T HE ARRIVAL OF JESUS, THE MESSIAH OF ISRAEL, IS THE FULCRUM UPON which God’s plan for the restoration of Eden tilts toward realization. He is the center of the biblical epic. Even though someone reading the Bible straight through has to wade three-quarters into it before encountering him, he’s been in the shadows the whole time. No, Jesus wasn’t an earthly man before he was born. Rather, Yahweh—the visible, second Yahweh—has been part of the biblical story in the form of a man since Eden.
It is this second personage who would, four hundred years after the close of the Old Testament period, be born of the Virgin Mary as the human man we know as Jesus of Nazareth. He had to become a man to ensure that humanity, God’s imager, is not erased from the Edenic vision due to his mortal weakness and invariable propensity to use his free will to attempt to gain autonomy from God.
An Edenic realization without human participation would mean that the nachash would then have won a victory—the abolition of humankind as God’s image. God need not change his plan in response to human weakness or the self-willed rebellion of a divine council member. He need not remove humanity or human freedom—and with it, his image—to accomplish what he wants. An omniscient, all-powerful being doesn’t need to cheat. He knows how best to win—and how best to misdirect his opponents.
We’ve already included Jesus in certain aspects of the supernaturalist Old Testament worldview and theology. We’ve seen that he ranks as unique among the divine sons of God of Yahweh’s council. 1 We’ve talked about the Old Testament backdrop to Jesus as the Word and the One who comes on the clouds. 2 But those items barely scratch the surface.
In this chapter, our goal is to accomplish two things. We’ll fill in a few more pieces of the messianic mosaic by noting more connections between Jesus and the second Yahweh figure, and then take a brief look at the divine council backdrop to the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. 3
In an earlier chapter, we learned about the Angel of Yahweh, in whom was the Name, another term for the essence or presence of Yahweh (Exod 23:20–23). 4 The New Testament applies that concept to Jesus in several passages. For example in John 17 , the famous prayer of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prays:
5 And now, Father, you glorify me at your side with the glory that I had at your side before the world existed.
6 I have revealed your name to the men whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours, and you have given them to me, and they have kept your word.… 11 And I am no longer in the world, and they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given to me, so that they may be one, just as we are. 12 When I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given to me, and guarded them, and none of them has perished except the son of destruction, in order that the scripture would be fulfilled.…
25 Righteous Father, although the world does not know you, yet I have known you, and these men have come to know that you sent me. 26 And I made known to them your name, and will make it known, in order that the love with which you loved me may be in them, and I may be in them (John 17:5–6, 11–12, 25–26).
When Jesus tells God the Father that he has revealed God’s name to the disciples (John 17:6), he isn’t talking about telling the disciples what God’s name was. They could read their Old Testament and see that in thousands of places (e.g., Exod 3:1–14). Revealing God’s name to them meant showing them who God was and what he was like. He did that by living among them as a man. Jesus was God among them. He was the incarnation of God’s essence (Heb 1:3). 5
The notion of making God known by revealing his name also takes us back to Yahweh’s Angel in the Old Testament. Recall that Yahweh’s Angel was Yahweh in human form—Yahweh’s “name” or presence resided in that Angel (Exod 23:20–23). John draws on that language in his presentation of Jesus as God. 6 When Jesus says he has “kept them in your name,” he means he has kept those followers the Father gave to him by means of God’s own power and presence—the Name, now incarnated in Jesus.
In this regard it is worth noting that, just as “the Name” was another expression for Yahweh, so “the Name” was used to refer to Jesus. 7 For example, in Romans 10 we read:
9 If you confess with your mouth “Jesus is Lord ” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth one confesses, resulting in salvation. 11 For the scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord is Lord of all, who is rich to all who call upon him. 13 For “everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved” (Rom 10:9–13).
The important thing to note here is that the quotation of verse 13 comes from Joel 2:32. In that Old Testament text we read: “everyone who calls on the name of the Yahweh shall be saved.” The apostle Paul deftly links “confessing Jesus is Lord” in verse 9 with the statement of the Old Testament prophet. This happens many times, especially in Paul’s writings. 8 The Name and Yahweh were interchanged in Israelite theology, so that trusting in “the Name of Yahweh” meant trusting in Yahweh. Likewise, trusting in the name of the Lord, who is Yahweh in the Old Testament quotation, is the same as confessing Jesus as Lord.
The identification of Jesus and the Angel who is the visible Yahweh by virtue of embodying the Name is made explicit in Jude 5:
Now I want to remind you, although you know everything once and for all, that Jesus, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, the second time destroyed those who did not believe.
This short verse credits Jesus with delivering the Israelites from Egypt. 9 The reference is to Exodus 23:20–23 (cf. Judg 2:1–2), where the Angel of the Lord, in whom is the Name, goes before Israel in the procession out of Egypt. The reference to destruction could be to the death of the Egyptians, but it is more likely post-Sinai, where judgments of enemies of Yahweh during the wilderness wanderings and the conquest (cf. Josh 5:13–15) resulted in destruction of unbelievers.
We often think of the commencement of the ministry and mission of Jesus as something quiet and mundane. Not so. A day in the ministry of the incarnate Yahweh was a spiritual assault on the forces of darkness to reclaim what rightfully belonged to him, his Father the invisible Yahweh, and those human beings who were part of the divine council family. The Gospels are far more than a boring point-to-point travelogue.
We’ve all read about Jesus’ baptism before, perhaps dozens of times—but we have likely missed the context for it. John’s gospel (John 1:19–23, 29–31) sets it up this way:
19 And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem so that they could ask him, “Who are you?” 20 And he confessed—and he did not deny, and confessed—“I am not the Christ!” 21 And they asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?” And he said, “I am not!” “Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No!” 22 Then they said to him, “Who are you, so that we can give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?”
23 He said,
“I am ‘the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,
“Make straight the way of the Lord,” ’
just as Isaiah the prophet said.” …
29 On the next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, “Look! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 30 This one is the one about whom I said, ‘After me is coming a man who is ahead of me, because he existed before me.’ 31 And I did not know him, but in order that he could be revealed to Israel, because of this I came baptizing with water” (John 1:19–23, 29–31).
What’s startling is the passage cited by John the Baptist. He identifies himself with the anonymous voice of Isaiah 40:3 that heralded the coming of Yahweh. The significance is obscured in English translations:
1 “Comfort ; comfort my people,” says your God.
2 “Speak to the heart of Jerusalem, and call to her,
that her compulsory labor is fulfilled, that her sin is paid for,
that she has received from the hand of Yahweh double for all her sins.”
3 A voice is calling in the wilderness, “Clear the way of Yahweh!
Make a highway smooth in the desert for our God!
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill shall become low,
And the rough ground shall be like a plain,
and the rugged ground like a valley-plain.
5 And the glory of Yahweh shall be revealed,
and all humankind together shall see it” (Isa 40:1–5).
In Isaiah 40:1 we learn that God is the speaker. He issues four commands, which I’ve put in boldfacing. All four commands are grammatically plural in Hebrew. That means that Yahweh is commanding a group. The group cannot be Israelites or a collective Israel, since it is Israel that Yahweh is commanding the group to comfort, speak to, and call. You should know the identity of the group by now: the divine council. 10
The context of Isaiah 40 is a new beginning for Israel. Judah, the remaining two tribes, had spent seventy years in captivity in Babylon. God brought them out of exile and back to the land. However—and this is frequently overlooked—the other ten tribes never emerged from exile. They were lost, scattered among the disinherited nations. But the coming of the messiah will result in redemption for all the tribes. Yahweh will draw his children from every tribe and nation, whether Abraham’s literal descendants or not. 11
In response to the commands in Isaiah 40:1–2, a lone response comes:
A voice is calling in the wilderness, “Clear the way of Yahweh!
Make a highway smooth in the desert for our God!” (Isa 40:3).
It is this verse that constitutes John the Baptist’s answer to the priests and the Levites. In Isaiah 40:3, the council member who responds is not identified. Earlier, in Isaiah 6:8, when Yahweh asks, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us ?” Isaiah the prophet answers, “I am here! Send me!” But that was centuries earlier. The exchange in Isaiah 40 also brings to mind the divine council scene of 1 Kings 22 , where a council member steps forward with a plan to finish Ahab.
With the arrival of the messiah, the apostle John casts John the Baptist in Isaiah’s role. Like the prophet of old, John the Baptist has “stood in the council” (Jer 23:16–22) and answered the call. To a Jew familiar with the Old Testament, the pattern would not be lost. As had been the case at the time of Isaiah, Yahweh’s council had met in regard to the fate of an apostate Israel. Isaiah had been sent to a spiritually blind and deaf nation. The calling of John the Baptist tells the reader that Yahweh’s divine council is in session again, only this time the aim is to launch the kingdom of God with the second Yahweh, now incarnate, as its point man.
THE INCARNATE YAHWEH LEADING A NEW EXODUS
The description of the baptism of Jesus added to the unfolding drama—for those who knew what they were reading. Mark’s account of the baptism (Mark 1:9–11) provides some key insights that connect to the Old Testament worldview we’ve been tracking:
9 And it happened that in those days Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized in the Jordan by John. 10 And immediately as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens being split apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11 And a voice came from heaven, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”
There are two items in this passage whose importance is not conveyed in English translation.
First, Mark’s note that the heavens were “split apart” is significant. The Greek lemma is schizo . Mark’s choice of the term in connection with the water baptism of Jesus has drawn the attention of scholars because of the use of schizo in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament used by Jesus and the apostles. Not coincidentally, schizo is the verb used in Exodus 14:21 to describe the miraculous parting of the sea. 12
Think back to our discussion of the exodus event. 13 The deliverance from Egypt was a victory over hostile gods. In Exodus 15:11 Moses asked the rhetorical question, “Who is like Yahweh among the gods?” The answer was obvious: no one. The exodus event was a release from exile. Yahweh brought his people out of Egypt to reconstitute them as a nation and re-establish his Edenic kingdom rule on earth.
Mark wants readers to see that a new exodus event is happening. The kingdom of God is back, and this time it will not fail because it’s being led by the visible Yahweh, now incarnate as Jesus of Nazareth. 14 The imagery is even more startling when we factor in Jude 5, a passage we looked at earlier in this chapter. Jude has Jesus leading a people out of Egypt. The reference was to the visible Angel, who was Yahweh in human form, who brought Israel out of Egypt into the promised land (Judg 2:1–2; cf. Exod 23:20–23).
Second, Mark 1:11 has God’s voice from heaven pronouncing, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” 15 We tend to think of this declaration as a sentimental one, or perhaps some verbal token of affection. It is far more than that. When God refers to Jesus as his “beloved” he is affirming the kingship of Jesus—his legitimate status as the heir to David’s throne.
The key term is “beloved.” Scholars have noticed that the term was used of Solomon, the original heir to David’s throne. It’s difficult to discern that in English translation, though, since the Hebrew term gets translated as a proper name: Jedidiah. Solomon is referred to as “Jedidiah” in 2 Samuel 12:24–25:
24 David consoled Bathsheba his wife, and he went to her and slept with her. She bore a son, and he called him Solomon, and Yahweh loved him. 25 He sent word by the hand of Nathan the prophet, so he called him Jedidiah because of Yahweh.
Notice the wording. “Jedidiah” is a name or term that Nathan told David the Lord wanted assigned to Solomon. The name in Hebrew is yediydyahu and is related to dawid / dawiyd , the proper name “David,” which also means “beloved.” 16 Used of Solomon, the term amounts to a title that marked Solomon as the legitimate heir to the Davidic covenantal throne. 17 The same message is telegraphed with respect to Jesus. God’s own voice announces, This is the king, the legitimate heir to David’s throne.
The New Testament story, then, begins with a dramatic revisitation of Yahweh’s call to the divine council to send someone to announce the appearance of Yahweh in the man Jesus of Nazareth. That much will become evident to friend and foe, human and divine. The strategy behind the appearance of the king, however, is cloaked. 18 It had been over five hundred years since the return of Judah from exile. The emergence of Jesus, born and raised in obscurity, from the water launches a battle of wits that entangles both the divine and the human realms.