Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Evening Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/ev/ev19960526.htm

MATTHEW: JESUS AS ISRAEL'S MESSIAH AND HIS MESSIANIC KINGDOM
Part IX: Christ's Messianic Kingdom Certified
A. Certifying The Messiah's Claims To The Disillusioned Messianic Forerunner
(Matthew 11:2-6)
  1. Introduction
    1. Jesus claimed to be the Jewish Messiah Who was also God incarnate, John 5:18; John 14:6.
    2. However, detractors today claim that Jesus was not deity, and that He never claimed to be the Messiah: John Dominic Crossan wrote in his book, Who Killed Jesus? that Jesus was just a peasant philosopher who preached an inclusive kingdom of God to outcast Jews whom a later developing Christian establishment transformed into the Son of God, Kenneth L. Woodward, "Rethinking the Resurr ection," April 8, 1996 issue of Newsweek, p. 60-70. Well, where's the proof that we can use for our own faith regarding the true identity of Jesus of Nazareth? What can we use besides just His claims that He is Messiah, God's Son?
    3. When John the Baptizer was put into prison against every concept he understood about the Messianic Kingdom with his Old Testament frame of reference, John himself questioned Jesus' id entity!
    4. Christ's response to John's doubts instructs us on determining the validity of Christ's identity:
  2. Vindicating The Upright Messiah Through Prophecy, Matthew 11:2-19.
    1. John the Baptizer had a big problem with comprehending Jesus as Messiah, God's Son, Mtt. 11:2-3.
      1. The Old Testament prophets considered Messiah to be both a suffering and a reigning king, but that when He came, He would then usher in the Messianic Kingdom, B.K.C., N.T., p. 43:
        1. When John was in prison, he sent men to Jesus, asking if He was the "one who should come" or if he should look for another to fit that role, Mtt. 11:2-3.
        2. The title "one who should come" is thoroughly Messianic in the Old Testament, see Ps. 40:7; 118:26.
        3. Since John, Jesus' forerunner, was in prison, he doubted Jesus' Messianic and divine credentials in spite of His former claims to that end (Jn. 1:29-34), for Jesus did not immediately usher in the kingdom as the Old Testament p rophets thought would happen, 1 Pet. 1:10-12.
      2. Accordingly, to establish a fact as certain according to the Old Testament law, John sent two witnesses to Jesus to certify the truth of Jesus' identity, cf. Mtt. 11:2 with Deut. 19:15.
    2. Jesus wisely refrained from relying on His own words as be the basis of John's belief, but relied on input sources aside from His claims that we can still use today for certification, Mtt. 11:4-6:
      1. Jesus referred to the works these two witnesses could attest for themselves: He mentioned his miracles of giving sight to the blind, of making the lame walk, of cleansing the lepers, making the deaf hear, raising the dead and preaching the kingdom to the poor, Mtt. 11:4-6.
      2. These miracles all fulfilled the Old Testament Messianic prophecies of Isaiah 35:5 and 61:1.
      3. We know that this prophecy of Isaiah was in existence long before Christ: the Isaiah scroll found at Qumran near the Dead Sea has been dated by carbon dating and paleographic examination (the study of the style of the formation of letters) to be around 150 B.C., Z.B.E.B., vol. 3, p. 321; Unger, Arch. and the N. T., p. 75-79. If that scroll existed in 150 B.C., it was copied from an earlier manuscript for sure to have become recognized by the Essene Judaisti c community at Qumran by 150 B.C., and most likely dates back to Isaiah who lived in 680 B.C., cf. Ryrie Study Bible, KJV, Intro. to Isaiah, p. 968.
      4. Thus, Jesus was clearly trying to convince the disciples of John so that John the Baptizer in prison would be sure that He was the Messiah and God's Son as he had formerly claimed. He did so by not having them rely upon Christ's mere words, but by the eyes and ears of John's disciples combined with what they themselves and John could read in Isaiah concerning what Messiah would accomplish. In other words, Jesus attempted to prove His divinity and Messiahship as impartially as was possible!
Lesson: When faced with the challenge of critics who say that Jesus never HIMSELF claimed to be the Messiah, and thus was not the Messiah, we simply rely upon the carbon-dated, paleographically dated witness of the pre-Christian Qumran Isaiah scrol l's predictions of a Messiah and the witness of the doubting disciples of John and their disillusioned, imprisoned leader himself: according to these sources, Jesus is certified to be the Messiah and God's Son!