Messianic Perspectives

Liz Aiello: The 110th Psalm is quoted or alluded to by Jesus, Matthew, Mark, Luke, Peter, Paul, and other New Testament writers more than any other passage in the Old Testament. But this Psalm is also a source of great controversy. So is it really a Messianic prophecy or just wishful thinking? We'll find out today right here on Messianic Perspectives.

Shalom and welcome to Messianic Perspectives, a daily program where we look into the Scriptures from a distinctive first-century Jewish point of view. This is Liz Aiello. Our Bible teacher is Dr. Gary Hedrick, President of CJF Ministries in San Antonio, Texas. You can reach our offices by dialing 1-800-926-5397.

Gary's subject today is "The Truth About Psalm 110." And since this Psalm is the most often quoted Old Testament prophecy in the entire New Testament, that means if it can be discredited, the whole Messianic house of cards comes tumbling down. I'll be back a little later with information about a special offer, so have your pencil and paper ready. Now, with today's study, here is Dr. Gary Hedrick.

Dr. Gary Hedrick: All right, thank you, and welcome, listening friend, to another edition of Messianic Perspectives. It’s good to have you with us today as we continue this series of studies on "The Truth About Psalm 110." And this is a very important series of studies because, as we said last time, the 110th Psalm is the most frequently quoted Messianic prophecy in the entire New Testament.

Psalm 110 is quoted or alluded to in the New Testament more than any other passage of Old Testament Scripture. And we’ve been going through this Psalm verse by verse, where we have these seven sublime Messianic prophecies. And on the last program, we saw that the first two prophecies are in verse one, where David says, "The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool."

We said the first prophecy is that David's Lord is exalted to sit at the right hand of God Himself. The second prophecy is also in verse one, and it says the Messiah will one day vanquish his enemies. The Lord says he will make the Messiah’s enemies his footstool. And we saw in these first two prophecies already two different timeframes emerging.

There are certain things David speaks about in the present tense and certain things he speaks about in the future tense. And remember what the Lord said in Matthew 22 when he had his little altercation with the Pharisees we talked about a few days ago? He reminded them that King David was in the Spirit when he wrote those words. He was in the Spirit.

It's like what the Apostle John said in the opening chapter of the Book of Revelation. John is explaining how this revelation came to him, and he says, "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day." John was saying he was in the Spirit when God gave him this vision of the Day of the Lord. The Day of the Lord is a prophetic timeframe that stretches from the Rapture—the Rapture of the church—to the end of the millennium.

The Day of the Lord is over a thousand years. In fact, maybe sometime we'll do a series on the prophetic days in the Bible because there's the Day of the Lord, and there's the Day of God, and the Day of the Messiah, and several other prophetic days. And although they’re all related, each one nonetheless has its own distinctive meaning.

But anyway, Jesus says the same thing about King David in Psalm 110. He says he was in the Spirit, which means this is more than just a song. Now, we know King David began his career as a musician. And we know he loved music. He wrote many beautiful songs. In fact, that's what the Psalms were. They were words set to music, singing accompanied by strings. That's where we get the Hebrew title Sefer Tehillim, or Book of the Psalms. And many of the Psalms were written by King David.

We wish the music itself could have been preserved, but all we have are the words. Maybe when we get to heaven, we'll find a concert hall somewhere and get King David to come and teach us how to sing these Psalms. Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I would love to hear that. So I think what the Lord is telling us here in Matthew 22 about Psalm 110 is that it was more than just a song.

It was a vision. God gave King David a vision. He was in the Spirit. It was a vision of the Messiah, just like He gave John a vision of the Apocalypse a thousand years later. So we have two different timeframes here. First, in the present tense, the Lord is seated at the right hand of the Father until God makes his enemies his footstool.

In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul also uses the future tense when he says this about the Messiah: "For he must reign until he hath put all enemies under his feet." (1 Corinthians 15:25) This is future prophecy. The present tense part is fulfilled by the fact that Jesus is reigning right now from the right hand of the Father in heaven over a spiritual kingdom. Dispensationalists call it the mystery form of the kingdom.

But there is also a future tense part of this prophecy, and that's the one that predicts a literal physical kingdom on this earth. But that cannot happen until the Messiah comes back to this earth and destroys his enemies. And that takes place when Jesus returns as King of kings and Lord of lords to destroy the armies of this world assembled against him at Armageddon. That’s in Revelation 19, verses 11 through 21.

Now let's move on to prophecy number three. The third prophecy is in verse two where it says, "The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion, rule thou in the midst of thine enemies." In other words, David says his Lord's dominion will extend from Israel over all the earth. It says the rod or the scepter of his strength shall go forth out of Zion.

The Prophet Isaiah foresaw a time when Sar Shalom, the Prince of Peace—another name for the Messiah—would rule over a restored earthly kingdom. Isaiah said, "For 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 Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, and Sar Shalom, the Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and peace, there shall be no end. Upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts," Isaiah says, "will perform this." That’s Isaiah 9, 6 and 7.

Fourth, David says his Lord will command a mighty army of willing warriors. Verse three. You know, it's interesting that this Psalm, the 110th Psalm, follows the same form as a coronation psalm. In fact, that's why some scholars say it's a coronation psalm for King Solomon written by his father David. The only problem with that is that there’s too much here that just doesn't fit Solomon.

It only fits the Messiah. So this is a coronation psalm all right, but it's not for King Solomon. It's for our King Messiah, Yeshua. Coronation psalms often refer to a king’s loyal subjects offering themselves to wage war against his enemies. Only in this case, the King is the Messiah. Where it says "thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power," the word translated "willing" literally means free-will offerings.

Likewise, the New Testament says that every one of us who are believers in Yeshua the Messiah should present himself or herself as a living sacrifice to God. Romans 12, verse 1. We are his warriors, fighting for the truth of the gospel in this dark and sinful world. Ephesians chapter 6, verses 10 through 18. And again, this goes right back to what we were saying a few days ago about the fact that we are in a war.

This world is not a bed of roses. It's a battlefield. There are spiritual forces all around us, powers of darkness all around us. Grenades are going off all around us, even though we can't see them with our physical eyes. There are landmines everywhere. That's why the Bible says we're supposed to let the Lord guide our steps, order our steps, because there is this vast unseen army of spiritual potentates arrayed against us.

Ephesians 6:12 says, "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." So the fourth prophecy is that David's Lord would command an army of willing warriors, people who have offered themselves to him as a living sacrifice.

Do you know what that means? It means we are already dead. It means you and I are sacrifices. You see, the term "living sacrifice" is an oxymoron because a sacrifice always died. You never saw a sacrifice in the Old Testament or in the temple crawl back off the altar after it was sacrificed. It never happened. Why? Because the sacrifice died. He was dead.

So when Paul in Romans 12:1 says that we are living sacrifices, it's like he's saying we are living dead people because we have died to self. That's what baptism is all about. When we go under the water, it symbolizes the fact that our old man was crucified and buried with the Messiah. And when we come back up out of the water, it means we have been resurrected with him to walk in newness of life. So we are living dead people. We are living sacrifices.

Someone asked Elizabeth Elliot about her husband Jim, who was killed by the Auca Indians on the mission field in South America. You know what Elizabeth Elliot said? She said the Aucas didn't kill Jim. He died years before when he gave his heart and life to Jesus Christ. He was a living sacrifice. And that same thing should be true of each and every one of us.

If I should die today, don't say, "Hey, that's too bad. Gary was a nice guy and he died today." Don't say that because I didn't, not really. I died in 1966 when a preacher named Bill McKee gave an invitation at the end of a service at summer camp. I was in junior high school. He looked out over the audience and he said, "If the Lord is calling you to full-time Christian service, and if you're willing to say with Isaiah, 'Here am I, Lord, send me,' if you're willing to say that, I want you to stand."

And I stood. I was a skinny junior high kid, and I knew I didn't have much to offer the Lord, but whatever I had, I wanted him to have it. And so you could say in a sense I died that day in 1966—a living sacrifice. How about you? So that's the fourth prophecy: David's Lord would command an army of willing warriors. Verse three. Well, we're out of time again. We'll finish this on the next program. Until then, this is your friend Gary Hedrick saying God bless you, take care, bye-bye.

Liz Aiello: Thank you, Gary. And thank you, listening friend, for tuning in today. We've been listening to our Bible teacher, Dr. Gary Hedrick, talking about "The Truth About Psalm 110." If you are interested in Bible prophecy, you'll be glad to know that our special offer this week is the CD of this current series of studies on "The Truth About Psalm 110" by our Bible teacher, Dr. Gary Hedrick.

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And as always, when you're in touch with us, please mention the call letters of this station. If you're listening to our webcast or podcast, we need to know that too. I'm Liz Aiello. Join us next time, won't you, as Dr. Gary Hedrick continues our series of studies on "The Truth About Psalm 110" right here on Messianic Perspectives. Messianic Perspectives is sponsored by CJF Ministries of San Antonio, Texas, and is made possible on this station by the free-will contributions of our listeners in this area.