Finding God’s Promises in Christ Alone
by Dr. Daryl Cornett
For all the promises of God find their Yes in Him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. 2 Corinthians 1:20
Jesus clearly identified Himself as the fulfillment of prophecy. He made this audacious announcement to a typical Sabbath gathering in the synagogue in His hometown of Nazareth. He read from the scroll of Isaiah. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor (Isa. 61:1-2).
Jesus had not merely arrived to take His place with the great prophets of Israel; He was the one of which they had prophesied. He did not come to tell people of the promises of God; He was the promise fulfilled. He said, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21).
The New Testament writers are in total agreement that Jesus was the Messiah, the Promised Seed of Abraham and the royal descendant of David. The Apostle Paul declared this truth at the beginning of his majestic exposition of the Gospel in his writing to the Roman Christians. He began his letter in this way:
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the Gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:1-6).
The first point Paul makes before he moves into the deep theological truths of the Gospel is that this good news was not news in the sense of being new. God’s good news of Jesus, the Son, was the mystery of the promise now known and confirmed through the resurrection. What God had promised long ago had now been fulfilled. From the broad promise given to Abraham to make his descendants into a great nation and a blessing to all the people of the earth (Gen. 12:1-3) to the specific words of the prophets, Jesus had always been the One of which God’s revelation spoke.
As Jesus’ ministry unfolded, it was clear that the power of God was profoundly with Him. The miraculous signs were undeniable. People speculated that He was a prophet Himself, or that He was possibly one of the great prophets back from the dead—and, of course, there was talk of Him being the Promised One that Jews had come to expect. But it was a like a puzzle that people had to put together. But as the ministry and saving work of Jesus unfolded, it became revealed that He was the One. Jacob’s blessing of his son Judah included the looking forward to a day when one of his descendants would command obedience from all the nations (Gen. 49:10). The prophet Micah foretold that Messiah would be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2). Isaiah had proclaimed that the promised son to come would be born to a young virgin and His name would be Immanuel, “God with us” (Isa. 7:14). Although Jesus’ mission to suffer and die for humanity’s sin came as a surprise to those who followed Him, they came to realize that this sacrifice had indeed been spoken of clearly by Isaiah (Isa. 53:5-12). Zechariah mentioned that Jesus would be pierced (Zech. 12:10).
The New Testament writers perceived Jesus in the Old Testament writers. The author of Hebrews quotes Psalms 2, 4, 5, and 110 as prophetically looking to Jesus. He also cites that Jesus fulfilled the covenant spoken of by the prophet Jeremiah (Jer. 31:31-34). The Apostle Paul, as he conveyed the fundamentals of the Gospel to the Corinthians, also stressed that Jesus’ death and resurrection were according to the Scriptures (the Old Testament): For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures. (1 Cor. 15:3-4).
And we see Peter, like Paul, affirm that Jesus’ glorious saving work was long in the making before the Christians to whom he wrote had heard and believed: Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look. (1 Peter 1:10-12).
Gloriously, this is true for all who profess Him as Savior and Lord today. Before we had the privilege of hearing this good news, God had inspired the prophets of long ago to speak of Christ with such detail that our faith in Jesus would be affirmed and unwavering.
Daryl Cornett (PhD, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) is Senior Pastor at Aberdeen First Baptist Church in Aberdeen, NC. His writings may be found at his blog, A Pastor’s Progress.
