Walking With Christ

24 days until Christmas.

We’ve been looking at some of the prophecies about the coming of Christ. A prophecy is a message from God communicated to people through a prophet that can serve any number of purposes. They can warn, instruct, comfort, assure, or simply help to align people with God’s will. Many prophecies are conditional, meaning that they are dependent on human response to them. A prophecy is not exactly a promise, though. A prophecy can contain promises. A promise is a covenant with God. A promise is relational. Unlike a prophecy that will not happen if people heed the warnings, a promise is a guarantee.

The old testament is simply full of prophecies pointing to the coming messiah. Now we begin to look more at the promises and the preparation for those promises.

Luke 1:30-31 (30)And the angel (Gabriel) said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. (31)And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.(ESV)

In Luke 1:29 it says that Mary she was greatly troubled by the greeting from the angel. She was afraid. Here was have the extremely ordinary girl in in Nazareth. She hadn’t really even started her life. She was not married, though she was betrothed (promised, engaged) to Joseph. Women, at the time, had very specific roles that they played in society. Mary had no idea why an angel would choose to speak with her, let alone call her favored.

When Mary heard that she would conceive, she was confused because she was still a virgin.

Gabriel echoed the prophecy from Isaiah 7:14. These words were not just the repetition of an old prophecy, but rather they were a promise from God. The conversation with Gabriel confirmed that the messiah would be born soon and through Him the world would find salvation, grace, and new beginnings. His purpose was even revealed in the name chosen for Him. Jesus is translated from the Greek “Iesous” which is transliterated from the Hebrew “Yeshua” that is a shortened form of “Yehoshua”. “Yehoshua” translates from Hebrew as “Yahweh saves”. Christ comes from the Greek work “Christos” which is the translation of the Hebrew word “Mashiach” meaning “Messiah”. His very name means Yahweh saves and brings salvation.

His very name is the promise that we all hold on to.

Mary was an ordinary little girl who was chosen to serve a divine purpose. God gave her a promise through Gabriel that she would be the vessel He would come into the world through. He gave her a promise. He has also given each of us promises through Jesus. A promise from God is unbreakable.

The old testament can be themed as “looking forward to hope through prophecy”. Once we see and understand this one thing, it changes how we do life. The new testament is where we move from the prophecy of future hope to living in promise.