How Could David Speak of Jesus?

Tom: This is our Understanding the Scriptures segment, and we are in the Book of Acts, we’re in Acts 2. And Dave, let’s pick up where we left off, Acts:2:24Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.
See All..., “Whom God hath raised up, (that is speaking about Jesus) having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.”

Dave: Tom, that’s a powerful verse, and I guess our problem is that we could spend the next several weeks just talking about that verse. “God hath raised up….” Well, of course, Jesus said that He raised himself up, you know. “No man takes my life from me.” But He was raised by the power and the glory of God.

Tom: And He is God himself.

Dave: Yeah, he is God. Right.

“No man takes my life from me, I lay it down of myself.” Yet, they were indicted as being His murderers, okay? Because that was what they intended, but they couldn’t have done it unless He allowed them to do it.

Tom: Mmhmm.

Dave: And then it’s talking about the pains—“Having loosed the pains of death….” We talked a little bit about that in our last segment. Death, the pain of death—Jesus on the cross cried out, “I thirst.” And, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Now, He’s God…He’s the Son of God, He and the Father are one…you know, Isaiah:9:6For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
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Tom: Mmhmm.

Dave: “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father.” That’s incredible. The babe born in Bethlehem was the everlasting Father. Jesus said, “I and my Father are one.” Yet, He endured the separation from God that—and this is not a Calvinist teaching, because they claim that He only died for a limited number of people.

Tom: Right, for the elect.

Dave: Right. But, He endured the pain, the separation, the thirst, of the lake of fire—eternal separation from God, for every person that was ever born, or ever will be born. Now, that’s pain!

Tom: And it’s something that only God could do.

Dave: Exactly, and I don’t understand it, and we don’t have to understand it, but we know that it had to be. If He didn’t pay the full penalty…then there’s no salvation….

Tom: Mm-hmm.

Dave: …For anyone. So, “…God loosed the pains of sin….” In other words, the fact that He was raised from the dead showed that the Father had accepted this payment.

Tom: As you said, “our atonement,” as the Old Testament refers to it.

Dave: Yes, yes, our reconciliation to God, and on that basis He was raised from the dead, as proof that the payment had been paid in full. Then it says, “It was not possible that he should be holden of it.” That kind of goes back to something—we mentioned it briefly on our live program. I guess I got a little bit hot, or a little bit upset because in the book, Rick is….

Tom: Talking about The Purpose Driven Life now.

Dave: …Yes, and he is depicting Christ as being torn between doing God’s will or not doing God’s will; that He was at a crossroads and just like us. And that He didn’t know which way to go, but he knuckled down, you know, and decided to submit to the Father. And that is not the situation at all.

When it says, “He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin,…” the word there means “tested.” He was tested like you would test gold in fire. Not that He was in a dilemma, “Shall I do God’s will, or shall I not? Shall I run away from the cross?” That was not the question.

So, it was not possible that He could be kept in the grave because He is the perfect Son of God and He paid the penalty for our sins. Having done that, He raised himself from the dead. You are not going to keep Jesus in the grave, and we cannot be kept in the grave either because we are raised from the dead, because Christ was raised from the dead, and it is the power of His resurrection.

And, so, as we often say, you want to know the life. Man was separated from God…and we talked about that…cut off from God, cut off from the life of God. Now what kind of life is it that God gives us to bring us to a right relationship with Him? Reconciliation with Him? It’s resurrection life. That’s the life that Christ has and that He bestows. In order to have resurrection life, you’ve got to be dead. Only dead people qualify for resurrection life.

And, so, when Christ took our place on the cross—we recognize He took our place—well, then we deserve to die. What He took for us was what we deserved. And, so, Paul says, “I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.”

Tom, I could start getting really excited about this.

Tom: Mm-hmm.

Dave: It is fantastic. “It was not possible that He should be holden, that He should remain.”

Tom: Dave, let me talk about death—just…I think about the verse in Revelation that people sometimes say it this way: “Born once, you die twice. Born twice, you die once.”

Dave: Very good. Uh-huh.

Tom: You want to explain that to me? (Chuckles)…to us?

Dave: Well….

Tom: I know what it means.

Dave: We die physically…everybody dies physically.

Tom: Yeah, if the Lord tarries and we’re not….

Dave: Well, we’re talking about sinners now.

Tom: Right.

Dave: Who have only been born once. They’re going to die twice, and then they stand before the great white throne judgment in Revelation 20, and then they are sentenced to…the Bible calls it the “second death.”

Tom: Right.

Dave: The lake of fire…this is the second death. So they die twice. You’re right. Born twice, you only die once. And you don’t even have to die once, because some of us will be alive…I would like to be among those…but I may not be.

Tom: And, Dave, obviously to us, and maybe for some people out there, born twice means you need to be born again, spiritually….

Dave: Right.

Tom: …born. And what about—you just said that you hope that you won’t die.

Dave: (Chuckling slightly), right.

Tom: Of course we’re referring to the Rapture of the church.

Dave: Right. “The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, the voice of the archangel…” and so forth. “The dead in Christ will rise first. We who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them to meet the Lord….”

Tom: Yeah.

Dave: “…in the air.”

Tom: Verse 25, “For David speaketh concerning him, I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved….”

Dave, is this similar to Job saying, “Therefore I know that my Redeemer liveth?” In other words, Job foresaw the Lord. How does that differ?

Dave: I don’t know that Job exactly says he foresaw the Lord, but he says, “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” So, in that sense, you could say he is looking forward to Christ.

Tom: Right. He understood that, that he’s one of the patriarchs as well.

Dave: It’s amazing because Job, as far as we know, is the first book in the Bible. But I want to go back to where David says this. Psalm 16, I think it is, and verse 8. He says, “I have set the Lord always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” And it’s quoting now, from Psalm 16 beginning at verse 8. Now, you can also tie that in with Psalm 27 where David says, “One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire at his temple.”

David was a man who knew the Lord; who meditated upon Him.

Tom: Mm-hmm.

Dave: Who dwelt in His presence, I mean, continually, in touch with God. So, this is what he’s talking about…but he’s saying Christ couldn’t possibly be kept in the grave, and furthermore, He is the Lord of glory. This is what David is saying. “Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my flesh shall rest in hope: because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.”

We have to come back and talk about that. The body of Jesus, “thy Holy One” did not suffer corruption. It’s one of the reasons why that little wafer could not possibly have been turned by a Catholic priest into the body of Jesus, because you leave it around and it will mold, worms will get it….

Tom: Right.

Dave: It will corrupt.

Tom: Right in the tabernacle, Dave.

Dave: Yeah.

Tom: Above the altar.

Dave: Yeah. So, the body of Jesus did not corrupt in the grave. They anointed Him--they thought it would—they didn’t know, they didn’t believe, and we have to come back and talk about that.