king were the main jobs that required it.

Now, in theology, when it comes to Jesus, those 3 jobs are often called the offices of Christ. The offices of Christ. They're not these kinds of offices that you might see on the corner of the road. It's a term which means This is who Jesus is, and this is what he does. These are his offices, his duties.

He is not just a prophet, a king, a priest, he is the prophet, the priest, the king. All that came before him were just shadows, Christ is the substance. Christ is the reality, He is the ultimate fulfillment of all of those jobs. That's what he does. He is the capital a anointed 1, capital k king, capital P profit, capital P priest.

And today, this morning, we're going to be looking at just the first office the role of profit, what that was, and how Jesus fulfilled it. And then in future mixes, we'll be thinking about those other offices too. So before we get into what a prophet was, we're going to sing again. So the band are gonna come up, and we are going to sing god's praises together. So let's stand and sing our next song, behold the power of his word.

So, after introducing the subject that we're gonna be looking at, this office of prophet and how Jesus is the ultimate prophet. Let's go right back to the beginning and try and find out a bit about what a prophet actually was. Now, in in the simplest terms, a prophet is someone who speaks on behalf of another person. And and normally that will be a man or a woman who is speaking for god. So there is always 2 sides of the coin here.

Okay? You have a a kind of passive side, if you like, and an active side. The true prophet had to listen. They had to have their ears open to what god was saying and they then had to proclaim it to speak it out to the people they were called to speak to. Now the first example of a prophet in the Bible is actually Adam, isn't it?

That's where prophecy begins. Adam and Eve were created to do both of those things. They had to listen to god's word, and then they had to speak it out into god's world to each other and to creation. But as we know, very quickly, they failed, didn't they? They failed actually in both of those duties.

They stopped listening to god, and therefore they became false prophets. So what happens when you don't listen properly to god, you become a false prophet. They started speaking wrongly about god to each other and they started to misrepresent the god who had called them with their words and their actions and their lives. And so from then on, The story of the Bible is the story of a fallen humanity, and therefore even the best prophets the most faithful prophets that exercised their duties for god, even them, they were still infect by sin. The job of prophecy was infected by sin, and there was no hundred percent faithful profit after that.

But, nonetheless, the the job description didn't change. Okay? The prophets still had to do those 2 things to listen to god and to speak for god. Here's how the lord puts it to Jeremiah, just very simply. I have put my words in your mouth.

You see? It's not their job to invent the message. Or to listen to what god says, and then to use that as a basis and think, okay, well, that's a good principle god. But let me just rework that in a way I know how and apply it to my culture. You know, it wasn't their job really to reinvent the wheel They just had to proclaim faithfully what god had told them to say.

It was their lips, but it was his words. But despite the fact that this job description never changes, the profits are not 1 sort of person. It is amazing when you read through the old testament to see the diversity that exists among them. So you've got Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah, who was a a very, kind of well-to-do educated man who moved in high circles. And then you had the prophet Amos who, by all accounts, seemed to just grow out of the ground.

I mean, he was from the earth. He was an earthy sort of person. He was a shepherd. Who spoke in very, very different ways, but but despite those differences, despite the the wonderful ways in which god used those different characters, The job description never changed. It was always to be his words on their lips.

They were a mouthpiece for the living god. But there was more to being a prophet than just being a mouthpiece. They also had to know the culture they were speaking into. They had to know the people and the context. They had to be asking these kind of questions, you know, who who am I speaking to?

And what do these people know already about god? What access to the law have they had? What festivals do they celebrate? What sins are they committing? Which false gods are they worshiping?

Is there injustice in the land that needs to be exposed. In what ways can I paint a picture of terrible judgment and in what ways can I bring wonderful gracious words? They they had to think about the people. A prophet was never called just to speak into the air. You know, they weren't just air dropped in, right?

I'm at the temple. Read points 1 to 3. What next? What next? It wasn't like that.

It was a very dynamic business prophecy. You had to know the words, but also the context and the culture that you were speaking into. Amos is a tremendous example. For 3 sins of Israel, even for 4 I will not relent. They sell the innocent for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals.

They trample on the heads of the poor as on the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed. You lie on beds adorned with ivory and lounge on your couches. You dine on choice lambs and fattened calves. You strum away on your harps like David, and improvise on musical instruments. You drink wine by the bowl full and use the finest lotions.

But you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph. And therefore, you will be among the first to go into exile. You're feasting and your lounging will end. You see how he knows who he's speaking to. It's not just general words, is it which we could all agree with?

We're all sinners, aren't we? Yes, Amos. We're all sinners. Yes. We deserve judgment, don't we?

Yes, we do. We all deserve judgment, Amos, you're right. That is not prophecy. When he's preaching sin, he's not gonna talk in a general way which will allow them to apply it to others or to escape the implications. He says, you sell the innocent for silver, and that is your sin.

You use the finest lotions upon your fat and faces, but you don't care for justice That is your sin, and therefore, you are gonna be ripped off your couches and thrown into a living hell. That is your judgment. That's prophecy. No wonder they were persecuted because they didn't just preach general words, which we could all agree with, but don't hit the heart. They had to know the word of god but also know the culture and the people and then speak into it.

And although as we'll see a bit later on, we are not prophets in exactly the same way, lord give us courage to be like that. That's what we want, isn't it? To be faithful mouthpieces, his word on our lips, but not just preaching into the air, knowing our people, knowing the culture and working out how to bring the word of god to bear in our in our world, just like the prophets did. So that was important. They were mouthpieces, but they also had to know who they were speaking to, but there was another aspect of being a prophet It was a message that they had to preach, but being a prophet was also a life they had to lead.

And sometimes it was a very it was a very strange life. I mean, most of us, when we think about Isaiah, particularly at this time of year, We might remember some of his Christmas prose, his Christmas poetry, some of the wonderful things that that he said versus like this for instance. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light, and those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned to us the child is born to us as son is given. But how many of us remember that this same Isaiah had to walk around naked for 3 years as part of his ministry. Okay?

Have a look at what the lord actually calls Amos to do. At that time, the lord spoke by Isaiah the son of Amos saying go and lose the sackcloth from your waist and take off your sandals from your feet, and he did so walking naked and barefoot. Then the lord said, as my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for 3 years as a sign against Egypt and cush, So shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptian captives and the Kushite exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot. Okay? So this sorry.

It's better in that version. Is it? Yeah. That's yes. That's the I think that's the ESV that version.

At that time, the lord spoke through Isaiah's other main ones. He said to take off your sacral through your body in the sanitary, they did so going, then the lord said, just as my servant Isaiah's gone stripped and barefoot, for 3 years as a sign of pro-portant against Egypt and cush, so the king of assyria will lead away stripped and barefoot the in captives and cush shots young and old, that's why it's better. I see. Yeah. It's just that line, isn't it really?

With buttocks bared. To Egypt's shame. Okay? So it's a strange old life, isn't it? Now, I did I did think about some sort of visual aid at this point.

But I think I think this morning would then be remembered for the wrong reasons. Okay? So Isaiah, this is strange. He was He was told to walk around naked for 3 years. Does anybody want that ministry?

Even in the friendliest of climates, okay? That is a strange thing to be called to do. But in another sense, you can see, it's all part of the job. It's really, really important. He was illustrating what judgment was going to be like.

He was called to do something strange and unusual to wake up his hearers to the fact that the judgment of god was coming upon them. So in other words, they had to speak but they also had to live their message. It had to be part of them. It wasn't just a job they were doing. It was a life they were being called to.

And again, I think that is a challenge, isn't it for us? Because people might ignore our words as we speak. But don't let them ignore your life. The child of god and the gospel of Jesus Christ are not 2 separate things. Like marriage, they are 1 flesh.

They are they are enmeshed together. We are not only to speak, but to live out our message, the gospel of Jesus Christ. And sometimes, people do need strange or or slightly different things in order to wake them up. And in order that we can get a hearing. Now I'm not saying that we follow Isaiah in this regard.

But it is worth asking, isn't it? What could we do? In order to wake people up to get a hearing for the gospel, you know, soul enrouted, it is worth thinking along those lines, at school and there are other things. What can you do? What could you start?

Is there something you could say? Is there a different way in which you could serve? Is there something out of the ordinary, something that your friends would never do that would allow you to get a hearing for the gospel. That is what they had to do. It was word and it was life and sometimes it was a very strange life.

Okay? So that is what the profit was all about. You can see how important this office was. On the 1 hand, we've got a holy god who loves to speak and who must be heard. And then on the other side, you've got a sinful people who need to hear how is the gap going to be bridged between these 2 parties?

By a prophet who is called to speak and live his or her message. That's what it's all about. And in a moment, we're going to see how Jesus is the capital p profit. So let's have the band up first. We're going to sing, and then after that, we are going to spend some time praying together.

So, in our first couple of sections, we've learned a little bit about what a profit was and, the kind of life that they were called to live. But there's 1 major thing that I left out. In the Old Testament, there were loads of prophets that came and went different characters and personalities, but bubbling underneath the surface throughout all those hundreds of years of prophecy was an important promise, and it was found in deuteronomy chapter 18. The lord your god will raise up for you a prophet like me, says Moses speaking, from among you, from your fellow Israelites, you must listen to him. The lord your god will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you from among your fellow israelites, you must listen to him.

1 day, a prophet like Moses but greater than Moses was going to come. Now by the end of the old testament that just had not happened, and the writers of the Old Testament were aware of that because there's a little section right at the end of deuteronomy, which was added at some point after the rest of the book. And it's like a footnote on the Old Testament. Duteronomy 34, since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the lord knew face to face. So prophets had come and prophets had gone but the jigsaw was still lacking this perfect final piece.

And that is because when Moses made that original promise, he wasn't just talking about another man like him, He was talking about another, a greater. Here's acts chapter 3, Peter is in Jerusalem preaching. Here's what he says. Repent then and turn to god so that your sins may be wiped out that times of refreshing may come from the lord and that he may send the Messiah who has been appointed for you even Jesus. For Moses said, The lord your god will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people.

You must listen to everything he tells you and anyone who does not listen to him will be completely cut off from their people. So why hadn't this prophet come in the Old Testament? Because Moses was looking ahead, and he was speaking about this capital A anointed 1, this great prophet who would come, the fulfillment of all prophecies, the essence of true prophecy, Jesus Christ, our lord. And when you turn to the new testament, the gospels, particularly, you see that Jesus was happy to take that name for himself. In fact, his life was just like the old prophets.

He was anointed by the spirit of god at his baptism. He was set apart publicly for the ministry which god had given him. He spoke the words of his father Just like the prophets, he had the father's word on his lips. I do not speak on my own. Jesus said.

But the father who sent me commanded me to speak. Like Amos, he didn't deal in sound bites He didn't just preach above the heart. He knew people, and he knew their situations, and he knew when and where to preach judgment and how to bring wonderful words of grace to people. He understood his context. So you see that Jesus was very much in the tradition of the prophets.

And yet at the same time, Jesus is not mainly revealed as just a prophet or even the greater prophet. In fact, people who called Jesus a prophet often knew very little about him. Who do people say I am? Jesus said? Some say on the Baptist, others elijah and still honor others, 1 of the prophets.

And what about you, Jesus said? Who do you say I am? You are the Christ, the son of the living god. To stop at 1 of the prophets is to say something true but to be very, very, very far from the truth. Or on the mount of transfiguration.

Remember that scene Jesus is on the top of the mountain with 2 greats, who are they? Moses, and Elijah, they are the fulfillment, if you like, of the law and the prophecy. They represent prophecy in all the years gone by, but who is center stage? Then a cloud appeared and covered them. And a voice came from the cloud.

This is my son whom I love. Listen to him. Like them, but very, very different from them. Or which prophet would ever have dreamed of saying, I and the father are 1. None of them would ever have dreamed of talking like that.

I and the father are 1. 1 writer says, Jesus stands within the long line of prophetic heroes, who bore the word of god and yet he towers above them for he also is the word he bears. And what a massive difference that is, isn't it? The prophets were called to speak and to live their message and they did but Jesus Christ towers above them because he doesn't just bring the word. He is the word.

He doesn't just bring the message. He is the message he bears. He is the words made flesh. Jesus Christ doesn't just bring us the words of the creator. He is the creator.

Through him all things were made. He doesn't just speak glorious words to us. He himself is the radiance of god's glory. We saw in Hebrews 1. He emanates god's glory.

He is god's glory. When Jesus came, he didn't just proclaim god's demands and god's grace. He he incarnated them. He was them. He is god's demands, and he is god's grace.

He is the word made flesh. And so when Muslim friends or friends from different religions say, well, yes, we have a very high regard for Jesus, and isn't it great that we love Jesus, and let's put our differences aside because we're all talking about Jesus. We cannot accept that. We cannot accept that. To call him 1 of the prophets is in the end of blasphemy because he is the very word of god, god himself with skin on the message that he bears.

And you can see that when we understand that, it not only changes our attitude to Jesus It changes how we read everything else that the prophet said, doesn't it? Because if Jesus is the word of God. Then that means when Isaiah and Amos were preaching, they were preaching Jesus. Because Jesus is god's word. God's communication to this world is Jesus.

And when they preached, they were preaching him. You can see that in 1 Peter. It's an amazingly important verse. Concerning this salvation, the prophets who spoke of the grace that was to come to you searched intently and with the greatest care trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the spirit of Christ in them was pointing. When he predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that would follow.

And that verse is just like a master key which opens every door in the Bible. The prophets spoke about the suffering and the glory of Christ. But more than that, it was the spirit of Christ in them that was preaching Christ through them. It's an amazing thought, isn't it? The spirit of the living Christ in them, preaching himself through their through their ministry.

That is why in Revelation 19 Jesus is called the Spirit of prophecy. He is prophecy. That's what it's all about. God's word to this world is and always has been his son. And that means that if anybody stands up and shares a message from the Bible or tries to tell somebody a gospel that doesn't have the biblical Jesus at its beating heart Whatever our stat is, it's not prophecy because the spirit of true prophecy is Jesus Christ.

The word of god, the word made flesh. And if that is true, then we must listen to him. Mustn't we? We must listen to him. This is what the father tells us at the mount of transfiguration.

This is my son whom I love listen to him. And so do you see week by week as we gather in this place? Although not for much longer, lord willing, in any place, and we hear the Bible opened up. It doesn't matter which chapter or book that we are in. As we open the word of God, the spirit of Christ, the eternal prophet will be prophesying himself.

His suffering, his resurrection, his glory, and we are to listen to him. Friends, we've gotta challenge ourselves on that continually, haven't we? As Jesus prophesies himself through his words, can we honestly say we are listening to him? As the father says because he is god's word to us. But as well as listening to him, we are also to proclaim him.

Okay? So as I said earlier, we are not the same as the prophets and the apostles of the Bible. The Bible actually tells us that those are foundational roles. It uses that term. And in building, Once you've laid a foundation, you don't need to lay another 1.

Once the foundations are set, you just build up on the secure foundation. And the word of the prophets and the apostles are the foundation for faith. They have been set and laid in Jesus and in the scriptures and so we just build upon them. So that's a very important difference. But nonetheless, we are called to be like the prophets who take the word of Christ on our lips and into our hearts and live it and speak it into our world.

1 Peter again, as just so helpful, but you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood a holy nation god's special possession that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. It's that amazing, isn't it? Why is Cornerstone church a chosen people? Why are we a royal priesthood? Why are we part of the holy nation?

Why are we god's special possession? Why have we been anointed in that sense? To proclaim the praises of Christ who has called us out of darkness into light. We're called to be like the prophets who preach up a big Christ into the world. I don't know if you pay much attention to the, to the extinction rebellion protest recently over the past few months or what your what your opinion of them is.

But what really whatever you think of their message, and their motivations and the way they've acted, there is always something to learn, I think. And the truth is when you look at that group of people despite all the disagreements and anger we might pour on them, it is quite interesting, isn't it? That there is a group of people Some of them very young, some of them very old who are willing to go to prison to tell people that the world is ending. And if that is true of that message, which is actually a message of hopelessness and a message of death and a message of good works, really, if that is true of that message, should it not also be true of god's people who are called to go out into the world to risk persecution like the prophets. In order to proclaim that Christ is coming, the world really is ending, but he will make it new and that there is grace for all who will turn to him.

That is the spirit of true prophecy, isn't it? Knowing the word of god in the Bible, understanding the world that we live in, and taking this good news of Christ, the ultimate prophet into the world. So simply that that is really what prophecy is all about. It's all about, and it's always has been about Jesus. The word made flesh, brothers and sisters, should we pray that god would help us to listen to him and to preach him boldly into this world which so desperately needs to hear.

Let's bow our heads and pray, and we'll sing our last song together. Father, we do thank you so much for your word and we thank you that, you have spoken. You love to speak. We thank you that you are not a god who exists somewhere in the universe who was happy just to create and then to leave things to unwind. Thank you that as well as making this universe you desire to speak.

You want people to know who you are and what you've done, and we praise you for your word. Which is your very breath. Thank you that it really contains everything that we need for life and for godliness. It is able to thoroughly equip us for every good work. And most of all, we thank you that it reveals your son.

Thank you that he is the grand theme of the scriptures, that he is the beating heart on every page, that Jesus Christ is your word to this dying world and that all who will turn to him in repentance and faith can be saved. Father, we pray that you would have mercy on us as a church family, and that you would help us week by week, please, to listen to Jesus as he preaches himself through the words of the prophets and the apostles. Help us not to be guilty of just, drawing near him, looking for something interesting to say, thinking that we know it all putting him to 1 side help us really to listen to Jesus as he speaks. Then help us as well, father, please, to proclaim him. We know that Christ is the only hope for this dying world and that you have called us out of darkness so that we might preach him.

You have anointed us by your spirit so that we might proclaim him. So lord help us to do these 2 things. With the words of your son, listen to him and proclaim him boldly. And we ask it all in his name and for his glory. Oh, man.