Hear now the word of the Lord from Matthew 2:13-23.

13 Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” 14 And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt 15 and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

16 Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men. 17 Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah:

18 “A voice was heard in Ramah,
weeping and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.”

19 But when Herod died, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, 20 saying, “Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child's life are dead.” 21 And he rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there, and being warned in a dream he withdrew to the district of Galilee. 23 And he went and lived in a city called Nazareth, so that what was spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled, that he would be called a Nazarene.
Matthew 2:13-23, ESV

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. When the year two hundred and seventy nine B.C., the Greeks went out to battle against the Romans in the famous battle of Asylum. The Greek King of Epirus, the City of Epirus, invaded the Roman Republic with 40,000 troops and 19 war elephants. That's a lot of war elephants. Well, they went in and attacked the Romans, and in this battle, the Greeks came out victorious. The Romans lost 6,000 in the battle, whereas the Greeks lost only slightly more than half that at 3,505 soldiers. I do not know how many war elephants perished in the fight.

In that battle, the Greek king, a man named Pyrrhus, looked at the losses that his side had sustained. He won the battle, but he realized that he had lost a tremendous amount of his most important leaders. He realized, especially far from home, that he would not be able to replenish his forces as easily as the Romans would be able to do so. So this King Pyrrhus, even though he had won the victory, had sustained such heavy costs in this battle that he had to withdraw from Sicily. This is known henceforth as a pyrrhic victory named after good Ling Pyrrhus there. It means whenever you win a battle, but you do so at such a difficult, costly cost that it ultimately is essentially a loss for you.

Now, in the Christian life, sometimes it feels like we are living one long pyrrhic victory. Where we recognize that Christianity is good, certainly it's better than some of the wickedness of the world. We may recognize that Christianity is true, that we believe what the Bible tells us about who Jesus is. Yet there's a calculation in our minds. We're always asking ourselves, is this worth the cost? Even if I may win the battle here or there, is this worth the suffering that this is going to cost me? What will it all costs for me to follow Jesus? What's going to happen today? What's going to happen tomorrow? When is the next shoe going to drop? The Bible has so much to say to address this.

The Bible has so much to say about suffering because God knows that we live in a broken, fallen, sinful world where we are surrounded constantly by this suffering. When God wants to tell us about suffering, especially in the fullness of the light that we have in the New Testament, God always wants to ground what we know about suffering and how we think about suffering and how we look at suffering in the example and the experiences of our Lord Jesus. Because our Lord Jesus didn't avoid suffering. Although he existed in the form of God, he did not consider equality with God, a thing to be clung to, but he emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. That's exactly what we're seeing in this passage.

We're seeing that Jesus entering this life even before he's old enough to really remember it, humanly speaking. Jesus has already plunged headlong into a life filled with suffering. Our big idea today hopefully captures something of what Jesus is doing, that this isn't a waste, this isn't just him spinning his wheels, but that he's doing something through this suffering. Our big idea is that Jesus claims his kingdom through suffering..

If you were here last week when we talked about the beginning of the chapter two of Matthew, we saw how there are two kings whose claims are at stake. You have King Herod, who is the one who has the power, who's the one who has all the force behind him. He's the adult, he has all the power in the situation, and yet he doesn't have a divine right to this kingship over the people of Israel. He's not an Israelite. He is an Edomite. He's not descended from Jacob. He's descended from Jacob's twin brother, Esau. Then we have Jesus, who's born a baby. But he's born, and no one knows that he has been born, except some gentiles who've come from afar to worship him. They want to know where the one who is born king is.

So there's these two kingdoms in conflict here, and what we are seeing here in the rest of this story is how Jesus is going about claiming his kingdom. It's not by immediately annihilating Herod, but rather Jesus claims his kingdom through suffering.

Well, the passage we're looking at is neatly divided into three sections, each of which ends with Matthew telling us a portion of Old Testament scripture that Jesus has fulfilled by this. But we're also going to see is that in each section, Jesus is facing both good and evil. He's facing both suffering and salvation. Jesus is plunged into suffering, and yet we are seeing how God is ordering and guiding his suffering to accomplish this great good of Jesus' claim to his kingdom.

So here are the three parts where I'm trying to capture both sides of this in each part.
1. Delivered but Exiled
2. Distraught but Expectant
3. Despised but Escaped.

Delivered but Exiled

So let's look at this first part in verses 13 through 15 delivered but exiled. The first few words in verse 13, tell us the end of the story of the wise men, "Mow when they had departed," this is the departure of the wise men. They played a central role in the narrative we read in the first part of Matthew chapter two, but now they depart and they don't re-enter the stage here. So the focus of Matthew's narrative is going to tighten only on Herod and Jesus's family.

"So now when they had departed", verse 13, "behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said 'Rise, take the child in his mother and flee to Egypt and remained there until I tell you for Herod is about to search for the child to destroy him.'" So an angel of the Lord comes to Joseph in a dream and delivers this terrifying news. This great king who may or may not have been on their radar up to this point, maybe the wise men had talked about him, but this great King Herod is going to come and try to destroy this child.

Now, in the previous chapter in Matthew 1:19, we read that Joseph was a just man, he was a righteous man, he was a man of faith. Originally, he had intended to divorce Mary when it seemed that her pregnancy could only be explained by infidelity or immorality. But when an angel of the Lord comes to Joseph again in a dream there to tell him that, in fact, Mary's conception was from the Holy Spirit, well, Joseph immediately believes the word of the Lord, and he immediately obeyed what the Lord commanded him to do by taking Mary as his wife.

Well, once again, an angel, the Lord gives the word of the Lord to Joseph in a dream, and Joseph immediately believes and perfectly exactly obeys. He was supposed to rise and take the child, and that's what he does in verse 14, "and he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod." Part of what we're seeing in the first couple of chapters of Matthew is the great faith of Joseph and his role in raising and protecting Jesus, especially in these early threats that Jesus faced.

What Matthew does, especially in this passage, is to frame what's happening here in the light of the fulfillment of Old Testament scripture. So at the end of verse 15, we read, "this", what has just happened? "This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, 'Out of Egypt I called my son.'"

Now, clearly, by citing this part of the Old Testament, Matthew wants us to remember the exodus of Israel out of Egypt. The story when God led his people, Israel out of their House of Bondage and the House of suffering and death in Egypt under the leadership of Moses. But the passage that he quotes here is not from the book of Exodus, where the story of the Exodus is recorded. The passage that he's quoting here, Matthew is quoting, here is written hundreds of years later by the Prophet Hosea. This is Hosea 11:1 or really the second half of Hosea 11:1. But I want to read you the full Hosea 11: to get a flavor for why Matthew is quoting this passage here. So here's Hosea 11:1, this is God speaking.

When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.Hosea 11:1, ESV

.

When you hear the whole verse, you can tell the emphasis here, the flavor here is on is on God's paternal love, his fatherly affection for his child, for his son, originally for Israel. What Matthew is saying is if God loved Israel, and he certainly did, enough to bring Israel out of Egypt, and he certainly did, how much more does God love his only begotten son? Who entered this world, humbling himself by taking the form of a servant to be born as this little baby and now this baby is threatened? Go, the Father will certainly protect his son. This is about the fatherly love of God for his son. First, Israel and now especially Jesus.

Now in what Matthew is doing here, there's a tremendous amount going on. If you want to grab my sermon notes, there are some copies out there and out there, I've written a much more about this and some of what Matthew is doing here because he's portraying Jesus as the new Israel. Jesus is going to do what Israel failed to do in himself. Jesus is going to accomplish everything that Israel could not do. And this is Matthew just beginning this thread that we're going to see as we work through our way through Matthew that Jesus is the new Israel. Part of that means that he is going to re-enact the great events from the history of Israel, especially coming out of Egypt.

He's also showing that Jesus is the new Moses. Remember that Moses also faced an infanticide, a mass slaughtering of infants at the hand of a wicked king. Pharaoh King of Egypt commanded that all Hebrew boys should be put to death. Moses’ parents, when Moses was born, refused to put their son to death and they saved Moses’ life. So Jesus's parents will not put their son to death, will not allow their son to come to harm, when another wicked king, Herod, commands the death of Hebrew boys. So Jesus is the new Israel, he's the new Moses, we don't have time to go into all that. What we need to see here, what the main thing that Matthew is trying to bring out is the love of God for his son.

What Matthew wants us to see is that as Jesus is entering this chapter, this part of his suffering. It's not like it's uncontrolled, it's not chaotic. It's not just hating Jesus from who knows where, and none of its under God's control. The point is that in the midst of all this, God is reaffirming his love to his son. Yes, Jesus is facing suffering and evil on every side, but don't think for a moment that the Father will fail to protect his son. He absolutely will. Jesus is going to be delivered from danger, even if it means taking him through exile.

The reason Matthew frames this by focusing on God's love for his son is to teach us that we can trust God as his children. What was true for Israel and what was true for Jesus will certainly also be true for us. That God sets real boundaries to protect his children as they pass through suffering on each side.

You know, as a father, one of my favorite things to do with my children is to take them to the pool. One of my favorite things to do with my children at the pool is to coax them to try to jump off the side of the pool into my arms. That's a very difficult thing to do if you've ever dealt with small children because it's a really big, scary way to jump from the side of the pool into your father's arms. So what you're trying to do is to teach them and to help them to believe that dad's strong enough and dad's big enough that he's going to be able to catch you and you will not plunge to your certain demise. Dad will keep you safe even as you subject yourself to this great risk. Then when they do, when they finally get the courage to jump, well, then we're there forever, because then they all want to do it again and again and again and again, because it's so much fun once they learn that they can trust their father.

Far more than any child can trust his or her human father, part of what this passage is showing us here is how much more we can trust our Father in heaven, even when we are surrounded by suffering on every side. Because of his love for his son, God delivers Jesus from Herod. But as you well know, the path of Jesus is suffering isn't over. It won't be over for a long time, but it's not even done in the near future. Jesus has to continue to pass through suffering. The delivery of Jesus, delivering Jesus out of his suffering doesn't mean that he's going to have a problem free life, and neither will we. Jesus personally must pass through the furnace of Egypt and on the way, Jesus is going to pass through a great amount of suffering that's happening all around him.

Distraught but Expected

This brings us to the second section, distraught but expected. So this in verses 16 to 18. We read "then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men became furious and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and all that region who were two years old and under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men." Remember, just like Pharaoh murdered all the Hebrew boys of his day, so Herod is trying to murder all the Hebrew boys in a particular area in Bethlehem in his day. Both are trying to preserve their power, their illegitimate kingship and ruling and reigning over God's people. Herod murders the children in Bethlehem.

Now the Old Testament background to this is from Genesis 27. What's important to remember is that Herod is an Edomite, he's not an Israelite, he's an Edomite. He's not descended from Jacob, who was renamed Israel. He's descended from Jacob's twin brother, Esau, and Esau was the father of the nation of Edom. Back in Genesis 27, Jacob tricked, the father of Jacob and Esau, tricked their father Isaac, into stealing the blessing. Isaac, wanted the blessing to go to Esau, but Jacob tricked Isaac into stealing the blessing from Esau. When Esau discovered that he'd been cheated out of his birthright when he'd been tricked. Just like Herod was tricked here, Esau becomes furious. So furious that he wants to murder his brother Jacob. Because of that, Jacob had to flee from the murderous wrath of his brother, Esau.

Well, the same thing is happening here. When Herod, the descendant of Esau, discovers that he's been tricked, he flies into murderous wrath so that Jesus, the descendant of Jacob, has to flee the country in order to find safety. That's the Old Testament background here. What Herod does, Esau doesn't ever actually kill anyone, but Herod does. Scholars estimate that Bethlehem had probably about a thousand people at this time, which means if you think about normal human population dispersal of by different ages, this probably means that there would have been 20 male children killed during this time. 20 male infants who were put to death. What's sad about this and sometimes historians say, well, why isn't there any other historical evidence to back up this particular story? They try to cast aspersions on this as though it didn't happen. Understand that for Herod, this didn't even tip the scales in terms of his greatest atrocities. Herod was a wicked, cruel man.

Matthew brings this out because it is prophetically and theologically significant. Those 20 male infants are very important for what Matthew wants to tell us. That brings us to the fulfillment of scripture he sees in Jeremiah 31:15. So look at verses 17 and 18, "Then was fulfilled. What was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah. A voice was heard in Ramah weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children. She refused to be comforted because they are no more."

Now, once again, this is a very difficult passage, and Matthew is doing a lot here in trying to connect this passage from Jeremiah 31:15 to what's happened here in the days of Jesus's birth. I have more information in the sermon notes, but there are two complications that I want to point out. I won't connect all the dots; you can read the sermon notes if you want to see. It's very complicated.

Ramah is not the same place as Bethlehem. How does Matthew see a fulfillment in Bethlehem if Ramah is not the same city? Bethlehem is in Judah; Ramah is in the territory of Benjamin. Also Rachel is not the mother of Judah. Judah, again, was the one from whom the children of who would have lived in Bethlehem would have been descended. Rachel was not the mother of Judah; Leah was the mother of Judah. So if Rachel, why is Rachel weeping for her children when they were not the ones who were executed here? Now in Ramah, Ramah is in Benjamin and Rachel was the mother of Benjamin. That makes sense. But how does this apply to what's happened here?

Well, again, the sermon notes, I connect the dots. It would take much too long in a sermon format. But again, I want to focus in on what Matthew is trying to accomplish with this. If he's using this text, let's just accept that what is he trying to bring out and tell us?

Well, Ramah was the place, a sort of stopping place that Jeremiah tells us about. That was sort of the way station that all of the people of Judah were gathered before they were carried off into exile in Babylon. That's what Jeremiah, 31:15, is about, the weeping of Rachel as the children of Judah and Benjamin together are carried off into exile in Babylon. We read this in Jeremiah 40:1, let me read this,

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord after Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had let him go from Ramah, when he took him bound in chains along with all the captives of Jerusalem and Judah who were being exiled to Babylon. Jeremiah 40:1, ESV

That's that great day of devastation when God's people have been conquered and they're being carried off to a foreign country because of their sins. We read that Rachel, who's been long dead, is seen as that she's weeping for her children as they're carried away. So there's a distraught sense of great loss that cannot simply be fixed easily as God's people are captured and carted away.

We read not only about someone being distraught. Here we read about an expectant hope. Let me read you all of Jeremiah 31:15-17, because in that context, not only do we have this verse about loud weeping, but we have God's expectant hope offered to those who are facing this weeping. So Jeremiah 31:15,

Thus says the Lord: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.” 16 Thus says the Lord: “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the Lord, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. 17 There is hope for your future, declares the Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country.Jeremiah 31:15, ESV

We're seeing here again this balance of good and evil, salvation and suffering. We are seeing irreversible, devastating suffering. You can't just fix a captivity in exile. In the midst of this, God is saying that not all hope is gone. God will continue to redeem and restore and rescue his people.

If the first section was trying to build this foundation of God's love for his people, you can trust your Father in heaven. This is trying to tell us you can trust God's plan. He's entirely in control of this. This may seem out of your control, but God is working and guiding all of this to the place that he has appointed in his wise goodness and love for your good. God works all things, even this, together for good.

Last week, I quoted C.S. Lewis story from The Chronicles of Narnia, "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe", I want to quote a different book from that series today, "The Magician's Nephew". "The Magician's Nephew", if you've read it, it's one of my favorites in the series. It's when we hear the story of Narnia creation, the dawn of Narnia when Aslan the King has sung Narnia into existence. Aslan gives an assignment to a boy Digory who's there and tells Digory to go across the far ranges of Narnia to a distant garden and to pluck an apple from that tree and to bring it back to Aslan, because that apple would be instrumental in protecting Narnia from the White Witch who's already there.

Well, when Digory goes there and when he finds this distant garden, he finds to his horror that the White Witch is already there, she's broken into the garden she's been eating of this fruit. It says the juice from the fruit is dripping down her face like blood. She's stolen this fruit and she tempts Digory with it, saying, if you eat this, you will become immortal, you will never die.

Well, that doesn't tempt him much until the White Witch reminds him about his mother back in our world who was lying on her deathbed, dying of some incurable disease. She says to him, are you going to be so selfish that you won't even help your mother? Well, that really gets to him, but because of his friend Polly, he's able to stand firm and they are able to flee the White Witch and bring the fruit safely back to Aslan. Digory does it, but he's distraught, reminded of his mother wondering, what is he going to do about his mother? He pleads, he begs with Aslan to save his mother.

Here's what Lewis writes, "Up till then, he Digory had been looking at the lion's great feat and the huge claws on them." In other words, he'd been aware of how much this lion could destroy him in a moment. That's what he'd been looking at. "But now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and wonder of wonders, great shining tears stood in the lion's eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory's own that for a moment he felt as if the lion must really be sorrier about his mother than he was himself. 'My son, my son', said Aslan, 'I know grief is great.'"

Christianity doesn't minimize or whitewash suffering. We face it, we recognize it for what it is. What Herod does here is a wicked atrocity. Christianity acknowledges that there are some griefs in this life that cannot be made right in this life. But Christianity also looks expectantly with hope to the day when God himself will wipe every tear from our eyes.

We recognize that even in the midst of a great deal of suffering and tragedy like this, God is working all things together for good. Jesus may have escaped this suffering of the innocent babies, but Jesus was the ultimate innocent, righteous one who did not ultimately escape suffering when he went to the cross for us. Again, all of this is for a purpose, all of this is with the Father's love behind this, for the rescue of his people. Jesus is claiming his kingdom through this suffering. Again, Jesus’ suffering isn't over, not even close to over, not even over in this passage.

Despised but Escaped

Which brings us up to our third section despised but escaped in verses 19 to 23. Let me read verses 19 to 22,

19 But when Herod died, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, 20 saying, “Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child's life are dead.” 21 And he rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there, and being warned in a dream he withdrew to the district of Galilee.
Matthew 2:19-22, ESV

Well, after Herod dies, we have the same command rise and take and Joseph again believes and obeys right away. He rises and takes. When they come back, they find that a new ruler is in place. A man named Archelaus, and Archelaus, makes Herod's wickedness look like child's play. As wicked and violent as Herod was, Archelaus was far worse. Joseph was worried about this, and Joseph apparently is being warned again in a dream and so he withdrew and went to the District of Galilee, up in the north, away from the southern reign of Archelaus over Judea.

Here again, Matthew insists this is for the fulfillment of prophecy. Verse twenty-three, "And he went and lived in the city, called Nazareth so that what was spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled, that he would be called a Nazarene." Now the other two fulfillment of prophecy are difficult because it's hard to see how exactly they square with the passage in view. This one is hard to see because Matthew doesn't even quote a particular passage of scripture. He just says, you know, as the prophets say, he should be called the Nazarene. So there's a lot of speculation. What does this mean? What's he talking about? What's he citing from the Old Testament?

One big idea, one popular idea is that Nazarene sounds like Nazarite. Nazarites in Numbers six were those who had devoted themselves, taken a vow, that they would be holy to the Lord. So they couldn't cut their hair, they couldn't eat anything that grew on a vine, they couldn't touch anything that was unclean. They were holy to the Lord, just like priests were holy to the Lord. It was open to men and women.

If it's Nazarite, if that's what's in view here, if that's the word play between Nazarene and Nazarite, then Jesus would be like Samson, the great Nazarite, the strong Nazarite, but better. Samson wasted his life pursuing his own pleasures where Jesus would not. Because when an angel of the Lord came to tell Samson's parents that Samson would be born and Judges 13:5, we do have a very similar verse to what we read here in Matthew 2:23. Judges 13:5 says this, "For behold, you shall conceive and bear a son. No razor shall come upon his head for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb, and he should begin to save Israel from the hand of the Philistines." That's one possibility.

The other possibility is a word in Hebrew means branch. This appears in a very clear prophecy about Jesus in Isaiah11:1, "There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse." Remember, David was the son of Jesse. A shoot from the stump of Jesse means a king is going to suddenly spring forth and bring new life to what looked like it was cut down and would never regrow again. This is a clear prophecy about the Messiah. A shoot from the stump of Jesse and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit." Indeed, in John chapter 15 Jesus, "I am the true vine. Through me you will bear abundant fruit." It's clearly about Jesus.

The problem with both of these word plays Nazarite and the Hebrew word for branch, is that even though they sound pretty similar to Nazarene in our language, they don't in the original languages. So if you actually spoke these languages, you would not think that this was a very good wordplay. The passages don't seem quite to fit. Why didn't Matthew just cite them if that's what he wanted to do?

What I think is a much better solution that some commentators offer is the idea that to be called a Nazarene refers to the idea that Jesus would be despised. There are places in the world and in our country that if you are from those places, you are automatically considered elite. People look at you and think of you with a certain degree of awe. So think if you were from Paris or if you are from New York City, you know someone say, wow, you're from really important places. If you were from Rome, you know, that's a really important place. Tell me more about this place that you're from.

But in the same way, and I won't name any, don't want to cause offense. But there are certain places that if you are from them, it doesn't have quite the same effect. Nazareth was that kind of a place. When Jesus is being told and the word is first spreading about him and the Gospel of John 1:46, when two of Jesus's disciples tell a man named Nathaniel that they found the one of whom the prophets have foretold and he's from Nazareth. Nathaniel asks, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" He's a Nazarene? You can just hear the disdain dripping from what he says.

What Matthew is citing is perhaps not a verbatim prophecy, this was written, it's fulfilled this way, but the general sense of the Old Testament that when the Messiah came, he would not be hailed, he would not be loved, he would not be fawned over and adored. He would be hated and despised. What we see here, and this is something that will stick with Jesus through his entire life, is that even though he escaped Herod, even though he escaped Archelaus, he grew up with a stigma about him.

By all outward appearances, God is stacking the deck against his son in this life. He's adding trial upon suffering upon grief, upon heartache, upon rejection. Jesus is coming maybe out of the frying pan in one moment, but he goes directly into the fire in the next. God's not doing this because he is cruel. Remember, this is the Father's beloved son in whom he is well pleased.

The reason that God is doing this in the life of Jesus, and it's the orders, providentially the affairs of his son's life is so that the final victory will be all the more glorious. God loves to work in this way. God loves to bring victory out of ashes.

Like when he made Gideon in the Old Testament pare down his army from twenty-two thousand. You could do something with twenty-two thousand people and God says no, I want 300. You can't do anything with 300. God loved to do this when Elijah poured four jars of water three times on his altar before asking God to pour down fire from heaven. If you're praying, hope against hope that just a spark is going to come, the last thing you do is to soak your altar. It's like when King Jehoshaphat had received a word from the Lord that the next day they would win in battle against their enemies. And Jehoshaphat believed the problem is so entirely that he put his singers to march in the front of his army as they marched out into battle.

God loves when the decks are stacked against his people. Not because he's cruel, not because he wants to harm us. He wants us to know without a shadow of a doubt that the victory is his and could not have come from anywhere else. By all outward appearances, we are doomed. Yet God removes every human pretense of pride in this way, so that we can't help but to glorify him for his great victory that could have been won in no other way. It was not humanly possible and can only be explained because of God.

Application

The application from this text, then, as we we've all of these scripture fulfillments together is this that Christ has overcome the world. Take heart, Christ has overcome the world. That's what Jesus himself says in John's 16:33. We read next Acts 14 that it'll be through many tribulations that we must enter the Kingdom of God. That was true in the Old Testament. That's true immediately in Jesus' own life. It was true for Israel. It's true for Jesus. It's also true for us. Through many tribulations, we must enter the Kingdom of God. Jesus claims his kingdom through suffering.

We're seeing here the cosmic struggle of the world and its raging forces against our Lord and his Christ. Christ's rightful claim to the kingship stirs up the rage of the rich and powerful of the world because those illegitimate kings know very well that Jesus is rightful kingship means that he has come to dethrone them. The world's rage is always against Christ, but we have to understand that those who are associated with Christ will also bear the brunt of the world's rage. These innocent babies, just because they were outwardly associated with him by being born at the same time and same place that he had been born were murdered. How much greater suffering must we face if we deliberately vocally confess our association with Jesus before the eyes of the world?

What we need to understand, what we have to steel ourselves for is that it is necessary that we must suffer for Christ's sake. You see, we're just coming out of Christmas, and if you've heard the Christmas story, sometimes it's sentimentalized around this time of year. We think about a cute baby, but make no mistake, Jesus's birth was not the birth of a cute baby. I'm sure he was plenty cute, but his birth was a king's invasion into enemy territory to reclaim his stolen throne over creation.

He came not to be fawned over. He came not even to be served. He came to be despised and exiled and rejected and hunted down because that's how Jesus claims his kingship, through suffering. What this passage does is to confront us with a challenge and to comfort us with a promise.

It confronts us with a challenge, will we follow him if we must suffer with him? If we must die with him? Are you prepared for a world that grows increasingly less tolerant of you? Are you prepared to be not only despised but persecuted and potentially even hunted? It happens to our brothers and sisters right now in other parts of the world. What if it came here?

There's no way of knowing what's coming, and by God's grace, we pray that God will continue to protect the many freedoms and liberties we've enjoyed for so long in this country. But one way or another, the rage of this world will continue. Whether it's this country, whether it's another country, whatever country happens to be, the world will always rage against the Lord and against his Christ. It'll spill over among those who are most associated with him, with us. Are you ready for that? That's the challenge of this passage. Jesus couldn't even get out of his infancy without facing this kind of suffering.

This also comforts us with the promise. What the scriptures proclaim is that if we suffer with him, we will be glorified with him. That's Romans 8:16-17,

16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. Romans 8:16-17, ESV

With the recipients of his fatherly affection, "Out of Egypt, I called my son." We are his children; the Spirit bears witness with us about that. “If children then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him."

Christ promised all those who suffer as this, that following in the footsteps of your master into suffering will lead you then also where Christ has gone before you into glory. There's no shortcut. There's no way around this, but take heart. Christ has overcome the world, even the world in all of its rage and all of its power cannot ultimately harm you. We may suffer, we may die. Certainly, Jesus did. But at the end of the day, we fear not those who can harm the body, but those who can cast body and soul into hell forever. That lays in the hand on God who calls us his children.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you that you have called us the children of God if we are looking to Jesus through faith. If there are any here who have not yet put their faith in Jesus, I pray that you would prick their hearts. That you would direct their eyes to Christ who is seated at your right hand, and that you would buy the power of the Holy Spirit give them eyes to see him, ears to hear his voice from your word, and hearts to believe and understand all that you've laid out in your scriptures. The good news that he is the Christ. The king has come to reclaim his throne, the one who's come to bring into salvation his children. I pray, Father, that we would believe this, that we would trust in this and that we would take heart in this no matter how dark life gets, no matter how much suffering grows. That we would cling to the promise that if we suffer with your son, Jesus, we will also be glorified with him by your grace. It's in Jesus, your son's name, we pray. Amen.