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Review
We found last week that the writer of 2 Samuel 7 wants our attention to be focused on the Davidic king who would someday receive all the fullness of the promise to David. He leaves out the conditional part of what God said because he does not want our focus to be on Solomon or the other sinful kings in David’s line; he wants our attention fixed on the one who would fulfill all the conditions perfectly and eternally. So we started thinking through the attributes of the Messiah that are highlighted in this chapter. Last time we looked at His righteousness, His eternality, and His sovereignty. His righteousness is exceedingly precious to us because it is the righteousness that is credited to our account when we believe.
His eternality is precious to us because it is the reason we never have to fret or worry about losing some good thing. Whatever benefit that good thing supplies for us is available to us for as long as Jesus stays on the throne of David, and that is forever.
And His sovereignty is delightful to us because it assures us that every single thing that ever happens to us is the best thing that could have happened to us. He is in total control of all of it, and He only does perfect things. And we delight in His authority, and we love submitting to His law because we know that His will is perfect and He only leads His sheep into green pastures. Now we are ready for the fourth attribute – His sonship.
The Identity of the Son
14 I will be his father, and he will be my son.
That is a very important verse in the Bible. That statement: “I will be his father and he will be my son” is repeated five times in Scripture. Why is that one statement so important?
And if it is so important, why is it that David is never called the son of God? Nowhere in this chapter or anywhere else in the Bible is David called God’s son. Nor are the other kings in his line after him for the rest of the Old Testament. Israel as a nation is called the Son of God – numerous times, but not the kings. If God wanted to make a big point about David being His son He had a great opportunity right in this passage.
2 Samuel 7:5 Go and tell my servant David, 'This is what the LORD says…
If God wants to make a point about David being His son why not say, “Go and tell my son David…”? But He does not say “My son David” He says “My servant David.”
So David is not called God’s son here or anywhere else in Scripture. Is that because everyone just kind of missed that part – forgot about it? Was it just a minor little statement that did not really matter that much and just sort of went by the wayside? No, not at all. From the time God gave this promise on the people of God were looking forward to a Davidic king who someday would be the son of God. David is not called the son of God, nor is Solomon or any of the other Old Testament kings, but that promise was not forgotten by any means.
The Nature of the Son
Psalm 2:7 I will proclaim the decree of the LORD: He said to me, "You are my Son; today I have become your Father.
Psalm 89:27-28 I will also appoint him my firstborn, the most exalted of the kings of the earth. 28 I will maintain my love to him forever, and my covenant with him will never fail.
He will be My Son – my firstborn Son, and I will be His Father. That is not said of any of the Old Testament kings because it is too high a title for a mere human. In fact it is too high a title even for an angel.
Hebrews 1:5 For to which of the angels did God ever say … "I will be his Father, and he will be my Son"?
The writer of Hebrews used that line out of the Davidic Covenant to prove that Jesus was God. David and his descendents were not called sons of God because that is a title for deity. And that explains Psalm 45:6-7. That psalm is about the coming Davidic King – the Messiah, and in verse 6 the Messiah is called God.
Psalm 45:6 Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever
Then the very next verse says this:
7 You love righteousness and hate wickedness; therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.
You, Messiah, are God, and Your God has anointed you. He Himself is God, and yet He has been anointed by His God. Isaiah saw the same thing.
Isaiah 9:6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, … 7 He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom
“Son of God” is a title of deity. As great as David was he never got that title – nor did anyone else in the Old Testament.
You know, you really can piece together the Trinity in the Old Testament. In Genesis one God the Father is in heaven creating the world, and the Spirit is down here on site hovering over the waters. So you get some sense that there is a distinction between the two. And then several passages like this one speak of the Son of God being God. So the Father, the Spirit, and the Son are each God and yet distinct from one another, and still there is only one God. That is the doctrine of the Trinity.
Likeness (Deity)
What does it mean that He is God’s Son? We know that God the Father is not a physical being, and that Jesus is not His literal Son by procreation, so referring to Him as His Son is a figure of speech. And figures of speech are used to compare one thing to another thing so that we can see the point of similarity. So in what way is Jesus similar to a literal son?
The first way is in the likeness of the Son to the Father. In a physical family the son comes from the Father’s own genes. He is made from the same stuff. And that is how it is with the Messiah. He is deity. He is not part of the creation. He shares the same nature as His Father.
Do not think of Jesus as a god, or a god-like being – there is only one God. There is one God, and He is the eternal, almighty, Creator of all things. And that God, the one, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal Maker of heaven and earth, is none other than Jesus of Nazareth.
Some people want to reduce Him down to a mere prophet. But in Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1 He is called our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. Some religions want to reduce Him down to just being an angel – but Hebrews 1:6 when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says, "Let all God's angels worship him." He is not an angel – He is the One all the angels are commanded to bow down and worship. If anyone tries to worship an exalted angel in Scripture they are rebuked, because worship belongs to God alone. And Jesus Christ is the object of all our worship. In Revelation 1 we see that He is the Ancient of Days, Yahweh Himself, who was and is and is to come.
Hypostatic union
And if that blows your mind that is good, because it should. If it doesn’t blow your mind you are just not thinking. How could a human being who was born of a woman and who had limited strength and who had to lie down and sleep when He got tired and who had to be taught how to walk – how could He be the eternal, Almighty Creator? Or in Daniel’s words, how is it that on the one hand he can seem to be a son of man, but on the other hand He travels on the clouds and can approach the Ancient of Days? How did it work? Did He stop being God for a while during the time He was human, and now He is back to being God? No. God the Son had the same, divine nature as God the Father for all of eternity past. And then when the time came for Him to become a man so He could bear the penalty for our sins, He took on a second nature. Having a divine nature means having all the characteristics of being God. And having a human nature means having all the characteristics of being human. Up until 2000 years ago God the Son had one nature – His divine nature. He had all the characteristics of being God. But starting 2000 years ago, at the moment the virgin Mary conceived, God the Son took on a second nature. And from that point on, forever, He has two natures. That is how He could die on the cross. God the Son could never die. God did not die at the crucifixion. Jesus, in His human nature died. But in His divine nature He was still upholding the entire universe by His omnipotent power. In His divine nature He knew all things. But in His human nature He had to learn to talk and learn to read and had all the limitations of humanity. That is why He could still the storm and walk on water, and at the same time got tired walking up to Galilee and had to stop and rest at the well in Sychar. He was and is to this day and will be forever – 100% God and 100% man. Right now the Son of God is omnipresent. He is everywhere present upholding every molecule in existence, hearing every prayer being offered everywhere in the world, reigning in heaven, dwelling in our hearts, functioning as Almighty God. But He also has a physical body. If you were in heaven right now you could reach out and touch His body – that same body that walked out of the tomb the day He was raised from the dead 2000 years ago. You could look and see the scars from the crucifixion. He is the God-man; a physical descendent of David who is the Lord of Hosts Himself.
Favor
So the first point of significance of the Messiah being God’s Son is that He is deity. Secondly, sonship points to favor. You favor your own son far more than you favor anyone else’s kids. It is a position of close, favored relationship. Calling Him God’s Son is a way of describing the depth and intensity and uniqueness of the Father’s love for Him.
It is literally impossible for me to fully describe to you the magnitude of the love the Father has for the Son. You have all heard presentations about the staggering, unfathomable size of the known universe. The expansiveness of the known universe is a grain of sand compared to the expansiveness of the love of the Father for the Son.
We have some concepts of the most intense kinds of love. The most passionate, consuming, most effusive love that has ever existed between two people in this world is as cold as stone compared to the passion and intensity of the love the Father has for the Son. When Jesus was baptized the heavens cracked open and God the Father spoke audibly.
Mark 9:7 Then a cloud appeared and enveloped them, and a voice came from the cloud: "This is my Son, whom I love.”
And Jesus spoke often about the Father’s love for Him.
John 10:17 my Father loves me
John 15:9 the Father has loved me
John 3:35 The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands.
John 5:20 For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does.
John 17:24 "Father, I want those you have given me … to see … the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
2 Peter 1:17 he received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased."
You can tell how good or bad someone’s heart is by what they love. If you love wickedness then you are evil. If your heart delights in stealing and murder and malice and lying – that is an evil heart. If you see a little child being beaten and abused, and you like that – you have an evil heart, right? But if a person loves what is good he has a good heart. And so the better the things are that you love, and the more intense your love for those good things, the more righteous and good your heart is.
So what about God the Father? Is His heart good? Yes – it is infinitely good; which means His heart will love the best possible thing and love it with the greatest possible love. And the best thing there is in existence is God. So God the Father has infinite love for God the Son and God the Son has infinite love for God the Father. However much goodness and virtue and holiness and righteousness is in the heart of God the Father, that is how much He loves God the Son. However worthy the Lord Jesus Christ is of love – that is how much the Father loves Him.
And so the Father’s love for the Son is the most incomprehensible of all incomprehensible things. It is more unfathomable than all unfathomable things put together.
Privilege/Inheritance
So what is the significance of sonship? It points to sameness of essence – the Messiah is deity. And it points to favor and love – the Father loves the Son supremely – more than He loves anyone or anything else. Thirdly, sonship points to privilege. The Old Testament passages do not just call the Messiah God’s Son – they call Him God’s firstborn Son. That is not a reference to birth order; it is a reference to position. The firstborn was the one who received the double portion of the inheritance (Dt.21:17), and who was given rule and authority over the rest of the members of the family (2 Chron.21:3), and who belonged to God in a special way (Nm.8:14-17). So the Messiah is called the firstborn Son because He enjoys all the birthright privileges - He inherits everything that belongs to the Father, He is the head of the Family, and He is set apart for God in a unique way. He is the chief over all creatures, the depository of all divine riches and power, the possessor of all privileges, and the heir of all things.
Hebrews 1:2 in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things
Jesus inherits everything the Father owns, which is everything there is.
And this also points to His deity. The prophets speak of the greatness and gloriousness of the coming Davidic king in terms that are reserved only for God Himself.
Daniel 7:13 "In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. 14 He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.
Greatness
Nations will rally to His glory
And one of the marks of His greatness is the fact that the nations will all come and rally to His glory.
Isaiah 11:10 In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious.
All the kings of the earth, all the greatest of men, will come streaming to see His glory.
Micah 5:4 then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth.
They will hear of His glory, they will come to see it, and when they come they will bow before Him and offer Him their full allegiance and obedience.
Genesis 49:10 The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.
And this action of the nations streaming to come see Him is a gift from the Father to honor Him.
Isaiah 55:5 nations that do not know you will hasten to you, because of the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has endowed you with splendor.
And from the sound of Isaiah 9 the nations will keep streaming to Him forever.
Isaiah 9:7 Of the increase of his government … there will be no end.
The Brothers of the Son
What is sonship all about? What ideas are intended to be conveyed by that figure of speech? It points to His nature, His favor, and His privilege. But why is that important for you? You might be sitting there thinking, “Of course Jesus has all that – He’s God.” If you have grown up in the church, and you have thought of Jesus as God every since you were a little child, then in your thinking there may be no real difference to you when I say, “God the Father reigns over all” or “Jesus reigns over all.” To our ears those two statements sound almost exactly the same, and there is no real difference in the way the two statements affect our hearts. When you grow up in Sunday school you are told that Jesus is God so many times that you just kind of think of Jesus as another word for God. And we lose the significance of the relationship.
Access to Favor
Yes, God the Father reigns over all, and that is a marvelous thing, but there is something even more wonderful about the fact that Jesus Christ – God the Son - reigns over all. The reason that is so important for us is because the grace we need from God is only available to His Son, and the only way we have access to it is if we are in His Son. And you can see that in Ephesians 1 where Paul lists all the various benefits we receive from God and after every single phrase he says, “in Christ.”
Ephesians 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
Every blessing we get from the Father we get only in Christ. Blessings only go from the Father to the Son, so if you want to get in on them you have to be in the Son.
4 For he chose us in him [Christ]
If you want to be chosen you have to be in the Chosen One – the Lord Jesus Christ.
In love 5 he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ
If you want to be predestined, if you want to be adopted, you have to be in Christ.
6 to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
If you want grace, it can only come through the One He loves – His beloved Son.
7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins
Redemption, forgiveness, grace, adoption, sonship, predestination, election, every spiritual blessing – God the Father gives all that only to His Son and those who are in His Son.
Everything we get from God we get only because of the Father’s love for His Son. It is all tied to that love. If there were ever a falling out between the Father and the Son, you and I would have zero access to God’s favor.
The certainty of the Father’s love for the Son
But of course there won’t ever be a falling out. The fact that all our favor from God is tied to the Father’s love for the Son is a great thing for us, because nothing is more certain than the Father’s love for His only Son. If God loved us for our own sake, then there would be limits on how much it would be appropriate for Him to delight in us and love us and bless us. But since all that is tied to His love for His Son, there are no limits. The Father’s love for us is as certain and as effusive as His love for His Son because it is the same love.
Christ-centered
And that is why it is not man-centered to speak of God’s love for us. The topic of God’s love for us, if understood properly, is actually a very God-centered, Christ-centered topic because since His love for us is tied to His love for Christ, the more love He shows us the more He glorifies His Son.
Think of it this way – suppose I wanted to honor my wife by showing how much I love her. And so some really undesirable person comes around, and I have no real interest in that person, but then one day Tracy comes up to me and says, “I have become good friends with that person.” And from that moment on I lavish that person with all kinds of love and honor and gifts and there is genuine delight in my heart when I’m around that person. Who am I honoring – that person or Tracy? If I only love him for her sake, it mostly honors her, not him. That person is definitely a beneficiary, but the conclusion of anyone who sees what is happening is not so much, “Wow, that guy is really important,” but rather, “Wow, Darrell really loves his wife.”
And if that hurts your self esteem to find out that God loves you not because of you but because of Christ, go ahead and let it deflate your self-esteem. But let it also bring you great joy when you realize how much better off you are this way. If God’s whole purpose in lavishing gifts and love and blessings on you is to bring glory to His Son, then how much love is He going to lavish on you? How much does God the Father want to glorify and honor His Son? It is the most important thing there is to Him, which means lavishing good thing on you is God’s highest priority! If God loved me for my own sake, or loved me because of how lovely I am or how deserving I am then blessing me would be billions of places down toward the bottom of His priority list. But if He loves me for Christ’s sake it is #1 on His priority list, because nothing is more important to the Father than honoring the Son.
We are sons!
So God favors His Son with infinite, unbounded exuberance of love. And there is literally no limit to the extremes He will go to honor His Son. And we are the beneficiaries of that because we are in Christ – so much so that there is even a sense in which we are sons and daughters of God. That is something the Old Testament saints could never say. But that is how identified with Christ we are.
Galatians 4:3 So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. 4 But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, 5 to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. (!) 6 Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father."
Wait a minute – only the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ can say that. Only Jesus can call God “Abba Father.” That is right, but because Jesus has given us His Spirit, the Spirit of sonship, now we can say that too because we are in Him!
7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir.
It is hard to appreciate the grandeur of that truth because we live in a world that thinks we are all God’s children. We aren’t. People throw that phrase around like it refers to everyone on the planet. You hear someone say, “I got troubles; you got troubles – all God’s children got troubles…” – as if God were everyone’s Father. God is not everyone’s Father. The universal fatherhood of God and the universal brotherhood of man is a lie. Most human beings have Satan as their father; not God. Being a child of God is an incredibly unique privilege that was not even enjoyed by Old Testament saints in the way it is by us. As a Christian, you enjoy a much deeper and closer relationship to God than people like Moses or Abraham or Enoch or even David had. David was never called a son of God, but you are.
J.I. Packer: “If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up in the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God. ”Father” is the Christian name for God.”
He is right.
In the Old Testament Israel, as a nation, was regarded as God’s son. So corporately they looked to Him as their Father, but when Jesus came along and started calling God “My Father” instead of “our Father” the Jews considered it blasphemy. That did not deter Jesus, in fact that is the only way Jesus ever addressed God (except for if He was quoting Scripture). Jesus knew full well that was the most grandiose claim any human being had ever made, yet He continued to refer to God as His Father.
And now, in Christ, we have been given that kind of relationship with God. In the Old Testament God reveled Himself to His people as Yahweh, which was an enigmatic name calculated to invoke a sense of awe. It was God’s covenant name. God’s relationship to His people was best described as that of a King to vassals. God used the terminology and format of that kind of treaty for the giving of the law in Exodus and Deuteronomy. That is appropriate. It was fitting that God take a few thousand years of human history to teach man that He is so awesome and great that the appropriate way for a human being to relate to Him is with the kind of fear and trepidation that you experience before a great king.
But in the New Testament we are given a different way to refer to God the Father. The name Yahweh occurs almost 7000 times in the Old Testament, but never in the New Testament. When Jesus taught us how to pray, He told us to begin not by saying, “Dear Yahweh” or “Dear Jesus” or “Dear King…”; He taught us to pray “Our Father…” The Old Testament language about God was filled with constant warnings for man to keep his distance from a holy God. Now we call Him Abba, Father.
Now do not think of that as a reduction in our view of God. The fearful, awesome, staggering reality of the dangerous, fearsome holiness of God remains. In fact, that is the very thing that makes our sonship such an amazing thing. It is absolutely essential that you understand the way God revealed Himself in the Old Testament to have any appreciation at all of our new relationship to Him in the New Testament. There are people who understand the closeness and intimacy that we can now have with God, but cannot appreciate it, because they do not have the background of the Old Testament to show us of the natural response to God being that of great fear. The fear still remains. The New Testament speaks extensively of fearing God. God is just as awesome now as He ever was. But something new has been added. God relates to His people now not through a Suzerain-Vassal treaty but through a family relationship. And so now the stress is not on the difficulty and danger of approaching God. Now the stress is on the confidence and boldness with which we can now approach that very same, holy God.
Hebrews 12:18 You have not come to a mountain … that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm; 19 to a trumpet blast or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them, 20 because they could not bear what was commanded: "If even an animal touches the mountain, it must be stoned." 21 The sight was so terrifying that Moses said, "I am trembling with fear." 22 But you have come …23 to the church of the firstborn, … 24 to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant
God is just as holy as ever but now because of the Son the emphasis is not on how unapproachable God is, but rather on how accessible He is in Christ.
No wonder the Apostle John burst out almost in unbelief in 1 John 3:1 Behold! What manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God!
When Jesus spoke about His kingdom it was so often in terms of family. He would refer to His followers, very often, as His brothers rather than His disciples. I remember years ago when I was sitting in church one Sunday and listened for the first time to the words to the hymn “Joyful Joyful.” “Thou our Father, Christ our Brother, all who live in love are Thine” – the first time I heard that I remember thinking, “Christ our brother? That is heresy!” It seemed to me to be an over-familiarity with the Lord Jesus Christ. But I was wrong.
Hebrews 2:11-17 11 Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. 12 He says, "I will declare your name to my brothers; in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises."
17 For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest
Jesus called His followers His brothers just as many times as He called them disciples. In Mark 3:35 He referred to female followers as His sisters and mother. He even made the point that an older woman who was a believer was more a mother to Him than Mary herself!
The Punishment of the Son
Look one more time at our text in 2 Samuel 7.
14 I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men, with floggings inflicted by men.
We saw last week that the reference there is primarily to Solomon and the other sinful kings in the Davidic line. When they sinned they were punished. And it would stand to reason that the sinless, perfect Son of David who would someday come and fulfill all the conditions of the covenant would be exempt from the rod and floggings of men. Because if He is perfect you would think there would be no reason for Him to have to suffer.
But that assumption would be wrong. He did suffer punishment with the rod and with floggings inflicted by men. Isaiah 53 speaks about the coming Son of David and says this:
Isaiah 53:7 He was oppressed and afflicted 8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
9 … though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. 10 Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer
Why? If He is sinless and perfect and never breaks any portion of the covenant requirements, why will the Lord punish Him like that?
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. 6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
8 … for the transgression of my people he was stricken.
9 … the LORD makes his life a guilt offering
11 … my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities. 12 … he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
He deserved no punishment. He deserved to never ever suffer at all in any way. But He chose to subject Himself to suffering to bear the punishment we deserved, so that if we are in Him, we can have total forgiveness of sins because His punishment is credited to our account.
Conclusion
There is an amazing promise in the second half of Isaiah 55:3 – one that you may have never noticed before. But it is a promise of staggering proportions.
Isaiah 55:3 … I will make an everlasting covenant with you…
What kind of covenant?
… my faithful love promised to David.
This unfathomable love God promised to the great descendent of David – if you qualify, God will give that same love to you. The glories and wonders of the eternal kingdom, and the special favor and nearness of God’s presence through all eternity, and all the rest; it is all yours if you qualify.
Now think about that for a second. Think about the love promised to the great King who would one day sit on David’s throne. The love that God showed to David is amazing. Not many people in human history have ever been blessed more than David – if anyone. And yet, the promises made to the Son of David make what happened with David look like a grain of sand. God loved David, but the love He promises to the Son of David is orders of magnitude greater. And what Isaiah 55:3 is saying is that love is yours if you qualify.
“How do I qualify?”
You have to meet the requirements and conditions in verse 1. The structure is very clear – God says, “Do this, and I will give you My faithful love promised to David.” So what is it that we have to do? What is the requirement to get it? How do I qualify?
Isaiah 55:1-3 Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. 2 Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. 3 Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my faithful love promised to David.
Most people do not qualify. Most people will not come to God, and if they do they don’t come hungry and empty. Instead they come dragging along all the things that they think they need to be happy and satisfied. They come with the attitude that says, “God, if you want to pile on a little more satisfaction on the top, fine; but these other things – this relationship, this dream, this job, this lifestyle – that’s essential for my happiness.” So they don’t come hungry and thirsty and empty-handed, which means they don’t qualify. Only the poor qualify. Only the destitute and desperate. Only the hungry.
“I’m hungry and thirsty. I have longing and desire in my soul that is not being satisfied by anyone or anything in this world. And I’ve finally come to the point where I’m willing to stop trying to find satisfaction in this world. I’m ready to come to Him – how do I do it?”
The answer to that question is the same no matter where you look in the Bible. One word – faith. Believe the truth about Him and about yourself, and entrust your life completely into His hands. And if you do that – you come to Him empty and thirsty for His presence, He will make an everlasting covenant with you, nothing less than His faithful love promised to the great, eternal Son of David: the Lord Jesus Christ.
Romans 8:17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
Come to Him in faith and you become a co-heir with Him, which means at the end of the age you inherit all things. And you will share in His glory and reign with Him forever.
Benediction: Revelation 22:17 The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" And let him who hears say, "Come!" Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.
