Son of God

Most other religions find some way, even atheists, secularists, they want to adopt something of his teaching because We have to, we read what he says. When we understand what he truly said, it's good. Love your neighbor as yourself. Do not judge. Now we oftentimes take that to mean something Jesus didn't mean.

But there's something unique about Jesus where most other religions will have to say he is a way. What makes Jesus stand out is he is the way. He himself says he is the way to the Father because he is the only son who was sent from heaven to be with us, to be like us, to return us to the Father. The main problem with other religions is they only see Jesus partially, and they make him fit into their own framework.

Well, as Athanasius taught us, he must, as the creator, come to be like us, to recreate us. There has to be something unique and great about our Savior. It must be God. This morning, well, a little bit later, I'll confess with the Apostles' Creed. He's the only begotten Son who was conceived of the Virgin Mary. Those two truths are the foundation of everything the church has always believed. It's everything about the gospel. He's fully God. fully man, so that he can truly and fully save us.

This morning, we have to be careful of thinking how we can be like the Pharisees. They believed the Bible, but they had misunderstood and misconstrued and kind of contrived their own kind of system. And well, when Jesus doesn't fit in your system, your system's wrong. When Jesus doesn't fit into your preconceived notions, you start over and say, Jesus, I'm going to start with you, who you are and what you said.

Last week, we talked about how God woos us with his good gifts. Now we come to Christ and we see who he is. He is the son of David. He is the promised Messiah. He is the son of God, the Lord who rose from the dead. Let's pray we will see more of who Christ is so that we will love him more. Key question for us this morning is the key question for all of life. Who is Jesus? Specifically, who is the Messiah? The answer is, he is the son of Adam, son of Abraham, son of David, the one promised son. And he is the eternal son of God, fully God and fully man.

If you're new with us, we walk through books of the Bible sequentially. We're walking through Matthew. And here we are at the end of this section. It begins with Pharisees and then Sadducees. They're coming to challenge Jesus. They're trying to trick him with their questions. In each one, Jesus leaves them silent. And notice the very end of this section, no one No one dared ask him a question after this. He silenced every possible challenge. The difference here is he's turning it on them. He's turned to now ask the Pharisees a question.

Who do you say the Messiah is? Now the Messiah, that's Hebrew. Christ, same word in Greek. So who is the Messiah? Who is the Christ? It means the anointed one. Who is the one the Holy Spirit would ultimately and finally anoint, the hero, the champion the world has been longing for? Who is the king who would come anointed by the Spirit to bring about a great victory? See, the Holy Spirit throughout the Old Testament anoints those whom God will use for His great purposes, specifically prophet, priest, and kings. Who is this final anointed one who will come?

If you want a picture of this, I'm going to have a lot of references today. We've got to do a whole picture of scripture. Maybe just jot these down and you can look at them later. Isaiah 61 is one of the clear texts. Jesus actually uses this text to identify himself. The anointed one, the Messiah, the one upon whom the Holy Spirit will descend, he will restore God's kingdom. He'll save the captive. He'll redeem the people of Israel. Using Exodus language, the Holy Spirit was gonna come upon one person to bring a completion of God's salvation. Here in our story, it's short, it's sweet, and there's a real clear point that we must submit to.

Jesus asked a softball question. Who do you think is the Messiah? Whose son is he? He's turning it now where after he's answered their questions in a way that they didn't want him to answer because he stumped them. He got to flip the categories on them. He's now asking them, you tell me whose son is the Messiah?

Well, their answer, he's the son of David, they replied, verse 42. So let's just pause there and make it a full stop just for a moment. That's the right answer. That's one of the many right answers they could have said. He could have said son of Abraham, son of Adam, but son of David is much more specific because that's later down the line, he must be a king. Could have been the son of Abraham because, well, Abraham's the OG, he's a father of fathers. But it's the son of David. Significant because David is promised a forever king.

2 Samuel 7, we'll talk about more in a little bit, and if this were a class, I would tell you, you wanna make sure you understand the importance of 2 Samuel 7 on the quiz later. There is no quiz later, just trying to highlight the importance of 2 Samuel 7. If you want a quiz, happy to help you. God and his promises of a son, the reason the son of David is so important, David says, God, I want to build you a house. And God says, no, I'll build you a household. And one of your sons will sit on the throne forever. That's why the son of David is so significant. The Messiah will be a descendant of David and that descendant of David will be forever.

So it's the right answer, but at the same time, he didn't say enough. The answer doesn't say enough about who Jesus is. And so Jesus now turns it to make sure they see the son of David is more than just a descendant of David. Verse 43, he said to them, How is it then that David, speaking by the Spirit, calls him Lord? Him referring to the Messiah. And then he quotes our psalm from earlier. For David says, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet. If then David calls him Lord, How can he be his son? Jesus asked this very specific question from Psalm 110.

And Christian, Psalm 110 is a very important psalm. We need to be careful that we're going to affirm every word is divinely given to us for our good. Every word is good for our instruction. Psalm 110 is the most quoted psalm in the New Testament. Psalm 110 is this wonderful prefiguring and a foreshadowing of many truths that are going to be picked up and expanded upon, especially in the book of Hebrews that we read from earlier. He cursed in Psalm 110. How is it that David will call the Messiah his Lord, and the point being here, he's more than just a descendant of David, He is also David's Lord. Now, we have to do a little work here. This is a thinking sermon. They're all thinking sermons. The Lord said to my Lord.

Whatever Lord is in all caps, that really is in the place of Yahweh, the covenant name of God. When the Lord is just a capital L and not caps, Adonai. Now sometimes we see Lord Lord and that's Yahweh Adonai and these are different titles, names. Very important Yahweh and the reason it is put in as Lord is that there was a concern with the Jewish people in terms of how to not take the Lord's name in vain so they try to remove themselves from it. I don't think that was a helpful move but here we are all caps Lord. That's Yahweh. That is a covenant personal name God gave to the old Testament people.

Adonai is a word for ruler, a mighty one, a great one. Yahweh says to my Adonai. The weight of this passage, the weight of what Jesus is teaching and pressing in here is how does David call one of his descendants his own Adonai, his ruler? How is it that David, the king, he's the first true king of Judah, from Judah, he's going to call one of his children, grandchildren, great descendants, his own Adonai and ruler? There's a second question is who's Yahweh and who's Adonai? We'll discuss that briefly. There's Yahweh and Adonai, who are these two and what is the right hand? It's a pressing point.

David's son is his Lord. You see, when we think about the hierarchy in the family, especially in the ancient Near East, and especially with Israel, the call to honor your parents, a father doesn't call a son his Lord. The whole focus here is that David is saying something about this descendant that is more than just a descendant, he's his ruler. It's a clue there's a great one coming who's greater than even David, He's his own God.

And notice they can't answer him. It's always interesting whenever somebody's in the middle of a discussion, a debate, counseling, and there's a Bible verse that just like lands, and you either see recalculating or disdain. Here there's no recalculating.

They can't answer him, and they walk away ready to condemn the real king. Again, their own theological misconceptions, their own preconceived ideas of who they are and who God is and what his word means has kept them from seeing Jesus the true king. It keeps them from seeing it to the point that they're going to crucify the true king of Israel. Why don't they see God? Why aren't they submitting to his word? Jesus says it's their own hard hearts. This morning, we really need to lean in on who is Adonai? Who is the ruler? Who is the one that David confesses to be his own ruler, even though he is David's descendant? Before we answer that question, I do want to focus on one small phrase that isn't the main point, but it's a significant one. Verse 43. Jesus makes it real clear, David speaking by the Spirit. Okay? How do we know who God is? God's revealed himself. But there are men who are writing. These men are speaking by the Spirit.

David is being carried along by the Holy Spirit in his confession. in the proclaiming Psalm 110 and in the writing of Psalm 110. This is divinely ordained truth. I believe Jesus actually adds this here because I think David is saying more than David truly understands. The Holy Spirit has provided this for us. This is written for us by the Holy Spirit in the time of David for us. so that we can look back and see that sure and steadfast anchor of our soul. God made these promises and kept them. He's given us these clues as to who he is, the one God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. God is making himself known God. The Holy Spirit has given us these words. If you want to know who God is, he's told us. by the Spirit himself.

And here's what's really encouraging for you. Anybody ever read the Bible and just wonder what does that mean? And you want to run to a commentator? Well, the first thing you do is pray. The Holy Spirit who inspired these indwells you and illuminates your heart and your mind. The Holy Spirit who wrote these words indwells a believer, indwells all of us so that we can come to his word and pray, help me see and understand and believe and love more.

We go to commentaries, we go to each other, we ask each other, what does this mean? We want to think about it together. But how quickly we lose hope because of a difficult doctrine, because of a difficult verse. When the author himself can illuminate your mind and your heart. This morning we pray that the Holy Spirit will illuminate our minds and hearts to see Jesus as fully God and fully man.

First, I want us to think about, as I mentioned earlier, Yahweh says to my Adonai. Yahweh says to my Adonai. Yahweh, that very unique name that when we see it, it is the covenant name of God. Ruler could be used for a king. Yahweh calls himself Adonai. That's a title he takes upon himself. Other gods are called Adonai.

That title, again, is very fluid. Here, though, Yahweh says to my ruler, David the great king, I just want to give you some handles to wrestle with this, because we must be monotheist. Here, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is. There we go, we are monotheist. Here's some handles to wrestle with who is Yahweh and who is Adonai.

John 1.1 is a wonderful, helpful tool here for you. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Yahweh, Adonai, Word, God. Those two are with each other in the beginning. In the same way, Yahweh and Adonai are with each other in the heavens, and as Adonai is at the right hand of the Father.

That conception is radical as John opens his gospel. As much as we think of one God, there is God and his word according to John 1. More specifically, it's the father-son language that we see in John 1. The son who is at the father's side He has come to make him known. So as we're thinking through Yahweh, Adonai, God, Word, well, I think the most specific words we have are Father, Son.

Paul does one of the most radical things in 1 Corinthians 8.6. I'll just quote it for you. Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one. That is called the Shema. It's the significant verse, one verse, like our John 3, 16, Deuteronomy 6, 4. Here, O Israel, the Lord your God is one. Paul splits the Shema. 1 Corinthians 8.

Therefore, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that an idol has no real existence and that there is no God but one. For although there may be so-called gods in heaven and on earth, as indeed there are many gods and many lords, Yet for us there is one God the Father from whom all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord Jesus Christ through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

One God and Father from whom all things exist, one Lord and Son through whom all things exist. This is a pattern we see throughout the New Testament. Psalm 110, Yahweh, Adonai, is like God and Word and Father and Son. Now, if you're hearing this, you are gonna pick up, in Psalm 110, Yahweh, I'm saying, refers to the Father. And in 1 Corinthians 8, 6, Elohim refers to the Father. These words are interchangeable for the three. Heads are spinning. I can feel it. Hear this.

Jesus is confessed by Thomas. after the resurrection, you are my Lord and God. Jesus is the eternal son, that is the proper name and position we know. In Psalm 110, Adonai is referring to Jesus in his eternal sonship as the ruler of David, the point being he must be greater than David even though David is the king. So that was us going high to think about Yahweh Adonai the right hand. Now we're going to go real broad. Jesus is the son of David. I want to prove to you that Jesus is the son of David. Again, we're going to do a lot of text references. Just write them down. I don't know how much you want to be flipping because it's going to go pretty fast. Let's start in Matthew. If we just look at the triumphal entry, people are singing son of David, Hosanna in the highest. In the temple, the crowds are cheering and singing, you're the son of David, Hosanna in the highest.

And the chief priests say, do you hear what they're saying? And Jesus says, yes, it's appropriate. Son of David has already been declared that Jesus is the son of David because of his great power to heal. That the blind man cries out, son of David, heal me. In the triumphal entry, the crowds are singing, Hosanna in the highest to the son of David. It's not even revealed this is the son of David, Jesus himself. If you go back to Matthew 1, 1, the genealogy of Jesus opens. He is the son of Abraham, the son of David. The lineage matters. Genealogies should excite you. Because Matthew 1 is a genealogy that ends all genealogies.

The genealogies are tracing, will God keep his promise? Will God be able to keep his promise? Who will be the son that will fulfill all these different promises to Abraham and to David? I want us to do something different this morning. I actually want to walk through and just see how we get to David and then how we get to Jesus, because I want us to see how faithful God is. to make promises, and most of those promises come right on the heel of some horrible sin, or right before a horrible sin, or in the middle of a bunch of sin. He's promising us salvation for our sin, and these promises build up into a grand testimony of God's great power to save us.

Well, the starting place is Genesis 3.15. This is the first promise of salvation. After we desire to see something better than God, we desire to eat the fruit he prohibited, God comes and he asks us, where are you? That's grace. It's an opportunity for us to reflect, where are we?

And he makes this promise to Satan, but in earshot of Adam and Eve. He says to Satan, You will strike the heel of the son of Eve, but he will crush your head. It's pretty wild. God is making that promise to Satan. He's promising, what you've done here will end. The destruction you've decided to bring about with death, it will come to an end. You will be destroyed. And that promise is for us to believe.

Because Christ is that fulfillment of that Son who will crush the enemy who brought us into the temptation, who brought us into sin, who made us slaves to sin, who brought us into death. That garden is now a glorious ruin because of us and our sin. And God didn't say, go and fix it and pull up the weeds. He said, no, I'll send a son who will crush the very power of Satan in sin and death.

A new child will be born that will bring about a new headship. We're all born an Adam in his sin, but a new one will be born who will crush Satan. We look farther ahead and we look to Abraham. Here, your key texts are Genesis 12, 15, 17. And Abraham, he's given many promises. He's promised many blessings. He's promised many sons, many nations, prosperity and a land. He's told you'll be a blessing. You're blessed to be a blessing. What's wild is how Abraham seems to believe and then doubt and believe and doubt. If you struggle with doubt, I encourage you to go read Abraham and be encouraged by how God is so faithful to him in the midst of his doubt.

Jesus 12, he hears and believes and leaves his home. And Abraham's problem is Sarah's womb is barren. She cannot conceive, but God says, I will give you a son and from that son, many sons. Well, they go down to Egypt and he doubts God, so he gives his wife over to Pharaoh. He then, after God saves him from Egypt, he doubts again. He tries to adopt a son because he doesn't believe God will give him a son. He then tries to have a son with another woman. Again, God is faithful. He keeps saying, no, I'll give you a son. Isaac is the firstborn of Abraham, but he's not the true son of fulfillment. He's not the son who can crush Satan. But God is faithful, even though Abraham doubted.

Isaac then has Jacob and Esau. Jacob is chosen, his name is turned to Israel, and Israel has 12 sons. And of those 12 sons become 12 tribes, and Genesis 49 tells us that Judah is the tribe chosen to have the royal line. The scepter will not leave Judah. So as we're narrowing down, we're looking for any child of Eve, which is any human being, then a child of Abraham, then a child of Isaac, then ultimately a child of Judah, because the king has to come from Judah. The king serpent crusher must come from Judah. Then God saves Israel from a famine and he sends them into Egypt.

There are small people. And as a small people, they grow to be so numerous that a new Pharaoh says these people are a threat to us. They become enslaved and abused. They cry out to God. And to give us a prefiguring of how great God is, even though Israel cried out to God and God said, I'll save you, because Egypt kept mistreating them, God remained faithful and wiped out all of Egypt. And there's a couple key verses in Exodus. One of them is chapter 14, verse four. Right before they get to the Red Sea, God tells Moses, I am gonna have glory over Pharaoh once more.

So the people of Egypt will know that I am the one true God. That's what God is constantly doing with his promises. He's saving his people for his glory. He's saving his people here in a way of missions. Let the people of Egypt know I'm the one true God, Yahweh.

Israel's supposed to make themselves a holy nation, a kingdom of priests, from whom the one king will come. If you skip ahead to Joshua, it traces how the people come into the land, they take the land God promised Abraham. Judges, it's fun to think about kingship.

The people all did what was right in their own eyes because they had no king. There's a cycle. Israel becomes more and more like the Canaanites worshiping other gods rather than becoming more and more like Yahweh. They all do what's right in their own eyes because there is no king.

And then to end Judges with Ruth, this short, sweet book of a non-Israelite woman, one of the three Gentile women in the genealogy of Jesus. It ends by establishing who Jesse is. A child of Judah, the father of David. And you think right there, okay, we're gonna get from Judah to Jesse to David and Ruth is setting up, there's gonna be a good king finally. But 1 Samuel tells you what the people of Israel like. Did they immediately appoint a king from Judah?

No, they said we want a king like the nations. Exactly the opposite of what God told them to have. We don't want a king who's faithful to you, God. We want a king like the nations. We want a king who's tall and mighty and will lead us into battle and we can trust him.

God remains faithful to his promise. And through some swerving and some pretty despicable chapters, we land in 2 Samuel 7. I said that would be on the quiz if you were to have a quiz. David sits on his throne and he sees how expanded it is, he sees how good it is, he sees how God has blessed him, and he sits back and he says, God, I wanna make you a house. You're living in a temporary tabernacle, I want to build you the temple you deserve. And God flips this on him, he says, no, you're not gonna build me a house, I'm gonna build you a household, a dynasty. And he says to David, I'm gonna give you a son. and I'll be like a father to that son, and that son will be like a son to me, and he will sit on your throne and rule forever.

Important we understand kings die. The very fact that he's promising that that king will be like his son, and the fact that that king will rule forever shows there's something unique about that son promised to David already. David already has some understanding, I think, there that a forever king, a king who will live forever? A king who will reign forever? A king who will be righteous and like your own very son?

If you were to look at the expansion and the way David's son relates to Eve's son, Psalm 2, it's a royal psalm. Kiss the son is the invitation. But it's a son who's going to come and destroy all the enemies of God. Or Psalm 89, God is a true and steadfast love. He will keep his promise to establish his king forever. Psalm 110, where the Adonai will sit at the right hand of the Father, conquering all the enemies.

So after David, we're thinking, all right, Who's his son gonna be? We've gone from Eve to Abraham to Judah to David, and now we're looking for this one son of David who's going to rule forever, and boy, does Solomon look promising. You can have anything you want, and he asks for wisdom, but this looks like a king we want to rule forever.

Until he disobeys God, takes many wives and foreign wives, and leads him to, Worshiping false gods. The Bible from here just gets discouraging. Over and over again, the kingdom is divided. And the refrain, it's not always a refrain, thank God, but the refrain, and this king did evil in the eyes of the Lord. And this king led Israel toward other gods and built altars to other gods.

It's amazing to think how God remains faithful to his promise to his people who are not faithful at all. Over and over again, God brings these pictures of how unfaithful his people are, yet he will keep his word. To highlight how good God is, the Hebrew Bible and our Bible, Old Testament, are ordered differently. The Hebrew Bible, without the New Testament, the Jewish Bible, it ends with 2 Chronicles. This is how the Hebrew Bible ends.

Now in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, Yahweh stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, the king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing.

Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, Yahweh, the God of heaven has given me all the kings of the earth and he has changed me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever's among you all his people may Yahweh his God be with him. Let him go up. Well, that should sound familiar. Yahweh has given me all the kingdoms of the earth. Yahweh has charged me to build a house. Cyrus, king of Persia, is he a son of David? Son of Judah? Son of Abraham? He's a son of Eve. God's people were so disobedient.

A king of Persia fulfills the promise, partially. It does two things. It shows how unfaithful and despicable God's people are that a king of Israel, a king of Judah, could not be the king who does this in that time. It shows how faithful God is, that he blessed the king of Persia to protect the people of Israel. to free the people of Israel, to send them back to worship Yahweh. A man who doesn't worship Yahweh sent them back to worship him. That is supposed to be confusing.

God is so good, he ordained it that the king of Persia would do things that are similar and sound just like what the eternal son of David is supposed to do. It's supposed to leave you wanting. It's supposed to leave you longing for a better way than just the king of Persia is going to send you back to do these things. Well, it shows you God's kindness. It shows you how when we are unfaithful, He is faithful. It shows you that He keeps every promise. But He's not fulfilled those promises in Cyrus.

No, we can jump forward to the Gospel of Luke, when Gabriel speaks to Mary, the virgin, and says, this child he's promised, he will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end. It's amazing how the king of Persia is how God used this foreign king to save his people when his people were unfaithful. What's even more amazing is how he sent his own son, the son of the most high, to be born of a virgin, and he who has been the eternal son, he will reign forever. The son who's the conquering king over Satan, the one who will crush Satan, is the same son of David.

He didn't come to crush Rome, though. He came to give us victory over Satan, sin, and death. When this king comes, he comes like a lamb to be slaughtered. So we think back to that Genesis 3.15, the cross is where we see Satan striking his heel. What Satan thinks is a victory blow. But oh no, that's where death was defeated. That's where Christ truly crushed him and removed his power on this earth.

Christian, the God of life has come to give us new life. The very son of God has come down from heaven, from his right hand, to be like us in every way, and he is exalted back to the right hand, having finished his job. The Messiah is the son of David.

And I just gave you the kind of bare minimum of verses to think through how the king and the promises all line up together. They show you how faithful God is. Most important thing is he's the son of God who came to give us true righteousness. So we think about that lineage, the genealogies are important to establish God kept his promises.

The Pharisees, we get back to where they are, they can't recognize who Jesus is because they don't truly love God. And they have their own religious commitments that keep them from seeing him as he is. They've delighted in the way they have made their traditions known rather than the very word of God. Christian.

What preconceived ideas do you hold on to as if gospel truths that Jesus must fit into? What do you think must be true about you or whatever you think must be in this reality that must come if God doesn't satisfy that or fit into that, he must be wrong.

We all have this. We all have this idea and I'm gonna, I'm gonna press in on one. It's our assumption that we're supposed to be self-ruling. That's what we're trained to be as Westerners. We like to recite Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. But really, we like to live as if I am my own shepherd, I will make my own way. The sure and steadfast hope you have is that God has promised himself to us In Ezekiel, when God sees the rulers of his people abusing his people, he says, I myself will come and I will shepherd my people. And Jesus, when he says, I am the good shepherd, is saying, I am that God. Ruling ourselves, that's what Adam and Eve were doing when they thought they could see better than God. A challenge this morning, Christian. Do we confess like David that he is our Adonai? Is he your Adonai? Let's back up one more. Do you believe his rule is really good? Has he ever failed to keep a promise? Which one of his words, his promises or commandments do you look at and think, that's really not good? God's rule just isn't good enough or he's not done it right.

The reason I walk through all the scripture in that way, if we look at who God is, it's overabundant, his testimony of himself. He's the good, faithful God who keeps his promises even to the point of his son dying for us. And yet, We prefer to say we believe in him, but we don't want to be ruled by him. If he is worthy of your faith, he's worthy of your love. If he's worthy of your love, he's worthy of your obedience. Our great God who created us has sent his son to save us. And he's saving us from our self-rule. He's saving us from the kind of self-love that destroys us, to establish us properly back into his image bearer, to establish us back properly under his good rule.

If you want the benefits of his good rule, if you long for church unity, You long for us all to be under God's rule. If you want to really enjoy what church unity looks like, we're all striving to be under the rule of Christ together. That dissipates all the little quarrels and chasms we got. If you want a happier marriage, to get rid of the conflict, You want to be under Christ's rule. Two in one covenant of marriage. Submitting to Christ's rule resolves most marriage problems.

At least the ones that feel the way it is that are usually us just being selfish. I love you, I'm sorry. We had a fight that was as stupid as I'll get yesterday, so there we go. We always want some kind of practical, practically a self-help thing. If I just do A, B, C, then this will help me be happy. Or better, most of the time we think if that other person will just get A, B, C, then I'll be happier. No, to confess, He is my Lord. He's my God and Creator. He's my Savior. He's my Ruler.

Ordering your life under his rule is what will truly give you the peace and give you the ability you need to help other people come under that rule. We want everything else but that, because we don't have any control when we submit fully to Christ. If you're not a believer this morning, I ask, is your life well-ordered and enjoyable, or is it represented by most of the chaos we all know? He is Lord. The beauty of coming to Christ isn't that you have to figure out everything and clean up anything.

You come and just simply say, I know this problem is bigger than me. Jesus, save me from it. And it's your sin. It's what we call sin. It's the corruption of the soul. It's the corruption of our desires. It's our inability to clean ourselves up. You come open-handed. And you just ask Jesus to save me. And then he'll save you from things you never knew were even a problem. But it comes back. Does Jesus have a good rule? Is it an authoritative rule? Lord, would you rule over me? Will you pray with me?

Father, we thank you for the many ways that we can call upon you as our God. We thank you for this unique, special way we can call you Father in the name of the Son. Lord, as we look to worship our Christ, our Messiah, our great final prophet, our true great high priest, the King who reigns forever, Lord, may your Holy Spirit help us see how good his authority is. May you help us see how good your authority is, so that we can rejoice in all of who you are as a glorious king, as you restore us to the glory that is proper for us. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.