Fix your eyes on Jesus

If you are Jewish, read these words with care. (In a sense, we Gentiles are jealous of you! -- you're so privileged as God's chosen race. And Jesus should be very special to you, very precious: Racially, He is one of you, not us.) "Messiah" means "the Anointed One," and your Jewish Scriptures, our Old Testament, said that the Messiah to come would be anointed prophet, priest, and king -- all three. 1. Fix your eyes on Jesus, chosen and anointed to be prophet. The first prophet, Moses, predicted the even greater Prophet to come. Said the Lord God to Moses, I will raise up for [the Jews] a prophet like you from among their brothers; I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him. If anyone does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name, I myself will call him to account (Deuteronomy 18:18-19). A prophet is one who comes to speak for God. Jesus was in a sense a double Prophet: He came to be God's Word, and He came to say God's Word. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God . . . The Word became flesh and lived for a while among us (John 1:1, 14). And He said, The words that I say to you are not my own. Rather it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work (John 14:10). Jesus came to fulfill, once and for all, God's great succession of prophets. 2. Fix your eyes on Jesus, chosen and anointed to be priest. In a sense He was a double Priest: He came to be both the offerer of the sacrifice and the sacrifice itself. Says Hebrews 2:16-17, Made like his brothers in every way . . . [Jesus] became a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God . . . that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. But Daniel had prophesied, The Anointed One will be cut off (Daniel 9:26). And Isaiah wrote, He was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was stricken . . . The Lord makes his life a guilt offering (Isaiah 53:8, 10). Now, praise the Lord, both you Jews and we Gentiles can be . . . justified freely by [God's] grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood (Romans 3:24-25). Behold the Lamb of God [announced John, pointing Him out] who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29). Jesus came to fulfill, once and for all, God's great system of priest and sacrifice. 3. Fix your eyes on Jesus, chosen and anointed to be king. Prophet, Priest, King -- in one Anointed One, all three come together. He's the Prophet who brings God to us. He's the Priest brings us to God. And, predicted Zechariah, It is he who will build the temple of the Lord, and he will be clothed with majesty and will sit and rule on his throne. And he will be a priest on his throne. And there will be harmony between the two (Zechariah 6:13, -- or "between the two offices," translates the Berkeley Version). A kingly Priest! A priestly King! And He will be in a sense a double King: not only a great Monarch but a great Servant -- both! A Servant King! He defies and similarity to any king before or after. No wonder The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Anointed One (Psalm 2:2). This King upsets all their images of how a king should be. Yet what a stir He's caused -- in the Gentile world, as well! When He was born, Gentile intellectuals traveled from the east inquiring, "Where is the one who has been born King of the Jews?" (Matthew 2:2). When He was tried, a Gentile political ruler interrogated Him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" "Yes, it is as you say," Jesus replied (Luke 23:3) And when He was crucified, for all races to see There was a written notice above him, which read, "THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS" (Luke 23:38). How could so many Jews miss it? Even as recently before this as 100 B.C., the old prophets were being read with a revival of new hope for the Messiah's soon coming. But so many predictions spoke of His suffering, and so many others of His reigning -- they wondered how both could be right. Some rabbis thought there might be two messiahs: one to suffer, one to reign. Most thought the suffering applied to the Jews, the glory to the messiah. It was confusing. Apparently not many thought of one messiah with two comings! At Jesus' trial it was not to Gentiles but to His own, the Jews, that He explained Himself, and in the context of His larger life. In front of them all -- chief priests, teachers, and the full Sanhedrin -- The high priest said to him, "I charge you under oath by the living God: Tell us if you are the Messiah, the Son of God." "Yes, it is as you say," Jesus replied. "But I say to all of you: In the future you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming in the clouds of heaven" (Matthew 26:63-64). You see, your King did first business first: He came to redeem before He will come back to reign. Oh, how we all needed that! He came first to wash us of our sin and make us acceptable in His kingdom. And we non-Jews were invited to be included! Isaiah had said the Messiah would also be "a light for the Gentiles" (Isaiah 42:6). Millions of us have humbly responded. Jesus was anointed by God to be "born King of the Jews," but at His first coming He was "cut off." Nevertheless, God makes even the wrath of man ultimately to praise Him (Psalm 76:10), and His cutting off effected salvation for us all -- Jew and Gentile alike. Wonderful! But "I will come again," He said (John 14:3). And at His return, God the Father will indeed "install [his] King on Zion" (Psalm 2:6) to rule gloriously! Think of it: He'll be a King who reigns with scars in His hands. What a savior for you and me! His suffering was part of His messiahship -- part of what He was anointed to do. Isaiah wrote that He would be "stricken, smitten, afflicted" -- words normally used to describe lepers! And yet Isaiah also wrote, He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:7). And in the New Testament we read that God [will exalt] him to the highest place and [give] him a name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow . . . and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:9-11). You personally need Him as your Prophet, "to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor" (Isaiah 61:2, Luke 4:18) -- to you! You can't understand it all without Him. You need Him as your Priest, bringing you to God, to atone for you and cleanse and forgive you (Psalm 110:4; Hebrews 10:17, 21, 24). You need Him as your King, to govern your personal life with wisdom and righteousness (Micah 5:2). Jewish friend, fix your eyes on Jesus! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Why don't you pray to Him this prayer: God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and my God, I receive Your Anointed One Jesus as my Prophet, my Priest, my King -- and more: as my Savior, which is what His name "Jesus" means. I love Him for being all this -- even for me. O Lord, I know that many of my beloved Jewish kinsmen are blind to Him, even as Isaiah prophesied they would be (Isaiah 6:10). But in mercy You have opened my eyes, and I fix them on Jesus, and I find my completion in Him. Thank You, Abba Father! In the name of Jesus, my Messiah and Savior, amen.