Questions, questions, questions. Have you ever asked a question and that question became the start of a real adventure? That can happen. It certainly has happened throughout history. Great discoveries that make our lives easier have often been the result of the right question that was asked at the right time. Think of Galileo, Isaac Newton, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, and they all shared this trait in common. They observed the world about them and they asked questions. Growing up, us kids were kind of into science. At that time, it was really popular in school. And I had a neighbor a year or two older than us. And he seemed like he was a budding scientist. He had a telescope. And we would look through the telescope. And then he got a sun filter. And we could look at the sun without asking our moms. And he would show us sunspots and this and that. And then he'd show us something else, a plant or a rock. And he would always use this word, notice, notice, notice. And then we found a rock that, if we were to see it today, was probably only this big. But to a second grader, it seemed like it was this big. And it was a print on it, looked like this. And we were convinced it was a dinosaur footprint. And we thought, there's a dinosaur that has been around here. So we were asking questions about our surroundings. When we grew up, it was three backyards connected. We had this whole world of adventure. Just without even getting into the street, we could do this kind of stuff. And so we were asking questions about the things that we saw. And this is what Einstein, Newton, Edison would do. They would observe the world around them and ask questions about what they discovered. Scientists have always asked big questions, and their answers have really improved life for us. William Wilberforce questioned the British slave trade. And as a result, in time, the slave trade came to an end in England. For many years, it was just reality. It was unquestioned. You think of John Newton, the great Bible teacher, pastor, hymn writer. He wrote Amazing Grace. He started out life as a sailor, later as the skipper of a slave ship, and that was just how things were done. There was a triangle between Africa, the Caribbean, and England, and ships would cycle through that triangle, bringing rum and bringing slaves to wherever they needed to go. And that's how it was done in those days. And then it was William Wilberforce said, why is this? Why are we buying and selling human beings? This is wrong. And that started a process which ended the slave trade after many, many years. And then Martin Luther asked a question that no one was asking at the time. In fact, in his time, the church taught that salvation was something you would earn or work for or even purchase in some way. And Martin Luther said, really? Is salvation something that can be bought? Could you buy your salvation? And as a result, he was one of the ones who started the Reformation, where the church rediscovered the gospel and the good news message that we're not saved by working for our salvation, by earning it or buying it, but we're saved by receiving it as a free gift. Martin Luther's question helped to trigger the Reformation. And then also there are others. Annie Sullivan questioned Helen Keller's teachers, doctors, and parents. Now, Helen Keller could not see, could not hear, could not speak. And Annie Sullivan said, why can't Helen Keller live a normal life? Isn't this possible? And the rest, of course, is history. And in fact, there's a record of Helen Keller giving a speech to people and living an amazingly normal life, being unable to see, unable to hear, unable to speak at an early age. But Annie Sullivan taught her and trained her and worked with her, very hard work. It all began with a question. Why can't she live a normal life? Questions are powerful things. And then Florence Nightingale was a nurse during the Crimean War. This was a vicious war with a lot of casualties. And she was treating casualties during that time. And she questioned the medical practices of that day. And they just did things a certain way that were not very successful. I remember having an experience. I worked in a woodshop that was fairly modern with its tools and things. And then I moved and went to work in another woodshop that was not quite as modern. And I said, you know, where I used to work, we used to do this. It was really quick and easy. And I said, where I used to work, we used to do that. And it's really quick and easy. And instead of getting promoted to vice president, somebody said, why don't you go back to where you used to live? So new ideas are not always that popular. Someone discovered or thought, asked the question, is it necessary to do surgery by making really long, large incisions? And at the time, there was a saying, apparently, that that was the way to do it. Someone questioned that. And if you've ever had certain surgeries, you go home not with a lot of stitches after staying in the hospital for days. You go home maybe the same day with some band-aids and you think, how is that? It began with a question. Someone asked the question, do we have to do it this way? Is there another way? Turns out there was and there is. And so there's lots of questions. Well, Florence Nightingale's questions brought about a result and her questions led to changes that really helped create the modern nursing practices that are used today. And there's many great changes in history that began with the question that is asked. It's a little hard to really come down to decide what was the greatest question that was ever asked. But there is a question that is the greatest question of all, and that is the message of our text today in Matthew chapter 22, starting at verse 41 to the end of verse 46. And the greatest question of all is simply this. Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus? And it's interesting to ask people that question and to see what answers they come up with. People have lots of different answers to that question. Who is Jesus? What is the answer? The Lord Jesus gives us this answer, gives us the answer to this most important question. here in these verses as he asks a series of questions, and he leads the people he's questioning to the correct answer, the answer to the question, who is Jesus? So we'll pick up at verse 41, and number one, we have the opportunity, the opportunity. And the Lord Jesus seizes a golden opportunity for the gospel. And he is our example as his witnesses today. He seizes opportunities. You know, we as believers and the disciples were called to be fishers of men. and I remember I had a friend had some property along a river in the coast range and it was right downstream from the hatchery and we would listen to the fishing reports and the way you go fishing for steelhead you have to wait till it rains and the river rises and just when it gets to the top And it starts to come down. That's when the fish will start to move, and they're hungry. And supposedly, you can catch a limit of steelhead. So we're listening every day, and I called my buddy. I said, it's time to go. We can catch some steelhead. So we drove down there 50 miles to this spot. Our hands are shaking as we're putting the hooks on the lines, and we're just so excited. We're trying to seize the opportunity of the century to catch some steelhead. Well, we set a lot of fish free that day. that never saw any of our hooks and any of our bait. But we had a good time nonetheless. But we were seizing the opportunity, or trying to. But the Lord Jesus is going to seize an opportunity for the gospel. And there are opportunities for the gospel, golden opportunities that the Lord puts into our path. Here's one here with a surprising group of people. Verse 41. Now, while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question. Now, the Lord Jesus is undefeated after his enemies tried three times to trip him up with trick questions. And we've seen these questions. Now the Pharisees were gathered and previously four different factions of Judaism tried their best through their worst at the Lord Jesus to try to get him to stumble over one of their trick questions and get him into some kind of trouble. They wanted to trap him. but all of them had failed. Now Jesus said this in Matthew 16, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. And what he's saying is this, that he is building his church and there's no force anywhere, no opponent that can stand in the way of him building his church. The building and the growth of the church, Thriving of the church is not a human thing. It's something the Lord Jesus does through people. And nothing can stop that. Even the devil himself, the gates of Hades, cannot stop that. And secondly, we see the Lord Jesus here. He takes the offensive. Now, previously in these three sessions with the Pharisees, with the scribes, with the Herodians, in these sessions, the Lord Jesus was the one being asked the question. Now he's doing the asking. He's taking the offensive. Verse 41, it says, he asked them a question. So the Lord Jesus is doing the questioning. And the point here is this, that the gospel ministry never needs to sound retreat. You know, if the church had a bugler, the only thing he would ever play is charge. That's it. He would never play any other bugle call. Maybe, you know, when we go to sleep at night, he might play tap so we can go to sleep. But other than that, he would never sound retreat. And there's no bugle call for retreat in the Christian ministry. It's always move ahead with the gospel. The Lord Jesus is doing this here. He's seizing the opportunity, now going on the offensive where he is asking the question. And he seizes the opportunity. Now again, his enemies did all they could against him. They've all failed. They have no more trick questions. They're speechless. If you look back at the end of verse 46, no one was able to answer him a word. Excuse me, let's back up a little bit here. Yeah, but again, they had tried everything, and no one could ask him another question. They did not know what to do. And so they were silenced. And so now the Lord Jesus is going to take the offensive. He's going to seize his opportunity. He sets the agenda. Something else here too, Jesus is seeking to win his enemies so that they might believe in him. Now again, even to the end, he is offering his enemies the opportunity to acknowledge who he really is as the Messiah. and to believe in him and be saved. He wants his enemies to be saved. He doesn't want to destroy his enemies at this point. He doesn't want to do that. He wants him to be saved. And so he's going to ask a series of questions, and these are not trick questions. In fact, the answers, as we'll see, are easy and obvious. There's four questions and the Lord Jesus is going to ask these questions to move the Pharisees to acknowledge that Jesus is the Messiah. and not just acknowledge it, but to believe it and to be saved. That's what he wants for his enemies. He wants them to be saved. Jesus said this in Mark 16, go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Another version says, go and preach the good news to everyone in the world. Everyone needs to hear the good news of the gospel. There's a lot of persecution of Christians going on around the world. A lot of people who are enemies to Christ and the church and believers. And we need to pray for them as well as the Christians that they're persecuting. We need to pray for these enemies. I heard an interesting interview with a man who works in a country where Christians are being attacked all the time. And some of these are actual gunfights, wars that are going on. And they're being attacked with military-type weapons. And he prays for the people that are injured. He helps assist them. He also prays for those who are doing the killing. He's praying for peace. He's praying for their enemies as well. And Jesus said, love your enemies. And what greater love can we show than to offer Christ to the one who is an enemy of Christ and an enemy of believers? So this is the opportunity. And the Lord Jesus seizes this opportunity. The Pharisees are still gathered. They're still in the temple. It's Wednesday. It's been a very long day. And the Lord Jesus doesn't just walk away, but he stays and has one more encounter with them, seizing the opportunity. Number two, we have the questions. And there are several. And we begin with the what question. This first question is what. If you look at verse 42, he says, What do you think about the Christ? What do you think about the Christ? Now, this sounds like a general theological question that Bible students might debate. We had a group that liked to debate theological things when I was in school. And there was a courtyard in between all the buildings. And if the weather was good, you'd see them out there debating, sometimes pretty enthusiastically, about some obscure point or another. And I would kind of listen in and say, OK, this sounds pretty good. And then I'd be on my way. But they would debate these things. And it sounds like Jesus is raising a question about the son of David, and it'll be a discussion and a debate, maybe a very simple question. That's what it sounds like, just a general question. But in fact, it is much more than a general question. Now, back in chapter 21, just a few days earlier, we have the record of what happened on Sunday. This would be the first Palm Sunday, and the Lord Jesus is coming into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey, and there's a massive crowd, really two crowds that are greeting him, and they're crying out. And we're in chapter 21, verse 9, and we read this. The crowds going ahead of him and those who followed. And so there's these two crowds who were there surrounding the Lord Jesus as he comes into Jerusalem on the first Palm Sunday on a donkey, presenting himself as the Messiah, as the King. And so they're shouting, Hosanna to the son of David. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. And so the crowd now is welcoming the Lord Jesus as their king, as the son of David, as the Messiah. They knew who he was, and they're welcoming him for that. And then a little bit later in the temple, he had a similar reception. In chapter 21, let's see, 22, let's see, he's in the temple, and again, the children are, yeah, verse 15. says, When the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things he had done, and the children who were shouting in the temple, Hosanna to the Son of David, they became indignant and said to him, Do you hear what these children are saying? And so again, they heard the same thing that the crowds were crying out on the street. And again, the kids were praising the Lord Jesus as the Son of David, as the Messiah, as the King. And so Jesus was welcomed and recognized generally, not as the carpenter from Nazareth, but as the Messiah. He was the Christ. Again, that was Jesus' question here. What do you say about the Son of David? Whose son is he? And so, and again, he'll want to know who the Christ is. What do you think about the Christ? And the Christ is the Messiah. He's the son of David. He's the king. And so on that first Palm Sunday, just days before this meeting now in the temple, it was generally recognized by crowds of people that Jesus is the Christ. He is the Messiah. He is the son of David and the king. So people in general believe this and understood it. So now when you go back to Matthew chapter 22, starting at verse 42, this question takes on a much greater meaning. What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? Now you could rephrase this, what do you think about Jesus? What do you think Jesus would say about him, about me? Whose son am I? And that's what he's saying, because he's been recognized as the Christ by the people of Jerusalem. And he's saying to the Pharisees, who do you think I am? Whose son do you say that I am? Who is the Christ? And so he's trying to move them to see that he is indeed the Messiah. So this is not just a general theological question, but he's asking the Pharisees a question about himself. Who do they say that he is? Who do they say that Jesus is? And life's most important question is this, what do you think about Christ? Who is he? This is the question we can ask many people who we meet today. Who is Jesus? Do you know who he is? And then you can talk to him about that. And then now we have not just the what question, but the who. And this next question is more specific. So first it is, what do you think about the Christ? Then secondly, whose son is he? This is the who, the who question. And they give the answer. It's very quick. It's a question that everyone knew. And they said very quickly, in verse 22, they said to him, the son of David. And this was an answer that practically everyone would know. Practically everyone believed that the Messiah was the son of David. And anyone who was descended from David would hope and pray that their child would be that descendant of David who would be the Messiah, the Christ, the King. And so people knew that the Messiah would be the descendant, the physical descendant of David. And this was God's promise to David 1,000 years earlier in 2 Samuel 7. God makes this promise to David. When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, who will come forth from you." And so he's talking about a descendant, a son of David into the future. and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." So this will be a very unusual king, a king who will not reign for 40, 50, 60 years, for a lifetime, but a king who would reign forever. And this king, of course, would be the Messiah, the Christ. And God made this promise to David. So when the Pharisees said, He is the son of David. They were right, but they were only half right. And there's more to this answer to this question. Christ is indeed the descendant of David. But of course, he is also God. And the Pharisees missed this. They understood he was human, a man, the physical descendant of David. But what they missed completely is that Jesus is more than a man. He is God in human form. And like many people, Like the Pharisees, many people see that Jesus was a good man, a wise teacher. He was the unfortunate victim of a crucifixion, but few people realize he is truly God. And then we have the how question, the how question. And answering the question, who is Jesus? The Lord Jesus takes the Pharisees to their own scriptures, to Psalm 110. And you'll see the quotation there. In my Bible, the font changes to capital letters. And you see, starting at verse 44, you'll see that this is a quote from the Old Testament, and it is from Psalm 110. So Jesus said to them, then how does David in the Spirit call him Lord? Saying, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. And so this is the how question. How is it that David, speaking of his own physical descendant, the Messiah, how is it he calls him Lord, meaning God? Why is he calling the Messiah God, if he is just his son? And so we learn several things here. First of all, Psalm 110 is written by David. These are the words of David. But these are not the words of David alone. This is what we call inspired scripture. And it says here that David, in the Spirit, he calls him Lord. And this means that David was writing his own thoughts, his own ideas, his own praise for the Lord in the form of a worship song, a psalm. But he also was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. How does that work? We don't know. But we know that David was writing what he wanted to say. And through the working of the Holy Spirit in him, David also was writing exactly what God wanted to say. And so that David's words written in the Spirit in Psalm 110 are not just the words of David, they are the word of God. And so this is the word of God written by David, but again communicated by God through David. It is the word of God. And it is a Christ-centered Psalm. It's all about the Messiah. It's all about Christ. It's all about the King. And it is a prophetic psalm. This is a psalm that unveils future events far after the time of David. Over 1,000 years after David is when these events took place or will take place. And so this is a psalm that gives us a look into the future. It's fun to visit an observatory one time. And it's just like you see in the movies. It had a round dome on it. And they opened it up. And there was a telescope inside. There was a graduate student there. He said, look at this. We looked inside, and what we looked at was something called a globular cluster. And he said, this is a countless number of stars, and this is how many millions of miles across? We don't even know. And it's just out there in space. And you're like, wow, we can look far, far out into space with a telescope at a college. And we were able to do that. It was amazing to do that. Well, what the Bible does, it's different. It looks not into space, but it is our, instrument, our tool for looking into the future. Everybody wants to know the future. The World Series went to seven games. I don't think anybody knew what was going to happen in the seventh game. Everybody was trying to predict the future. There was endless talk and discussion. We want to know the future, but we don't have a very good record of predicting the future. But the Bible unveils the future through Bible prophecy, and there is a lot of prophecy in the Bible, including in the Old Testament. We have it here in Psalm 110. And so Psalm 110 answers the question, who is Jesus? And the first thing we see is this, verse 44, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. Now this psalm opens with an amazing statement. David wrote these words 1,000 years before this event took place. David would have had no way of knowing, but the Holy Spirit knew and enabled David to write these words. So David is unveiling the future for events 1,000 years after him. And these events take us past the events of Passion Week. Jesus is in the middle of what we call Passion Week. It began on Palm Sunday, would continue through the week, and come to an end Friday or Saturday, we would say. And it includes, of course, his death and burial, and then the beginning of the new week on Resurrection Sunday he's raised. And this is now Wednesday of Passion Week. Jesus is at the temple questioning the Pharisees. And so this prediction takes us beyond Passion Week, beyond Jesus' betrayal, his arrest, his trials, his torture, and his death on the cross. In fact, it takes us beyond his resurrection on Sunday, the third day. These words take us to the time of his ascension 40 days after his resurrection. And then he ascends into heaven personally. He's there with the Father. And this is a conversation that the Father will have with the Son. And he says, the Lord said to my Lord, that is the Father, the Lord said to my Lord, the Lord Jesus, sit at my right hand. And so these are words that God the Father says to Jesus after he returned to heaven. And this means that Jesus, saving work, is done. He returns to heaven as the victorious Savior. And there on the cross, weeks earlier, he did everything necessary to pay for the sins of every person who has ever lived. There's nothing we need to add to Jesus' finished work. Jesus from the cross cried out, It is finished. And again, the Lord Jesus did everything necessary. I meet people from time to time who don't know this, don't understand it, don't believe it, but they think that somehow they have to add to what the Lord Jesus did on the cross. I know people like this. There's things they think they have to do to add to the Lord Jesus' saving work. But it's all done. And the Lord Jesus ascends into heaven and sits down at the right hand of the Father because his work in salvation is finished. He's finished with that. He's done everything necessary. Now the Bible says this, by grace you have been saved through faith, that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. And the Lord Jesus provided a salvation that is not something we need to earn, but it is a free gift. And he gives it to everyone who receives it by faith. Jesus is, if you want to know the answer to the question, who is Jesus? He is our victorious Savior. He's done everything necessary to save anyone who would believe. Number two, he is our coming king. He is our coming king. Verse 44, again, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. And today the Lord Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father. This part of the psalm has been fulfilled. And he is waiting for the day when he will come to earth to take possession of his kingdom. And so he is our coming king. We don't see this today. Hebrews 2 says, but now we do not yet see all things subjected to him. So the Lord Jesus is not reigning on earth as king today. but the day is coming when he will. He is our coming king. And when he does this, when he returns, he will defeat his enemies and reign as king. Revelation 19 says, I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on it is called faithful and true. And in righteousness he judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, many crowns. And he has a name written on him which no one knows except himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following him on white horses. And from his mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it he may strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He treads the winepress of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And the coming of Christ our King will be a world changing event. The world will change physically. It'll change in many ways. There'll be no more sickness or disease. You won't be able to find a hospital. You won't need a hospital when Jesus comes to reign as king. No more sickness. There's going to be a change in the climate, and the desert will bloom. Places that have been totally unproductive for agriculture will be rich and productive during that day. And again, the world will change socially. Isaiah 40 says, the crooked will be made straight. You know, today's twisted moral values, we know all about those, will be no more. The crooked will be made straight when Jesus reigns as king. The will of God will be the new normal. Crime will be dealt with summarily. There'll be no jails. The Lord Jesus will take care of people doing what is wrong. And the world will change economically, a time of prosperity. There'll be no housing problem. Isaiah 65 says they will build houses and inhabit them. and the world will change politically. And the Lord Jesus will reign from Jerusalem, the world capital, and he will reign as king. And then also the world will change militarily. War will be replaced by peace. We read this in Isaiah, He will judge between the nations and render decisions for many peoples, and they will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. And so they will take their weapons and repurpose them into farming tools. There won't be any weapons. And it says, nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war. This is what will happen when the Lord Jesus comes to earth to reign as king. He is our coming king. and the best is yet to come. When we look at the future through the lens of Bible prophecy, we can say the best is yet to come. Jesus is coming again. We will be with him when he reigns as king. We're in that picture. And then also, number three, who is Jesus? He is our high priest. He is our high priest. Again, we see this, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I put your enemies beneath your feet. And at this time, the Lord Jesus is seated in heaven. What is he doing there in heaven at this time? Well, he is functioning as our high priest. He is, as the high priest in the Old Testament, he today is representing us before God. In heaven, that's what he does. He is our help when we need him. The Bible says this, We do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace. so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And the Lord Jesus, as our high priest, is our help whenever we need him. We can bring our need to him. We can tell it all to him and look to him for the mercy and the grace that we need at any time. There's something else that he does. He is our high priest. He is also our advocate. I was acquainted with a young person who had a major legal problem and we were able to find him, someone recommended to me, a very good lawyer for him who was his advocate in court. And he represented this young man and the young man was able to go home and was not convicted of any crime. And the attorney said, you know, I won't do this for you again, but I did it for you this time and now You need to live a good life, and he's done that. But he had an advocate, someone who represented him before the court in just the right way so that he could convince the judge to allow this person to go free, which is what he did. And it was an amazing thing. Well, the Lord Jesus is our advocate before the Father when we sin. Every now and then I'll run into somebody who thinks they lost their salvation because they were saved and then they sinned. Well, in fact, what happens is this. When we sin, the Bible says this in 1 John 2, if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And so he is our advocate. He represents us before the Father. and he is the propitiation of our sins and also the sins of all the world. His sacrifice has satisfied the wrath of God, and we'll never see God's punishment for our sins. What happens is this. When we sin, we have an advocate, Jesus. He represents us before God. We also have an accuser. One of the names of the devil is the accuser of the brethren. And so he is there accusing us before the Father. And he says, you see that person? They say they're a Christian. Look what they just said. Look what they just did. Give him to me. He can't possibly be saved. And then the Lord Jesus is there pleading on our behalf and saying to the Father, He's the propitiation for our sins. He's the atoning sacrifice. He paid the price for every sin, including that one. And then God the Father forgives us on the basis of Jesus' finished work. So when we sin, it's not over. But we need to bring that sin before the Lord and look to the Lord Jesus as our advocate. He represents us before the Father and secures our forgiveness when we sin. So Jesus is our high priest. And finally, number four, he is our God. Look at verse 44. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand." And here it is, God the Father, the Lord, speaking to my Lord, the Lord Jesus. And both are called Lord, both are called God. John 1 says, no one has seen God at any time. the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has explained him." And God is a God in a form we can understand. God is invisible to us. We can't see him anywhere. I had a fun time on shortwave radio a couple of weeks ago. There was a fellow and his daughter on an island in the South Pacific, and it's very rare that you'll hear a shortwave communication from there. A buddy of mine called me on the phone. He said, they're there on this island. Get on your radio. So I got on there, and I heard them calling. And I was able to make a contact with them and get credit for that contact. I've never seen them. I've never met them. I have no idea what they look like. I just heard their voice and they heard mine. And we were able to have this brief contact over many, many miles with shortwave radio. Well, they're invisible to me. Someone knows who they are. They're visible to somebody. They're real people. But God is totally invisible to everyone. No one has ever seen God. So how can we know who God is? Well, he became a man. He sent his son as a man, the Lord Jesus, as man and God, to explain to us who God is, to reveal God to us in a way we can understand. But what has he done? Well, first of all, think of his miracles. John said all the books in the world could not contain all the miracles that Jesus performed. And one of the things about Jesus' miracles, they all demonstrate his power. You know, he's able to do things like still a storm, cure incurable diseases, drive demons out. All of these things require power, huge power. power that we don't have. And so we see his power, and it's a reminder that the miracles of Jesus say to us that nothing is impossible for God. He has all power to do all things. And then also his judgments show us his righteousness. Remember, right after Jesus entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the first place he went was to the temple to clean the place up, and he drove out the crooked money changers and all the merchants and all of that, and cleansed and cleaned out the temple to return it to what it's supposed to be, a place of prayer and fellowship and teaching, which is what he did. It's a picture of the judgments he will bring in the future. And God judged sin, and Jesus will be doing the judging, and so today's the day to be saved. His teaching shows us His wisdom, and He is our wisdom. We have decisions to make, things we're trying to understand. The Lord Jesus is our wisdom. And then finally, the cross shows us his love. Sometimes a person wonders, does God really love me and how would I know? Think of all the things that happened to me, could God possibly love me? Well, the Bible says this, Jesus said it, greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. And at the cross, the Lord Jesus shows us God loves us. So who is Jesus? Jesus is our God. And so we have the questions. And these questions, again, answer the question, who is Jesus? Jesus is God. And then we have the challenge. And this is the last of the four questions. And Jesus poses this to the Pharisees. And this question is to really move them beyond just head knowledge, but to acknowledge that Jesus is the Christ, that he is God, that he is the Messiah. And so verse 45, David then calls him Lord. How is he his son? So David calls the Messiah his Lord, but he's also, of course, the physical descendant of David. And how could they do that? Now, there's many descendants of David who technically could qualify to be the Messiah. Think about King Hezekiah, a great godly man. The problem was, he isn't God. The Messiah had to be a physical descendant of David, but also the Lord. He had to be God, both. Only Jesus fits that description. And verse 46, no one was able to answer him a word, nor did anyone dare from that day on to ask him another question. And now, just as the Sadducees were silenced, The Pharisees are silenced as well. Why didn't they answer? This is an easy question. Really, I mean, the answer is obvious that David called him Lord because he is the Lord. It's right there. It's in written form. It's impossible to miss. Why is it that the Pharisees would not answer? Well, either they could not answer, they didn't understand, or they did understand and they would not answer. But either way, they were so close to the information they needed to believe in the Lord Jesus as their Savior, but they decided to say no. And sometimes this happens. Occasionally, we'll have that experience where we share the gospel with someone, They've heard everything, they understand it with their mind, but they can't believe it with their heart. And sadly, that is what happened here with these Pharisees. So who is Jesus? This is the most important question of all. Many great questions have been asked through history. This is the most important question. And as we've seen, he is our victorious Savior. This is good news for anyone who's ever done anything wrong, and everyone has. And the good news is this, there is salvation from every sin. And the Father forgives and forgets because Jesus died for all our sins. He's the victorious Savior. He's also our coming King. When He returns to this world, all the wrongs that we see around us will be made right. Everyone can make their own list of all the things that are wrong. with this world today. Well, make that list, and then right at the top of the list, Jesus is coming again, and then cross all those things out. And you realize, wow, all those things will go away and be changed when Jesus returns. And then also, he's our high priest. When we need help that no one else can give, we can call on him, and he'll provide mercy and grace when we need it. Whatever we need, in whatever amount, he'll provide that. And also when we sin, he is our advocate, best lawyer you'll ever have. And he pleads our case before the Father and secures our forgiveness. And finally, he is our God. If you wonder what God is like, look to the Lord Jesus. He's shown him to us in a form that we can understand. And we know this because Jesus told us himself, and then we also have it in inspired scripture in Psalm 110. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word and thank you for who Jesus is. Thank you for these questions that would help anyone to understand the answer to life's greatest question. Thank you for all that he is to us and help us to take these truths to heart and share them with others. In Jesus' name, amen.