Seeing Jesus Through Portraits
JM - Dr. Joel Muddamalle - Author LT - Lysa TerKeurst - Author
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Hey friends! Welcome to Week One of Seeing Jesus in the Old Testament. I'm Dr.
Joel Muddamalle and this is my dear friend, Lysa TerKeurst. This week, we're going to be studying a
couple of different people, five different people throughout the Old Testament. We'll be looking at
Adam and Eve, Moses, Joshua, David, and Esther. But really, Lysa, what we're going to be talking
about, is how we can see Jesus in the midst of our loneliness. When we open up to the very beginning
pages of Genesis, which is I think we can now say, our very favorite pages out of Scripture
Lysa TerKeurst: Absolutely, well, I mean, I don't know if it's our very favorite,
but it's the place we return to often. There's so much in the story of the creation
that provides this backdrop through which many things that unfold in the Bible should
be considered. I love the topic today. I think it's important for us to remember
that just because we feel lonely, does not mean we are actually alone.
JM: Yes, that's so good, Lysa. I was reading a commentary the other day, which is what I do
for fun. It was really interesting, because what this author said is that the gospel doesn't begin
in Genesis 3 in the Fall; the good news doesn't begin in Genesis 3. Actually,
the good news starts in Genesis 1. And what is the good news? That there's a really good God
who makes all of creation incredibly good, and as the cherry on top of his creation,
He makes Adam and Eve, in His likeness and in His image. It's really amazing that God
saw that it was so important for Adam and Eve to live in the context of community.
That God was going to be present and be their God and walk and talk with them in Eden. But then God
would make for Adam, a helper, a co-partner, a person who would be (this is a technical
term I'm going to use) a vice-regent, a royal person to reign and rule in Eden alongside him.
The very opening pages of the book of Genesis tell us that God cares about community.
LT: Mmm Hmm.
JM: God wants us to be in relationship with other people. And then--and if we
had an organ playing, it would go duh-duh-duhn--and then,
Genesis 3 happens. LT: That's right.
JM: And not everything is good. Sin enters and one of the consequences of sin is that Adam and Eve
at one point had such incredible intimacy with God--to walk and talk in the middle
of the garden of Eden with Him--and then sin created isolation. Sin created a separation...
LT: and division JM: ...and a division between God and
His people. But Lysa, one of the things I love about God is that He doesn't look at a situation,
and He's not going to settle for it. So in this situation, He doesn't look at the isolation,
the division, the separation that Adam and Eve had really caused because of their sin and just say,
"It's okay," He actually acts. I'm curious what your thoughts are.
LT: Well, not only does He act, but He also has mercy on them. God clearly established there
was a consequence if they chose to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
God didn't tell them not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because He's
a killjoy God. God told them not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because God
knew that the human heart would be devastated by the weight of the understanding of sin. And,
of course, once they participated in sin, by the weight of the consequence of sin.
And so, the consequence of sin--and God had already clearly laid it out in advance--if
you eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the consequence was death.
JM: Yeah.
LT: Now, there was not an immediate physical death. But there was a death to the purity,
and the perfection, and their body entered into that place.
JM: A state of death
LT: A state of death. And so, they had to be taken out of the garden of Eden.
If we look closely at what the Scripture says, because I think sometimes we can miss this.
In Genesis Chapter 3, it makes it very, very clear, starting in verse 21, "The Lord God
made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and He clothed them." So, as He's sending them out,
He was still very much present with them, and I'm going to come back to that in just a minute.
Verse 22, "And the Lord God said, 'The man has now become like one of us.'" So there's the "us",
and what is the "us," Joel? It's obviously that God is not alone.
JM: Yeah.
LT: It's, there's the triune presence of the Almighty God there,
which the triune presence is...
JM: God the Father, God, the Son, God the Holy Spirit.
LT: Exactly. "The man has now become like one of us knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed
to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever. So, God
banished him (Adam and Eve) from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been
taken." Here's the thing, God makes it very clear, "You must leave the garden of Eden," because there
was another tree in the center of the garden, the tree of life. Before sin, they could absolutely
eat of the tree of life. After sin, God had mercy on them and said, "I have to make you leave the
garden because if you eat from the tree of life now, you will be perpetually separated from me."
JM: Yeah.
LT: And so, God sends them out.
But remember, they were in shock after they sinned and one of their first reactions,
when it says, "And their eyes were opened to sin, and they knew the difference between good
and evil." They immediately realized they were naked, and they covered themselves.
JM: Right.
LT: And so, do you see in God's mercy, Him providing in verse 21, garments of skin for Adam
and his wife--that was an act of physical, and maybe even emotional, mercy on them.
JM: Hmmm.. Mm Hmm..
LT: But it's also a very important spiritual reality. And the spiritual reality is that
this day, it was the shed blood of an animal that became a sacrificial covering to their sin.
JM: That's right. Yeah.
LT: Because sin always demands a sacrifice. But you have to know that that day it was shed blood
of an animal. But one day it would be the shed blood of His very own Son that would become an
atonement for sin. Let me turn over to...do you have anything else you want to say about that?
JM: Yeah, you know, I think one of the things that happens, Lysa, is when we're studying Scripture,
there are these thoughts or ideas like the sacrifice of an animal,
and sometimes I'm worried that we've moved past that too fast.
LT: Mm Hmm
JM: There are certain things that we really do need to slow down and consider. And one of
those things, and I know that you're getting to this point, that's magnified in Jesus is,
the animal didn't do anything wrong.
LT: Right.
JM: I mean, it's not like this was a rebellious, unruly animal that needed to be put down
because it was biting people and doing all kinds of evil. This was an innocent animal that was
an innocent bystander of the consequence of Adam and Eve's sin. And so, sin always has an impact,
and we've talked about this before. Typically, we feel it personally, individually--but
sin is always a package deal. It's always impacting us individually and corporately,
and it has ramifications elsewhere. And so, this animal is a foreshadowing of the necessity
of an eternal kind of sacrifice that had to happen in order to restore
restoration and relationship, and to deal with isolation that man had placed himself in.
LK: That's right. So if we turn over to Hebrews Chapter 2, starting in verse 14, I'm going to
read it here. It says, "Since the children have flesh and blood, He (meaning Jesus), He too shared
in their humanity so that by His death He might break the power of him who holds the power of
death--that is the devil--and free those, who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of
death." Go on down to verse 17. "For this reason He had to be made like them, fully human in every
way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest, in service to God,
and that He might make atonement for the sins of the people." So indeed, Jesus was going to be that
perfect sacrificial, just atonement, for the sin of the people.
JM: Yes.
LK: But, I don't want us to miss something else. It's not just that Jesus came to be an atonement
for the sins of the people, but He also came to be a merciful and faithful high priest. This
is where we get into just because you feel lonely doesn't mean you're actually alone.
JM: That s right.
LT: I think the loneliest places we can ever get to is when we feel utterly alone in our pain.
JM: Yeah.
LT: Like there's no one else going through what we're going through. There's no one else that
understands the depth of our pain. I think what we'll see when we turn over to Mark Chapter 14,
Jesus was a merciful and faithful high priest and we can trust His teaching
because--not only is He the Son of God and He was sinless, but there's this other component.
Jesus was very much sinned against.
JM: Mmm
LT: He knows the depth of rejection,
abandonment, people falsely saying things about Him that weren't true.
JM: Yeah.
LT: He knows the sting of accusation. He knows what it feels like to have His closest companions
walk away in His time of greatest need. You know, when that happens to me and I feel so utterly
alone, that's my deepest place of loneliness. And sometimes I will say a couple of things. I'll say,
"This is so overwhelming, the sorrow of this, it feels like it just might kill me." Or,
I will say, "God, everything's possible for You. I don't understand why You aren't fixing this,
changing this. God, don't let this be my life." And when I go over to Mark Chapter 14, I find
astonishing words of Jesus, and I pray that you will see today--indeed, just because you feel
lonely doesn't mean you're alone in your pain. Mark Chapter 14 verse 34, these are the words of
Jesus right before He goes to the cross. He's in the garden of Gethsemane, and He cries out, "My
soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death." I am astonished at how much Jesus, though
He was perfect in His divinity, He felt the grit and grime of being made fully human in every way.
JM: Hmmm
LT: So, Jesus says, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the
point of death." It sounds so much like what I say, or maybe even what you say,
when you're going through devastating times. And then look at verse 36. Jesus says, "Abba,
Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me." Even Jesus says,
"Don't let this be the way it goes. Don't let this be the way that the story unfolds." And,
I relate to that so much. And then, of course, Jesus models for us what to do in that extreme
place of loneliness. He finishes that statement by saying, "Yet not what I will, but what You will."
He's telling God, "I'm going to trade my will for Thy will, because I'm so confident You will, God."
And I pray that as you study Jesus in the Old Testament and we get some of these revelations--I
know we've been in the New Testament--but now in this week's study, we're going to be in the Old
Testament. And I pray that as you continue to see Jesus working in the Old Testament, you can better
feel comforted this week that He is absolutely with you as well. Joel, will you wrap us up today?
JM: Yeah, I really love what you said, Lysa. If we just go back for a second, back to Genesis
3:21, we talked about the clothing. In the midst of our deepest loneliness, when we
feel like we're so utterly alone, it can be hard to believe that we're actually not alone. Right?
LT: Hmmm
JM: And so, how can we know that we're not alone? Well,
there's an interesting little grammatical fun fact here.
LT: This is where "Dr." Joel Muddamalle comes in.
JM: That's right (laughter)
LT: Okay, here he goes, guys!
JM: The Hebrew word here for "clothe them," it's a Hebrew verb, and y'all, catch this.
It's used two times consistently. One is of a king, clothing of a person of royalty.
And two, when the high priests were dressed, right before they would go in to do sacrifice.
LT: Wow.
JM: So I just wonder, what if God in His kindness, knowing
the loneliness that Adam and Eve were going to feel, even in the midst of a sacrifice of the
clothing of an animal, that that clothing that they took with them out of Eden was a tangible,
physical reminder that in the midst of their loneliness, actually, God Himself was with them.
LT: Hmmm. And He didn't dress them in rags, or in insufficient coverings. He dressed them in
the skins of an animal that would protect them, comfort them, and it almost sounds like it gives a
nod to the fact that there is still royalty, even though they're being made to leave the garden.
JM: That's right. And I think that's something that you and I can hold on to this week.
In the middle of our loneliness when it feels just unbearable--I can resonate, Lysa,
with what you said--that we can turn to these passages of Scripture and we can be reminded
that Jesus is with us, that we are clothed in the righteousness of King
Jesus and that the Holy Spirit indwells inside of us. Just because we feel lonely, it doesn't
mean that we are lonely. We have Jesus right next to us, and that is a comforting assurance.