Wonderful Counselor

Introduction

Part A

We will spend the next four weeks primarily in one passage, one verse of Scripture is so packed with eternal and powerful truths that as much I will try we will not unearth all of it. But by the grace of God it will be sufficient for this season as we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.

This celebration is somewhat controversial among Christians because we share this celebration with the world. A lot of deities of antiquity have December 25 as their celebration point.

You can do a scholarly search on Christmas and find whatever opinion you prefer. In other words, there really is no scholarly consensus about why or how Christian came to celebrate the birth of Christ on Dec 25

There are several competing explanations:

Dec 25 is a pagan holiday celebrating the birth of the sun. Christians adapted and countered that pagan idea with the celebration of the true light of the world. (Roman times)

For various reasons, early church fathers believed that Jesus was conceived on March 25, around the time of his death… and 9 months later…

So the question is which explanation came first?

“Oxford Companion to Christian Thought: “the hypothesis that December 25 was chosen for celebrating the birth of Jesus on the basis of the belief that his conception occurred on March 25 ‘potentially establishes December 25 as a Christian festival before the Aurelian decree which when promulgated might have provided for the Christian feast both an opportunity and a challenge’”

So, they don’t know. I don’t know either and I do not care. What we are going to do is concentrate on the facts we do know. We know that he was born and there is a nature to who he is even at birth as prophesied by the prophet Isaiah. We will concentrate on one particular prophetic utterance of Isaiah for the next 4 weeks found in Isaiah 9:6.

Part B

His name means "the Lord is Salvation"

Ministered throughout the reigns of 4 kings of Judah: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah from 739- 686BC... 700 years BC.

He was perhaps a member of the nobility he had access to the royal court.

Isaiah gladly accepted even volunteered for the call to his prophetic ministry in the year that king Uzziah died, (when He saw the Lord high and lifted up Isa 6:1) even though he understood that his ministry would be fruitless from his standpoint: Isa 6:8-10

Isaiah 6:8–10 (NIV)

8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” 9 He said, “Go and tell this people: “ ‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’ 10 Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”

Isaiah's Importance

It is directly quoted over 65 times in the NT

Quoted far more than any other prophet in the OT

He is mentioned by name over 20 times in the NT

He is called the evangelical prophet.  He speaks more about Messianic activity than any other.

Chapter 7, 9, and 11 describe the entrance, characteristics, and glorious future reign of the Messiah, but chapter 53, toward the end of the book gives a much different picture

Chap 53 is the Fulcrum of the Entire Universe.  It is the pivot point of all of history.

The two ethnic roots of Judaism are actually divided over Isaiah 53. The Ashkenazi Jews were so disturbed by this chapter that they removed it from their Bible altogether. The Sephardic Jews thankfully left it in.

Some Jewish scholars actually suggest that Isaiah 53 was a later addition by Christian sects in order to authenticate the person and work of Jesus Christ.

In 1946 a couple of teenage brothers stumbled upon the greatest discovery ever:  while searching for a lost goat along the shores of the dead see in Qumran, these kids bumped into The dead Sea Scrolls:  Which had large representative manuscripts of every OT Book.

But the book of Isaiah was complete and what we find there? Isaiah 53, a stumbling block to the unbelieving historian and scholar.  This copy of Isaiah dats to the second century before Christ.

Two hundred years that predates the birth of Jesus, is at least 200 years before the birth of Christianity, 200 years before even a dream of a possible Christian conspiracy to make the historically verifiable facts about Jesus a later insertion.  Isaiah 53.

Meet & Potatoes

Isaiah 9:6 (NASB95)

6 For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

Us… the nation of Israel for sure but the us also applies to all nations. God promised Abraham:

Genesis 22:18 (NIV)

18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

This sentiment is reiterated in Acts 3:25.

The birth of a child denotes that this would be a human child, but he is not our Son. The son is not born to us or from us, the Son is given to us. Someone else’s son is given. The Father gives his son, begotten in eternity.

Micah 5:2 (NASB95)

2 “But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Too little to be among the clans of Judah, From you One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel. His goings forth are from long ago, From the days of eternity.”

This child born to us, this Son given to us begins his human life at a predetermined moment in history. It is that predetermined moment that we celebrate this season, but He Himself is eternally old. In John we learn that in the beginning there was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God.

It is at His incarnation that the Word became flesh and lived among us humans.

The heart of Isaiah’s promise is that God will send a king who will lead Israel and the entire world. This is denoted by the Hebrew word mis-rah… translated as government in your Bibles which really means to rule, to have absolute dominion… which will be on his shoulders.

The attributes of this king will be a source of hope and joy for all people. Isaiah describes the attributes and makes them personal and inseparable attributes which is the reason why he says that His Name shall be call. The word name sem is also translated as standing, reputation, fame. It is not that His names are, but that His name is...

The perfection of this King is seen in his qualification for ruling (Wonderful Counsellor), his person and power (Mighty God), his relationship to his subjects (Everlasting Father) and the society his rule creates (Prince of Peace).

Let’s talk about his first attribute, name, title, putative qualification as Wonderful Counselor. There are no commas in ancient Hebrew, so which is it. Most scholars prefer Wonderful Counselor, arguing that wonderful is used as an adjective which serves a modifier or describer of the noun Counselor. However, in my studies I see that it could also be a noun. Let’s look at these two words

Wonderful pe-le denotes something unusual or supernatural, something too difficult, something miraculous.

Scholars have agreed for centuries that when the bible refers to the angel of the LORD it refers to the pre-incarnate Christ. Do not be thrown by the word angel, it only means messenger. Anyone can bring a message without being an angelic being.

In Judges the Angel of the LORD gave Samson’s instructions concerning how to raise Samson, and Manoah was curious about the Person the Being talking to him...

Judges 13:17–22 (NASB95)

17 Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, “What is your name, so that when your words come to pass, we may honor you?” 18 But the angel of the Lord said to him, “Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful?” 19 So Manoah took the young goat with the grain offering and offered it on the rock to the Lord, and He performed wonders while Manoah and his wife looked on. 20 For it came about when the flame went up from the altar toward heaven, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar. When Manoah and his wife saw this, they fell on their faces to the ground. 21 Now the angel of the Lord did not appear to Manoah or his wife again. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of the Lord. 22 So Manoah said to his wife, “We will surely die, for we have seen God.”

Here we see that same word pe-le “wonderful” used again. It definitely could stand alone. But put together with the word Counselor yo-tse (to advise, to plan, decide). Has to do with wisdom which is beyond comprehension, beyond limitation, supernatural, it is a wonder.

Wonderful-Counselor’ emphasizes primarily that he will be most effective in planning, in formulating a plan for action. A great work is to be done by him, even the greatest ever attempted. But he had an adequate plan, the only one ever devised that measured up to the things to be attempted. In fact the very plan as such is a marvel; therefore: ‘a marvel of a counselor,’ as the term may also be translated.

In John 2:24-25 we are told that he knew all men knowing himself what was in every man.

In Colossians 2:3 we are told that in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

In John 7:46 we see temple guards confessing that never a man had spoken the way He spoke.

Matthew 7:29 it is recorded that Jesus spoke as one with authority, not like the other religious leaders

Multiple times in the book of Revelation Jesus says “I know your works.”

Isaiah’s prophecy called for the people to anticipate a person who would come and bring about foundational hope for the world.

Seeing Jesus as the Wonderful Counselor, one who is fully capable of leading and ruling the world at large is critical to our understanding how he governs now and our confidence that he will govern this way forever.

In these dark times, we must make the decision to be ruled by this Wonderful Merciful Savior. Accept his word, his counsel for our lives.