This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Matthew 2:13-23” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 31, 1995.

This morning we are reading from Matthew chapter 2, and we are beginning at verse 13. Matthew 2, verse 13, to the end of the chapter. Give your attention to God’s holy word. And when the wise men were departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt. and be thou there until I bring thee word, for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him.’

When he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night and departed into Egypt, and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son. Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under according to the time which he diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying in Ramah, Was there a voice heard? lamentation and weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and would not be comforted because they were not. But when Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel, for they are dead which sought the young child’s life. and he arose and took the young child and his mother and came into the land of Israel.

But when he heard that Achelaus did reign in Judea in the room of his father Herod, he was afraid to go thither, notwithstanding being warned of God in a dream, he turned aside into the parts of Galilee. And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth. That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, he shall be called a Nazarene.”

Let’s pray together. Lord, how your word sustains your people, giving them nourishment, encouragement, and comfort. Lord, we ask that your word may do just this, even as your people are made to stand before the governments of this world. And Father, we ask that it would please you to grant grace and mercy by way of your people to those governments, even to this point, O Lord, that peace may prevail, that your children may worship unhindered. Father, we pray for our land. We pray for those in authority over us. We pray, Lord, that there would be that form of righteousness in our authorities that are appropriate to their position. We ask, Lord, that we might give them the appropriate reverence and homage that is due them. We ask, Father, in this way we might please you, and that we also may prove to be peaceful citizens in this world. as we are the citizens of the kingdom of heaven. We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

The scripture is in some ways like the kingdom declared in it. As the kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is hidden in and from the world, So the meaning of Scripture, in all its richness and multifaceted beauty, is hidden away from the casual and even purely strictly devotional hearing and reading of the text. It is in the interest of Scripture’s richness and multifaceted beauty, that our shorter catechism encourages us to approach the Scripture with diligence, preparation, and prayer. It is in the service of that richness and multifaceted beauty that is found within the that the risen Christ opens the minds of his disciples so that they understand how the law, the prophets, and the Psalms are fulfilled in him, his death and resurrection.” And it is in the service of that richness and multifaceted beauty, hidden away in the divine self-revelation of the Scriptures, that Jesus declares that every scribe of the kingdom of heaven will bring forth out of his treasure things new and old.

Matthew 13, verse 52. Matthew chapter 2, verses 13 through 23, is a passage in which the hidden richness and multi-faceted beauty of the biblical revelation should be carefully investigated by God’s people. For such investigation carries with it the promise of opening up this story’s magnificent power for God’s people as a whole.

The first thing we observe about this passage is that it is a unit, deliberately constructed to be such. There are three episodes, verses 13-15, verses 16-18, and verses 19-23. These three episodes belong together and hang together in their similar structure. Did you notice anything characteristic of these episodes as we read through them this morning? Look again at these verses. at them in the division that I’ve given you, and particularly now, look at the last verse of each section of each episode.

For each section or episode will end with a quotation from the Old Testament, deliberately set there to mark out the unitary character of this portion of Scripture. And this quotation introduced to you by a formula, an appropriate accompanying word concerning the fulfillment of this particular Old Testament quotation with respect to the distinct gospel event in view. For example, the statement in verse 15 is this, that what was spoken by the Lord to the prophet might be fulfilled, saying, out of Egypt did I call my son.” You find similar statements then in verse 18 and in verse 23. But I want you also to take note of the power that these similarly structured episodes create for us. The first.

13-15, tells us about Joseph’s dream and the angel’s warning to him that he must flee to Egypt with Jesus and his mother because of Herod’s murderous intent. To this episode, Matthew Nair, by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, applies an Old Testament an Old Testament prophecy, Hosea chapter 11 verse 1, Out of Egypt did I call my son. But you might be taken aback by this quotation, for in reading that text in context, in Hosea, you discover there that it is not referring to some future event, anticipated by the Prophet, but rather is reflective of a past event, that Hosea is actually speaking there of Israel’s escape from Egypt in the Exodus.

So as you read through this first episode and you’re noticing the patterning going on, you’re also noticing a certain tension, a certain strain in the text, because it seems as if Matthew has grabbed an Old Testament text to suit his purpose and wrenched it out of context and applied it to a situation to which it doesn’t apply at all. The second episode, verses 16-18, tells us about Herod’s realization that he has been betrayed by the wise men. It tells us about his rage. It then tells us about his consequent assent upon the families of Bethlehem and the destruction of the children there. Here, once more, Matthew quotes an Old Testament prophecy, an Old Testament text.

In this case, Jeremiah chapter 31, verse 15. A text that speaks about Rachel weeping for her children because they are no more, but you will note the same kind of tension developing here that we observed in the previous episode. This passage from Jeremiah? is one that is filled with highly poetical language, but it speaks, again, not of some future anguish and grief, but of a present anguish and grief upon the background of that anguish and grief which Rachel herself experienced at the loss of her children all the way back in Genesis. The specific devastation in view here in this Jeremiah passage is not some event taking place in Bethlehem when Herod wreaked his wrath upon the children of Bethlehem, but rather it pertains to the time of the Babylonian invasion and the subsequent exile of the Israelites from their land.

Is Matthew just running through his Old Testament and grabbing texts that he thinks are appropriate, and pushing them into his circumstance to suit his purpose? It is with the third episode that things begin to come to light, even though this third episode is the most difficult of all. verses 19 through 23. These verses relate to us the death of Herod, the return of Joseph with Mary and the Christ child to the land of Israel, and their eventual settlement in the town of Nazareth. Matthew now tells us the settlement in Nazareth is to fulfill what the prophets declared. that he, that is, the Messiah, shall be called a Nazarene.” It’s at this point that Matthew applies the breaks in the most definite fashion.

If you’re straining with him thus far, you knowing your Old Testament, you knowing your prophecy of Hosea, you knowing Jeremiah, you wondering what he’s doing with these texts as he brings them into these contexts in his gospel, if that raised for you The question, now you are faced with the other incongruity of this statement at the end of verse 23. He shall be called a Nazarene. I ask you, can you find that in your Old Testament? It isn’t there. There is no Old Testament text that says, he shall be called a Nazarene. Well, if I was in a quandary before, I’m absolutely beside myself now.

Indeed, the quotations here creates severe difficulties for us, because in searching our Old Testaments we find no passage that matches what Matthew writes. Now, many proposals have been made to resolve the difficulty. Chrysostom, the great father of the early Church, believe that Matthew was quoting from a lost prophecy. We don’t have all the prophecies in the Bible, and Matthew was aware of one that we don’t have, one that had been lost. This is a very, shall we say, convenient suggestion, but hardly believable. Calvin was a little bit more imaginative.

He believed that Matthew was combining the town of Nazareth, the name Nazareth of that town and what it might suggest, with the Old Testament order of the Nazarites. Those who took special vows about not drinking any strong drink and not cutting their hair It was along this line, then, that Calvin concluded that behind the Matthew quotation in chapter 2, verse 23, is Judges chapter 13, verse 5, a text that speaks about Samson, who was to be a Nazarite from his birth. But this exegesis fell down because no subsequent exegesis, even in the Reformed Church, could not match up Nazarite lifestyle with Jesus’ lifestyle. They might do so with John the Baptist, but they couldn’t do it with Jesus.

So, subsequent interpreters have moved in a different direction. They have noticed, for instance, that at this point Matthew’s reference is not to a single prophet, but to prophets plural, that what was spoken through the prophets. In other words, Matthew’s quotation here is not of a single prophet. solitary prophet, or as a single verse from the prophets.

It is rather a reference to a general thought from the prophets, and an expectation that is voiced by them repeatedly. And what might that thought and that expectation be? The New American Standard Version, in the margin, has the key across reference. Directing our attention to Isaiah 11, verse 1. You see, the key is found in a play on words engaged by Matthew. Matthew picks up on the similarity between the place-name Nazareth, which means the guarded one or the protected one, the similarity between the place-name Nazareth and the Hebrew word Mevier, which means branch or shoot. Branch or shoot. This Old Testament word, however, introduces us to a common thought that we find running through the prophets, a pervasive thought. That thought is that through the judgment that overtakes Israel, there comes then into sight, there is revealed before our eyes, the branch and the shoot from the stem of David, miraculously raised up and preserved according to the saving purposes of God, through whom righteousness and security would be bestowed upon the elect of God.

And as I have already indicated, making reference here to the marginal notes In the New American Standard Version, the fundamental text in view for Matthew is Isaiah 11.1, where that Hebrew word may hear as used, “…and there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, a branch shall grow out of his roots.” And this thought, although with a different word, a synonym, appears in Isaiah 53 verse 2, “…he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, or as a shoot, and as a root out of dry ground.”

A passage that refers specifically to the suffering servant and the Messiah of the Lord. And most particularly and impressively are these other texts, Jeremiah chapter 23 verses 5 and 6. behold, the days come, said the Lord, that I will raise up to David a righteous branch, and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.” Jeremiah once more, chapter 33, verse 15, “…in those days, and at that time, I will cause the branch of righteousness to grow up unto David, and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.” And what about Zechariah, chapter 3, verse 8? Here now, O Joshua the high priest, thou and thy fellows that sit before thee, for there are men wondered at, for behold, I bring forth my servant, the branch, the shoot.

All these verses give thought to the common prophetic hope, then, that the kingdom of would, in fact, arise despite the devastation and even the exile that had overtaken the people of God in the time of Jeremiah. And this would happen by the raising up of David’s line, through whom a remnant would be rescued. Matthew, in chapter 2, verse 23, is declaring that Jesus This one, of the family of Joseph and Mary, living in Nazareth of Galilee, is the fulfillment of Israel’s hope concerning the Son of David, the one by whom the salvation of the remnant, himself being his person, the embodiment of that remnant, shall be realized.” that now the richness and the multifaceted beauty of Matthew 2 verses 13 through 23 begins to open up to us, and an explanation for us of the other citations that Matthew makes of those texts. It’s not, you see, that Matthew is here simply concerned to attach texts from the Old Testament in order to prove his case, in order to build his case for Jesus being the fulfillment of these texts in isolation cited from the Old Testament.

It is more complex, it is deeper than that, it is richer than that. Look at these episodes then once more, and the intention of Matthew coming out by the Holy Spirit as you do so. Do you see something more here, holding these episodes together as you move through these verses, besides the common outline that we have already commented upon? Think about the progression as you move through them in the first episode. You have the descent of Jesus into Egypt, and a quotation from Hosea about the Exodus. Hold on to that. Move to the second episode. Here you have the slaughter of the children by Herod and the quotation from Jeremiah about the devastation, particularly the devastation that is accompanying the exile. We have moved from exodus to exile, the third episode.

You have here the return of Jesus to the land of Israel. reference to the collective mind of the prophets, particularly generated from Isaiah 11.1, and the message that we find there about the restoration and the salvation of God’s holy remnant. Now, put them together. Exodus, exile, restoration. What do you have? even chronologically exact. Exodus, exile, restoration. You have a summary of Old Testament history. You have a summary of the Old Testament, and the experience of the people of God in the prior dispensation.

But what’s the purpose of it? Why? Why this neat, compressed, compact summation of Israel’s history and experience. Is it not for the purpose of declaring to the hearer and the reader that the Son of God, in his humiliation, motivated as he is by his love for his people, has thoroughly identified himself with his people and with their history?

It is not a matter of him standing at a distance from their experience, it is a matter of him entering into it. It is as if now Jesus is reliving Israel’s history in its entirety, and so it must be for him in order that he might be the covenantal head of the people. But consider this also. Having taken the history of Israel to himself, he is the one now who comes through that history—Exodus, Exile, Restoration—as that one specifically who bears Israel’s sins and judgments, but also is constitutive of the content of their righteousness.

Israel failed at every point. Read the account of the Exodus. Read the account of the exile. Read about the restoration. Israel failed. But now Jesus takes the history and the experience to himself, and he is perfect. So Jesus relives Israel’s history and becomes the fulfillment of that history, clearly identifying with Israel.

So what? I’m not a Jew. So what? Well you see, Matthew 2 verses 13 through 23 is prelude in Matthew’s Gospel. Just like Israel’s history is prelude to the history of the Church, and the Christ who so graciously enters Israel’s history graciously envelops our history, his church’s history. All of it, its past, its present, its future.

And you will note in this regard that Matthew has already tipped us off concerning his intention, for he has told us In chapter 1, verse 23, inciting another Old Testament text, Isaiah 7.14, that this one Jesus, virgin-born, shall be specifically identified as Immanuel, God with us. And as Jesus has been present with Israel in its exodus, exile, and restoration, so he has also been present God with us in His Church through its ancient and medieval and Reformation and modern situation.

There is no circumstance and situation which the Church can encounter that Jesus has not already encountered. Our success, our strength, our perseverance, our endurance is only because we are related to the One who has taken our history to himself. He has taken the most grand, eloquent aspects of our existence, the most sublime, the high-level matters of the Church, and having taken the highest, you can be assured he has also taken the lowest. Is there any detail of your existence? that Jesus is not familiar with.

He, in sustaining his church, is sustaining you as an individual. The Emmanuel, God with us, is specifically the Savior of his church, but he is also the Savior of the individuals who make up that church. Matthew declares even to Israel the hidden presence of the Son of God throughout Israel’s past history. He also declares to us the Son of God’s hidden presence for the sake of his hidden kingdom for the present time, even to the end of the age.

Do you know that he is near, that he is in our midst, that he is with you? O Lord, is there anything left out in your consideration of us? No, rather, there is whole sufficiency in your plan and purpose and in the execution of it, even as all this comes to center in Christ. And in him, O God, we find nothing lacking. Therefore, Lord, we will not despair, nor will we give in to discouragement, because you are with us, even as it has been declared to us by your servant Matthew, in the power of the Holy Spirit. We praise you for our Savior, Jesus Christ. In whose name we pray, amen.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.