as we open to God's Word and ask for His blessing upon our time. Our Father in Heaven, we thank you for your Word, which is true all the time, which is right, which is good. which reveals Jesus to us. I pray as we open your holy and inspired and inerrant word that you would cause us to come at it with reverence, with awe, with humility, that we might be taught by your spirit from your word. Father, I pray that you would enable me to communicate it rightly, that you'd enable all of us to have ears to hear it rightly, and that we would be rightly changed and transformed as a result of what You have written in Your Word. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Well I invite you to open up your personal copy of God's word to Luke chapter 24 and we find ourselves again this morning in the familiar story of Christ on the road to Emmaus. Last week we began looking at this account as Jesus came upon two of his disciples. This narrative as we looked at last week, describes a significant appearance of Christ after his resurrection. He had been raised from the dead. His resurrection had been declared by the angels and said, he is not here, he is risen. But people needed to see him with their own eyes. And the Bible faithfully records how he appeared to many different people. In fact Paul records in 1 Corinthians 15 that he appeared to 500 at one time. And so this was not just a small private revealing to a few people here and there but ultimately many many people, hundreds of people saw Jesus raised from the dead. But this passage before us is one of those precious accounts in which Christ appeared to some of his own people. Now Jesus could have appeared to them right in front of them on the road and said, boom, here I am. And the people could have been, the two men could have been shocked. and said, huh, it's Christ. And then Christ could have disappeared and left and that could have been the end of the account. That could have been the end of the appearance and it would have been miraculous and amazing even in that. But that's not what happened. Jesus chose to take it slower with these men. And he stayed with them, he talked with them, he taught them. He took them through what we began to identify last week as four stages. Four stages that begin with spiritual blindness and end with spiritual excitement. As these men encountered the resurrected Lord on the road to Emmaus, they were utterly transformed. They were not the same men afterward as they were before. And in this transformation in these two men, there's something for us to see in our own story, something for us to learn of our own conversions as well. And so let's begin by reading the passage, follow along as I read, beginning in Luke 24, verse 13. The account begins this way. It says that very day, two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And he said to them, what is this conversation that you are holding with each other as you walk? And they stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days? And he said to them, what things? And they said to him, concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet, mighty indeed, and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him. We had hoped that he was to be the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see. And he said to them, O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets had spoken, was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly saying, stay with us for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent. So he went in to stay with them. When he was at table with them, He took the bread, and blessed it, and broke it, and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized Him, and He vanished from their sight. And they said to each other, did not our hearts burn within us while He talked to us on the road, while He opened to us the Scriptures? and they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem and they found the 11 and those who were with them gathered together saying, the Lord has risen indeed and has appeared to Simon. Then they told what had happened on the road and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread. Thus ends the reading of God's word. May the Lord bless it upon all our hearts this morning. Well, as we look further into this account, as we see Jesus engage these two men on the road to Emmaus, we can discern four stages by which the Lord transforms each of our lives. For indeed, we must see Jesus as these men saw him. We must have our eyes opened as well, and so we began looking at these stages last week. And we saw that Jesus transformed the lives of these men on that day. He transformed their lives that they were not the same men afterward as they were before, after they encountered Christ. And we can be sure, friends, by the testimony of the word of God and by our own experience, that he is still transforming lives today, amen? The same resurrected Lord that met these men upon the road. meets sinners still today and transforms their lives in equally radical ways. The question for each of us is, has he transformed your life? Has he transformed you this morning? But let's look at the first stage of this transformation, and that is stage one, failing to see Jesus. These men failed to see Jesus. We looked at this last week, and so this is just a brief overview of what we covered last week. We looked at verses 13 to 24 for this first stage. These men were followers of Jesus. We learned that one of their names is named Cleopas. And they had gone to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. But as they were there, they were caught up in the events surrounding Jesus. And they saw his crucifixion, and they were then huddled with the other people that followed Jesus, and as then they heard the news of the empty tomb, they were caught up in the midst of that. And here it is, the very same day, it is Easter morning, it is Easter day, you could say, still, here, when we encounter these two men, because Luke told us, verse 13, that very day, the very day that the tomb was found empty, these men began their walk from Jerusalem to Emmaus. And as they returned home, they were not happy, they were not encouraged, but rather they were dejected and disappointed. Their hopes had been destroyed, had literally been killed in the person of Jesus Christ. They had placed all of their hope upon Jesus and yet that man that they had placed their hope upon was nailed to a cross and he died there on the cross outside of Jerusalem. And even though they had heard reports of the tomb being empty, there was no hope in that. Their hearts were not lifted up by that news. And so they're discussing these things, quite sad, looking sullen, as the text says in verse 17. But as they're talking and walking, another man walks up alongside them and joins them in this walk. We know it's Jesus, as the readers, but they did not know it was Jesus. And they didn't know it was him because verse 16 says it was kept from them. Their eyes were kept from recognizing Jesus. The Lord in his sovereignty had determined that it was not yet time for them to be able to recognize Jesus. The Lord was going to do something mighty in withholding that and opening their eyes later. And so they fail to see Jesus. They fail to see him when he first walks up. And you could kind of imagine that, you kind of hear footsteps, you kind of see the corner of your eye, another person kind of coming alongside you as you're walking, but you don't really go over to like look to see who it is. But then he asked them a question, and at that point, they're bound to like look in his face, and you would imagine that for one who had followed him, those that had followed him would recognize him, but they failed to recognize him even when they engaged in conversation. And ironically, they begin to tell Jesus about Jesus of Nazareth. And again, the irony is so thick here. They're telling Jesus about Jesus and they do not yet recognize that they are telling this man his own biography. And as they finish their report, you notice their last words in verse 24. that others had gone and found the tomb empty, just as the women had said, and it says, but him they did not see. I mean, they're looking at Jesus and they said, but they didn't see Jesus. And they're looking right at him. They absolutely. missed it. The one piece of empirical evidence that they said that they needed, the one piece of empirical evidence that would cause their whole situation, their whole mood to change was right in front of them and yet they missed it. And we talked about how this is the case for all of us before Christ. That unbelief blinds our own eyes, that keeps us from seeing the glories of Christ in the gospel. We can read the scriptures, we can hear the truth, the good news, but until the Lord opens our eyes, it just is, bounces off of us. We don't get it, we fail to see Jesus. We fail to recognize him in the truth, in the word of God. And so this, After we see stage one, the failing to see Jesus, we come to the second stage that this narrative gives to us, and that is seeing Jesus in the scriptures. The second stage that Jesus brought these men along in, and I believe is paradigmatic for what happens in our lives as well, is seeing Jesus in the scriptures. Jesus, after listening to these men recount his ministry, his death, his empty tomb, he then addresses them straightforwardly. He wanted these men to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that everything he was and everything that he did, everything that happened to him, was the fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures. It was the fulfillment of the prophecies and the promises given long ago. They could not miss, they should not miss, is Jesus' point, that everything that happened to Jesus of Nazareth was a part of God's plan. Well, Jesus confronts them, Jesus addresses them here in verses 25 to 27, and this is where we're gonna spend our time this morning, is on stage two. As I said last week, last week was on stage one, this week's on stage two, and next week we'll look at stages three and four together. But this stage here, these verses 25 and 27 are so rich for us to consider that we need to spend some time here this morning. And Jesus addresses them in two ways. And the first way that Jesus addresses these men is he rebukes them for not seeing the Messiah in the scriptures. He rebukes them for not seeing the Messiah in the scriptures. Look at verse 25 and 26 with me. It says, verse 25, and he said to them, oh foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? Out of love for these two men, Jesus does not leave them in their ignorance, he does not leave them in their blindness, but he confronts them. He confronted them on two points specifically that are connected to one another. And these are played out over verses 25 and 26. The first thing that he rebuked them in was number one, that they didn't believe the prophet's messages. They didn't believe the prophet's messages. Verse 25, you'll see it begins, oh foolish ones, That word oh is given and it's a word of emotion. It's a word of really in this case great disappointment. Jesus, his heart is burdened for these men that how could you have missed this? And notice that he calls them foolish ones. Notice that they're not just ignorant though. It's not that they didn't have enough information. It's that they were foolish. This means to be foolish biblically means to be unwilling to use one's mental faculties in order to understand. To be foolish means to be unwilling. Unwilling to use your mind, unwilling to use your heart to be able to understand what's taking place. And so Jesus is saying that these men have in one sense been unwilling to understand these things. They were unwilling to think rightly about the Scriptures. Their biases, their other preconceived notions, assumptions, and expectations had kept them locked into a way of thinking that kept them from seeing and believing all that the Scriptures had said. He says, oh foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe. slow of heart to believe. They were slow to connect the dots. They were slow to think properly about the word of God. They were slow to believe. They were slow to trust. In other words, they weren't yet there trusting. They weren't yet there believing all that God had said through his prophets in the Old Testament. And specifically, do you see that? Slow to believe, he doesn't point to his word. He could have pointed back to his own teaching. To all the teaching that he gave throughout his ministry. But he doesn't. He says, slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken. This is amazing. Jesus rebukes them that they were slow to believe their Bibles. They were slow to believe the written word that was right in front of them, that they had been immersed in for their entire lives. As Jewish men, they would have been steeped in the Old Testament scriptures, the Hebrew scriptures that we know as the Old Testament. It was there for them to read. It was there for them to hear in the synagogue. But they were slow to believe it. They were unwilling to follow the ways where the truth led. God didn't mess it up. God didn't mess up the truth but they were the ones that were not connecting the dots as they should have. And this is really true of all of us on our own, is it not? that we don't believe the scriptures on our own. We go to open the Bible together and we, in our unbelief, we don't see it, we don't connect the dots, we don't really wanna see it. We don't wanna be confronted with the truth. We don't wanna be told that we're sinners destined for eternity in hell. We don't wanna be told that there's judgment awaiting us. We don't wanna be told that we have to repent, we have to trust and to believe in God's only son. We are resistant to the truth, naturally. But if there's gonna be any hope for us, we've got to have our eyes open to the Scriptures. We've got to be able to see the truth about Jesus Christ and the Word of God. Friends, it can be true even of us as believers, who've been Christians for a long time, that we can come to the Bibles, our Bibles, and we can be slow to believe. Isn't it true? We can say that we believe in a big picture sort of way. Yeah, I believe in Jesus. But then you get into specific passage, you get into a specific way that it confronts us and we kind of close our reading for the morning and move on. We don't wanna be pushed in those sorts of ways and we too can be slow to believe. And so Jesus' rebuke here is a good word for all of us. that we need to read our Bibles, and we need to believe our Bibles, and we need to put into action what is in our Bibles. Jesus says that these men should have paid attention to all that the prophets had spoken. Because if they had believed what they had read, if they had believed what the prophets had spoken, they would have seen Jesus, and they would have believed in him. They would have recognized him. And so his first rebuke was that they didn't believe the prophet's message. But there's a second rebuke that he gives in verse 26, and that is they didn't understand the Messiah's mission. They didn't believe the prophet's messages, and they didn't understand the Messiah's mission, verse 26. Was it not necessary, he asks, that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into glory? He hones in on the Christ. Throughout his ministry, he's spoken of himself as the son of man, primarily. But here, he says the Christ. Christos in the Greek, Mashiach in the Hebrew, where we get the word Messiah from. Both Christos, Mashiach, both mean anointed one. It's the same term, just different languages. This is the Messiah. He says, was it not necessary that the Messiah had to suffer and then enter into glory? And so he's making it clear to these first century Orthodox Jews that there was clear aspects of the Messiah's mission to be discerned from the scriptures. And the way he asked the question, it's assumed a positive answer. It's not like it could be a yes or no. He's assuming an affirmative answer. It's like when a parent asks their child, isn't it important to be kind to your brother? This isn't a debated question. There's a clear answer here that must be expected and is a yes. The same is here. Jesus says, was it not necessary? Yes, it was necessary, you could say. It was necessary that the Messiah suffer and enter into his glory. Now, we would all say that as New Testament, New Covenant believers that was, if someone says, was it necessary for Jesus to die on the cross and be raised from the dead? And we'd say, yes. Why? Well, because there's no other way that we'd have salvation. But would we say, yes, it was necessary because the prophet spoke it? because the Bible said it had to happen. Because that's what Jesus is saying. He's not so much making a theological point as he is making a bibliological point. The Bible required it and so it had to happen. This shows Jesus' absolute trust in the word of God, reverence of the word of God. He holds the word of God in high esteem. Every word must come true. You'll notice here the sequence of his mission. Should suffer and enter into his glory. Suffer, referring to the cross, his sacrifice. Glory, then referring to the resurrection, the ascension, and then his return and his reign. So glories, glory here, enter into his glory is a broad term. But the key sequence is clear. The cross and then the crown. This was the Messiah's mission. And these two aspects are stated in other verses too. First Peter chapter one verse 10 through 11. It says concerning this salvation. The prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. You see those two parts, the Messiah's mission? These prophets, Peter says, predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. The very two things that Jesus identifies here on the road to Emmaus. Something similar is found in Acts chapter 17, verse one to three. It says, now when they had passed through Amphibiopolis and Apollyonia, they came to Thessalonica where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the scriptures. What did he reason? Explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead and saying, this Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ. Paul went into the synagogue to the Jews and he explained from the Old Testament, what we call the Old Testament, the Hebrew scriptures, that indeed the Messiah, it was necessary, notice that same language, it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, the first part of his glory. then to ascend on to high and to then return in glory and to reign eternally. And then Paul says that connects it. That Messiah that was spoken of in the Old Testament, well, those have been fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. This Jesus whom I proclaim to you is the Christ. And so behind these passages and Jesus' statement here in Luke 24 is the reality that the Old Testament spoke of the sufferings and the subsequent glories. We will look at some of those predictions, some of those prophecies in a minute. But needless to say, it's the point here to see that Jesus expects these men to know what the scriptures say, to know what the Old Testament wrote about the Messiah and that therefore it was necessary that Jesus die on the cross and then be resurrected in order to fulfill the scriptures. These men had failed to see that. They'd failed to see Jesus as the fulfillment of the messianic prophecies. But We've seen Jesus now rebuke for not seeing the Messiah in the scriptures, but there's a second way that Jesus addresses these men. Not only does he rebuke them, but then the text says in verse 27, he turns to instruct them. And here we see in verse 27, instruction on seeing Jesus in the scriptures. Instruction on seeing Jesus in the scriptures, verse 27. Look at verse 27 with me. And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. Now Jesus, this is a narrative comment that is here that is before Jesus had been speaking, but now this is a comment by Luke saying that beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. Moses and all the prophets, a phrase to describe all of the Old Testament. Moses, the author of the first five books of the Old Testament, what we call the Pentateuch, or the law, the Torah. And then the prophets. Prophets, not only what we know as the prophets, but even the history books that we call history, 1st and 2nd Samuel, 1st and 2nd Kings, Joshua, those are included in the prophets in the Hebrew Bible. They're known as the former prophets and the latter prophets. And it says that Jesus interpreted to them. He gave careful explanation. He made it understandable to them. I could imagine these men here doing lots of, ah, now I get it. Oh, yeah, oh, yeah. As Jesus continues to explain and connect the dots, their minds are opening to this truth. Jesus here is the expositor of the Old Testament. He is showing that the truth about himself is found hidden in the pages of the scriptures, and we need to go and dig it out. This is a conversation that I would love to hear the recording of someday. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall, to hear how Jesus exposited the Old Testament and explained how it spoke of himself. And yet, we have to believe that God and his sovereignty and his providence believed that we didn't need that, actually, because he gave us his word. He gave us the testimony of the apostles. He gave us the books of the New Testament that helped to help us understand the Old Testament as well. But what's clear from this verse, friends, is that Jesus saw that the Hebrew Scriptures, what we call the Old Testament, speaks of himself. Now too often, and I've found myself in this category from time to time, that we have a meager understanding of the Old Testament. We gravitate towards the New Testament because it talks about Jesus and what we do in our Christian life. And sometimes if we go to the Old Testament, where are we gonna go? Psalms or Proverbs, right? Because there seems to be immediate devotional content that's there, or practicality to our lives. And there's nothing inherently wrong with that. But if we're only going there in the Old Testament, and not going to the other parts of the Old Testament, then that is a problem. Because all scripture is breathed out by God, and is profitable for us, right? It's profitable for us, all of it. And so we need, today, as New Testament believers, New Covenant Christians, we need all of God's revelation, which means we need the Old Testament. We need to be immersed in the Old Testament. Of course, we can tend to think that, well, the New Testament's most important, or, you know, the Old Testament can get a little boring sometimes. Or we just don't really realize the importance of it. Didn't Jesus come and like make everything new? You know, isn't it kind of like he kind of replaced all that? Well, it's important, friends, that if we want to correctly and biblically understand and worship Jesus, we cannot neglect the Old Testament. If we want to rightly worship our Lord and Savior we must understand the Old Testament. We must not only understand the Old Testament we must delight in the Old Testament. We must see in it our Savior and how it leads and points to him and have our hearts rejoice in it. Dr. Abner Chow, he's the president of the Masters University and Seminary, and I leaned on him heavily for this message this morning as he has dealt a lot with biblical theology and connecting the Old and New Testament. And he's written the following. He said this, he says, because New Testament Christology draws from the Old Testament, A shallow understanding of the Old Testament leads to a shallow Christology. New Testament Christology, understanding who Jesus is, even in the mouth of Jesus himself, is all dependent upon and flows from an understanding of the Old Testament. And so if we want a full and rich Christology, a belief about who Jesus is and what he did, we've got to make sure that we're rooted, that we're steeped in the Old Testament. We need to understand how the Old Testament points to Christ. Now we weren't there, again, on the road to Emmaus on that day, and God and his providence didn't want us to hear that conversation, but we can use the rest of the scriptures to understand to the best of our ability how to see Christ in the Old Testament. Now sometimes, when you come to this conversation of seeing Jesus in the Old Testament, it reminds me a little bit of the stories that you hear from time to time of people seeing the face of Jesus in odd things and in odd places, right? You see this news story pop up on your news feed or your Facebook feed every once in a while about someone saw a face of Jesus in their piece of toast, or they saw the face of Jesus in, I saw in a Walmart receipt, you can find a picture of that online, or, freshly dried socks, they saw a face of Jesus, I'm not making this up, there's people that have reported these things, or in their pancakes. Again, the things can go on, but you begin to go, okay, number one, you've never seen Jesus, how do you know what his face even looks like? And number two, big deal, or you know, this is kind of a random assortment of shapes and whatever to make you think, what are you gonna do with that receipt? What are you gonna do with that crease sock? You know, it's like, And rightly, they seem ridiculous, and we're a bit skeptical, but sometimes when you hear people talk about seeing Jesus in the Old Testament, it can lead us going, really? You sure you see Jesus there? Is that the right way to understand that passage? Not quite as ridiculous as the socks, I admit, but still, we can find a bit of skepticism. And we left wondering, did God want us to see Jesus there, or are you just making that up? Because that's a big deal. We don't want to follow someone's made up vision of Jesus. We want to follow what God intended us to see of Jesus. Now there are, evangelicals can go different directions on this. There are some that, There's two primarily erroneous ditches, two erroneous approaches that I believe we need to avoid. And the one is that there's some that don't think they see Jesus at all in the Old Testament. They don't think the writers of the Old Testament intentionally wrote of the Messiah. These folks believe that the authors of the Old Testament were simply writing for their immediate audience, addressing the needs of the time. This writer was simply writing for the Jews who were there under Hezekiah. Leave it at that. Or they were just writing as those addressing the attacks by the other nations. Just leave it at that. Don't see anything beyond that. And so they say that the authors of the Old Testament could not and did not have any thought about a future messiah. In fact, take this quote from evangelical scholar, Trumper Longman. He says, it is impossible to establish that any passage in its original literary and historical context must or even should be understood as predicting a future messianic figure. In other words, there's no passage that we can see in which there's any messianic figure predicted. And I believe this goes against the very testimony of Jesus that we see in Luke 24. So that's one error, to fail to see Jesus in the Old Testament. There's another error, and that is where you can see Jesus too much, and I kind of alluded to that already. It may sound funny to see Jesus too much, but it's common among conservative evangelicals today to use an approach to read in the Bible called a Christocentric hermeneutic. And the heart behind this is good. They want to see how the Old Testament speaks to Jesus. They want to follow in Jesus' footsteps here as he describes in Luke. In fact, these verses in Luke 24 are a keystone of their approach. And they rightly desire to see Jesus and his gospel as the center point of all of scripture. But here's the heart of the matter, as I alluded to earlier, in order to legitimately see Christ in the Old Testament, we need to determine, is this what the author intended to say? Is this really what God and David meant to say in this text, or are we simply importing this and bringing it in? They will typically take, read the New Testament and read it back into the old, where we believe that yes, the New Testament sheds new light and illuminates, but it's never going to reinterpret or add something the original author did not understand. And so the problem is when they try to see Christ in every single text in the Old Testament, and they try to relate every verse to the gospel in some sort of way, and this approach can cause one to see things about Jesus in the text the original author did not intend. And yet this is what we do in hermeneutics. When we try to study the Bible, we are trying to understand authorial intent. What was the intent behind the author? And that's how we understand what was written and what is for us. Now, it's important to note that here in Luke 24, verse 27, Jesus does not say that every single verse in the Old Testament speaks about him. Notice the language of what it says. and says that he interpreted to them, in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. So there's this whole corpus of scriptures, and in all of those scriptures, from beginning to end, so in our case, Genesis to Malachi, Jesus then pointed out all the things concerning himself. And I would say that there are many things, the Old Testament is chock full of things about Christ, and he pointed out all those things to them. But that doesn't mean that every single verse, every single passage is somehow pointing to or talking about Jesus. So how do we see Christ in the scriptures and in the Old Testament in particular? With the time we have remaining, I wanna just suggest three broad ways that we can see Christ in the Old Testament, and this is just to launch you out onto your study, because we are not gonna have time to dive into all of these in particular. Some of these I have addressed in some Advent messages, and I will continue to address further in other Advent messages. but we will simply be able to skim over the surface, and for those that would just like to listen, that's fine. For those that you wanna jot down references, you can do so. But these are three ways that we can see the Messiah in the Old Testament, and these are categories, again, that I've borrowed from Abner Chow, the president of Massachusetts University and Seminary. So the first way we see the Messiah in the Old Testament is preparation. the preparation. And these refer to theological details that prepare the way for Jesus, that prepare the way for the Messiah, and these details ultimately connect with, eventually connect with Christ. For example, the sacrificial system. You know, the book of Hebrews kind of dives into all that. The fact that there was these animals that were sacrificed in order to provide forgiveness for sins. That whole system A theological construct that then began to prepare the way for Jesus, the ultimate Lamb of God, to be slain. And for Jesus to be the great high priest for us. Or take like the Day of Atonement. Leviticus 4, Leviticus 16 talks about that one day a year when the priest would go in and offer sacrifices for the people of Israel. Jesus than would offer himself once and for all, as the book of Hebrews says. These are theological details that eventually set up for and prepare the way for Christ. Or you take kingship, the fact that there is a king, the fact that we need a king. This is given, particularly through David, in the line of David, it sets up for us to be looking for a greater and better king. Or the same with kingdom. This idea of not only a figure, but also his reign, his rule, his domain, his dominion. The king must have a kingdom. Again, this is set up in the Old Testament. It prepares the way for Jesus to ultimately fulfill this. Or you take the priesthood, as I've already alluded to, the priesthood in the Old Testament sacrificial system, and ultimately, then this sets up the need for Jesus to ultimately fulfill it, as we read in the New Testament. He is the great high priest. The fact that there were priests in the Old Testament taught the fact that sinful people could not live with the holy God. It prepares the way for this ultimately to be resolved in Jesus. Or think of the Exodus. The Exodus is a, and you can just put the book of Exodus as a scripture reference for this, but it shows how this Jesus, or Yahweh rather, saved Israel out of Egypt, rescued them, and led them to the promised land. This set up a pattern, this set up a theological reality in which humanity needs a new Exodus. Humanity, ourselves, need to be led out of our sin and into the new heavens and the new earth. Jesus is the one who ultimately fulfills that. And it's in this category of preparation that I believe typology comes in. You hear a lot about typology. We aren't able to go into it in depth this morning, but typology refers to patterns that we see throughout the Old Testament that then set up and culminate and climax in Jesus Christ. And these types are not just whatever we want them to be. These types must be driven by the text itself. And I'll give you one example. Romans chapter five describes Adam. First Corinthians 15 describes Adam. There's a first Adam and there's a last Adam. The very fact that Adam is a type of Christ, the scriptures reveal. And so we see Jesus ultimately fulfilling that type. Jesus is the last Adam. He succeeded where Adam failed. Adam led the old humanity, sinful humanity. Jesus Christ leads the new humanity. And so Abner Chow states this as a summary of this point. He says, these different doctrinal points may not originally be talking directly of the Messiah. However, at one point or another, whether in the Old Testament or in the New Testament, they are incorporated into the Messiah's work. So when understanding these concepts, one is better prepared to understand the person and ministry of Christ. If you don't have any of that Old Testament theological themes and you just open the page of the New Testament, you're gonna be lacking understanding some of these nuances of what's going on. We get to a deeper understanding of Jesus when we understand what's going on in the Old Testament. But there's a second way. Preparation, we see the Messiah, but secondly, participation. Participation, there is, evidence in the Old Testament that the second person of the Trinity participated in the movement of divine history. And I'll just give you one example of that, and that is the angel of the Lord, or the angel of Yahweh. And there's some verses that seem to talk about the angel of Yahweh as God himself, and there's other verses that seem to talk about the angel of Yahweh as someone distinct from Yahweh. And so you have someone that's identified with God, and yet distinct from God. Hmm, what fits that kind of category? Well, the second person of the Trinity fits that category. Someone who is one in essence with God the Father, and yet is distinct and different, and a different person. The second person of the Trinity. And so, we can see that in these ways, that this angel of the Lord was helping to lead Israel out of the promised land. And in the wilderness, it says that the rock who was Christ led the people of Israel. And so, as Abner Chau again summarizes this point for us, he says, all of this together suggests that the angel is God, yet distinct from God, because he is the second person of the Trinity, the Son. If this is the case, then the Son's glory is revealed in the Old Testament as he speaks to Abraham, calls Moses, and leads Israel from Egypt to the Promised Land. Jesus was not just a bystander in the Old Testament history, he was a participant, moving history according to God's predetermined plan. But there's a third and final way that the Old Testament speaks of the Messiah, and this is probably one that our minds first jump to, and that is direct prophecies, direct prophecies. The scriptures are fulfilled, are filled rather, with prophecies about Christ. And we won't look at all of them this morning. We don't have time. We would be here for days, for weeks, if we looked at every Old Testament prophecy regarding the Jesus Christ. And based upon our time, we don't have time to turn to these. If you're a note taker, write these down. If not, just listen. But it all begins, you notice that Jesus says that he began with Moses and then went through the prophets. We gotta go to the first five books of the Old Testament to see where these messianic prophecies begin. And again, we've looked at some of these in some of the advent messages in the past. I encourage you to find those on our website. Genesis 3.15 describes how the offspring of the woman would ultimately crush the head of the serpent. An offspring of Eve would ultimately defeat Satan. But this offspring of the woman would they, Gain that victory, clean and square? No, this offspring would be bruised by the serpent. And so even in Genesis 3.15, friends, we have an indication, a hint towards the cross. Jesus says from Moses onward, you should see that the Messiah had to suffer. You should see that all the way back in Genesis 3.15. That even though he would crush Satan's head, his heel would be bruised. But ultimate victory would be accomplished. Genesis 49 verse 10 talks about this Messiah would be a king from Judah, and all the obedience of the peoples would come to him. Numbers 24 verse 17 says that this is a future king who would crush the forehead of Israel's enemies, which is an allusion back to Genesis 3.15, meaning that this is meant to be read as messianic. You could look at Deuteronomy 18, and there Moses promised that there would be a prophet just like Moses who would come, and that the people should listen to this prophet. And when Jesus shows up, they see that this is indeed the prophet that Moses spoke of. Of course, we could spend ages in the Psalms. Psalm chapter two, Yahweh and his anointed. This is Yahweh's king that he has placed upon his hill. Verse seven, it alludes to 2 Samuel, verse 14, where God said that the descendant of David would be a son of God. And this, Psalm 2, verse seven, is quoted in Acts and in Hebrews and applied to Jesus. Psalm 16, verse 10, quoted in both Acts 2 and Acts 13, saying that David prophesied the resurrection of Jesus. So again, Jesus in Luke 24 says that the suffering of the Messiah and the glories to follow were both prophesied. And the apostles made that clear in the book of Acts, that the resurrection of Christ was also prophesied by David in Psalm 16, verse 10. Psalm 22, this is a, you can read the whole chapter, talks about, is a prophecy of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Verse one, Jesus quotes while he's dying on the cross, and then you go through, there are so many verses that are quoted in Psalm 22, in the book of Matthew, in the passion narrative. about him being mocked, about describing his crucifixion, all the rest. Psalm 110 verse one is the most quoted Old Testament verse in the New Testament. Psalm 110 verse one. He has ascended upon high and he waits until his enemies are made a footstool for his feet. Isaiah chapter seven, verse 14, Matthew one tells us that this was fulfilled in the birth of Jesus, that behold, the virgin shall have a son, he shall name him Emmanuel. Isaiah chapter nine, verses six and seven, that unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, his name shall be called, and lists all those divine characteristics, and then it says that he will reign forever in an everlasting kingdom. Isaiah nine, verses six and seven. or another place of the suffering of the Messiah, where else can you go but Isaiah 53? Isaiah 53, the great chapter, the whole chapter that describes the suffering of the servant, the suffering of the one who will take on the iniquities of his people. This cannot be a prophecy about Israel. This is a prophecy about an individual, and it has to be a divine individual who can take the sin for his people. We could go on, Micah 5.2, the prophecy of his birth in Bethlehem. Jeremiah 23, the fact that a descendant of David will reign. Zechariah 9, how he will come mounted on a donkey into Jerusalem. Zechariah 12, they will look on me, Yahweh says, on him whom they have pierced. Somehow Yahweh and this Messiah are put together and there's one that the people have pierced. I'm sure Jesus pointed there. Again, we don't know all the verses that Jesus looked to, and we could look at tons more. This is just a sampling, but this is how the Old Testament, from beginning to end, points to Jesus. Many were fulfilled in his first coming. Many are still yet to be fulfilled in his second coming. but it prophesied that the Messiah must suffer and then enter into glories. Friends, is this not our glorious Savior? The one who fulfilled all of these prophecies, the one who the Old Testament spoke of and prepared for. And so here's the point for us this morning, friends. Like the disciples on the road to Emmaus, we cannot miss Christ in the scriptures. There are riches that we cannot pass over. If we do, it is to our own detriment. Now Jesus did not instantly reveal Himself to these men. He first opened the Scriptures. We're gonna look at next week how He actually opened their eyes, but here He begins to teach them, teach them deeply from the Scriptures. And what does this tell us? It tells us of the importance and the primacy of the Bible, the importance and primacy of the Word of God should have in our own lives. that we should see that the Bible is crucial for our relationship to Jesus. He transforms our lives by opening our eyes to the truth about who he is in the word of God. He is alive, and we have a personal relationship with him, but we know him through the scriptures. We're not to cultivate a relationship with Jesus outside the scriptures. We cultivate a relationship with Jesus through the scriptures. That's what Jesus was teaching these men. They should go to the word of God. A relationship with Jesus should be centered on the Bible. Now, this means the Bible is not an end to itself. We don't just study the Bible and stop there and go, now I know a lot about the Bible. The revelation of God is for relationship with God. That's the purpose of the reason he revealed himself. And so we go to the scriptures so we might know the living God who wrote the scriptures. In this case, we might know his son, Jesus Christ. All these prophecies are important because it shows that God has had a plan from the beginning. A plan to redeem sinners like you and me through the person and work of his son. It's a plan that cannot be thwarted. It's a plan that continues on until the end of time. Jesus wants us to see himself in all the scriptures and for us then to submit our lives to him. I pray that you've done that as well. Let's bow together in a word of prayer. Our loving Father, we thank you for this word. We thank you that it speaks of Jesus. Oh Father, please forgive us for our neglect of your word. Forgive us for our neglect, even of the First Testament, and help us, Lord, to be able to see and to know Jesus through the scriptures. I pray that if there are any here this morning, Lord, who do not know you, that you would please open their eyes, humble their hearts, and help them to see that they are lost, that their sin mounts up before the Lord and that they need Jesus. to find that forgiveness that only you can provide. We thank you for your word that reveals this gospel to us, and it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.