Names of Jesus in Isaiah: THE MIGHTY GOD
Hebrews 1:1-4 - Victory Fellowship
December 5, 2021 - Rev. Roderick Grabski
2nd Sunday of Advent
ISAIAH WANTS TO INTRODUCE YOU TO JESUS!
In Isaiah 9:6 Jesus is named: For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
Our focus the next couple of weeks will be on these names. Last week we started with Wonderful Counselor. The Hebrew word (pele) translated "wonderful" in this verse signifies something indescribably great; something so tremendous, so amazing, that it’s literally beyond description. (Miracle)
This week our focus is on The Mighty God. The Hebrew words for “Mighty God” are El Gibbor. “El” is the noun in the phrase. “Gibbor” is the adjective that modifies the noun. “El” is the shortened form of “Elohim,” which is the most common name used for God in the Old Testament. When the Bible says in its very first verse in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” the word for God there is “Elohim.”
Whenever the shortened form “el” is used, instead of “Elohim,” in the Bible, “el” always describes “The Mighty God.” Which is very interesting, because “Gibbor” the second word in the phrase, is an adjective that modifies mighty God. And gibbor itself means, “Mighty.” So literally, what Isaiah 9:6 is saying is, “And he will be called… The Mighty, Mighty God.
Isaiah prophesized that Jesus would be called “The Mighty God”.
To state that “Jesus is God” explains Jesus’ exalted position - but “mighty” helps us to understand the character of His God-head. We don’t use the word “mighty” too often, but its Biblical use would include the words “powerful” and “strong”. We use the word “powerful” to include armies and aromas, speech, strength, certain men & women, motors and much more.
The word for “mighty” means “strong” or “strength”, but it is the intensive form of the word - so Jesus is stronger or mightier than all the rest. In the Biblical sense, Jesus is immutably strong. He is eternally strong. His strength prevails against any forces.
Jesus is always and consistently powerful and strong. He offers change for us in His birth, life, death and resurrection. He offers renewed strength and new life to us from his inexhaustible and unchangeable strength as the Mighty God.
Jesus is also self-sufficiently strong. Self-sufficient strength does not hope for enough of anything in order to satisfy itself. Jesus doesn’t need outside help or resources to remain strong. He doesn’t need spiritual vitamins or flu shots. Jesus had been designated and promised from all eternity - before the world began - to be the Savior. Jesus was born to accomplish His saving task; but He was not BORN mighty. He was ALWAYS mighty, and proved in His earthly task, to be MIGHTY to save.
In His flesh, He was “found in appearance as a man in order to humble Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:8)
The Mighty God appeared “in the flesh” “as a man” in order to accomplish His role as Savior. And He was self-sufficient to accomplish that task. Humanly speaking, that may be difficult to understand, but spiritually speaking it is crystal clear because God is God, Jesus Christ is always Mighty God.
Hebrews 1:2-3 says: “In these last days (since Jesus was born until He comes again,) (God) has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. 3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.”
Jesus did not sit down at the right hand of the Majesty because He earned that position; He sat down at the place he vacated IN ORDER to accomplish the task for which He came to earth as Mighty God: to provide purification for sins which He had promised since Genesis! Jesus needed no one else’s strength to accomplish sin’s payment for us. He is self-sufficient and mighty to save.
Lastly, this word “Mighty” means “strong”, “strength” or “most powerful”, but its most primitive word, it means to “bind up anything that is broken.”
In other words, Jesus as MIGHTY God, “binds up” the weak to make them strong.
In Psalm 147:3, it says that God “heals the brokenhearted (literally, those who are broken in pieces, those who are crushed and crippled, smashed to smithereens!) and binds (or bandages) up their wounds.”
What things does the Mighty God have to “bind up” for you through Jesus Christ? Hurt, disappointment, feelings of failure, economic insecurity, guilt from having made wrong choices, forgiveness for anything, freedom from the past, fear of the future?
Jesus promises to bind up our wounds and brokenness because He is the Wonderful Counselor, and the Mighty God. He comes to FIX: to refresh, renew, repair and redeem anything that is broken or crushed. He guarantees to forgive, heal, to comfort and encourage, no matter what the cause or cost. He supplies and provides for ALL of our needs while He accompanies us always, protecting and defending with the inexhaustible power, but also compassion of the Mighty God.
A very basic question is always asked around Christmas: Who is this Jesus who was born in Bethlehem? We know that one of His names is Mighty God! Why? Because He has been Mighty in our lives!
PRAYER
SONG: Born in Bethlehem
Hebrews 1:1-4 NLT
1:1 Long ago God spoke many times and in many ways to our ancestors through the prophets. 2 And now in these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son. God promised everything to the Son as an inheritance, and through the Son he created the universe. 3 The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God, and he sustains everything by the mighty power of his command. When he had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honor at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven. 4 This shows that the Son is far greater than the angels, just as the name God gave him is greater than their names.
