#DailyDevotion Jesus Is YHWH, Israel’s King & Redeemer. The First & Last
Isaiah 446“The LORD, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the LORD of armies, says: ‘I am the First, and I am the Last, and there is no God besides Me.
So this is a pretty loaded verse. In the very least we have several things here we need to look at: The LORD, the King of Israel, Redeemer, the First and the Last.
First there is LORD. When you see LORD in all capital letters (usually the L is normal font and ORD is in a smaller font) this is the name God had given Israel to call him. You may see it in places in the Hebrew YHWH, Yahweh or Jehovah. Hebrew didn’t have vowel marks at one time. Grammatically speaking it is most likely pronounce Yahweh. At some point the Jews quit pronouncing this name in reverence to it and would Adonai (Lord) instead. Eventually someone took the vowels of Adonai and inserted them into the consonants and that is how we got Jehovah. God told Moses he was AHWH (Aethweh) I am. The people confess back to him YHWH (Yahweh) You are.
When we confess Jesus is Lord in the New Testament, what we are saying by the Holy Spirit and only by the Holy Spirit is Jesus is LORD, YHWH, Jehovah in the flesh. There are a couple of places in the New Testament he is also called Lord i.e. adonai. But when St. Paul says no one can confess Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit he means YHWH, the King of Israel and Israel’s Redeemer. Plenty of heretics, false teachers can say Jesus is Lord, i.e. Lord or ruler etc.. They cannot and will not confess he YHWH though.
The LORD said he was Israel’s king in Exodus through Deuteronomy. He gave them a fleshly king when they rejected him as king in 1 Samuel. He gave them Saul and then David. He them made a promise to David that He would join Himself to David’s house one day, i.e. become David’s seed, descendent. We do not see any of David’s sons ruling forever. The royal rulership over Israel and Judah stopped with the Babylonians. Jesus, the son of David, is the promised LORD who would join himself with David’s seed and house. He was rightly crucified with the charge, “King of the Jews.” The Jewish leadership of his day also rejected him as king as their fathers did when they said, “We have no king but Caesar!”
Jesus is the LORD, Israel’s Redeemer. He is the One who Redeemed Israel from the Egyptians. He is the One who Redeemed them from the Babylonians. Jesus is the Holy One of Israel who redeems not only Israel but the whole world with his innocent and precious blood. To redeem is to pay someone’s debt. Our debt is our life, the soul who sins must die. In the shedding of blood, in dying Jesus has taken on our debt and we have been freed from death.
In Revelation the Father says He is the First and the Last. Jesus says He is the First and the Last. Jesus and the Father are One God and One LORD. Jesus is the eternal one who through everything was created, visible and invisible. Jesus is the King of Israel, the Redeemer, YHWH.
Heavenly Father, you sent your only begotten Son Jesus Christ to be our King and our Redeemer. Grant us your Holy Spirit that we may confess and believe in him as such. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.