Two of my favourite books as a youngster were \u201cThe Once and Future King\u201d and \u201cThe Lord of the Rings.\u201d <\/p>\n
From \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d my favourite character was Aragorn \u2013 an anonymous Ranger who is slowly revealed to be the long awaited descendant of Isuldur, the King of Arnor and Gondor. A man of humble beginnings who rose to return the kingdom to its former glory and lead the defeat of the evil and darkness of Mordor. <\/p>\n
From even more humble beginnings the boy \u201cWart\u201d in \u201cthe once and future king\u201d is tutored by Merlin and rises to be the King of England, head of the Round Table. To be honest, I prefer the first section of the book with it\u2019s boyhood adventures than the rest with it\u2019s betrayals and disappointments, but I guess it\u2019s all part of the Arthur myth. This myth, of a great King who drew a country together under God is one that has been retold hundred and one ways. I wonder if you have a favourite Arthur \u2013 maybe Sean Connery with his ubiquitous Scottish accent, the Disney cartoon of \u201cThe Sword in the Stone\u201d, or the romantic poetry of \u201cMorte D\u2019Arthur\u201d. <\/p>\n
The place of King David and his heirs held a similar place to these stories in the culture and national life of the Jewish people around the time that Jesus was born. There was one big difference, of course. Unlike Aragorn who is completely fictional and Arthur who is mostly fictional, and is impossible to place in actual British history, David was a historic King of the people of God. They knew when he had reigned, they had kept his genealogies, they had written Chronicles and records of his reign. <\/p>\n
He was the one who had drawn the twelve tribes of Israel into a formidable kingdom under one King. He was the one who had given them a capital city, an identity as a nation under God, who had begun the process of building the temple that was completed by his son, Solomon. He was the great, founding King of the kingdom, chosen, anointed, blessed by God. His \u201cMighty Men\u201d were the leading warriors of the time. In 2 Samuel 7:16 we read this promise that God made to David:<\/p>\n
\u201cYour house and your kingdom shall endure for ever before me, your throne shall be established for ever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, following David\u2019s death his son, Solomon, had been crowned and led the people, but after his death there was a dispute over the succession and the kingdom split into two, north and south. Eventually these kingdoms were defeated and the people were taken into exile. Eventually they returned but the kingdom was not re-established. By Jesus time there were \u201ckings\u201d \u2013 various Herods, but they were a pale shadow of the great King David. They were client kings, dependent on their power on the Roman overlords. <\/p>\n
By Jesus\u2019 time the title of \u201cSon of David\u201d had come to mean a descendant of David who would be sent by God as a fulfilment of that promise that had been made to David, someone who would re-establish the Kingdom, reform the nation under God, drive out the Romans, free the people from darkness and evil.<\/p>\n
It is all this historical and cultural understanding that lies behind the references to David in our two readings this morning. <\/p>\n
In Paul\u2019s letter to the Christians living in Rome he refers to Jesus as \u201ca descendant of David.\u201d This might initially strike us as a bit odd, but it reminds us that Paul was a Jewish scholar, who loved pointing out the different ways in which Jesus fulfilled the promises of God made in the Jewish Scriptures. In this, he had a lot in common with Matthew, who more than any of the other gospel writers is at pains to point out the consistency between what God said through the prophets of the Jewish scripture, and what Jesus was and did. He uses the title \u201cSon of David\u201d significantly more often than the writers of the other accounts of Jesus\u2019 life, and in our reading this morning we have the only time that is used to refer to anyone apart from Jesus. <\/p>\n
But even here, when he have Joseph called \u201cSon of David.\u201d the whole point is to emphasise that Jesus, legally Joseph\u2019s son by his marriage to Mary, was legitimately a \u201cSon of David\u201d, heir to all the promises that were made to David about his eventual successor. <\/p>\n
The important of this to Matthew is clear when we go back to the very beginning of Matthew\u2019s eye witness account of Jesus\u2019 life, to verse 1 of chapter 1, where we read:<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the Son of David, the Son of Abraham:\u201d
\nSetting out his stall to his readers, Matthew leads with the three things that are to him the most important things to say about Jesus \u2013 he is the Messiah, God\u2019s chosen one, he is the Son of David, heir of the kingdom, and he is the Son of Abraham, the one who will fulfil Abraham\u2019s vocation to be a blessing to the whole world. <\/p>\n
So, from this brief survey I hope that we can see that it was really important to Matthew and to Paul that Jesus was the Son of David. It was important to them because it was important to the Jewish people \u2013 Jesus was the one they had been waiting for. But what about us, why might it be important to us that Jesus is the Son of David, particularly in this season of Advent?<\/p>\n
The first thing that it reminds us is that Jesus was fully human. He was born into a real family that had real ancestors. That family was messy. If you read through the rest of Matthew chapter 1 you will find a list of names, ancestors of Jesus. In there you will find people who committed murder, rape, adultery, bigamy, who failed as parents and leaders, who were unfaithful to God. Whatever we might have or uncover in our own family trees, it\u2019s almost certain that it is there in Jesus\u2019 family tree. He wasn\u2019t limited by that, in fact he can to redeem it all. He can do the same for whatever we might feel overshadows us from our ancestors. <\/p>\n
The second thing that we might draw from this is that Jesus is King. He did come to establish a throne that will last forever. He spent a lot of his time on earth talking about this kingdom. The kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven. He insisted that this kingdom is near at hand, that it was breaking through, that it could be seen and experienced. His death, resurrection and ascension to heaven were his enthronement, his coronation. <\/p>\n
This kingdom will have no end. The challenge for us is that we don\u2019t see it in all it\u2019s glory yet. I believe that it is near, that when we see the kingdom values of love and joy and peace at work it is evidence of the Kings rule over his kingdom. I\u2019ve been thinking a bit about the fruit of the Spirit recently, they are listed in Galatians 5:<\/p>\n
\u201clove, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.\u201d <\/p>\n
It has struck me afresh that whenever we see fruit it is evidence that a fruit tree or bush is there. Think about it for a minute. If you\u2019re out for a walk in the autumn and you see blackberries in the hedge, if means there\u2019s a blackberry bush there. It seems to me that the same is true of the fruit of the Spirit. Where ever we see this fruit, then it is evidence of the Holy Spirit at work, producing that fruit in the world, even where he is not acknowledged. This is the Kingdom that is near in our everyday lives. <\/p>\n
And yet, we know the kingdom is not yet fully realised. There\u2019s too much darkness still in the world. In advent we look for, we pray for, we yearn for the return of the King, when he will bring in his kingdom in all his glory, and the promise made to David, which has begun to be fulfilled in Jesus, the son of David, will be completely fulfilled as Jesus\u2019 reign is recognised and acknowledged by the whole of creation.<\/p>\n
Thirdly, it might be helpful to remember that while Jesus was the Son of David, and did come as God\u2019s chosen one to establish this kingdom, and to free the people, he did so in a way that was completely unexpected. He was the king who came to serve, who defeated death by dying, who forgave those who persecuted and killed him. We might find that in a similar way he does things in our lives that we do not expect, that he answers prayers and fulfils promises in ways that we do not expect. That following him is likely to lead us down unexpected paths. <\/p>\n
So, this Advent, as we wait for the King, let us be open to the unexpected, let us look for signs of the Kingdom to celebrate, and let us worship the one who took on our humanity and raised it to the heights of heaven\u2019s throne. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Two of my favourite books as a youngster were \u201cThe Once and Future King\u201d and \u201cThe Lord of the Rings.\u201d From \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d my favourite character was Aragorn \u2013 an anonymous Ranger who is slowly revealed to be the long awaited descendant of Isuldur, the King of Arnor and Gondor. A man […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[431],"tags":[59,1097],"class_list":["post-1161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wellington","tag-matthew-118-25","tag-romans-11-7"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1161"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1161\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1162,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1161\/revisions\/1162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carterclan.me.uk\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}