Behold The King Who Saves Us!

BEHOLD THE KING WHO SAVES US!

An Exposition of Matthew 1:18-25

By Pastor Brian Wilbur

Date: December 24, 2017 (Fourth Sunday of Advent)

Series: Advent 2017

Note: Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard   Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

INTRODUCTION

Let us suppose that your family exchanges gifts on Christmas Eve. After a wonderful evening supper you gather round the Christmas tree with creamy hot chocolate in your hands, and now you are all ready to open presents. The Christmas carols are playing lightly in the background, the young children are eager to start tearing away the wrapping paper, while the older children and adults are more reserved in their excitement. But all are happy to give and to receive, and off you go. There are new clothes and new books and new toys and new technology gadgets; there are some old faithfuls like candy and a package of socks and some pleasant surprises like original artwork and homemade jam. The whole thing is about to wind down when you notice an envelope about two-thirds the way up the tree, nearly hidden behind that large reindeer ornament that someone made in the third grade. The envelope has your name on it.

You proceed to open up the well-crafted card and inside you find written these words:

THIS CARD MAY BE USED TO OBTAIN SALVATION

FROM ANY ONE THING THAT YOU CHOOSE

Well, what will you do with this free ticket? A complete salvation, a perfect healing, a wonderful deliverance is promised you for any one thing. What will you choose? A difficult choice, yes?

There is no question that people want to be saved, is there? People want to be saved from cold weather, from poverty, from unpopularity, from ill health, from imperfect families or frustrating workplaces. Sometimes people just want to be saved from boredom, so they will do about anything to spice things up. In the end, though, things might get really personal: I want to be saved from my singleness, my loneliness, my childlessness, my dead-end job, or from the stupid choices I made in my youth, or from this addiction that is eating away my vitality.

What would you do with a “be delivered from anything” gift card?

In the answering of that question, and the subsequent reading of God’s Word, we may find that our own aspirations for the improvement of our lives don’t square with God’s plan.

THE SCRIPTURAL TEXT

With that in mind, let me read Matthew 1:18-25. Holy Scripture says:

¹⁸ Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹ And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. ²⁰ But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹ She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” ²² All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:

²³ “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
    and they shall call his name Immanuel”

(which means, God with us). ²⁴ When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, ²⁵ but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus. (Matthew 1:18-25)

PART 1: THE COMPLICATED DILEMMA THAT REQUIRED DIVINE INTERVENTION

Let’s begin our walk through this passage by reflecting on the complicated dilemma that required divine intervention. The passage itself is clearly about “the birth of Jesus Christ” as verse 18 tells us, but the circumstances surrounding His birth were, to say the least, complicated – complicated in a scandalous and suspicious sort of way.

In the sermon two Sundays ago we looked at Luke 1:26-38 and pondered the miraculous supernatural conception of Jesus by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the virgin Mary. Now in Matthew 1 the focus is not so much on the supernatural conception but on the social scandal resulting from it. If a young lady is engaged to a man, and prior to their coming together in marriage and conjugal relations, she is discovered to be pregnant, then what you have is a scandal. And who would believe this young lady if she claimed that she was neither guilty of sexual immorality nor was she the victim of another man’s sexual assault, but rather that the Holy Spirit conceived this child apart from any male involvement whatsoever. Never happened before, never happened since – who would believe her?

We don’t know about the nature of any correspondence that Mary and Joseph might have had, but what we do know is that at a certain point it was publicly known that Mary was pregnant. And from every possible human angle, this looked bad. Joseph knew that Mary’s child was not his child. So Joseph, an upright man whose heart was inclined to both justice and mercy, decided that he would “divorce her quietly.”

Remember that betrothal is not like our modern notion of engagement. Betrothal brought with it such legal obligation that the betrothed couple could already be referred to as husband and wife, even though they didn’t share the marriage bed yet; and a legal divorce was required to terminate the relationship. This is why verse 19 reads as it does:

“And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.” (v. 19)

This is not the response of an angry self-absorbed unreasonable man. This is rather the response of an honorable man who sought to do what was right and, at the same time, who sought to treat Mary with kindness in spite of the scandalous circumstances. Joseph’s proposed action was justice with restraint, justice tempered with mercy, justice under the control of a gracious spirit. He sensibly believed that divorcing Mary was the right course of action, while at the same time he had no desire to shame or humiliate her by making a lot of noise about it. He would act with dignity and decency, even while he must have been full of disappointment that his expectation of marriage would now be put on hold.

Now if Joseph had followed through on his proposed course of action, we would have had a complicated dilemma of an entirely different sort on our hand, though I doubt we often think about it. Why was it so important that Joseph not break off his betrothal to Mary? Why would Joseph’s divorce from Mary be problematic?

If we are pondering this difficult circumstance in merely human terms, we might think along these lines. We want Joseph and Mary to remain together because they are supposed to be together, and it would be an utter tragedy for their betrothal to be dissolved on the basis of misinformation. We must save their opportunity for wedded bliss! Or we want Joseph and Mary to remain together because it was very much a man’s world in those days and Mary would be quite vulnerable without a husband to protect her and provide for her. We must save their marriage for Mary’s sake! Or we want Joseph and Mary to remain together because every child, especially the Holy Child Jesus, needs to grow up in a family that is intact with both father and mother lovingly present. We must save this marital union for the child’s sake!

Now all of these thoughts are wonderful sentiments and we may even say that there is much truth in them. This is God’s world, after all, and in this divinely designed world truth matters, husbandly care matters, and intact marriages and families matter. I doubt, however, that any of these good things is the main issue at stake. What, then, is the dilemma if Joseph walks away from his fiancé? I’m so glad you asked!

How does Matthew begin his book?

“The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David…” (Matthew 1:1)

Jesus is “the son of David,” the long-awaited descendant of King David who had the rightful claim to David’s throne – the kingship of Israel. But in what way is Jesus “the son of David”? Well, you have to follow the genealogy, right? And the genealogy comes all the way down to who? To “Joseph the husband of Mary.” (v. 16) Jesus is “the Son of David” by virtue of His legal adoption by Joseph. Now look at how the angel addresses Joseph in verse 20:

“Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife…” (v. 20)

Do you see the connection? Jesus is “the son of David” through his legal relation to “Joseph, son of David.” So what would have happened if Joseph had divorced Mary? In that case, Mary would have had no legal relation to Joseph and, more to the point, Mary’s child would have had no legal relation to Joseph. Which means that Jesus would not have been “the son of David.” Is this starting to make sense?

Now there is probably someone really smart out there who wants to protest my line of thought. Whoever you are, you want to protest that Mary was also a descendant of David, and therefore Jesus would have been “the son of David” even if you take Joseph out of the equation. But here’s the problem with that protest: even if Mary was also a descendant of David, Matthew makes no mention of it. And my job as a preacher and teacher of God’s Word is to cut with the grain of the text. Just as men in the shop want to cut with the grain of the wood in order to make a clean cut, so a man in the study of God’s Word must cut with the grain of the Word in order to make the right point. And in this passage it is clear that Jesus’ status as “son of David” is tied to “Joseph the husband of Mary.” And God’s plan was for “Joseph, son of David” to adopt Jesus as his very own son, with all the rights and privileges that pertain thereto, including the claim upon the Davidic throne.

Therefore the angel, after assuring Joseph that the conception of Mary’s child was the work of Almighty God and that no man was involved in it, tells him that he shall name the boy:

“She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus…” (v. 21)

It is the privilege of parents to name their children. The naming of a child by a parent is an indication of parental authority. In Luke 1 the angel told Mary that she would “call his name Jesus”, but now in Matthew 1 the angel tells Joseph that he would “call his name Jesus.” And thus “Joseph the husband of Mary” takes his place as father alongside of Mary the biological mother, and shares with her the parental task of naming the boy. In this way the angel makes it clear that Joseph must assume the office of father to this Holy Child and own the dear boy as his very own.

In his response to this angelical visitation, Joseph proved once again to be an upright man by doing what “the angel of the Lord commanded him…” (v. 24)

Although scandal and suspicion continued to surround the circumstances of the Savior’s birth, Joseph now knew the truth of God’s plan. Joseph embraced the divine plan with an obedient heart; he embraced Mary as his wife; and he embraced Jesus as his son. In all this, God was faithful to shepherd Joseph and Mary through the complexities they faced in order that they might be joyful co-participants in His plan of bringing His Son into the world.

PART 2: THE SAVIOR’S NAME

It is not enough, however, to admire God’s shepherding care for Joseph and to appreciate Joseph’s obedience to God’s instruction. Instead we must go from these outer courts into the inner sanctuary and behold the Lord Jesus Himself. The angel made it very clear to Joseph how great Jesus is. And thus Matthew picked up his pen and recounted the angel’s words in order to make it very clear to us how great Jesus is. The words “call” and “called” and “name” appear multiple times in this passage, and these words direct our attention to the Savior’s names. These names, in turn, are windows into the Savior’s identity and mission. So let’s ponder them.

Matthew identifies three names of our Savior in the first chapter: Christ, Jesus, and Immanuel. 

The Savior is Called Christ

The name “Christ” appears in verse 18:

            “Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.” (v. 18)

And Matthew had previously written in verse 1,

            “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ…” (Matthew 1:1)

A novice reader might assume that “Christ” is Jesus’ last name, but that would not be accurate. “Christ” is actually a title. It is very similar to the one other title that appeared in the genealogy:

“Jesse [was] the father of David the king.” (v. 6)

The man’s personal name was David, and David’s title was king. Likewise with Jesus: The Savior’s personal name is Jesus, and one of Jesus’ titles is Christ. In fact, “Christ” and “king” are closely related concepts in the Bible. The word “Christ” is derived from the Greek language and it is identical in meaning to the word “Messiah” which is derived from the Hebrew language. “Christ” and “Messiah” literally mean “Anointed One.” So when we say that Jesus is the Christ, what we mean is that God has appointed and anointed Jesus to be the Spirit-empowered King who brings justice and peace to the world. Therefore it is quite right to call Him King Jesus! 

The Savior is Named Jesus

Next, let us consider His personal name – the name we would rightly think of as his first name: Jesus. When the angel tells Joseph that he will “call his name Jesus,” the angel adds an important word of explanation:

“She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” (v. 21)

The name “Jesus” literally means “The Lord saves” or “The Lord is salvation.” Jesus is “the Lord who saves His people.” That said, we must not leave this wonderful truth at a general level, but must press on to know the nature of this salvation: what does He save us from?

Now at this point you might recall my introduction about the “be delivered from anything” gift card that you found hidden in your Christmas tree. The first century Jewish people wanted to be saved from the Romans – and down through history people have wanted to be saved from political oppression or military aggression. Of course, people are concerned not only about large-scale governmental dysfunction, but also about the acutely felt needs in their own home and neighborhood: people want to be delivered from disease or drought, from low wages or unsafe working conditions, from inclement weather or criminals on the loose. In other words, people typically want a temporal this-worldly salvation that makes life more comfortable today. But is that why Jesus came?

Make no mistake about it: the day is coming when the Lord will make all things new! The Lord will bring forth a new heaven and new earth, where righteousness dwells – and in this new creation there will be no discomfort or disturbance of any kind, there will be no sorrow or threat of sorrow, there will be nothing fearful or harmful anywhere, but all will be a perfect and comprehensive peace in which the Lord’s glory fills the universe from top to bottom, and then the Lord’s people will enjoy unhindered fellowship with the Lord and with one another, forever and ever. All the fruits of sin shall be removed, and all the fruits of righteousness shall flourish.

But here is our problem as human beings: in our sinful state, we want to be saved from the rotten fruits and bad effects and unpleasant consequences of our sin, but we don’t want to be saved from our sin itself; we want God to release His blessings to us while we hold on tightly to the sins that we cherish. But Jesus didn’t come to make our lives externally beautiful on the outside while our hearts remain internally corrupt on the inside. Jesus didn’t come to bring peace to our physical and social world while our souls remain alienated and disconnected from God. And what separates us from God? Our sins.

So our Lord, being good and wise, came in order to address the core problem – the root issue – which of course is our individual and collective sins. Sin is an absolutely terrible thing, and we must always remember that sin can only be understood in relation to the Holy God. When we think about bad character and conduct, we often think about it only in moral or social terms: that person isn’t very nice; that person abandoned his or her spouse and children; that person is a user or abuser or manipulator or taker; that person has committed crimes against humanity. To be sure, sin has a moral and social component: sinful behavior violates the moral or legal code of our culture, and such behavior hurts people. But what makes sin “sin” is not that it offends against people, but that it offends against God.

Biblically speaking, sin is first and foremost theological and spiritual. When we sin, we turn our backs on God and decide to do life our own way. When we sin, we thumb our nose at God’s glory and get really excited about lesser things. What do you think God thinks when we find the worship of God boring but Patriots football or Celtics basketball really exciting? What do you think God thinks when we find His words dull-drum but we find the posts and tweets and gossips of people captivating? What do you think God thinks when we find His mission unappealing but we are only too happy to “evangelize” for our favorite product or service or experience?

Our bondage to sin means that our fundamental problem is a God problem: we do not want to rejoice in the Lord and delight in His truth and walk in His ways, but instead we want to be far from God in a faraway country where we can do as we please. If you had children who constantly wanted to take your gifts out of your hand, without so much as looking into your eyes and saying thanks, and then quickly rush out of the house and down into town with those gifts to live wildly without you, and these children never wanted to spend time with you and fellowship with you and enjoy your company, you would be brokenhearted and rightly angry with their perpetual dishonor. How much more is the Holy One brokenhearted and righteously angry with our ungodly pursuits, when each and every one of us has received our life and our every heartbeat and every breath and every ounce of strength from Him and Him alone! And we say: No thanks, I’d rather go off on my own. Fools! Do you not know that the wages of sin is death? Do you not know that the soul that sins shall die? Do you not know that those who continue in sin have nothing to look forward to except swift judgment from the Almighty on the last day? How will you escape the Righteous Judge who knows you completely and will repay you according to all of your unrighteous deeds?

There is but one way of escape – and that way of escape is to run to Jesus, who came to do what? To “save his people from their sins.” What a tragedy it would be to be saved from a litany of financial and medical and relational problems, but still be dead in your trespasses and sins, and then face judgment all alone on the last day!

The words of Don Carson are very helpful:

“If God had perceived that our greatest need was economic, he would have sent an economist. If he had perceived that our greatest need was entertainment, he would have sent us a comedian or an artist. If God had perceived that our greatest need was political stability, he would have sent us a politician. If he had perceived that our greatest need was health, he would have sent us a doctor. But he perceived that our greatest need involved our sin, our alienation from him, our profound rebellion, our death; and he sent us a Savior.”[1]

Don’t hear this message, go home, and decide that from here on out you are going to be less naughty and more nice. For that would be an exercise in missing the point. The point is that each and every one of us has a profound sin problem, and the solution to that problem is not to do anything, but rather to receive the salvation that Jesus brings. He is the Savior, not you. He does the heavy lifting, not you. He was crushed for your sins, so that you don’t have to be crushed. He rose from the dead, so that you don’t have to remain in the realm of death. He ascended into heaven, so that you can be lifted up to fellowship with the living God. There is nothing for you to do, except to believe, to entrust your heart to the Savior, to turn away from your long record of folly of sin and start treasuring Jesus as the greatest gift. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved from your sins; and this gracious King will immediately start changing your life from the inside out. 

The Savior is Also Called Immanuel

The Savior is called Christ, because He is the true King anointed by the Father. The Savior is named Jesus, because He is the Lord who saves His people from their sins. Finally, a third name occurs in verses 22-23: Immanuel.

Notice the flow of thought coming out of verses 20-21. In verses 20-21, the angel tells Joseph that Mary has already conceived and will soon “bear a son” and that this Spirit-conceived Son will be the Savior of God’s people. Now in verses 22-23 Matthew tells us that this supernatural conception and birth is, in fact, the fulfillment of a divine prophecy that was given hundreds of years earlier to the prophet Isaiah. Matthew writes:

“All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:

“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,

and they shall call his name Immanuel”

(which means, God with us).” (v. 22-23)

The incarnation of our Lord didn’t happen out of nowhere, but took place as the fulfillment of God’s plan which He had announced beforehand through the prophets.

Now verse 23 is actually a quotation of Isaiah 7:14, so in order to unpack the meaning of verse 23 we need to zoom in our biblical lens on Isaiah 7.

In Isaiah 7 you have King Ahaz of Judah – King Ahaz was a wicked king who disobeyed the Lord. On this occasion King Ahaz and the people of Judah were under military threat from two other kings – King Rezin and King Remaliah – and they were very afraid. So the Lord sent the prophet Isaiah to King Ahaz with a message: “do not fear.” (Isaiah 7:4) And why not fear? Because the Lord promised that these threats from the north “shall not stand” and “shall not come to pass.” (Isaiah 7:7) The only thing King Ahaz needed to do was to trust the Lord. (Isaiah 7:9)

After telling Ahaz not to fear, the Lord told Ahaz to request a sign from the Lord – a sign that the Lord would make good on His promise to save Judah from the warring kings to the north. The wicked king put on his ‘pretend to be righteous mask’ and said he “will not put the LORD to the test.” (Isaiah 7:12) At this point the Lord decided to give Ahaz a sign anyway:

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.” (Isaiah 7:14)

The immediate point of application in the days of Ahaz was that God was with His people in order to save them from their enemies – from King Rezin and King Remaliah. The word “Immanuel” literally means “God is with us” or “God with us.” The point, of course, is not that God is with us in order to pal up and play your favorite board game. The meaning, rather, is that God is with us in order to rescue us from our deadly foes.

And as we have already seen, the deadliest foe is not any would-be aggressor out there, but is the spiritual cancer in here, within our hearts. Even in Isaiah 7 the Lord told Ahaz and the people of Judah:

            “If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.” (Isaiah 7:9)

Our greatest threat is the lack of faith, the lack of trusting God, which then produces fear and every other kind of sin, which leads to instability and ultimately to ruin. So when we get to Matthew 1, the ultimate fulfillment of the Isaiah 7:14 sign is that God is with us in order to save us from our sins. The Spirit-wrought conception of Jesus in the womb of the virgin, and His birth into this world, is the glorious sign that salvation has come near.

CONCLUSION

Sometimes we Christians get overly sentimental about Christmastime. Now believe me, I would rather you be sentimental than cynical; I would rather you feel some exaggerated emotion than that you put on a Scrooge face. But even so, we must face the utterly serious truth that Jesus is “God with us” for the express purpose of entering into mortal combat with our sins, because if He doesn’t defeat our sins, then our sins will defeat us. So guard against a shallow reading of “God with us,” as if He has shown up mainly to be our friend in a lonely world. I’m happy to sing “What a friend we have in Jesus,” so long as we immediately proceed to “all our sins and griefs to bear”.[2] I’m happy to sing “No one ever cared for me like Jesus, / There’s no other friend so kind as He.” But we must immediately proceed to the rest of the stanza: “No one else could take the sin and darkness from me; / O how much He cared for me.”[3]

What a great and gracious Savior, that He would come from heaven to earth in order to do battle against our adulteries and immoralities, against our lies and deceits, against our materialism and greed, against our lusts and indecencies, against our envy and hate, against our pride and ego trips and side shows, against our God-belittling idolatries and false forms of worship, against our foolish attempt to be the captain of our own ship and sail the high seas of life at our own command – all the way to hell. Against all this our Lord did battle! Jesus is “God with us” who took all of our sins upon His own shoulders and carried them to Calvary. Then, as God’s holy justice fell upon the innocent Savior who was covered head to toe with our sins, He suffered and died in our place. The true King was bound hand and foot, and was slaughtered like a lamb as a sacrifice for sin, so that we wayward sheep might be released from our sins! Jesus our Immanuel was forsaken by the Father, so that we might have peace with the Father! And the once crucified, now risen and glorified King says to all who will listen:

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28) 

Sentimental? Hardly. A cause for deep joy? Absolutely! When we grasp that our sins are forgiven, that we have fellowship with the gracious King, and that “God with us” will be our glad portion and great joy forevermore, then we have every reason to rejoice and sing glory to our God. 

ENDNOTES

[1] D. A. Carson, A Call to Spiritual Reformation: Priorities from Paul and His Prayers. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1992: p. 109.

[2] From the hymn “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” by Joseph M. Scriven.

[3] From the hymn “No One Ever Cared for Me Like Jesus” by Charles F. Weigle.