I was asked a question recently about how to understand a
well-known prophecy from 2 Samuel 7.
David had been given rest from all his enemies and purposed to build a
house for Yahweh. But Yahweh told
David not to build a house for Him, but that Yahweh would build a house for
David:
“…the LORD declares to
you that the LORD will make you a house. 12 When your days are fulfilled and
you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who
shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He shall build
a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14
I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits
iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the
sons of men, 15 but my steadfast love will not depart from him, as I took it
from Saul, whom I put away from before you. 16 And your house and your kingdom
shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever.”
(2Sa 7:11-16)
This prophecy is recognized in the New Testament as being
fulfilled in Jesus Christ (Heb 1:5).
And yet, this prophecy speaks of David’s son committing iniquity. So how can this prophecy really be about Jesus? There is no sense in which Jesus
sinned, is there?
There are couple of things to keep in mind when we are
considering Messianic prophecy.
The first is that biblical prophecy often has both a near-term
fulfillment and an ultimate fulfillment.
For example, Isaiah 7:14 reads: Therefore
the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and
bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. This is understood by Matthew to be a reference to Jesus in
Matthew 1:23. Yet, the surrounding
context of Isaiah 7-8 seems to point to a nearer-term fulfillment in the birth
of Isaiah’s son, Maher-shalal-hash-baz.
With both prophecies, 2 Sam 7 and Isa 7, there are elements
that do not perfectly fit Jesus, but rather look more like Solomon and
Maher-shalal-hash-baz, respectively.
This is not so troubling when we consider a second principle
of biblical prophecy: the Old Testament shows a pattern of imperfect shadows
pointing to the ultimate work of Jesus.
These patterns are much easier to spot when either reading through the
Old Testament very quickly or when intentionally looking at the big picture
storyline. In Gen 1-3, we see God
setting up a kingdom on earth in which man lived in fellowship with God and
ruled as God’s steward. But Adam
sinned, leading to a pattern of God approaching man to re-establishing the
relationship but man not keeping his end of the deal.
Therefore, the Flood shows God wiping the slate clean and
starting over with Noah. This is
why we find language in Gen 9 that is just like language in Gen 1 (“Be fruitful
and multiply…”). We see man asserting
himself against God again in Gen 11 (the Tower of Babel), and God essentially starting
over again with Abram in Gen 12. The nation of Israel then represents the most vivid and
long-term picture of man’s inability to live in fellowship with God. The NT shows Jesus as the answer to
this problem.
In a similar way, Solomon was an imperfect shadow of Christ
in that he was the son of David and he did build a house for God (2 Sam 7:13,
cf 1 Kings 6), yet, he was sinful and his legacy led to a rending of Israel
into two kingdoms and eventually into exile and oppression under numerous
foreign powers. Jesus is the more
perfect and ultimate Son of David (Matt 1:1), who never sinned and who is
building a glorious house for God, the church (Eph 2:19-22).
The ancient Near Eastern mind had no problem with this
understanding of fulfillment, an understanding that is looser than our modern
Western minds are comfortable with.
We look for verbatim fulfillments.
They looked for shadows and shapes. This is why New Testament authors had no qualms not only linking
odd OT passages to Jesus, but also to quoting them imprecisely. If the apostles had not problem with
this kind of interpretation of prophecy, neither should we! We should not impose our modern Western
standards of fulfillment on ancient Near Eastern documents. Further, that there are near-term
imperfect fulfillments gives us all the more reason to rejoice in the ultimate
fulfillment in Christ!
If you ever have any questions about theology, bible
interpretation, or Christian living, please let me know. Any question you have is most likely on
the minds of others as well. If
appropriate, I’ll be happy to answer that question here for the benefit of all.
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