002 Matthew in Seven Movements: Messiah the Advent - Hidden Signs of the Savior

Date: December 28, 2025 Lord’s Day: 52 Series: Matthew in Seven Movements: Advent Title: Hidden Signs of the Savior Text: Isaiah 7:10-17; Matthew 1:18-23   Apostles Creed on Christ I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord; Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary: Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried; He descended into hell. The third day He arose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven and sits on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; From there He shall come and judge the living and the dead.   Matthew 1:18-25 18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ[e] took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed[f] to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. XX 20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” XX 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,     and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). XX 24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, 25 but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus. XX Isaiah 7:10-16 NLT 10 Later, the Lord sent this message to King Ahaz: 11 “Ask the Lord your God for a sign of confirmation, Ahaz. Make it as difficult as you want—as high as heaven or as deep as the place of the dead.[e]” 12 But the king refused. “No,” he said, “I will not test the Lord like that.” XX 13 Then Isaiah said, “Listen well, you royal family of David! Isn’t it enough to exhaust human patience? Must you exhaust the patience of my God as well? 14 All right then, the Lord himself will give you the sign. Look! The virgin[f] will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son and will call him Immanuel (which means ‘God is with us’). XX 15 By the time this child is old enough to choose what is right and reject what is wrong, he will be eating curds and honey. 16 For before the child is that old, the lands of the two kings you fear so much will both be deserted. XX The Reading of God’s word     There are days, seasons and moments when we feel overwhelmed.  Possibly there are periods of extended time where everything seems to be a challenge. Looking at this text in Matthew regarding Joseph and it is very easy to see that potentially Joseph is going through one of those times.  It gets buttoned up quickly, the resolution comes within a few words and sentences.  In 89 words Joseph went from: strongly committed man getting ready to be married to then learning that his fiancé was pregnant, to planning to end the relationship entirely To being informed that this was of God To getting married. That is a LOT of ground to cover quickly. This is not absent from our lives: On one front we can have health issues that arise. On another front we have a family conflict On a different front we can look at the moral issues and cultural issues of the day Wealth (or lack of it) management, bills, looking at the horizon of the future. The common reaction for most is that we only look horizontally for the answer.  ALL of Joseph’s reactions to what was happening was horizontal.  This will be the end of our relationship I don’t want to hurt her public perception, will do it in secret We will do it quickly It was the angel who corrected Joseph.  God is doing something here Joseph.  We have the luxury of the text.  We have the inside scoop, so it is easy for us to see God is doing something great here.  Joseph did not have that.  Given we were in a similar situation we would also be looking horizontally.  Pondering the situation and solving it with horizontal means. There is a very peculiar thing here that Matthew says to us regarding Joseph.  We get to 1:22-23 and we see Matthew, telling us, that everything took place with Joseph and Mary to fulfill what Isaiah had said. This will happen a lot in Matthew.  We are beginning this new series today looking at the book of Matthew.  It will be broken into 7 sections (movements).  This will be the content of the Sunday Sermon as well Sunday adult class. As you read through Matthew when it says, “This is to fulfill what  . . . said.”  Follow through. Look it up. “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet” “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel.” (1:22-23) Let’s go back and see what was going on with Isaiah.  This is the second text that we read today from chapter 7.  We picked up the story right from where this quotation was made so let’s look at the whole context and see why it was said. Going back to the beginning of Isaiah 7 we see this king from Judah, his name is Ahaz.  He is 20 years old.  Can you imagine that?  Being a king at 20? Ahaz is a brand new king, has not been around very long and his life is NOT absent of a lot of issues. Pekah the king of Israel and Rezin the king of Syria joined forces to go to battle against Ahaz and Judah When Judah and Ahaz realized this this was one of those very overwhelming moments and they were afraid Pekah and Rezin wanted Judah to join forces with them to fight Assyria (big power of the day) Assyria was whipping everyone and taking names There was panic because as king Ahaz and the people of Jerusalem looked around horizontally, there was a LOT to be feared.  Syria and Israel look HORIZONTAL: what do we have? There is a cut in our story right here.  The Isaiah version is the Readers Digest version of this event.  This is the second time this story was told and the first time had a few more details in between 7:2 and 7:3. 2 Kings 16 provides the details here. Ahaz took money from the temple and took it to the king of Assyria and said, “I am your servant and your son.  Come up and rescue me from the hand of the king of Syria and the king of Israel, who are attacking me.” (2 Kings 16:7) Horizontal cure – God said ISRAEL is my servant and my son. Isaiah meets Ahaz at this place called the Washer’s Field Says, everything will be fine, God will rescue you from Syria and Israel. Here is the interesting part, Isaiah says, “You want me to prove this?  Ask the sign, the Lord will give you a sign.” Ahaz says, “I do not want to put the Lord to the test, I do not want to weary him with this thing.” Now you see the importance of knowing the 2 Kings part of this story.  The reason Ahaz had no desire to seek a sign is because he had already made a deal with Assyria.  Ahaz had no fear because he found, what he thought was the most powerful thing to protect him (horizon). WhAT IS MORE POWERFUL THAN GOD? This is when Isaiah insists and gives him the sign anyway.  Here is the sign Ahaz that you do not need to worry about Syria and Israel” “14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.[h] 15 He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. 16 For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you dread will be deserted.” Isaiah 7:14-16 Here is your sign Ahaz, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, his name will be Immanuel and by the time he reaches puberty these kings will have died.  This means in 12 to 14 years, this issue Ahaz was facing with Syria and Israel will be fixed. No need to fear these kings at ALL. In any way.  God is saying here, I got you. Don’t look horizontally.  This presents a problem.  Anyone see the problem?  This is a great message to Ahaz.  Is this not a great message to him it is also powerful. At face value this has nothing to do with a birth of Jesus 7:1 Army surround Jerusalem 7:2 All were afraid 7:6 Foreign king to replace Davidic king with someone else 7:3 Message at the Washer’s Field 7:4,11  Don’t be afraid 7:10 Offers a sign 7:14-15 Sign of eating Matthew is quoting Isaiah here.  “ALL OF THIS TOOK PLACE to fulfill (fill full) what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel.” I want to share briefly, in part, what I do when getting ready to share a message or teach a class. There is a thing called hermeneutics which is a very fancy word for interpretation.  There is interpretation for every literature.  My interest is Scripture interpretation, and it is very important.  We do not read a phone book like we do a Tom Clancey novel.  This applies all over Scripture because there is differing types of Literature in Scripture.  There are poetry and apocalyptic and story narrative and parable.  When we read in Psalm 50 that God owns the cattle on a thousand hills, we do not interpret that to refer to God as a cattle rancher.  We look at what type of literature it is and from there try to find meaning. This must be done when teaching.  The struggle is to look at what is written and do the best possible to find the meaning by considering the context in which a passage is drawn. One DOES NOT WANT TO PULL A READING OUT OF CONTEXT.  YET THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT MATTHEW DID HERE. Isaiah, meeting Ahaz at the end of the Washers Field and he says to him, “God has you.  No reason to fear.  The sign that you can be assured of this is, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and you shall call his name Immanuel, God is with us.” (God is with you – the child is a sign of that) The issue here is, Matthew is drawing a quote from Isaiah, “Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear and son, and they call his name Immanuel.”  Yet Matthew is pulling this completely out of context.  It is from Isaiah 7 and this has nothing to do with a future Savior Jesus, saving people from sin. So how do we handle this?  How do we resolve how Matthew pulls a quote that was a sign for king Ahaz and seemingly in no way pointed to a future birth of Christ? Matthew is an inspired writer of God Spirit and can use scripture in anyway he desires. And that is okay if you want to take that route.  It is God’s book, God can do what God wants to do.  There is nothing wrong with this resolution.  Matthew is drawing from a larger pattern in the book of Isaiah. Fast forward to chapter 36 of Isaiah and we see a repeating pattern.  Almost exactly with what happened to king Ahaz.  Now it is with a different king, Hezekiah. The city of Jerusalem is shaking and quaking and so is Hezekiah.  Why are they afraid?  The big boys on the block, Assyria are after them and their army surrounds the city. The foreign king wants to replace the David king with someone else.  (explain here what is taking place with Rabshakeh. 7:1 Army surround Jerusalem 7:2 All were afraid 7:6 Foreign king to replace Davidic king with someone else 7:3 Message at the Washer’s Field 7:4,11  Don’t be afraid 7:10 Offers a sign 7:14-15 Sign of eating         36:1 Army surround Jerusalem 36:21,37:1 All were afraid 36:14-17 Foreign king to replace Davidic king with someone else 36:2 Message at the Washer’s Field 37:6, 30  Don’t be afraid 37:30 Offers a sign 37:30-32 Sign of eating     The constant solution is vertical.  Matthew’s book is written to Jewish people.  As we look at the gospel accounts, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, they retell the story of Jesus.  They are written accounts of the life of Christ. Each are written to a different people.  Matthew written to the Jewish people. Matthew is looking back a whole entire sections of scripture and showing Christ in the Old Testament.  This is where Christ is.  Matthew, when he quotes this passage in Isaiah 7 is giving a nod to all of Isaiah.  He is seeing a pattern.  This first account of Christ’s birth is, quit looking horizontally rather, look vertically. Rather than seeing the words, “The virgin shall be with child . . .“ the Matthew quotation reflects a way of seeing Israel’s story as a resource of repeated patterns with Jesus as the culminating climax of all the patterns.  Matthew is seeing the entire view of Isaiah and see Jesus as the fulfillment. THE DELIVERER FROM THE ENEMY – God with us! What can be seen in Ahaz and in part his son Hezekiah is this horizontal view that is absent of God. What is the application for our lives today? What is the so what here? The answer to all of our issues in life is vertical.  There is a greater work of God. He began painting this picture in the book of Isaiah and pulling out and seeing the MACRO view is God is in control. Christmas Eve we touched briefly on the fact that the circumstances of Christ’s birth followed him through his life.  The accusations of him possibly being a child conceived in sin. Why would the Father do this?  Why would the Father have him born in such substandard circumstances.  The filth of a barn and a manger.  Is not Jesus king?  Why God, Why would you do this? In the hour of our deepest lack of understanding, He calls us not to simply looking at our horizons but to look vertically. Matthew is saying, there is this greater work of God going on – I want you to pull back and see how He has been working salvation.  It is in Jesus – Immanuel God with us.  Just as much as he delivered the sinful, rebellious king Ahaz and the arrogant self-depending Hezzekiah, He deliverers us in redemption.