The Prophet Micah even pinpointed the town of the future king’s birth-Bethlehem, David’s hometown (Mic. From this point in history onward, the Jewish prophets and people based their Messianic hope on a future descendant of David. In 2 Samuel 7, God promised David that one of his descendants would rule an eternal kingdom: “thine house and thy kingdom shall be established forever before thee thy throne shall be established forever” (2 Sam. The most important prediction of this coming king is known as the Davidic Covenant. Not only will this man crush Satan, He will also receive the worship of the nations. Second, all the peoples of the world will obey this king. First, Shiloh (either a title for the Messiah or a description of Him as “the one to whom the scepter belongs”) will have a scepter, the mark of a king. It also describes two important aspects of His work.

This text narrows the source of the Messiah’s lineage to the tribe of Judah.

Jacob pronounced these prophetic words: “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come and unto him shall the gathering of the people be” (Gen. Although brief and compact, this verse contains all the seeds that unfold in the rest of divine history.Īnother promise shines brightly from the first book of the Old Testament. God promised to provide a male from the chosen line of His people who would destroy the tempter. But at that very time, God pronounced the Devil’s doom: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed he shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel” (Gen. The world and all its creatures fell under the curse of corruption and sin, and Satan thought he had won a victory. In the earliest time period described in the Bible, God planned to provide someone who would right the wrongs of this world. Jesus has come, but things are not as good as the song suggests-yet. The nations of the world have no desire to prove God’s righteousness and revel in His love.

I still weed garden beds and prick myself on thorns. In this well-known carol, “Joy to the World,” Isaac Watts expressed the thrill of the Messiah’s birth by describing events that just don’t seem to exist. They make me wonder what the author really intended. At times I become perplexed with the words of a favorite Christmas carol.

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