Matthew 22, 41 through 46 is what we'll be reading today. Really, the end of a section, because in the next section in chapter 23, Jesus goes on an extended narration or discourse, however you want to call it, often called the seven woes, where he pronounces woes on the scribes and Pharisees. This would be the last of the interaction, at least at this point, between Jesus and the Jewish leaders. Matthew 22, 41 through 46. While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying, what do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? They said to him, the son of David. He said to them, how then does David in the spirit call him Lord, saying, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. If David then calls him Lord, how is he his son? And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day on did anyone dare question him anymore. That's the reading of God's word, and we pray that he would bless it to our hearts. Amen. Growing up in Pittsburgh, I often heard the question posed to me, are you a Steelers fan or a Pirates fan? For some reason, the Penguins weren't brought into this too much. They had their own fans, too, but they were kind of a different sort. Are you a Steelers fan or a Pirates fan? Now, this question seems to be a rather easy type of question. You just give the proper answer to it. You think, well, if you like football, you're a Steelers fan. If you like baseball, you're a Pirates fan, right? But there's much more to a question than that than meets the eye at first. Why? Because Steelers fans and Pirates fans aren't only distinguished from themselves in the sport that they prefer, but also in how they act, what they do, and who they are. Pirates fans are the nice, decent suburbanites. They come to the game with their children. They eat their hot dogs. They watch the game and their kids enjoy it. They might even bring their glove to catch a fly ball. And even the stadium reflects this. If you've been to Pittsburgh, PNC Park is a beautiful stadium, I have to say, even if the Pirates are the worst team ever. in the history and franchise of any sport, really. They have a beautiful stadium, and they have that going for them. It overlooks the rivers. It's just really nice, and it's that nice family-friendly environment there, and that's who goes to the games if anyone goes anymore. Steelers fans, on the other hand, if you've seen Heinz Field, it's the ugliest stadium in the world. It's just disgusting. It's yellow, yellow seats, no amenities, nothing in it that looks nice. It's just, if you wanted to make a stadium ugly, you probably couldn't make it more ugly than Heinz Field. And they did that on purpose because it reflects the attitudes of the fans. They are the ones who are the diehard Steelers fans. They'll come in any weather. They'll come and support the Stillers, as they call them. And they'll come in, oftentimes not in a good state of mind, if you know what I'm saying. And they'll come in and they'll be rowdy and obnoxious, because this is what the Steelers fans are like. They're different. So what seemed at first to be a very innocuous, simple, easy question to answer actually is a lot more to it than that. There's a lot more to that question than meets the eye. Because not only does it say which sport you like more, it actually puts you in Separate quite separate categories. Now, of course, this is set up for illustration purposes Not all Steelers fans are like that. Not all Pirates fans are like that, but just to show you in general what the perception is Here in Matthew 22 Jesus asks what looks like a very simple question Which often will have just a very simple answer but there's a lot more to it than that and It isn't simply a question that is answered in five, four, or five words as the Pharisees do. It actually shows the perception of who you think the Christ or the Messiah is and what do you think he will be like. So this morning we're going to go over this question which Jesus asks. The Pharisees' response And then Jesus' response to them. Those will be the three sections here. But in doing so, I hope that we can learn more about the office of Messiah, what it meant for Jesus to be the Messiah, and how he fulfills that. Beginning with Jesus asking a question. We see in verse 42 is when it comes, Jesus asks the question in the form of two questions, but really just one. What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? Now in order to get our bearings here, let's look at the context some. Jesus has been asked many questions up to this point. Remember he was asked... earlier in chapter 21 actually in verse 23 the Jewish leaders and authorities came up to him and asked him by what authority is he doing these things that he's doing and in in Context it's what how can he go and destroy the temple and do all these things by what authority doing these remember Jesus answered with a counter question about John the Baptist where did he come from from heaven or from man and That was one question the first question they had for him They also asked him that very difficult and tricky question, which was on a hot button issue. What was that? Should we pay taxes to Caesar or not? And it explicitly says there, and that's found in Matthew 22, 17, it explicitly says that they were asking him that question to trap him, to get him entangled. Remember, the Sadducees also asked him a question about the resurrection, which was also trying to trap him. Remember, they told that long, extended story about a woman who had a husband and then he died and they had to the seven powers. She had seven husbands and they all died. Now at the resurrection, whose wife would she be? Of course, they were trying to trick him because they thought they didn't believe in the resurrection as Sadducees. And so they asked him that question. Jesus gave a brilliant response to that. And then a more serious question in Matthew 22, 36, one of the Pharisees came and asked him, which is the greatest commandment? And of course, Jesus answered with, the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. The second is like it. to love your neighbor as yourself. So Jesus has been being asked many questions. The Pharisees and the other leaders, the Sadducees and the Herodians are also involved in this, are all asking him questions, trying to trap him, trying to get to know him better, some with sincere motives, some with very insincere motives. They're asking him questions. And now, finally, it's Jesus' turn to ask the question. And so, he asks them this question, verse 42. What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? What does this question mean? It would seem that Jesus at first would just have wasted his opportunity to ask them a question because it's so simple, right? Everyone knows that the Christ is the son of David. But as we look at it more in depth, we see just how profound it really is. First of all, what exactly is Jesus asking? What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? Importantly, Jesus is not here asking the question, what do you think about me? He already asked that question to Peter. Who do the crowds say I am? Who do you say I am? That's not the question here. The word the is very important in this translation. They get it right here in the NKJV. What he's asking is not what do you think about me, it's what do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is the Messiah? Because remember, the word Christ simply is a transliteration or translation from Hebrew, the Hebrew word Messiah comes into Greek as Christ, and both of those mean Messiah, and both of those mean in English, anointed one, the one who is anointed. So what Jesus is asking here is, what do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is the Messiah? Not asking, whose son am I? And that's an easy mistake to make, because when we read the scriptures, we often think that Christ is somehow Jesus's name. It's part of his name, right? Because it's connected to his name so many times. And it's really not. It's a title. Just like Lord is a title for Jesus, Christ is also a title for Jesus, Messiah. It's just connected with him so many times that we automatically assume it's his last name. It is not. It is a title. So Jesus here is asking, what do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is it? Okay. Before we go on to the Pharisees response to that, I want to apply this to our lives right now. Notice when Jesus confronts the Pharisees, what does he confront them with? The most important thing. What do they think about the Messiah? That is the most important and most critical difference between Jesus and the Pharisees. Whether Jesus is the Messiah and the question that goes with it here, What is the Messiah like? This is the heart of the debate. If you look at it, everything else, what the Pharisees were doing with tradition, what the Pharisees were doing with their converts, how Jesus talks about them with respect to the Sadducees, the Herodians, and all the other types of Jews, all of that centers around the question, who is Jesus? And therefore, what is the Messiah like? That is the key question. I think so often when we're dealing with the questions in the New Testament or when we're dealing with other religions around us now, we try to come at them from other angles. We try to say things like Christianity is better than everything else because it teaches the best ethics. Jesus taught the best system of ethics. That may be true, but that's not the heart of the issue. Or, probably more common in our circles, we'll say things like, Christianity is better than all religions because Christianity teaches salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone. And other religions teach works. That might be true. In fact, I think it is true. But that's not the heart of the issue. The heart of the issue has to do with the identity of Jesus Christ and what kind of Messiah he is. That is the heart of the issue. And Jesus is getting at it right here. Everything else is connected to that. Everything centers on the person of Christ, the Christ, and whether Jesus is the Christ or not. That's the center question. And we need to keep that in perspective because everything else kind of goes around and finds its coherence and its relevance in that question. Okay? So Jesus gets right to the heart of it here. What do you think about the Christ whose son is he? Now, of course, the Pharisees have a really simple answer to that. They probably thought, We got off easy here, right? They probably thought that Jesus had just been silencing all the peoples. He had just been giving great replies to it all. And now we get an easy question. What is he doing? And then they give a simple answer, the son of David. And we can add, of course, to that, because everyone knew that the Christ was the son of David. Even Matthew knows that as he's writing the gospel. The very first line in the gospel of Matthew is this. the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, that is, Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Matthew is saying that Jesus is the Christ, but he's also implicitly saying that Jesus is the son of David and that the Christ, therefore, is the son of David. Everyone knew that. Matthew goes on in his genealogy to show that Jesus came from David and that he is the Christ. The Christ comes from David. Jesus makes claims to be both the Christ and the son of David. He makes claims to be the Christ when Peter in Matthew 16 says, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus says, blessed are you, Simon bar Jonah, or Simon, son of Jonah, for flesh and blood did not reveal us to you, but my father is in heaven. He agreed that he is the Christ. And then later, when the two blind men come up to Jesus, they say, son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus accepts that as truth. As well as the triumphal entry when he comes in the Jerusalem, they call out to the son of David and he accepts the praise. He is the son of David. He is the Messiah, of course. The Pharisees, again, must have thought that this was a rather easy question, a question. Which they probably weren't expecting. I like the question at the beginning of the sermon here about which sports team do you like. There's a lot more to it than meets the eye. There's more to it here than simply whose physical descendant Jesus is. Her ancestor, I should say. Because in that culture, and I want you to get this, this is very important for understanding this text, because it does seem a little bit strange at first. In that culture, as well to a lesser extent than ours, but still there, To be a son not only meant to be a physical descendant of, but it also meant that you were subordinate to your father in behavior, in occupation, all around action. In other words, if your father did something, say he was a blacksmith, that's what you were called to do and you didn't ask questions. You know, it's so funny, in today's day and age, we talk about our calling from God, and normally we search ourselves, what is it that God wants me to do based upon my own urges or feelings or something, or what I like doing, or what is it that God wants me to do based upon my circumstances, or what I'm good at, my talents, and those are all good and fine things to do. But that whole question was just sidelined in the time of Jesus's, of course, indeed in the time of the Old Testament as well. It was simply, you did what your father did. Jesus was a carpenter because his father was a carpenter. To be a father of someone not only meant that you had a physical son proceeding from your body, but also that your son was expected to behave in a similar way that you did. This meant an occupation, this meant in character, and this meant in all areas of life your son was to be like you. In the New Testament, this usage of the word son can be illustrated like this. In Ephesians 5, 6, Paul calls the Gentiles, or the wicked people, sons of disobedience. Now, obviously, Paul was not stupid. He's not saying that they actually physically descended from someone named disobedience. He means that their action is in line with the idea of disobedience. He's talking about their actions and their heart, not about their physical descent. We use this word today. Yesterday, Larry and I were talking about my son, Ambrose. He loved to dance. He thought he was at the Netherfield ball. He was having a great time with my daughter, Portia, and they were dancing around, and thank you to all the very kind ladies who danced with them. At the break time, there was food. And Ambrose rushed over there and he got his plate and he filled it up with chips and he ate all of them. And then he went back again. And he did it again and again and again. And Larry said to me, boy, he's his father's son. And boy, was he right when he said that. Because my dad tells me when I was young that he used to get delight in seeing how much I just loved food. My son, when I ask him what he wants for his birthday, he doesn't say toys. He says pizza, chicken, cake, and ice cream. The same thing over and over again. He's his father's son, right? Now, obviously, when Larry said that, he did not mean that Ambrose was my progeny. Obviously, that's implied in that, but that's not what he meant. He meant that his actions are in line with, subordinate to the actions of the Father. And so when Jesus is asking the question, when he asks the question, whose son is the Christ or the Messiah? It's more than simply who are his ancestors. or from whom did he descend? It's what type of behavior is he expected to do? What type of pattern of behavior, pattern of life is he going to follow? The son of David meant, for many Jews at the time, not merely someone who descended from David. It meant someone who would act like David. And what did David do? Now, this is no dig on David. This is what God called him to do. But what did he do? He fought with the sword, didn't he? He was anointed as the king, but it took him a while to become king and establish. And when he was established as king, he fought off rebellion and he expanded the kingdom of God through fighting. Again, this is not a dig on David himself. This is what his calling was. But this was what the son of David was expected to do. And think about the time When Jesus comes, who is the great oppressor? Who is the one who was oppressing the people of Israel? It was the Philistines back in David's day. It was Rome in the time of Jesus, who in many ways was a lot greater threat than the little Philistines. So they thought that the Messiah would behave like David did, or would act in accordance with what David did. They thought that the Messiah would be David's son in the sense that he would act like David, that he would gather an army, that he would vindicate the righteous within Israel, and cause them to be the new Rome. Although, not the new Rome in the sense that they would be worshipping other gods. They'd be worshipping the true God, but they would be an empire, like Rome was an empire. This was the view of the Messiah, and to be David's son was to act in that way. So when the Pharisees say the son of David, they're not merely saying, oh, he descends from David. Matthew knows that. Jesus himself knows that. And they all agree on that. The point is, how would the Messiah act? What type of king would he be? Would he be like David, or would he be like something else? Would he be different? And so, Jesus responds with scripture, going in, to the third part here of the sermon. Jesus responds with scripture and we'll see the differences in how Jesus responds. Jesus quotes from Psalm 110, the first verse. Let me read it to you here from verses 43 through 45. He said to them, how then does David in the spirit call him Lord, saying, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand so I make your enemies your footstool. If David then calls him Lord, how is he his son? Let's break this down. First, in verse 43, Jesus says, How then does David in the Spirit call him Lord? Then he goes on to say, What is Jesus saying there? Well, David is the writer of Psalm 110. It's what the inscription says, and it's what everyone believed then, and I think it's what we should believe too. David is the writer of Psalm 110. So that's obvious why Jesus says that David call him Lord. However, he adds the words in the spirit. What does that mean? It doesn't mean that David felt particularly inspired when he wrote those words. It meant that he wrote them under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. It was the Holy Spirit inspiring David to write these words. This is why they're in the scriptures. David wrote these not because he felt a certain way. It wasn't a certain whim of his. He was under the inspiration of the Spirit. And the point is, and the point that Jesus brings out, is that now they are therefore authoritative. And this is something on which Jesus and the Pharisees would agree upon. And we have to give the Pharisees credit for that. They took seriously the Scripture and its inspiredness, its inspiration. Jesus and the Pharisees agreed upon this. Note, David in the Spirit calls him Lord in the book of the Psalms. As a sort of aside application here, I think too often when we're talking about exclusive psalmody, we tend to go right to the verses in Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3, and that type of argument is difficult because it requires knowledge of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. It's based upon that, and that won't convince many people. What might be a better strategy, in general, is to look at what Jesus says here, and says that David in the Spirit calls him Lord. The Psalms speak of the Lord, the Christ, the Messiah. And if that is not inspiration to sing them, then I don't know what is. The Psalms speak of him. David here is speaking of him. And this is so important for us because too often we, like, this is not a dig on any one particular brand of Christianity. I think we all have this problem. We always think about ourselves. We always talk about our relationship with God. We think about ourselves in relation to God. And we think about what God makes us feel and how he fulfills us. And those are true and good things to think about. But we never, ever, ever lose sight of the main fact that the scriptures are about Christ. They're about him as the Lord, as David speaks here. And so when we think about the Psalms, we do sing them as our own experiences, but as our own experiences in Christ. They're his first. And that is why we sing them. And this keeps us, I think, balanced. It helps us to understand what the story is all about, the main character, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. We do have a part, and I don't want to denigrate that part. We do, and we are created in God's image, and we have worth and value, and we will be resurrected, and all that's true. But Jesus is the main character, and David speaks of him here as Lord. So what does Jesus mean here by this statement? I think it's important to bring this out. In verse 44, Jesus quotes from Psalm 110 in the first verse, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand. Now this could be obscure to readers here in English, but what do you notice about the first Lord here versus the second Lord? What's the difference? One is all caps, right? and the other one is not. It's just the first letter of the capital letter. Did it have that in your Bibles? I know in mine it did. Okay, good. The point of that is, and this is actually true of the whole Bible, is that when you see the word Lord in all capital letters, it's referring to what in English is butcheredly called, if that's a word, Jehovah, the divine name. When they were Originally, Hebrew didn't have any vowels. Imagine trying to read without vowels, but that's the way it was. When they added vowels, instead of putting the correct vowels under the divine name of God, Yahweh or Jehovah, they put the vowels for the word Lord under them so that they would remind the reader not to read what it says there, lest they take God's name in vain, but to say Lord instead. And the Greek translation of the Old Testament, what's called the Septuagint, followed this tradition. They continued that and they just translated it as Lord, as opposed to the divine name. So this is why an English tradition actually is the same. This is why in the Old Testament, indeed here in the New, When God's divine name is given, it's not written out, it's just written as Lord, but they put it in all caps to distinguish it from normal usages of the word Lord, which is just simply a word that means Lord. It could be used for God as a title, it could be used for masters, it could be used for the present, it could be used for anything, anybody who is in that position of authority. So when you see the word Lord with all caps, that's referring to God. When you see the word Lord with just the capital L and all the rest are not, that refers to any Lord. Sometimes it's God, sometimes it's humans in positions of authority. So that is the point here. The Lord, that is Jehovah, Yahweh, said to my Lord, The one who is over me, the one to whom I am subordinate, sit at my right hand, so I make your enemies a footstool. Now it's important to note also here, as a little further background, that Psalm 110 was being viewed as a psalm relating to the Messiah, and greatly so. Psalm 110 is talking about the Messiah, and Psalm 110 talks about the Messiah as David's Lord. The Lord said to my Lord, that is the Lord of David, because David wrote the psalm. That's what Jesus is bringing out here. Notice here, he's not contrasting son with father. Jesus is David's son in that sense. He physically descends from David. He contrasts son with Lord. David is not the Lord of the Messiah. Therefore, and this is Jesus's point here, David does not set the agenda for Jesus's program. David does not set the agenda. Even David himself admits in the Psalms that he is subordinate to the Messiah. David is not setting the agenda. He's not like a typical father who would set the agenda for what their child or son would do. He is subordinate to the son, just like all of us. Now, Christ's Messiah ship his his Jesus's time as Messiah follows the same Old Testament pattern as David in the sense both suffers than are glorified Both are God's anointed King I mean of course David was anointed by Samuel Jesus was anointed at his baptism with the Holy Spirit coming upon him both defeat God's enemies as the psalm here in 110 says But Jesus did it in a different way And here is the point I think of the passage I There are two differences. First, the way in which Jesus defeated his enemies. David defeated his enemies by war. It's the normal expected way of defeating one's enemies, right? But Jesus defeated his enemies in a completely different way. By dying. By going to the cross. dying for the sins of his people and being raised the resurrection. That is how Jesus defeated his enemies. In fact, Paul quotes this song in relationship with the resurrection in first Corinthians 15. God is putting all of his enemies under his feet. He is he is at God's right hand. So Jesus doesn't fight with the sword. Remember when Peter said, we have two swords here, like that's going to do anything, right? And Jesus said, those who live by the sword, he didn't say that. Those who have the sword will die by the sword. That's not his point. He didn't come to fight. Secondly, it's not just the way in which Jesus defeated his enemies. It's also the nature of the enemies themselves. What does Paul say in 1st Corinthians 15? Who is the last and greatest enemy? Death. And this is how Jesus defeated the enemies. By his resurrection from the dead, Jesus defeated death forever. And death was the last and greatest enemy of the Christian and of the whole human race. The enemies weren't, in the end, Rome. They weren't, in the end, the empires or the wicked Gentiles. They were in collusion with them. There's no doubt they were wicked, too. But the worst enemy of all, as Paul himself says, is death itself and Satan, the one who comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And in his death and resurrection, Jesus Christ destroyed the last enemy. And he sat at God's right hand. where all of his enemies are being made his footstool. I think we need to keep this in mind, not only as we live our lives, but as we interpret the scriptures. Jesus is the one who came not with the sword, but with his mouth. Here he does it here with his mouth. As the prophecies in Isaiah said, he came not to kill, but to die. This is not the way normal empires think about winning by dying. This is just not normal. So, while in a sense Jesus is David's son, he's physically descended from him, David doesn't set his agenda. Jesus's agenda is from the Father, and that is self-giving love, and that is how he defeated his enemies. Remember that. Remember that when you think to retaliate against those who are giving you trouble. I think we all go through trouble, whether it's at home, it's at work, or whether it's in any of our relationships with friends and family and all of that, we all have trouble. And there's a tendency to react, even if we're justified, a tendency to react like the rulers of the Gentiles act, and to react with force, to react with defense. But if we react with self-giving love, that's when we're most effective. Because that is when we are following Christ in His way. And that is when God is glorified and he is happy with us when we do these things. The Christian life is being conformed into Christ's image and therefore we will follow that same pattern. He is in this sense the Lord and we follow him. So we follow Christ in the way he defeated his enemies and also the way he was glorified. Think about that as we live our lives. But also think about Jesus Christ as the king. the king over all. And he sits at God's right hand. And he may not be like the kings of this age, but he certainly is the king. So that should also grant us comfort in knowing that Jesus Christ is David's greater son and David's Lord, the Lord of all. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for these words of Jesus here. We thank you that what they mean, we thank you that In a sense, he is David's son, as the Gospels make it clear. The Messiah certainly is to be David's son, but not in all ways. He's also David's Lord, and he is also our Lord. And so we pray that we would live according to the pattern he set forth, that we would suffer with him so that we might also be found in him. No righteousness of our own through the law, but the righteousness which is from you be made like him in his death, so that we might also partake of the resurrection. We thank you for the defeat of death in the resurrection and your abundant mercy shown in that. And we thank you for the promise of our resurrection for those of us who have trusted in Christ. And so we pray that as we await that day, That we would live in a way consonant with the pattern which Jesus put forth for us. In this we pray in his name. Amen.