"Jesus, The One Who Will Reign Forever” Series

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“Jesus, the One Who Will Reign Forever”

CLBC November 30, 2003 a.m.

Subject: Jesus, Kingdom of

Theme: His Kingdom Announced

Passage: Genesis 49: 8 - 10

A Kindergarten teacher was observing her classroom of children while they were drawing.

She came to one little girl who was working diligently, and asked what the drawing was. The girl

replied, "I’m drawing God." The teacher paused and said, "But no one knows what God looks

like." Without missing a beat, or looking up from her drawing, the girl replied, "They will in a

minute."

And that’s the story of Christmas. Throughout all the centuries, many people believed in

God, but they didn’t really know what God was like and then Jesus was born, and in Jesus, we

learned what God was like.

We have been taking a refresher course about the birth of Jesus by looking back into the

first book of the Bible, the Book of Genesis, to see previews of His coming to earth. From

Genesis 3:15, we saw the conflict between Christ and Satan, and learned about Jesus, the One

who will win the Victory. From Genesis 22: 18 we caught a glimpse of the sacrifice of Christ,

and learned about Jesus, the One who will bless all Nations.

And now, today I want you to look at Genesis 49: 10 as we learn about Jesus, the One

Who Will Reign Forever.”

To set the stage, I invite you to come back in time with me to ancient Egypt, to a bedroom

where an old man has gathered his 12 sons around him to talk to them before he dies. The old

man is Jacob and his 12 sons are called the children of Israel. As they gather around his bed, he

begins to speak to each one of them from the oldest to the youngest, and he comments about each

of them in turn.

Firs, he speaks to Reuben, his firstborn. Now, normally, the firstborn would receive the

largest portion of his father’s goods and he would also receive the birthright which meant that he

would be responsible for the rest of the family. But Reuben had committed a sin of passion, and

Jacob announced that he was disqualified for leadership.

Then Jacob spoke to his next two sons, Simeon and Levi, and told them that they to were

disqualified for leadership because of their sin of anger and cruelty.

After that he came to his son Judah, and now we see an entirely different picture. Genesis

49: 8 “ Judah, you are he whom your brothers shall praise; your hand shall be on the neck of

your enemies; your father’s children shall bow down before you. Judah is a lion’s cub; from

the prey my son, you have gone up. He bows down, he lies down as a lion, and as a lion, who

shall rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah nor a lawgiver from between his

feet, until Shiloh comes; and to Him shall be the obedience of the people.”

Now, let’s see if we can break this down into simple bite sized pieces that so we can

understand this prophecy.

1. Judah will be the leader of the 12 tribes.

2. He will be a strong leader winning great victories. In the animal world he is pictured as a

lion, the king of the beasts.

3. The tribe of Judah will continue to be the ruling tribe into the far distant future. From

this tribe will come a line of Kings who will rule in Israel. In fact, they will continue to be the

dominant tribe until someone called Shiloh arrives on the scene, and this one called Shiloh will

gather all peoples to Himself.

Now all of this came true.

1. Judah will be the leader of the 12 tribes.

Judah did become the leader of the twelve tribes.

a. When the children of Israel were traveling through the wilderness from Egypt to Canaan, this

was pictured by the organization of the tribes. In order for that huge multitude of people to move

from place to place organization was absolutely essential, and so God set forth the picture of how

they were to camp. The tabernacle was to be in the middle with 3 tribes on the east, 3 tribes on

the south, 3 tribes on the west, and 3 tribes on the north (Show slide). You can read about this in

Numbers chapter 2 and chapter 10.

2. He will be a strong leader winning great victories. In the animal world he is pictured as a

lion, the king of the beasts.

Then when they were to move out, they went in order, first the tribes on the east, then the

south, then the west and last, the tribes on the north side. Every tribe had its own banner and so as