233. Whose Son is The Christ?

Psalm 110, Matthew 22:41-46, Mark 12:35-37, Luke 20:41-44

Key Verse: "The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind: "You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek."   -- Psalm 110:4

Jesus has turned the tables and is now asking a puzzling question of His own. It may seem that Jesus' subject matter is irrelevant to us today, after Christ's resurrection. We must understand, however that this topic was very important to His Jewish audience who were looking for and hoping for Messiah to come. Jesus was suggesting that He was Messiah and the leadership, as we have seen, was desperately trying to prove that He was not. Jesus now asks a question of them to demonstrate that their understanding of Messiah may not be as rock solid as they thought it was.

"Now I have a question for you," Jesus seems to say. "How is it that the teachers of the law say that the Christ is the son of David? David himself, speaking by the Holy Spirit, declared: "The Lord said to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I put Your enemies under Your feet." David himself calls Him "Lord." How then can He be his son?" (Mark 12:35B-37A) In other words, how could David claim that his son was his Lord? Wouldn't the father see himself as Lord over his son? This was a tough question to which the Pharisees wisely chose to remain silent.

The Psalm that Jesus is referring to here is Psalm 110. The leadership was in agreement that this was definitely a Psalm of David, who had lived a thousand years before. In reading it, in its entirety, one can't help but see how it accurately describes Jesus Himself, as we know of Him today. It does not necessarily describe Jesus as the Pharisees were seeing Him before His death and resurrection. We understand, however that it describes Jesus as he will be when He comes in all of His glory to establish His eternal rule once again.

What was of the most importance in this Psalm, is not just the thought that Messiah would sit at God's right hand, but also that He would be a priest along the order of Melchizedek.

To remind us of this significance, we read in Hebrews: "This Melchizedek was king of Salem and priest of God Most High. He met Abraham returning from the defeat of the kings, (Genesis 14:18-20) and blessed him, and Abraham gave him a tenth of everything. First, Melchizedek's name means "King of Righteousness," then also, "King of Salem," means "King of peace." Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God He remains a priest forever." (Hebrews 7:1-3) Later, in Hebrews 7:17-22, the writer refers to the same psalm that Jesus quoted: "The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind: You are a priest forever." Because of this oath, Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant." (Heb. 7:22)

If Messiah had simply been a man, which is all a human descendant of David could have been, David wouldn't have considered him greater than himself, but just another king who would free the Jews of his day as David had freed them from the Philistines in his. David knew, however that there was going to be something greater in Messiah than what a mere human could be. The order of Melchizedek was part of this expectation, but David knew that Messiah would actually, eventually sit at God's right hand, as we learn took place in Philippians 2:10. Messiah was not just a man, He was one that God could be near, meaning He had to be sinless and Holy as well.

The Pharisees were only looking for a man to do what humans could do, lead an army to defeat men, the Romans. They were being short sighted and so they were missing who was actually standing before them. They could not, however, give Jesus the satisfaction of admitting that perhaps, they had been looking for the wrong thing. Instead, they remained silent to His face and plotted His death behind His back. Their pride kept them from accepting the truth. We must be careful not to do the same.

Hymn: "O King of Love, O King of Peace"