Hidden Treasures

The Bible is much more than a book of religion.

God’s Plan vs Satan’s Plan

The crucifixion and death of Jesus was no horrible accident nor plans gone awry. Jesus was not the victim of circumstance. He was in full control of His life to the smallest detail.  Consider God’s plan versus Satan’s plan.

God’s plan was for Jesus to die on a cross, shedding His blood on the appointed day, the 14th day of Nisan and the  hour when Passover lambs were being slain.  As the sacrificial Lamb of God,  Jesus sacrificed His blood  and then rose from the dead to save those who trust Him.

In fact, according to Revelation 13:8,  that was God’s plan for His Son before He had ever created the world and before man had sinned and before Jesus was born in Bethlehem.

Satan’s primary plan  was first of all to keep Jesus from ever being born. When that failed, His secondary plan was to keep Jesus from ever going to the cross and dying for our sins.   Satan knew that if Jesus died, shedding His blood for our sins and if He ever rose again from the dead, he would be defeated and bound for eternity in Hell fire. God had told him in Genesis 3:14-15 that  His head would be crushed.  Thank God, that promise is as good as fulfilled.  God said it!  It will be accomplished!

So the Old Testament story is a story of Satan trying his best to destroy the line of Judah which would ultimately produce the Saviour of the world.  Throughout the Old Testament we see God protecting the royal line of Christ so that the Saviour could be born.

The Royal Line of Christ

Follow with me as we trace through the Old Testament Satan’s vain attempts to destroy the royal line of Christ.

After Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden, they died spiritually and eventually died physically.  In the Garden of Eden God confronted them, saved them with a blood sacrifice of an animal and pointed them to the Saviour who would one day come into this world as the final, perfect sacrifice for sin.  God also outlined the course of history and the final destruction of Satan in Genesis 3:15, the key verse of the Bible.

Now banished from the Garden of Eden, the first two sons of Adam and Eve were Cain and Abel. Cain murdered his brother Abel over God’s acceptance of Abel’s blood sacrifice and God’s rejection of his own sacrifice of his works, Adam and Eve had a third son, Seth. Though they had many more sons and daughters, God chose Seth through whom the promised Seed (Saviour) would come.

From Seth’s line eventually came Noah.  You remember the story of Noah and the Flood.  When God destroyed the entire human race because of sin, He spared Noah and his family, through whom the promised Saviour would come.

From Noah’s three sons and their wives,  God chose Shem to continue the promised royal line of Christ.  As we follow Shem’s line through Genesis 10-12 we learn that God chose Abraham’s seed to produce the promised Saviour. That promise is the heart of God’s Covenant with Abraham, as recorded in Genesis 12.

Abraham had two sons, Ishmael and Isaac. God chose Isaac to carry on that line, as recorded in Genesis 17 and 21.

Isaac had twin sons, Esau and Jacob. Esau, the oldest son, should have inherited the blessing, but he despised it and eventually Jacob through trickery, but also through God’s sovereignty, inherited the blessing. That very interesting story is recorded in Genesis 25 through 28.

Genesis 32 records the story of  Jacob who wrestled with a human manifestation of Christ and through persistence won. God changed his name from Jacob, which means trickery, to Israel, which means prince with God. 

Jacob had twelve sons.  One of those sons was Judah, through whom God promised the royal line of Christ would continue. See Genesis 49:8-10. So now as we continue our study of the Old Testament, we can rule out all other families and focus our attention on the line of Judah through whom the Saviour would come.

Genesis 38 tells us the sordid story of how Judah got involved with sexual sin with his daughter-in-law, Tamar. Because of God’s curse on such behavior, Deuteronomy 23:10 records that no one could reign in Judah’s royal line for ten generation. So don’t look for any king or Messiah for at least ten generations.

Though Boaz, the second husband of Ruth was from the line of Judah, he cannot reign.  Go to Ruth 4:18-22 and note that from Judah to David was ten generations.    So from Judah through Jesse, the father of David, we can look for no king.

The nation Israel jumped the gun. In their insistence to be like other nations and have a king, God allowed them to have Saul as their first King.  He was not from the royal line of Judah, but from the line of Benjamin.  His reign turned out to be a failure.

Finally, in God’s time, David the tenth generation  from the line of Judah became the first king of God’s choice.   As you read through I and II Samuel and I and II Kings, you learn of the royal line of David. I Samuel 7 records God’s covenant with David that through his line the promised Messiah would come.

David’s royal line continued through Solomon and  on down to little Joash.  His story is found in II Kings 11.   There we learn David’s royal line continued down through King Jehoram of Judah. Jehoram did a foolish wicked thing by marrying Athaliah, daughter of Israel’s king Ahab and his wicked wife, Jezebel.   Jehoram married Athaliah, who turned out to be perhaps more wicked than her mother Jezebel.

Jehoram and his wife Athaliah had a son Ahaziah  who had a number of children.  Then Ahaziah died and his mother, Athaliah, scrambled to try to usurp the throne.  Actually, one of her grandsons was rightful heir to the throne.   So Grandma Athaliah began murdering all her grandsons.  

Ahaziah’s sister, Jehosheba courageously hid  her little nephew, Joash, thus saving him from his grandmother’s rage.  If little Joash had been murdered with his brothers, the royal line of Judah would have become extinct.

Because of courageous Aunt Jehosheba, little 7 year old Joash became king of Judah.  So one of the major themes of the Old Testament was God’s protection of the line of Judah through whom the Messiah and Saviour of the world would one day appear.  Satan vainly attempted to destroy it and God intervened, protecting that royal line.

The Importance of the Virgin Birth of Christ

The Genealogy of Mary

The Genealogy of Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus,  is found in Luke 3. Heli, in Luke 3:23 is Mary’s father and the father-in-law of Joseph, the step-father of Jesus.  His genealogical line can be traced back to Nathan, one of the sons of King David who was in the line of Judah. His line can be traced back through Abraham to Adam. 

This shows that Jesus was a man in the same sense you and I are men and women; totally human though absolutely sinless, for God the Father caused Mary to supernaturally conceive the child, Jesus.

The Genealogy of Joseph.

In Matthew 1 we have the record of the genealogy of Joseph, the husband of Mary and the step-father of Jesus.  He had no sexual relationship with Mary until after Jesus was born.  To Mary and Joseph were born several sons and daughters who are mentioned in Matthew 13:53-56.  That rules out the false teaching of the perpetual virginity of Mary, doesn’t it.

Joseph’s genealogy can be traced back to King Solomon, another son of King David, who succeeded his father as King of Israel before Israel and Judah divided under the reign of Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, who remained King of Judah while Jeroboam became King of Israel.

The Curse of Coniah

As we read Matthew 1, we read the generations of Jesus starting with Abraham in verse1  and through King David in verse 6. But here the genealogies of Mary and Joseph divide.  Whereas  Mary’s line continues through Nathan, the son of David;  Joseph’s line continues through Solomon, the son of David.  In verse 11 we find King Jechonias, one of the last kings of Judah before the people of Judah were taken into Babylonian captivity  in 597 BC.

A study of  II Chronicles 3, 36,  II Kings 24. brings us to the conclusion that Jechonias, the son of King Jehoiakim, is also known by two other names, Coniah and  Jehoiachin.  Perhaps in Babylon, the prefix JE, which refers to Jehovah, was removed from his name.

Whatever the reason for these multiple names of the same king,  Jeremiah 22:24-30 records a curse on the line of Coniah.  No one from his line can ever reign on the throne of David.  Since Joseph, the step-father of Jesus, was in that line,  Joseph and his biological sons are ruled out from ever reigning on the throne of David.

If Joseph had been the biological father of Jesus,  Jesus would have been barred from ever reigning on the throne of David and the Davidic Covenant of II Samuel 7 would not have applied to Jesus.

Not only that, but if Joseph had been the biological father of Jesus,  Jesus would have, as all of us,  inherited a sinful nature from his father and thus could never have been our sinless Saviour.

The Virgin Birth is an essential doctrine of the Faith. To deny it is to deny the deity of Christ  and His efficacy as our Saviour from sin.

As we continue with this series, Lord willing, we will continue to see how every detail of Christ’s trial and death on the cross was being fulfilled like clock-work in God’s plan of the Ages.

God Bless You

Rey Anthony Gatela

http://www.cesreygatela.blogspot.com