You will have to listen to Jesus. Why wait?

March 31, 2013 Evening:

Title: The King and Priest of the Resurrection

Old Testament Passage: Psalm 110 – The Victorious King and Priest

Gospel Reading: Luke 24:44 – ...everything written about Me in the … Psalms

Sermon Text: Hebrews 1:13 – a quote from Psalm 110:1 about what God is doing right now

Sermon Point: The Son of God is at the right hand of the Father as the Triune God prepares His enemies to be visibly under the foot of Jesus Christ.

[13] And to which of the angels has he ever said,Psalm 110 must have been a very confusing psalm to those Old Testament worshipers who sang it back in the days before the coming of Jesus. How could David's son be David's Lord? Who exactly were the two persons referred to in the beginning of the Psalm in these words: “The LORD says to my Lord...”

The first “LORD” was the holy Name that so many were afraid to utter, the great “I-AM.” This only God said something to David's Adonai (Lord). In order to avoid the word YWVH, Jews subsituted in the word for Lord, Adonai. Therefore they would have sung these words, “The Adonai said to my Adonai.” What could this possibly mean?

The expectation from the rest of the psalm is that the figure who was “my Adonai” was the expected Messiah, who according to 2 Samuel 7 was to be a descendant of David. But how would David have referred to his own descendant as his “Adonai?” Would not David, the forerunner, be the superior of the two?

When Jesus posed this question, it stopped all questioning of Him. His adversaries did not know what to say.

We know the solution to this mystery, and thus we are able to make very good use of Psalm 110. The Father spoke to the eternal Son, now made man for our sake. Since Jesus was not only the Son of David according to His human nature but also the eternal Son of God according to His divine nature, He was clearly far above David. Psalm 110 was not written about an angel. It was written about the God-Man, Jesus.

“Sit at my right handThe message quoted here reminds us of the present work of Jesus Christ so that we will pay more careful attention to what we have heard from Him and from His ambassadors.

After Jesus died for us and rose again from the dead, He ascended on high and was seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven. To be at the Father's right hand is to be at the place of supreme power and authority, where all of the glorious attributes of the Lord are expressed in His soverion dominion over this creation.

until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”?This position of glory over an inglorious creation is only temporary, as the psalm informed us. There is an “until” in our text. One feature of the end of the inglorious era is listed. All apply. The enemies of the Messiah will be entirely subdued.

But this is not all that will take place when this “until” comes. The inglorious will give way to the perfectly glorious. Jesus will be at the head of that new creation, not an angel. We who have that great hope need to listen to our King and High Priest now.