Peripatetics: The Art of Walking
Friday, March 18, 2005
A good friend of mine had to testify in a court of law this week. He'd never done anything like that before, so he called a lawyer to ask him how he should respond to the questions he got from the attorney.
The lawyer-friend used this example to encourage my friend:
He asked, "Do you know what time it is, Franz? (names have been changed to protect the innocent!)
Franz answered, "Yes. It's 10:15."
"Wrong!" said the lawyer friend. "You need to remember that it's going to be very simple if you only answer the question the attorney asks you when you're on the stand! The correct answer is simply, 'Yes.' If the examining attorney wanted to know the time, after you answered, they'd ask, 'Good. Then what time is it right now?' And then, you might only want to answer, "According to my watch, it's 10:15."
Well, in Luke 19, the Lawyers gave Jesus a "yes or no" type choice. Remember, the last few days we've been working through the Palm Sunday story, and we left off with Jesus heading into Jerusalem with the surrounding disciples singing a Messianic psalm. In effect, Jesus, riding into Jerusalem the week before Passover on a donkey, was being announced as the Messiah in a formal, meaningful manner.
And the Pharisees would've known it, too. That's why they say what they do in Luke 19: 39: "Teacher, rebuke your disciples."
The message is firm. Jesus, this borders on blasphemy and this parade needs to stop. You should do it, too. They'll listen to you, and well, that'll make for a very peaceful Passover week. If not, we're probably going to have to kill you...or at least a very good scourging. So, just stop them and we'll go about our festival.
It's a "yes or no" option.
It's what the lawyers want.
Pretty simple, really.
Yet, Jesus gives a cryptic answer in verse 40: "I tell you, if these become silent, the stones will cry out." The Message reads, "If the people kept quiet, the stones would do it for them, shouting praise."
Why would He answer it this way instead of the yes or no?
The answer begins in Daniel 9: 24--27:
"70 weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to annoint the most holy place."
The interpretation, in order to save you some time, means that it'll take 490 years ("weeks" in Hebrew means "periods of 7," of which you have to see the sentence context to determine if it means weeks, months or years) for The Messiah to make everything right again.
Then in verse 25: "So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince there will be seven weeks and 62 weeks; it will be built again..."
So, we keep track of time beginning with a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. Then, there will be a time frame that looks like this, (7 x 7) + (62 x 7) = y. I know. It's math, but trust me on this one. It means 49 + 434 = y. Y = 483. So, we're missing 7 years...which I'll explain in a second.
But 483 years, when broken into days, is 173,880. So, once we find a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, we can find out when the Messiah will come, right? That's what it says.
Well, in Nehemiah 2...we see in verse 7 that Nehemiah gets the king to sign a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. We learn in 2:1 that it's March/April of 444 B.C.
So, if you go 173,880 days forward, from March/April 444 B.C., you'll wind up in late March of 33 A.D.
And, Jesus strolled into Jerusalem riding a colt on exactly 173,880 days from the day that decree was signed.
That's why He didn't give a "yes or no" answer. It would've sounded more like, "Fellas, I'd love to. But, see...ummmm...this day was prophesied about 173,880 days ago--since you are Lawyers I thought you'd know that--and according to Habbakkuk 2: 10, well, if the Messiah isn't announced today...well, yeah...your reality is that you'll have a huge problem because the stones will start announcing the arrival of the Messiah. Because God's Word doesn't lie. And try explaining a lot of rocks singing that same song to your Passover crowd, while you're at it, too.
(Now, the missing 7 years that will have to take place to complete the 490 years...in Daniel 9: 26 tells us that after the 62nd week--see our math equation above--the Messiah will be cut off. And yet all the Messiah's works won't have been done yet. Well, read 9:27 and you'll see language that is similar to Revelation, and if you know anything about the Tribulation that it is 7 years long, beginning from the Rapture of the Church...so, after the rapture, that clock starts ticking,too)
So, think about it. You're holding a book near you that is accurate down to the very single DAY.
And if it's correct about that much history to that degree of accuracy, well, wouldn't it be correct about WHO Christ is and the work He did on the Cross (which we'll look at next week) for us? What can we do to apply these truths and realities?
Brent 10:05 PM
Comments:
That was a wonderful explanation...you truly have a gift. I taught that a few weeks ago to a group of men and wasn't nearly that eloquent.
-Hollywood
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-Hollywood
