This episode intricately weaves the threads of Old Testament prophecies, showcasing Isaiah’s vision of a servant that brings judgment not only to Israel but to nations afar—signifying the reach of God’s love and judgment beyond borders. Explore how the role of Jesus as this servant was prophetically clear even in the ancient scrolls, and how Matthew corroborated this through his writings. We also navigate the significance of different manuscript traditions that shaped the narrative and understanding, reflecting on what is timelessly important for modern-day believers.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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There seems to be a difference between a secret and a mystery. At the very least, the Bible seems to use the word mystery in more than one sense. For example, there might be something that can be known, but it has been deliberately kept secret. In other words, God just doesn’t let anybody know it at all. Block them from it. Then there could be something that is stated. It’s right there in black and white on the paper, but it’s not understood. It’s a mystery because of our limitations and our inability to deal with it. And that’s the only way I can understand what Paul is driving at when he declares that the conversion of the Gentiles was a mystery, that it was, as in his words, not made known to the sons of men. Here’s what Paul says. It’s found in Ephesians chapter 3 and beginning in verse 1. For this cause I, Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ, for you Gentiles, if you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me toward you, how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery, as I wrote to you before, so I want you to understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ. He has made known to me the mystery which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. What is this mystery? That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel. Now, that’s clear. That the mystery was that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body. We don’t need a Gentile church and a Jewish church. There’s going to be one church of Jesus Christ, and that’s that. Now, it’s a mystery to me how this could have been a mystery to Paul. I’ll try to explain what I mean. In the last program, I made the point that in the Old Testament, the stranger, the non-Israelite, could live in Israel as one born in the land. In fact, the law is very emphatic about it and repeats it over and over and over again. It says, “…you shall love the stranger, and he shall live among you as one born in the land.” Not only that, the stranger was allowed to offer sacrifices, and the law specified that if he comes up to offer a burnt offering, as you do, so shall he do. God didn’t have one way the Gentiles did it and another way the Israelites did it. They seem every bit to be a part of the same body that is of the house of Israel. Now, let me add some more to the mix that I didn’t mention in the last program. There’s a prophecy in Isaiah 42. He says, Behold my servant whom I uphold, mine elect in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. Now here we are way back in the Old Testament. Israel is a country with borders. And as far as anyone could tell, they’re their worshiping God. They’re the only people in the world that worship the true God. They have their temple and all these good things. Now he says, Behold my servant whom I uphold, mine elect in whom my soul delights. Who is this servant? He says, I put my spirit upon him, and he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. In other words, the bringing forth of judgment or sitting in judgment is what a ruler does. And the implication is that this one is going to be reaching out to the nations, the Gentiles, not just to Israel. And then it says, He, that is this servant, shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. He’s not a big mouth. He’s not a shouter. He’s not running up and down the streets making a lot of noise. A bruised reed shall he not break. He’s not going to be a rough and tumble person. The smoking flax he will not quench. He’s not going to change much of the environment that’s around him. He says he’s going to bring forth judgment into truth. He will not fail. He will not be discouraged till he has set judgment in the earth. Not just Israel. In the earth. And the isles shall wait for his law. Now, the word isles is commonly used in this way as a substitute. Actually, the Hebrew word means coastlands. It’s generally used as a substitute for the nations that are kind of outside of Israel. Now, how is this to be understood? Well, I don’t know how we would come to it if we didn’t have Matthew, but Matthew makes it about as plain as it can possibly be. He makes it plain that the servant he’s talking about is Jesus. The passage in question is Matthew chapter 12 and verse 9. And here’s what Matthew says. When Jesus had left there, he went to their synagogue. And behold, there was a man there that had his hand withered. And they asked him, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath day? It really wasn’t a genuine question. They just wanted to accuse him of something because they knew that Jesus had been healing on the Sabbath day. And he said to you, What man shall there be among you that shall have one sheep, and it falls in a pit on the Sabbath day, will not lay hold on it and lift it out? Isn’t a man better than a sheep? So it’s lawful to do well. It’s lawful to heal on the Sabbath day. And he turned to the man and he said, Stick your hand out. And the man stretched out his hand, and it was restored whole, like the other. It must have made every hair on everybody’s body stand straight out. except the Pharisees, who went out and held a council against him, how they could kill him. Now when Jesus knew that, he withdrew from there, and a lot of big crowds followed him, and he healed all kinds of people. Now here comes the part that is interesting to us right now. He healed them all, and he charged them that they should not make him known. Why? So that it could be fulfilled what was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Behold my servant whom I have chosen, my beloved in whom my soul is well pleased. I will put my spirit on him, and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive nor cry, neither shall men hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, a smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. Now this is interesting because the general presumption of the Messiah is that he’d be a conquering Messiah. He’d come out on a horse with a sword in his hand and slay the Romans and free everybody. And yet here is an Old Testament prediction of the Messiah that has him being, well, like Jesus. Quiet, unassuming, a strong teacher, a healer. And then comes the clincher. In verse 21, Matthew cites the Old Testament as saying this, And in his name shall the Gentiles trust. Now, if you’re a careful reader, you may conclude that Matthew is playing fast and loose with Isaiah’s prophecy. But it’s almost certain that Matthew is citing a different Hebrew manuscript of the Old Testament from the Masoretic text. There’s a lot we didn’t know about the Old Testament in the years gone by. We assumed there was only one tradition of Old Testament manuscripts. And that was the Masoretic Text. It’s the basis of the Jewish Bible, that is the Hebrew Scriptures. And it’s also the basis of most translations of the Old Testament into the English language. But there is a Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, that was translated from a Hebrew text with some important variations. We know from the Septuagint, which was translated some years before Christ, we know from the Septuagint that there was a different Hebrew text, a different manuscript tradition. Now, if you’re not familiar with this… In the Greek New Testament, there are a number of manuscript traditions. And it’s only by comparing all the different variants of copies, because if you understand how they were made, these things were all copied out by hand. And mistakes got made. And it’s only in later years that you can work your way back to the original manuscript by examining the various manuscripts that are available and understanding why this kind of error might be made. You can spot a lot of them because it may be obvious that what a person has done is simply copied one line twice. He got to the end of the line, didn’t realize where he was, and when he went back to copy, he copied that line over again. or it could be a line left out because his eye slipped down a bit. But you’ll find other manuscripts that you can use to correct that mistake, and that doesn’t become a problem. Well, in the Old Testament, we never have had that kind of a variety of manuscripts to check against the Masoretic text, which is the standard text of the Old Testament. That is, we didn’t until recently. We knew from the Septuagint that there was a different manuscript tradition. When we found the Dead Sea Scrolls, we learned what that tradition might have been. I say might have been, because in fact, it’s obvious that the Septuagint was not translated from the manuscript tradition that was found at Qumran. So, which version of the Old Testament was Matthew translating or drawing from in making this statement? Because what he has done… is take the text from the Masoretic text which says, the isles shall wait for his law in Isaiah, and he has changed it to, in his name shall the Gentiles trust. And when you understand the Hebrew, you understand the usage of terms, you can easily understand how this variation takes place. I won’t bore you with a discussion of that right now. Except to make it very clear, What Matthew understood the Old Testament to be saying was that the time was coming that in the name of God the Gentiles would trust. Now this is why I have a little problem with Paul calling it a mystery and with suggesting that nobody ever knew this in ages gone by. Because it appears Matthew knew it. It appears that Isaiah knew it. Now there’s another important passage from Isaiah. We’ll take a break, and when I come back, I’ll show you what that one is.
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Isaiah often speaks of a person he calls the servant. And there’s a certain ambiguity in it. Sometimes he seems to be talking about Jesus, other times even himself. But still other times, like this place in Isaiah 49, he’s obviously talking about Israel, the servant of God. And he says, listen, O Isles. And he seems in this context to be using the term Isles to be talking about the nations, that’s the Gentiles. Listen, you isles unto me, and listen, you people from far, which again is a reference to Gentiles. The Lord has called me, that’s Israel, from the womb. From the bowels of my mother has he made mention of my name, and he has made my mouth like a sharp sword, and the shadow of his hand has he hid me. He has made me a polished shaft, in his quiver he has placed me. And he said to me, You are my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. Then I, that’s Israel speaking metaphorically, I said, Now I’ve labored in vain. I’ve spent my strength for nothing and in vain. Yet surely my judgment is with the Lord and my work with my God. And now saith the Lord that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him. Though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength. That’s an odd thing in a way because always through the prophets we’re talking about Israel being gathered. Israel this, Israel that. And this time he said, well, even though Israel is not gathered yet, shall I be glorious? Why? Then listen to verse 6. And he said, it is a light thing. It’s a small thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel. No, no, that’s a light thing. I will also give you for a light to the Gentiles that you may be my salvation under the end of the earth. The salvation of God is to go everywhere to all nations to the Gentiles. The conversion of the Gentiles, folks, was prophesied way back in the Old Testament. Now, there’s a lot more than this, and you can find it. It’s not hard to find. If you’ve got a concordance, just look up the word Gentile or Gentiles in a concordance and run them down. Now, it’s a mystery to me, in the face of all that I read there, that it should be a mystery that the Gentiles are to be part of God’s people. But it was a mystery to the Jews of Paul’s day anyhow. They had developed a tradition of separation. It was a tradition so strong that even Jesus’ apostles were slow in breaking out of it. And as late as the time Ephesians was written, the church was still divided along the lines of Jew and Gentile. This is the only way I can understand what Paul is saying. He says, “…if you have heard of the grace of God given to me toward you…” how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery. We’ve got to break out of this mystery, which people don’t understand, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men. Well, it was written down. They obviously did not understand it. it is now revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs of the same body and partakers of the promise in Christ by the gospel. And the first four chapters of Ephesians are all about this particular problem, that it was not to be two churches, there was to be one, that Jew and Gentile were to be together in one body in Christ. Now he goes on to say, I was made a minister of this according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am the least of all saints, was this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. You know what Paul is doing here is returning to the promises and the obligations that God had given to Abraham centuries before. There’s a short passage in Genesis chapter 12. The Lord said to Abram, get out of your country and from your kindred and from your father’s house into a land which I will show you. This thing goes all the way back to the very basics of man’s relationship with the descendants of Abraham. He says, and I will make of you a great nation. I’ll bless you. I’ll make your name great and you will be a blessing. Notice he said to Abraham, you will be a blessing. Not just that Abraham would receive a blessing, but that he would be a blessing. How does that work? Well, he says, I will bless them that bless you. I will curse him that curses you. And in you shall all families of the earth be blessed. Now, what God is talking about here is an active blessing, that Abraham would be an active blessing, that his descendants would be an active blessing among the people with whom they dwelt. Take, for example, a day a long time ago when Abraham was minding his own business up in the plains where he kept his flock. And some marauding bands came down from the north and invaded Sodom and Gomorrah and took the whole cities and everything in them captive and took a lot of spoil and kidnapped Lot, Abraham’s nephew. Well, Abraham saddled up his men and took off after them. Cat caught up with them, defeated these kings thoroughly, and restored all the goods, all the wealth, everything, and all the people, rescued Lot from these people. Abraham was a blessing to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. And then he went out and fought their battle and got their stuff back for them. It’s precisely the same thing in a way that the United States was a blessing to the people of Kuwait. who when they were invaded and oppressed by the armies of Baghdad, gathered together a coalition, came in and defeated those armies and kicked them out. We were a blessing to the nation of Kuwait. Not exactly a blessing to Iraq, but that’s a different story entirely. So Abraham also was a blessing to Sodom and Gomorrah later on when God was going down there to see what was going on to destroy the cities. He actually made an attempt to try to save Sodom. He may have been the last to take this idea very seriously. Israel failed to be that blessing and was ultimately scattered by God. Even the New Testament church failed initially. The New Testament church sat around Jerusalem for years. I don’t know how long it was. It was years, though, that they were there. Oh, they were having a wonderful time. They were preaching the gospel. They were breaking bread from house to house. They were really enjoying being Christians. Nobody was going anywhere. Then God caused a persecution, or allowed, perhaps I should say, a persecution to come upon the Jerusalem church, and they were scattered to the four winds, and when they went that direction, they took the gospel with them everywhere they went. God says, I want you to be a blessing to the nations, and you either go, or I’ll get you out there one way or the other. Israel went to exclusivism, and so did many in the early church. And so, at long last, after he wasn’t able to be successful, it seems, with different people, finally he found him a man who would go, and his name was Saul. You and I know him as Paul. So Paul writes to the Ephesians, and he says, “‘Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.'” and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the world has been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. And why? To the intent that now, under the principalities and powers in heavenly places, might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God. Actually, Paul seems to be saying that there are even principalities or powers in heaven that are coming to understand what’s going on through the work of the church. According to the eternal purpose, which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. Notice, the eternal purpose, it’s always been his intent to reach out to the world, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him. Wherefore, I desire that you don’t fainted by tribulations for you, which is your glory. Paul was in jail. He says, I don’t want you to get too upset by this. For this cause, I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and in earth is named. Wow. He says, I bow my knees to the Father of Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven, family in heaven, and family in earth is named. We’re all named after the Father. That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man. That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and the length and the depth and the height, and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with the fullness of God.
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I’ll let you think about that, and I’ll be right back after these words. If you would like to share this program with friends and others, write or call this week only, and request your free copy of Christian Origins No. 64, Ephesians. Write to Born to Win, P.O. Box 560, White House, Texas 75791, or call toll-free 1-800. 888-BIBLE44. And please tell us the call letters of this radio station.
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Now Paul turns his attention to unity in the church. But keep in mind that Paul’s approach to unity is, let’s don’t just throw people out to get unity. Let’s pull everybody together. Remember what he said in the first chapter? In verse 9, he said, “…God having made known to us the mystery of His will, according to the good pleasure which He has purposed in Himself.” This is what God’s purpose is. “…that in the fullness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ in heaven, on earth, and in Him.” He doesn’t want to leave anybody out. So the whole idea is he wants to pull them all together, Jew and Gentile, everything together in Christ. And you also need to remember, as you approach the fourth chapter of Ephesians, that Paul is addressing unity at the local level. And as you read it, you should think about all these principles as local principles. Now, I don’t mean by that that you won’t find ideas, principles, thoughts that have broader applications than that, but you’re going to only understand what Paul is driving at accurately in the sense of the inclusive approach to unity that If you look at the situation on the ground in Ephesus, the people who were reading this letter, remember, we’re reading someone else’s mail, and we need to put ourselves in their minds to understand what’s going on. And so you have a church, a church that’s divided, and the primary focal point of division is between Jew and Gentile. I therefore, says Paul, the prisoner of the Lord, is in jail. I beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you are called, with all lowliness and meekness and longsuffering, forbearing one another in love. And when he says one another, he’s not talking about some general vague sense. He’s talking about one, that is the Gentile, the other, the Jew, that you put up with one another, that you endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. I think this is marvelous. He says endeavoring, which means you’re supposed to work at this thing. And it’s not just any old unity he’s talking about. He’s talking about the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. You can have a unity that’s imposed by coercion from on high, but that’s not real unity, and it won’t hold indefinitely. It’s too brittle. What he says we’re supposed to do is work, each one of us at the grassroots level, to keep the unity of the Spirit. And right along with it is the bond of peace. There is one body, not two. One spirit, not two. Even as you are called in one hope of your calling. There aren’t two hopes. There aren’t two different callings. It’s one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father over all who is above all and through all and in you all. He isn’t dividing himself up, folks, between Jews and Gentiles. Keep in mind what Paul is saying to this church. But to every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. So when he says he ascends upon high, he led captivity captive and he gave gifts to men. He’s citing an Old Testament scripture. Now he that descended is the same one that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things. And he gave some gifts to people down here. Some were apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, some teachers. What did he do that for? For the perfecting of the saints. For the work of the ministry. For the edifying of the body of Christ. Till we all. Jew and Gentile, come in the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. We’re supposed to be more like Him every day. And as we grow more like Christ every day, we grow to understand God’s purpose. We grow closer to one another, for it’s not possible for us to both be like Christ and be all that different from one another. We do this that we may henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive us. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in him in all things, which is the head, even Christ. Boy, there’s a lot of stuff in here. He’s talking about people who actually deliberately, with conscious forethought, lie in wait to deceive. That’s hard to figure. I don’t know anybody like that. I know they’re there because Paul said they were at that time, and human nature hasn’t changed a bit. But it’s very troubling, isn’t it? It makes it all the more important that a person draw near to God. Speaking the truth in love, we’re to grow up into him in all things who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together, compacted by that which every joint supplies. according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, makes increase of the body to the edifying of itself in love. Man, that’s a pregnant sentence. He says the whole body does this. Every joint supplies something. Every single person is making a contribution. And the objective is making increase of this body. What do you mean this body? The body of the Ephesian church composed of Jews and Gentiles without making any kind of distinction between them. that all this makes increase of the body unto the edifying of itself. All of us together in this church work together, each one of us making our contribution to build it up, to make it more like Christ. I know we often fail, but at least we know the winning strategy. Until next time, this is Ronald Dart, and you were born to win.
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