Advent Day 27
Genesis 49:8-10 ESV
Deuteronomy 18:15-18
Numbers 24:17 ESV
Isaiah 11:1-10 ESV
The arrival of the shoot from the stump was foretold from the beginning.
His arrival was announced in the Old Testament scriptures as early as in Genesis when Jacob was giving the blessings to his sons. In Genesis 49:8-10 Jacob told Judah, “Judah, your brothers shall praise you; your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies; your father's sons shall bow down before you. Judah is a lion's cub; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down; he crouched as a lion and as a lioness; who dares rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.”
In Deuteronomy 18:15-18 Moses told the Israelites God would raise up a prophet after Him, and they WILL listen to Him, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen—just as you desired of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.’ And the Lord said to me, ‘They are right in what they have spoken. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.”
Numbers 24:17 says, “I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near:a star shall come out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel;it shall crush the forehead of Moab and break down all the sons of Sheth.”
God told David in Psalm 60:7, “Judah is my scepter.”
And Isaiah spoke of the ONE coming numerous times. In Isaiah 11:1-10 he wrote:
“There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear,
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.
The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat,and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den.
They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain;for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.
In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples—of him shall the nations inquire, and his resting place shall be glorious.”
Still, when He came He was not recognized.
It’s almost like He wasn’t expected.
The First Century leaders were so immersed in their own power that many (most) didn’t consider Jesus of Nazareth to be a likely candidate.
He was of the Tribe of Judah but they did not see the scepter.
He was from the stump of Jesse, Father of David but many didn’t notice that.
The Spirit of the Lord rested on Him, He had the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, and the Spirit of knowledge of the fear of the Lord but few (especially from the educated Hebrew Priests) took note of it.
He judged the poor and the meek with righteousness and He was criticized for it.
He was righteous and faithful but few spoke of it.
He walked with the lions and the bears but no one noticed.
They did however notice there was something very different about this man from Nazareth from the line of David of the tribe of Judah.
This man SAW people others did not see. He noticed the man at the pool of Bethesda (John 5). He had compassion on the Samaritan woman that others scorned (John 4). Jesus took time to look into the heart of the woman caught in adultery (John 8).
Jesus SAW into the heart and soul of men and women. The fact that Jesus even noticed a woman was shocking! But what was even more earth-shattering was that Jesus LOVED them.
This long awaited shoot from the stump of Jesse came to earth as a tiny babe and left in a cloud of shame as the ruling religious class sought to silence Him.
But the shoot from the stump of Jesse would not be silenced.
As it turns out…He had the last word three days later when He arose from the dead.
Spiritual Practice: He Arose
Consider was it was like when Jesus arose three days later.
In God, Deborah
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