by Ptr. Art Calaguas<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Shalom. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As mentioned last week, what the Lord instructed his disciples (i.e., to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers and cast out demons) when he sent them out earlier as narrated only in Matthew 10:8, should be seen in parallel with the continuous occurring of such events contained in the Lord\u2019s reply to John\u2019s disciples (Matthew 11:5; cf. Luke 7:22). The Lord Jesus and even the Twelve were performing these miracles over a wide geographical area. Even if the Lord did not directly answer John\u2019s query if he was indeed the \u201cthe One Coming\u201d or \u201cthe One Who was to Come\u201d or \u201cthe Expected One,\u201d the answer was quite obvious. As translated last week, the core assertion of his answer was:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
5<\/sup>(the) blind see, and (the) lame walk, lepers (are) cleansed, and (the) deaf hear, and (the) dead (are) raised, and (the) poor (are) evangelized;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n As also stated last week, Matthew and Luke would have known that the Lord Jesus was quoting Old Testament (OT) scripture; that the Lord was doing these miracles in fulfillment of what was prophesied about the Messiah. It is now time to examine the consensus of Biblical scholars that the messianic prophecies of the Prophet Isaiah were unmistakably being quoted or alluded to in his answer to John\u2019s disciples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Apparently, the Lord Jesus was alluding to Isaiah 29:18-19; 35:4- 6 and 61:1-2, among others. The following are the relevant passages (all from the NIV Bible):<\/p>\n\n\n\n Isaiah 29:18-19<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup>18<\/sup><\/em>In that day the deaf will hear the words of the scroll,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>and out of gloom and darkness<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>the eyes of the blind will see.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>19<\/sup><\/em>Once more the humble will rejoice in the LORD;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>the needy will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Isaiah 35:4-6<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>4<\/sup><\/em> say to those with fearful hearts <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBe strong, do not fear;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>your God will come,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>he will come with vengeance;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>with divine retribution<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>he will come to save you.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>5<\/sup><\/em>Then will the eyes of the blind be opened<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>and the ears of the deaf unstopped.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>6<\/sup><\/em>Then will the lame leap like a deer,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>and the mute tongue shout for joy.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>Water will gush forth in the wilderness<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n and streams in the desert.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Isaiah 61:1-2<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>1<\/sup><\/em>The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>because the Lord has anointed me<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>to proclaim good news to the poor.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>to proclaim freedom for the captives<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>and release from darkness for the prisoners,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>2<\/sup><\/em>to proclaim the year of the LORD’S favor<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/em>and the day of vengeance of our God,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/sup><\/em>to comfort all who mourn,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The messianic signs and wonders are mentioned in parallel in the 3 Isaiah passages. Among others, Isaiah 29:18 speaks of the deaf being able to hear and the blind being able to see. Isaiah 35:5 says the same about the restoration of sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf. Then its next verse says that lame will be able to leap and the dumb able to shout for joy. Lastly, Isaiah 61:1 speaks about the proclamation of the Good News to the poor and also the recovery of sight for the blind (in LXX version). Most of the things mentioned in Matthew 11:5 (cf. Luke 7:22) come as fulfillments of what Isaiah had prophesied hundreds of years before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [Note that almost all of Isaiah 61:1-2 (apparently the LXX version) was quoted by our Lord Jesus in Luke 4:18-19. When we get to our studies of the Gospel of Luke, we will get deeper into this. For now, we will just keep our discussion to the immediately succeeding paragraph.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n The last phrase for the Hebrew (MT) version of Isaiah 61:1 (\u05e4\u05b0\u05bc\u05e7\u05b7\u05d7\u05be\u05e7\u05b9\u05bd\u05d5\u05d7\u05b7) is translated by the NIV as \u201cand release from darkness for the prisoners,<\/em>\u201d (cf. ESV: \u201cand the opening of the prison to those who are bound;<\/em>\u201d; cf. NASB: \u201cAnd freedom to prisoners;<\/em>\u201d). However, the Septuagint (LXX) has its Greek translation as \u03ba\u03b1<\/em>\u1f76<\/em> \u03c4\u03c5\u03c6\u03bb\u03bf<\/em>\u1fd6<\/em>\u03c2 <\/em>\u1f00<\/em>\u03bd<\/em>\u03ac<\/em>\u03b2\u03bb\u03b5\u03c8\u03b9\u03bd<\/em> which can be translated as \u201cand (to the) blind recovery of sight<\/em>.\u201d If we take the LXX version for this then all 3 different Isaiah passages speak of the blind recovering their sight on \u201cthe day of vengeance of our LORD\u201d (Isaiah 61:2); or the day when God will come to save (Isaiah 35:4); or simply, in \u201cthat day\u201d (Isaiah 29:18). <\/p>\n\n\n\n It is evident from the Isaiah verses quoted above that the messianic \u201cday of the LORD\u201d (salvation) for the Jews is being referred to. It was the expectation of the Jews during that 1st<\/sup> century AD that the messianic era referred to by these Isaiah passages will usher in miraculous signs by God himself or his messianic agent. Redemption will be accompanied by fulfillment of prophecies, healing miracles such as the blind being able to see, the lame walk, the deaf hear, the Gospel proclaimed\/preached, the lepers being cleansed and even the raising of the dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The raising of the dead is another special case similar to the cleansing of leprosy that we had discussed last week. Only in Matthew 10:8 did the Lord explicitly command the Twelve to \u201craise the dead,\u201d while the mention of the dead being raised grouped together with the other miraculous signs and wonders is only found in Matthew 11:5 and Luke 7:22. Furthermore, very few scriptural passages explicitly refer to the raising of the dead (resurrection), let alone prophesy about this. However, the Dead Sea Scrolls have a manuscript that includes<\/em> a prophecy about raising the dead when the Messiah comes!<\/p>\n\n\n\n We will continue next week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n God bless us all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Ptr. Art Calaguas Shalom. As mentioned last week, what the Lord instructed his disciples (i.e., to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers and cast out demons) when he sent them out earlier as narrated only in Matthew 10:8, should be seen in parallel with the continuous occurring of such events contained in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[6,7,18,9,8,5],"class_list":["post-216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ptr-art-calaguas","tag-church-of-the-risen-lord","tag-crl","tag-jesus","tag-spiritual-refreshment-of-the-day","tag-upcemi","tag-upcrl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":217,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions\/217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/upcrl.org\/refreshment\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}