Glory and the Gibbit

Dear Ehud,

Having covered the Christian understanding of Christ as prophet, priest, and king, we come now to a more foundational question. It is one thing to say what Christians believe about Christ, for they are Christians after all, while it is quite another to understand what the Old Testament says about the coming Christ . . . before we have heard anything about Jesus of Nazareth. What sort of fulfillment should the first century Jews been expecting?

There are scores of places we might look, but we don’t have endless amounts of time. What I propose to do is simply walk through the life of Christ and show how different aspects of His life are clearly anticipated by the Torah and the prophets.

We may begin with the fact that Mary conceived Him while she was still a virgin. No human father was involved in his conception. This was foretold by the prophet Isaiah.

Now I readily acknowledge that the word rendered as virgin here is almah, and in Hebrew it can mean virgin, but it can also mean young woman. The prophet was also talking about how a woman would bear a son (likely his wife), a child who would provide a sign of reassurance to King Ahaz. She would conceive that son in the ordinary way, and by the time the child was weaned, the enemies that Ahaz was so worried about would be a non-factor. But there is clearly more going on here than just the sign for Ahaz.

Centuries later, but well before the Christian era, this was plain to the rabbis who translated the Hebrew of Isaiah into Greek, when the Septuagint was completed several centuries before Christ. They rendered that word almah as parthenos, which in Greek means virgin, and only virgin. The word parthenos here refers to a woman who has not known a man. The doctrine of a virgin birth for someone was not introduced after Jesus came as a way of elevating His status. No, it was part of the prophetic literature of the Jews.

But there is more here, and it is related to the second thing I want to emphasize. The name that Isaiah gives to this child is Immanuel, which means “God with us.” The Greek Old Testament tells us of a coming figure, one who would be born of a virgin virgin, and He would be a divine incarnation. He would be “God with us.” This is a promise that is asserted elsewhere as well. Two chapters later, Isaiah tells us that the people of Galilee would see a great light (Is. 9: 1-2) because “to us a child is born” and “a son is given” (Is. 9:6). He is a true human, in that He is born. But what name shall He go by? He shall be called “mighty God, everlasting Father” (Is. 9:6). So He is also divine. But then His humanity is emphasized again because we are told that He will sit on the throne of David, which He could not do unless descended from David.

This ties in with something the prophet Micah says when predicting His birthplace.

And so we now have someone who is the true and living God, one who was to be born in Bethlehem, was to grow up in Galilee, before assuming the throne of His father David. This is nothing less than the doctrine of the Incarnation. This was the natural conclusion that the Christians drew—Son of David, but also Son of God.

It is not at all unusual that the Jews were therefore expecting a Messiah, which means anointed one. The Greek for this is Christ. So Christ is not a surname, but rather a title. If Jesus were to be identified by a surname, it would be Jesus ben-David, or, if we did it according to our system, Jesus Davidson.

But this brings us to the great stumbling block, which has to do with the nature of the Messiah’s mission. The possibility that Jesus could be the promised Messiah was an obvious possibility, and so the question was posed to Jesus on various occasions.

Given the works of power that Jesus performed, the question was an obvious one. But it also seemed equally obvious that if He was the Christ, He would reveal His Christ-status by even greater works of power, ascending upward in a straight line. Now they were right about the greater work of power—which is what the resurrection was—but they failed to budget for the humiliation that would need to happen first, setting the stage for the resurrection. In order to make a resurrection possible, it was necessary for Him to die.

Elijah accomplished a great triumph on Mount Carmel when he called down fire from Heaven. That was the resurrection. But before he did that, he soaked the sacrificial altar with water. That was the crucifixion.

In short, the Jews had a triumphant Messiah promised in the Old Testament, and they had many prophecies to point to in line with that triumph. Of the increase of His government there would be no end (Is. 9:6-7). He was going to be given universal dominion over all the nations of men (Dan. 7:13-14). The Messiah would have a place of supreme honor at God’s right hand (Psalm 110). The Messiah would have both judicial authority and military might (Is. 11). The Messiah as king would have a commanding authority from sea to sea (Zech. 9:9-10).

So when the Christ finally appeared, it seemed pretty clear to everyone what He was going to do. The most natural thing in the world to assume was that He would be manifested in power and glory, He would bare His right arm, and deliver the people of Israel. This assumption was even shared by the Lord’s disciples. He would destroy the Romans, and establish Israel as a free and prosperous kingdom, and He would do it all by kicking butt and taking names. It also seemed clear to everyone that Jesus had the kind of power that could actually do this. He fed the multitudes. He raised the dead, He healed the sick. He walked on water.

What was to prevent Him from just throwing down the Romans? The only thing preventing that was the wisdom of God.

The Scriptures also contained the promise of the Isaianic Suffering Servant (Is. 53). The Jewish failure of interpretation was in not seeing these messiahs as being united in one man. He was not going to do anything so trifling as overthrowing the Romans. No, He was sent in order to conquer death. And He was going to do it by allowing Himself to be swallowed by death, and then He would burst forth from death three days later. He was going to kill the dragon, and the plan was to have the dragon eat Him first.

But this was the rancid and offensive thing. Here was the great scandal. Because the Messiah was the anointed one of God, He had the blessing of God poured over His head and shoulders. And it certainly looked as thought Jesus were just that kind of Messiah. He absolutely fit the bill. Behold, He does all things well.

But then . . . then He was betrayed. He was sold out by one of His disciples. He was stripped naked and flogged. He had a crown of thorns jammed on His head. They spit in His face, and plucked out His beard. And in the crowning indignity, He was then nailed to a wooden cross, and suspended there to die. How could such a one be considered the Messiah now? The Scriptures were so clear on the point.

Compounding the problem was the fact that Christians were not embarrassed by this angular fact, but rather gloried in it. That was probably the most offensive thing about their behavior—they didn’t have the decency to be humiliated by the fact that their vaunted Messiah was cursed by God. They admitted it. They boasted in it. Their claim was that Christ was hanged on a gibbit, which was about as offensive as you can get.

The reason the Christians were not humiliated is that this was the glorious intersection between the predictions of a triumphant Messiah and those of a Suffering Servant. They were all about the same man, and all of it was foretold. Not only so, but everything came together in a tight weave.

Before He assumes the rule over the nations, the Messiah was first going to assume the sins of nations.

That was the point where He was eaten by the dragon, and why He cried out in holy despair. “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” But once He was swallowed up by death, He was in the only position where it was possible to deliver a death blow to death itself. He delivered the death blow from inside. And that is precisely what He did on the third day, just as the Scriptures had foretold that He would.

That is how it all happened. And that is the message that we believers have been commissioned to proclaim.

Cordially in Christ,

Douglas Wilson

Douglas Wilson