JESUS CHRIST, THE PROPHET
DR. JIM DIXON
HEBREWS 1:1-4
DECEMBER 17, 1995
George Frideric Handel was born in Germany in 1685. When he was 27 years old, in the year 1712, he moved to London, England, and there he would live for the remainder of his life. In London, he wrote music for the nobility and the royalty. From London, he impacted the continent of Europe and he came to dominate the world of music. George Frideric Handel was a complex man, accomplished but arrogant, brilliant, but filled with himself. He was the kind of guy that some people found easy to hate. And there were many people who wished him ill. People who wanted to see George Frideric Handel fall. They wanted to see him crash economically. They wanted to see him fall professionally and socially and even physically. And their desires were granted in the year 1737, when through a variety of business misdealing’s, George Frideric Handel declared bankruptcy. And just a few weeks later on April 13th, 1737, George Frideric Handel had a massive stroke from which no one thought he would recover, but he did recover.
As Handel said, “By the grace of God, I was resurrected.” And he began to write again, began to compose more operas and oratorios and his star began to rise again. But then Queen Caroline, the wife of King George II, died and she had been Handel’s greatest supporter, and then some of his closest friends died and George Frideric Handel slipped into a depression, a great depression. He began to be angry at God. He said, “God resurrected me only for tragedy.” And he was in such a mood in 1741 when he returned to his flat on Brook Street in London. He saw a package at the door. The package was from a friend. It was from Charles Jennings, and Charles Jennings was a Christian. George Handel was also a Christian. He had accepted Christ in the Lutheran Church when he was very young, but Handel didn’t have a Christ-like disposition and attitude. But you see, Charles Jennings was known for his Christ-like disposition and attitude. So Handel, who greatly respected Jennings, took the package into his house and he opened it up and inside he found Bible verses, scripture passages all relating to the glory of Jesus Christ. And a note from Charles Jennings asking George Frideric Handel to write an oratorio, to compose an oratorio to the glory of Christ using the scripture verses.
Well, Handel wasn’t in the mood and he pushed the package aside and he went to bed. He could not sleep that night, he tossed and turned in the middle of the night. He suddenly was aware of the presence of Christ just filling his room and he felt a conviction in his soul. He got out of bed and he got on his knees and he began to cry. He repented of his anger and of his arrogance and he felt a filling, a filling of the Holy Spirit, and a prompting to write this oratorio to the glory of Christ. He began right then in the middle of the night and he wrote for 24 days with very little sleep. When he was done, he had completed this masterpiece the world knows today as The Messiah. It was April 13th, 1742, the fifth anniversary of his stroke, when George Frideric Handel first conducted The Messiah, in Dublin, Ireland. In subsequent years, Handel would conduct The Messiah time and again until April 13th, 1759, the 22nd anniversary of his stroke, when he conducted The Messiah for the last time. When they came to the great words ‘the trumpet shell sound’ George Frideric Handel fell down and he died. He is buried in Westminster Abbey in London, England with the great and with the renowned. Handel is no longer in this world, but The Messiah continues to be performed. It continues to be sung at Christmas time and at Easter all over the world.
The word Messiah comes from a Hebrew word, meaning the anointed. It is the exact equivalent of the Greek word of the word Christ, which comes from the Greek word also meaning the anointed. You see in Israel, there were three anointed offices: the office of prophet, the office of priest, and the office of king. These three offices were anointed by God and one could only enter these offices through the anointing of oil. It was believed and it was known that the Messiah, the Christ, the anointed, would fulfill all three of these offices when he came: prophet, priest, and king. To shepherds on a Galilean hillside, the angel of the Lord proclaimed “Behold! I bring you good news of great joy, which shall come to all the people,” excuse me, at a Judean hillside, “good news of great joy, which shall come to all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a savior who is Christ the Messiah, the anointed, prophet, priest, and king. And this morning, we focus on what it means to say that Jesus Christ is the prophet. What does it mean to say that Jesus Christ is the prophet? And what does it mean to you?
The biblical word for prophet is the word “proph?t?s.” It has two meanings and these comprise our two teachings. First of all, the word proph?t?s means to speak for, to speak for. You see, a prophet is someone who speaks for someone else, someone very special. A prophet is someone who speaks for God. That’s what a prophet does. You can look at Exodus, chapters 3 and 4, and you can see how God revealed himself to Moses through a burning bush. God spoke to Moses and God called Moses the first of the prophets. God called Moses to the prophetic office. Moses would speak for God. That’s why Moses was able to stand before the Pharaoh of all Egypt and say, “Thus sayeth the Lord, let my people go. Let my people go. Thus sayeth the Lord.” God said to Moses, as God said to all the prophets, “I will put my words in your mouth, my words in your mouth.”
The prophet speaks for God. This was true of all the prophets from Moses to John the Baptist. It was true of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. It was true of Samuel, true of Elijah and Elisha, true of the so-called minor prophets from Hosea, Joel, and Amos, to Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi; they all spoke for God. God put his words in their mouths, but they all knew, indeed all Israel knew, that one day there would come a prophet greater than all. It had been prophesied. God had spoken to Moses and told him, and Moses as recorded in Deuteronomy, chapter 18, revealed that another prophet was coming. God said, “I shall raise up from amongst your people another prophet, and those who will not listen to him shall be cut off.” And all of Israel looked for the day when the prophet would come.
In John, chapter 1, we read how the people came to John the Baptist and they said, “Are you the prophet? Are you the one promised?” And John said, “No, I’m the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord, but after me comes one who ranks before me, the thongs of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie,” Jesus Christ. In John, chapter 6, after Jesus fed the 5,000 with two fish and five loaves of bread, the crowds cried out “Is not this the prophet Moses promised, is not this the prophet?” And the answer was yes.
In Acts, chapter 3, Peter stood before a vast crowd and he told the people of Judea, he told all the people of Jerusalem that Jesus Christ was the prophet promised of old by Moses. But what does all this mean to us? What does it mean to say that Jesus Christ is the anointed, the prophet? What does that mean?
Well, to understand, to truly understand, we’ve got to understand the importance of the word of God. You see, the prophets spoke the word of God. The Hebrew-speaking Jews called the word of God “dabar.” The Aramaic-speaking Jews called the word of God the “memra.” The Greek-speaking world called the word of God “logos.” But in any language, in any language, nothing was more important than the word of God. By the word of God the worlds had been created “ex nihilo,” out of nothing. God spoke and the world came into being. The power of God was in the word of God. And the mind of God was revealed through the Word of God, so that when the prophets spoke the word of God, those who believed stood in awe. They stood in awe because in the word of God was the very power of God and the mind of God.
Well, in John’s gospel, in the prologue, in the first chapter, a very important title is given to Jesus Christ. He is called the word of God. No other person who had ever lived had ever been called the word of God. No other person who will ever live ever could be called the word of God. John said, “In the beginning was the word and the word was with God. And the word was God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us full of grace and truth. We beheld His glory.”
That baby born in Bethlehem, the Word of God. Do you understand the significance of that? You see, the prophets of old had spoken the word of God, but Jesus Christ is the Word of God incarnate. That’s why the prophets of old would always begin their proclamations by saying, “Thus sayeth the Lord.” But Jesus never began His proclamations that way. Jesus never began His proclamations by saying, “Thus sayeth the Lord” because He was the Lord and He is the Lord. He would begin His proclamations by saying, “Truly, truly, I say to you.” Do you see? He didn’t just speak the word of God. He is the Word of God.
A prophet speaks for God, but no prophet ever spoke for God like Jesus Christ because Jesus Christ is God’s own Son and is one nature with the Father. That’s why in our passage of scripture for today, the author of Hebrews writes “In many and various ways God spoke of old to our ancestors by the prophets. But in these last days, God has spoken through His Son whom He’s appointed the heir of all things and through whom also He created the worlds. He reflects the glory of God and bears the very impress, the very stamp of His nature, upholding the universe by His word of power.” Do you understand what this means? It means that Jesus Christ has authority. He has absolute authority. No one ever spoke with the authority of Christ. No one ever will speak with the authority of Christ.
He is the Word of God. That’s why Jesus said, “Why do you call me Lord, Lord and not do what I tell you to do?” He is the prophet, the very Word of God. “Why do you not do what I tell you to do?” That’s why Jesus said, “He who hears My words and does them, I’ll tell you what he’s like. He’s like a man, a wise man who built his house up on the rock and the rain fell, the wind blew, the floods came, and the house stood firm where it was founded on the rock. But he who hears My words and does not do them, I’ll tell you what he is like. He’s like a fool who built his house up on the sand and the rain fell, the wind came, the wind blew, the floods came, and the house fell down, and great was the destruction of it. This is the issue that confronts us this day. If you really believe that child born in Bethlehem is the Messiah, you really believe He is the Christ, you really believe He is the anointed, He is the prophet, the Word of God.
If you think Muhammad is the word of God, read the Quran. If you think Buddha is the word of God, read the Tripitaka. If you think Krishna is the word of God, read the Bhagavad Gita. But if you really believe Jesus Christ is the Word of God, live your life by His testimony from head to toe every moment of every day because you see, He is the prophet. He is the Word of God.
On November 28th, Monday night, November 28th, my mom and dad went to bed. My mom had a cold, a head cold that had gone into her throat and into her chest and she had a bad cough and she was coughing a lot that night. So much so that my dad couldn’t sleep. So my dad said he’s going to go into the bedroom that my brothers and I used to sleep in. My dad spent that night in that bedroom. The next morning, November 29th, Tuesday morning, dad came back into his own bedroom, woke my mom up and he tried to speak to her. But his speech was slurred and he was having trouble standing up and mom was alarmed and asked him to sit down. As he tried to sit down, he knocked the lamp over. My mom called 911 and they rushed my dad to Verdugo Hills Hospital.
For the first 24 hours, my dad had had a massive stroke, for the first 24 hours my dad was kind of awake and conscious, but then he slipped into unconsciousness and he died nine days after the stroke. During those nine days, my brothers and I and my mom, we’d gathered in the hospital room with my dad. My dad’s eyes were closed and we really, I mean, we would whisper in his ear. I told my dad I loved him and how much I respected him and all he had meant to me through the years. I don’t know whether my dad heard any of that. I really, I mean I don’t know whether my dad heard any of that, but it doesn’t matter because I’d told my dad many times how much I loved him and how much I respected him. My brothers and I have talked much about this this past week and my mom too; why we respected our dad. We respected him certainly because of his integrity. I mean his word was his bond because of his great work ethic, because of his generosity. But I would say most of all, we respected him most of all because of his commitment to Jesus Christ and to the Word of God.
You see, my dad was probably as faithful a churchman as I’d ever met. 45 years; the same church. He saw many pastors come and go. He taught Sunday school. He served on the elder board three different times. He served on various committees. He loved the church, he tithed to the church, and he double tithes to the church because you see, he wanted the word of God to go forth. He wanted the word of God to go forth to children and to adults. He wanted the word of God to go forth all over the world. He loved missions because he wanted the word of God to go forth over the world.
At his memorial service on Monday, Joe Stevens, a pastor our family’s known for 45 years, conducted the service. I just didn’t feel up to it. But Joe was there. Joe had married Barb and I and my brothers and their wives, just a great family friend. When he concluded his talk, he said my dad had fought the good fight, had kept the fate, and finished the race. He said, “I just know the first words he heard when he saw Jesus was ‘well done good and faithful servant.’” Isn’t that what you want to hear? I mean, I know that’s what I want to hear. Those are the words I want to hear: “well done, my good and faithful servant.” If you want to hear those words, if you want to hear those words, then submit your life to the word of God every day, every moment of every day, week after week, month after month, year after year, until you see Christ face to face. The world will never understand you. But you see, you are an alien in exile on this earth, and this world’s not your home. Jesus Christ is the prophet. He speaks for God like no one else ever has or ever will. He is the Word of God.
Well, secondly and more briefly, Jesus Christ is the prophet because speaks forth. You see the word proph?t?s not only means to speak for, but the word proph?t?s also means to speak forth. It carries the connotation of boldness and courage. You can’t be a prophet, can’t be a prophet, can’t speak for God unless you have courage, unless you have boldness. Why is that? Because you see, the word of God is not popular. It’s not popular in this world. Surely you know that.
In the year 399 B.C., an Athenian crowd of people gathered together to sit in judgment of Socrates. They really expected that 70 year old man to come and humble himself before them because they were about to execute him. They expected him to come and just beg for mercy. They expected him to come and repent and apologize, but he did not. He stood before that crowd of people and he said, “I do not deserve the death penalty, but rather I deserve your gratitude. I deserve your gratitude because I have only spoken the truth.” Only spoken the truth. Then he delivered this great message that would inspire people for generations to come. He concluded that message by saying these words, “the difficulty, my friends, is not in avoiding death, but in avoiding unrighteousness.” The difficulty my friends, is not in avoiding death, but in avoiding unrighteousness.
Well, the Bible tells us that there is none righteous save Christ. Christ alone is righteous. In the sight of God for the rest of us, all of our righteousness is as filthy rags. The Bible tells us that righteousness is really only found in Christ. The Bible tells us the world does not love righteousness. Jesus said, “This is the testimony, light has come into the world. Mankind has loved darkness rather than the light.” People really don’t love the light. People don’t love righteousness. They don’t love the word of God. That’s why it takes courage, courage to speak forth the word of God. It’s a dangerous thing.
Of course, Jesus Christ is the Word of God. He got in a lot of trouble. I mean, He told the multitudes that they were in darkness, and that He was the light of the world. He told them they were like lost sheep and He was the shepherd. This wasn’t something people wanted to hear. He told the Pharisees that they were blind guides, hypocrites, a brood of vipers, whitewashed sepulchers, children of hell. That wasn’t something they wanted to hear. Sometimes the truth just hurts. He pronounced judgment on the cities of Capernaum, Bethsaida, Corizon. He pronounced judgment on the city of Jerusalem for its unbelief. That wasn’t something those cities wanted to hear. But He is the prophet, the Word of God. He lacks no courage. He said, “A prophet is without honor in his own city,” but He knew truly a prophet really is without honor anywhere. I mean, Jesus Christ was not crucified in Nazareth. He was not crucified in Capernaum. He was not even crucified in Galilee. He was crucified in Judea, crucified in the city of Jerusalem. If he had been born, if Christmas Day had taken place in Athens or in Rome, it wouldn’t have made any difference. He still would’ve died. He still would’ve been crucified because He is the prophet, the Word of God.
The word of God offends. Though it is the good news, it offends. Do you realize that, you who believe in him, do you realize you have been called to a prophetic office? You are priests and you are to manifest the compassion of Christ, the love of Christ, but you’ve also been called to the word of God and to the ministry of the Word. As you go forth into this world, and you must have courage, if you would speak for God and if you would speak forth, you must have courage. If ever the world needed courage, if ever Christians needed courage, it is today. And so the call of Christ this morning is the call for faithfulness. Of course, people, for you, that’s it. That you would be His people and your lives would be given over to the prophet and to the service of the word of God. Let’s close with a word of prayer.