Latest / Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers / #80 What's Up with the Virgin Birth?

Transcript

#80 What's Up with the Virgin Birth? · Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_02: Hey everyone, Tim Wright here along with John Burgess and Terry Summers.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: We want to wish you a very happy Advent, a Merry Christmas.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_02: Normally we have music to start our podcast,
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: but I didn't get a chance to download some Christmas music.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: So we're going to start.
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  She doesn't know this yet,
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  but Terry is going to open up the show by singing Oh Holy
• 0:20
  Night.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_02: Take it away, Terry.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, let me just go gargle first.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Gargle so I can hit those high notes.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_02: Thank goodness it's not me.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_02: I think she's passing.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_02: So we'll just do a little bit of this.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_02: Here we go.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_02: There we go.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_02: The next time I'll make sure I download a little bit of Christmas music.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: So here's what we're going to do.
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  SPEAKER_02: We're in the Advent season, which means a time of anticipation.
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  SPEAKER_02: We're focused on the birth of Jesus.
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  The whole world is focused on the birth of Jesus,
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  as we talked about last week.
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  SPEAKER_02: And today,
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  what we want to do this week and next week is look at Luke's
• 1:03
  telling of the birth
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: stories of Jesus and what he's up to in the telling of these stories.
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  And I don't want people to get nervous and suddenly think Tim's
• 1:14
  going to tell us
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_02: these aren't true stories.
• 1:17
  But Luke is doing something very,
• 1:19
  very important in these birth stories,
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  as does Matthew.
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  SPEAKER_02: And John has a very different kind of birth story, so does Mark.
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  But Luke is using these birth stories to say something about
• 1:33
  Jesus before we get
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: into the actual Jesus story that he writes in his gospel.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: So we're going to look today at Luke chapter 1, verse 26 to 38.
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  SPEAKER_02: And rather than singing,
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_02: O Holy Night,
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  we will have Terry read about the months that happened prior to
• 1:50
  that O Holy Night.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy,
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  SPEAKER_01: God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth,
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  SPEAKER_01: a village in Galilee,
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  SPEAKER_01: to a virgin named Mary.
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  She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph,
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  a descendant of King David.
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  SPEAKER_01: Gabriel appeared to her and said, Greetings, favored woman.
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  SPEAKER_01: The Lord is with you.
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  SPEAKER_01: Confused and disturbed, Mary tried to think what the angel could mean.
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  Don't be afraid,
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  Mary,
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  the angel told her,
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  for you have found favor with God.
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  SPEAKER_01: You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus.
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  SPEAKER_01: He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David,
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: and he will reign over Israel forever.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: His kingdom will never end.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: Mary asked the angel, But how can this happen?
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm a virgin.
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  SPEAKER_01: The angel replied,
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  the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most
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  High will overshadow you.
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  SPEAKER_01: So the baby to be born will be holy and he will be called the Son of God.
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  SPEAKER_01: What's more, your relative Elizabeth has become pregnant in her old age.
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  People used to say she was barren,
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  but she has conceived a son and is now in her sixth month.
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  SPEAKER_01: For the word of God will never fail.
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  SPEAKER_01: Mary responded, I am the Lord's servant.
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  SPEAKER_01: May everything you have said about me come true.
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  SPEAKER_01: And then the angel left her.
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  SPEAKER_02: So we have these different birth stories in Matthew and Luke.
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  SPEAKER_02: They're the ones that really focus on birth stories.
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  SPEAKER_02: Mark starts us right away with Jesus' ministry,
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  SPEAKER_02: and John starts from not just the birth story,
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  SPEAKER_02: but the beginning of time.
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  And what we're going to focus on today is what the writers are
• 4:34
  trying to say
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  SPEAKER_02: through their birth stories.
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  SPEAKER_02: A couple of things.
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  SPEAKER_02: Let's just remind ourselves the Bible was not written to us.
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  SPEAKER_02: It is written for us.
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  SPEAKER_02: Right.
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  SPEAKER_02: For us.
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  SPEAKER_02: So this was written some 2000 years ago.
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  SPEAKER_02: using the techniques of writing back then,
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  SPEAKER_02: the genres of writing back then to communicate stories,
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  SPEAKER_02: writing to a particular audience.
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  SPEAKER_02: Luke in particular is the only non-Jewish writer in the New Testament.
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  SPEAKER_02: And so he's writing to a pretty strong non-Jewish Roman world.
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  And we will see throughout his gospel that he sort of compares
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  and contrasts Jesus
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  SPEAKER_02: with the Roman emperor and the power of Rome.
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  SPEAKER_02: Matthew's writing to a Jewish audience.
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  SPEAKER_02: And it's only Matthew and Luke who refer to Mary being a virgin.
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  SPEAKER_02: Matthew traces it back to the fulfillment of Scripture in Isaiah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Luke makes no mention of a prophecy about having to be born to a virgin.
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  SPEAKER_02: The first thing that we want to know.
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  Second thing that I think is really interesting in
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  understanding birth stories is
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  is that birth stories don't become important until after the
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  person is an adult and
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  SPEAKER_02: you realize that person is special.
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  SPEAKER_02: Right?
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  SPEAKER_02: And so when you are articulating their life story,
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  SPEAKER_02: particularly back in ancient times,
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  you would then put a birth story to their story to show that
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  they were right from
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  SPEAKER_02: the beginning,
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  SPEAKER_02: special.
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  SPEAKER_02: We think,
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  SPEAKER_02: for example,
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  SPEAKER_02: of the birth story of Moses,
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  SPEAKER_02: who became the leader of the people of Israel,
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  SPEAKER_02: led them out of slavery in Egypt through the waters.
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  SPEAKER_02: And so this birth story is added to his story.
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  SPEAKER_02: That's not to say it's true or not true,
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  SPEAKER_02: but it's meant to say from the very beginning,
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  SPEAKER_02: his mother saw that he was beautiful,
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  SPEAKER_02: that there was something about him,
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  SPEAKER_02: and the Egyptian princess saw him and saw there's something beautiful.
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  SPEAKER_02: He shouldn't be killed.
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  SPEAKER_02: And this birth story shows us,
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  SPEAKER_02: looking back from who Moses was,
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  SPEAKER_02: looking back now,
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  SPEAKER_02: yeah,
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  SPEAKER_02: even in his birth,
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  SPEAKER_02: he was special.
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  SPEAKER_02: But you don't know they're special when they're born.
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  SPEAKER_02: Well,
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  SPEAKER_02: every child born is special,
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  but you don't know that they're going to be this guy who's
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  going to save the world.
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  SPEAKER_02: So birth stories,
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  SPEAKER_02: especially in the ancient world,
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  SPEAKER_02: tend to be written after they were famous adults,
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  And oftentimes were written to say,
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  pay attention,
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  this person is special and significant.
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  SPEAKER_02: Look at what their birth story tells us.
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  SPEAKER_02: In the case of Luke,
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  SPEAKER_02: and in the case of Matthew,
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  they are using their birth stories not only to say that Jesus
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  was special from the
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  SPEAKER_02: very beginning,
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  SPEAKER_02: but they're using them theologically to
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  SPEAKER_02: to say something theological about who Jesus is.
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  SPEAKER_02: And we'll get into that here in a few moments.
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  SPEAKER_02: So we'll keep that in mind.
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  SPEAKER_02: And then finally,
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  the thing that I stumbled across a few years ago that I found
• 8:01
  really fascinating,
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  SPEAKER_02: we've talked about this,
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  SPEAKER_02: I think,
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  SPEAKER_02: when we did Mark's gospel.
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  SPEAKER_02: The gospel writers,
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  SPEAKER_02: and we'll just use Luke as an example,
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  SPEAKER_02: he uses his birth story sort of as his overture to the movie.
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  SPEAKER_02: So if you think about the old,
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  SPEAKER_02: I don't know,
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  SPEAKER_02: I haven't seen the new Wicked movies yet,
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  SPEAKER_02: so I don't know if they have the musical overture or not.
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  But in Sound of Music,
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  it's just celebrating its 60th anniversary this year.
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  SPEAKER_00: Really?
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  SPEAKER_02: That movie opens up with this orchestral overture.
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  SPEAKER_02: And what does it play?
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  SPEAKER_02: Snippets from the songs that will be coming up.
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  And the point of the overture is to get you ready for the story
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  that's going to be told.
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  SPEAKER_02: It's giving you little touch points.
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  And so Luke is using his birth stories to begin to tease out
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  the theological points
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  SPEAKER_02: and the story points he's going to make later when Jesus is an adult.
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  SPEAKER_02: And he's getting us ready for them.
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  SPEAKER_02: And again,
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  we'll talk more about that as we go along today and then next
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  week when we look at
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  SPEAKER_02: Luke chapter 2.
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  SPEAKER_02: So all of that together.
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  SPEAKER_02: Birth stories were often written after the person was famous.
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  SPEAKER_02: It was meant to say, pay attention.
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  Even in the birth,
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  we knew that there was something special about this person.
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  SPEAKER_02: The Gospels are written in a different world than we live in.
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  So we need to understand how it was written,
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  why it was written,
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  and what it says to us today.
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  And then we really want to pay attention to what Luke is
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  telling us theologically
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  SPEAKER_02: about Jesus through these birth stories.
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  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_02: So I'll sort of pause there and take a breath.
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  SPEAKER_02: That's all introduction before we get to the really good stuff.
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  SPEAKER_02: All right.
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  SPEAKER_02: So any comments, questions?
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  SPEAKER_01: No, I had not ever heard any of that before.
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  SPEAKER_02: what you just said.
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  SPEAKER_03: Me too.
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  SPEAKER_03: This is new material.
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  SPEAKER_02: So let's talk a little bit about what's going on here.
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  There's a couple different ways to get at this particular
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  telling of the birth of Jesus.
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  Luke's Gospel starts out with two old people who are unable to
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  have children.
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  SPEAKER_02: Zechariah and Elizabeth.
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  And Zechariah goes into the temple and he has a vision of an
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  angel saying,
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  SPEAKER_02: you are going to be the father of John.
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  SPEAKER_02: I want you to call him John.
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  And he is going to be the one who will prepare the way for
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  Jesus,
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  for the Messiah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Now,
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  SPEAKER_02: Elizabeth is too old to have children and she's barren,
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  SPEAKER_02: meaning she never had the ability to have children to begin with.
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  Zechariah,
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  we're assuming,
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  was so old that shooting blanks,
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  for lack of a better word,
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  right?
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  SPEAKER_02: Right, okay.
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  So they're not able to have children,
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  have never been able to have children.
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  SPEAKER_02: And now suddenly in their old age, they're going to have a child.
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  SPEAKER_02: Does this remind you of anybody from the Old Testament?
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  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sarah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Sarah and Abraham, right?
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  SPEAKER_02: And there's another story where the prophet Samuel,
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  who becomes one of the great prophets in the early history of
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  the Jewish kingdom,
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  was the one who chose Saul to be the first king and then chose
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  David to be the next
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  SPEAKER_02: king.
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  Samuel was also born to an elderly couple who were unable to
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  have children.
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  SPEAKER_02: So the Old Testament pattern,
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  oftentimes is that these special children who are going to have
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  a special call of
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  God in their lives would be born to two old parents who are
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  unable to have
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  SPEAKER_02: children.
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  SPEAKER_02: And so now Luke's story starts us,
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  Luke's Jesus story starts us with an Old Testament model of a
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  child being born to
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  SPEAKER_02: an old couple who is going to prepare the way for the Messiah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Okay,
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  the next story then is a complete change from anything we've
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  ever seen in scripture
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  SPEAKER_02: where God comes to a young woman and she could very well have been 13.
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  SPEAKER_02: It was not,
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  SPEAKER_02: in those days,
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  it was not unlikely for a 13 year old to be married off and
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  start having children.
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  Seems horrifying to us today,
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  but that's,
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  I mean,
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  life expectancy and so on.
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  Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_02: So an angel now appears not to a barren old couple,
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  but to a young woman who we don't know if she's able to have
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  children or not.
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  SPEAKER_02: We do discover that she does,
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  SPEAKER_02: but we can assume that where you've got an old couple whose womb is dead,
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  SPEAKER_02: she's coming to a young woman whose womb is possible of creating life.
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  SPEAKER_02: And says, you're going to have a baby.
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  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_02: And this baby will,
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  SPEAKER_02: and later on,
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  SPEAKER_02: we'll find out this baby will be,
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  SPEAKER_02: you know,
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  SPEAKER_02: an ancestor of David.
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  SPEAKER_02: He's going to be, you know, the Messiah and so on and so forth.
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  And so one way to understand the virgin birth theologically,
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  from Luke's point of view,
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  is that
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  the story of Jesus is doing something radically different from
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  the Old Testament story.
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  So the Old Testament story is about two old people who can't
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  have children having a
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  SPEAKER_02: special baby,
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  SPEAKER_02: and now God's going to do something radically new,
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  SPEAKER_02: and there's not even going to be a man involved in this,
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  SPEAKER_02: and it's going to start with a young woman.
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  SPEAKER_02: So pay attention.
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  SPEAKER_02: Pay attention.
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  This is a continuation of the Old Testament,
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  but God is doing something radically different.
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  SPEAKER_02: Pay attention.
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  SPEAKER_02: Okay?
• 14:33
  So that's one way to sort of understand why he positions the
• 14:37
  story the way that he does.
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  SPEAKER_02: He's got sort of the Old Testament couple,
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  SPEAKER_02: Zachariah and Elizabeth,
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  SPEAKER_02: having a baby,
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  SPEAKER_02: kind of the Old Testament way.
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  And now we've got God doing a brand new thing through a virgin
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  without a man involved.
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  SPEAKER_02: at least according to the text.
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  SPEAKER_03: So the continuation is,
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  and the callback to the Old Testament is a baby being born to
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  parents who are in a
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  SPEAKER_03: way that is not obvious that this should even be possible.
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  SPEAKER_02: Right.
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  SPEAKER_02: It's a miraculous birth, right?
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_02: It's a miraculous birth.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_03: But this one is a new kind of miraculous birth.
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  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_02: You think that was special?
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_02: Get a load of this.
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  SPEAKER_02: There's not going to be any SEX involved at all.
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  SPEAKER_02: And this young woman is going to have a baby.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Which ups the stakes for who this Jesus is going to be.
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  SPEAKER_02: So right away you're saying, I better pay attention to this.
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  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 15:40
  So that's sort of the first reason why he would use the birth
• 15:45
  story in this way.
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  SPEAKER_02: And then there's another reason.
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  SPEAKER_02: And I'll get to that in a moment,
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  SPEAKER_02: but I want to pause,
• 15:53
  kind of let us all kind of understand that what Luke is doing
• 15:58
  here is he is setting
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_02: up the story of Jesus by saying,
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  SPEAKER_02: you think this miraculous birth is something,
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  SPEAKER_02: the birth of Jesus is going to change the world.
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  SPEAKER_02: Because nothing like it has ever happened before.
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  SPEAKER_02: We've had Isaac born to Sarah and Abraham.
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  SPEAKER_02: We've had Samuel born.
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  SPEAKER_02: We're going to have John born.
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  SPEAKER_02: But we've never had a baby born to a woman who didn't have sex.
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  SPEAKER_02: Putting it crassly.
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  SPEAKER_02: So something really different.
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  So he's really positioning us for why we should read this story
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  for the Jewish audience.
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  SPEAKER_02: And then he's also going to speak to the Roman audience.
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  SPEAKER_02: But
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  SPEAKER_02: I want to pause there for a moment,
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  SPEAKER_02: John,
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: because you wanted to ask about the virgin birth period,
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: where that comes from.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_03: I just,
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: what was important to me is all of the prophecy in the Old Testament that
• 16:57
  specifically speaks to the virginity of the birth or the
• 17:02
  miraculousness of the
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_03: birth.
• 17:04
  And so you already alluded to Isaiah 7,
• 17:07
  14,
• 17:07
  therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.
• 17:10
  The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and you will
• 17:14
  call him Emmanuel.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_03: And that's one of, I think, four or five.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_03: And it just,
• 17:22
  it seems like it's such a culmination of efforts over the
• 17:26
  hundreds of years,
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_03: and that this kind of miraculous birth was well recorded,
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_03: it seems like.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_03: And I was wondering what you thought of that.
• 17:37
  So,
• 17:38
  this is where we want to both celebrate the majesty of the
• 17:44
  Bible,
• 17:44
  and yet
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_02: interpret it the way the Bible wants to be interpreted, right?
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: We always want to read the Bible as the Bible wants to be read.
• 17:53
  The challenge with the verse that you referenced is that the
• 17:58
  better translation for
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_02: the virgin will conceive is the young woman will conceive.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't necessarily have to mean virgin.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_02: It just means young woman.
• 18:18
  and it got translated into virgin when the greek when the old
• 18:23
  testament was
• 18:24
  translated into greek partly yeah um so it can be translated
• 18:31
  virgin right but it
• 18:34
  doesn't have to be translated that way so that's why i wanted
• 18:40
  to pause and talk
• 18:41
  about this for a moment because luke doesn't reference that
• 18:45
  verse at all right
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_02: So Luke is,
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_02: as we're seeing,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_02: he's doing something by telling the story about a virgin having a baby.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_02: And the first one is to say, this is the way that God did it.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_02: Now look at what God's going to do.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_02: All right, so pay attention.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_02: And then we'll look at what it means in the Roman setting.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_02: Matthew does, however, quote that verse.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_02: Because he wants to tie in, he wants to use the virgin birth in part.
• 19:16
  say to the jewish people we need to pay attention to this right
• 19:20
  this is a part of
• 19:21
  our history and um uh and that's why uh it's it's always really
• 19:28
  important for us to
• 19:29
  understand what these writers are doing uh if we if we always
• 19:35
  insist that we take
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_02: the bible literally that these are literal stories um
• 19:43
  And nothing wrong with believing that Mary was a virgin and God
• 19:46
  did whatever God
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: did and she had a baby.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_02: Nothing wrong with believing that.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_02: But these stories are doing more than just giving us a newspaper account.
• 19:56
  These stories are setting up the Jesus story by teasing out
• 20:01
  themes through their
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_02: birth story that will come back into play later on in the life of Jesus.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: It's an overture.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: And...
• 20:12
  So part of what I'm pleading for here in this podcast and next
• 20:15
  week is for us to
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: not just get stuck on the question,
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: was she really a virgin?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_02: But to ask, what is the beauty behind the story?
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: What is Luke trying to tell us about Jesus through these birth stories?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so the first thing he's saying to us is,
• 20:32
  God is doing something radically new in the birth of Jesus that
• 20:38
  God has not done
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_02: before.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_02: And so we want to pay attention.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: Go ahead.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: I was going to transition to the next point.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: So let's stay where we are.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: If
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: Her being a virgin or not,
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: whatever the clarity might be on that at the end point,
• 20:58
  would not necessarily have a bearing on anything about alerting
• 21:03
  us to how what's
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: coming.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:05
  I mean,
• 21:07
  I'm not trying to say is it a moot point,
• 21:08
  but the virginity portion of it was that.
• 21:11
  Are you asking,
• 21:13
  could Jesus still be Jesus and be born,
• 21:16
  be the child of Joseph and Mary?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_02: Of course.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, God can do whatever God wants to do.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I want people to understand,
• 21:28
  there are some Christian theologians who don't believe in a
• 21:31
  literal virgin birth.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_02: They look at it far more kind of the way we are right now.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not one of those people.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have a problem believing that that happened that way.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_02: But I don't think that's Luke's point.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's a little incidental, maybe, right?
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_02: And I think my second point will help clarify, and then we'll come back.
• 21:54
  So Luke is writing,
• 21:56
  and we'll see this far more clearly in Luke chapter 2.
• 22:01
  Luke is setting up a contrast between the kingship of Jesus and
• 22:11
  the rule of the Caesars.
• 22:15
  as we're going to see next week all of the language that the
• 22:20
  romans would use to
• 22:21
  announce the birth of uh the caesar or the coming of the caesar
• 22:25
  is the exact
• 22:26
  language that he uses to talk about the birth of jesus to
• 22:29
  essentially say there's a
• 22:31
  new caesar in town okay and then the whole book of luke the
• 22:37
  story of luke is the
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: contrast of jesus in his kingdom and the roman kingdom
• 22:43
  The kingdom of Rome,
• 22:43
  which uses violence and might and tyranny and death.
• 22:48
  And the kingdom of Jesus,
• 22:49
  which uses life and forgiveness and grace and peace.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: And so Luke is setting that up right from the beginning.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_02: Here's how it works with the virgin birth.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_02: In those days, a decree went out from whom?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_02: Caesar Augustus.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_02: So Caesar Augustus,
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_02: who was the Caesar around the time that Jesus was born,
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_02: claimed to be the Son of God and claimed that his father was Apollo.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so he was, in a sense...
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if he quite used this language,
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: but if they didn't use the word virgin,
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_02: at the very least,
• 23:42
  he was using for political propaganda to try to bolster his
• 23:47
  street cred that
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_02: somehow,
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_02: in some way,
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_02: Apollo had sex with his mother.
• 23:55
  And because of that,
• 23:57
  so a god had sex with a human mother,
• 24:01
  which we see in Greek,
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_02: mythology, for example.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's why Augustus is the son of God.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_02: He's the son of Apollo.
• 24:16
  So now maybe you can begin to see what Luke is doing here with
• 24:19
  his story about a virgin birth.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: And if he's indeed trying to say, Caesar's got nothing on this Jesus.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_02: So what we have now with the story of Jesus,
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_02: He is the son of God,
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_02: but this God did not have any physical,
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: sexual relationship with the woman.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: This God just spoke life into that womb.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_02: Same God who spoke life and created the universe, by the way.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_02: And she became pregnant and gave birth to this son.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_02: So the birth of Jesus,
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_02: the virgin birth of Jesus,
• 25:11
  shows him to be far superior to the birth that Augustus claimed
• 25:18
  for himself.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: So then that wouldn't be incidental.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: That would be kind of like the qualifier of sorts.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: So one way you could say it is Luke is creating his own propaganda.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_02: in the good sense of the word,
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_02: to say,
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_02: you think Caesar Augustus is really something because his dad was Apollo?
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_02: Well,
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_02: let me tell you about Jesus,
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: the creator of the universe,
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: not just one of the gods,
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: the creator of the universe,
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_02: without any physical contact.
• 25:55
  And by the way,
• 25:56
  the story of Apollo seems to suggest that Apollo forced
• 26:01
  himself...
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_02: onto Augustus' wife.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: And in this story, that doesn't happen at all, right?
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_02: Mary is kind of invited into the story.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_02: She could have said no.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's wildly different stories.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_02: But the point is,
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_02: once in a while,
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_02: you'll hear people say,
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: well,
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_02: virgin birth,
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_02: they just made that up.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_02: There are other religions where the gods...
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_02: had sex with women, and they then had a son of God.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_02: But there's nothing like this story anywhere.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: And so Luke is doing two things here.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_02: He's using this story to say to his Jewish audience,
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_02: yeah,
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_02: we pay attention when old people miraculously have babies,
• 26:53
  but now we really need to pay attention because a 13-year-old
• 26:56
  girl's going to have
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: a baby without...
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_02: any sex at all.
• 27:00
  And by the way,
• 27:00
  you Roman readers,
• 27:03
  Jesus,
• 27:04
  the son of God,
• 27:05
  trumps Augustus,
• 27:07
  the son of God.
• 27:11
  And so the virgin birth then begins to set the agenda for how
• 27:19
  Jesus is going to
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to say redefine the Old Testament,
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_02: but he's going to live it out to its fullest intent.
• 27:30
  And he is going to prove himself to be the true Caesar of the
• 27:34
  world who rules
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_02: vastly differently.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_02: Doesn't rule through a throne, rules through a cross.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_02: And so he's using the virgin birth story theologically.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_02: And in that sense then, that's why in the story,
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_02: it's important that she's a virgin.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: And not that I don't think she was,
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_02: that's not my argument,
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_02: but my argument,
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think that's Luke's point.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: I think Luke's point is theological.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_02: He's using this birth story to set it up.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_02: And by the way,
• 28:13
  one of the challenges we do have is that Matthew's birth story
• 28:16
  is different than
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_02: Luke's birth story.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_02: And that doesn't mean that they contradict each other.
• 28:22
  That means that they're telling the story from a different
• 28:25
  theological perspective
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_02: to make a different point.
• 28:29
  So they're coming at the same story from two very different
• 28:32
  directions to two very
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_02: different audiences.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: And they're using the story theologically,
• 28:37
  which I think makes the story far richer than simply having to
• 28:43
  say literally,
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_02: yeah,
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: well,
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: somehow in some way she became pregnant and had Jesus.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_02: What Luke is saying here is that God is up to something.
• 28:54
  And this is the prelude to this massive story that's going to
• 29:00
  change world history.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_02: And the birth stories get us ready for that,
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_02: and in a sense,
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_02: especially in those days,
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: give some street cred to it.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_02: So that's what he's doing,
• 29:17
  and then we'll look at how he teases that out next week when we
• 29:21
  look at Luke
• 29:21
  chapter 2 and really uses the Roman language to talk about the
• 29:27
  birth of Jesus.
• 29:30
  So that's part of what's happening with Luke's gospel is he is
• 29:34
  setting the stage
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_02: through these beautiful stories,
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_02: wonderfully written stories.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: that God really is up to something different,
• 29:42
  both for the people of Israel and for the Roman Empire and all
• 29:47
  generations after
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_02: that.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah,
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_03: and Tim,
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_03: for those of us who are,
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_03: hanging on throughout this whole discussion,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_03: you're saying,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_03: really,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_03: this is the swelling of the overture before the story really kicks off.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_03: It's gaining attention.
• 30:07
  It's setting up the grandiosity of the,
• 30:11
  maybe even audacity of the coming story.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_02: So,
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 30:18
  one of the themes in the book of Luke is the challenges that
• 30:24
  Jesus often had when
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_02: he faced off with some of the religious leaders.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, because he's bringing sort of this new vision.
• 30:35
  to a religion that had gotten,
• 30:37
  in some cases,
• 30:38
  a little stale or rigid,
• 30:40
  fundamental.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_02: And what Luke is saying is that,
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_02: he's saying right away in the birth story,
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_02: this is gonna be different.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_02: This isn't Moses,
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_02: this isn't Samuel,
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_02: this isn't even John the Baptist,
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_02: this is Jesus,
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: something new.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_02: And there's gonna be some conflict.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_02: And then,
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_02: of course,
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_02: we're going to see throughout all of Luke's gospel,
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_02: Jesus confronting the empire over and over again,
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_02: to the point where Pilate says,
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_02: are you a king?
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_02: And the Roman soldier crucifies him.
• 31:16
  It's Rome that,
• 31:19
  through the egging on of some of the fundamentalist religious
• 31:23
  leaders,
• 31:24
  But that conflict is being set up already in this verse where
• 31:29
  he's saying,
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_02: you think Apollo and Augustus' mom were something.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_02: Check this out.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_02: This Jesus is far superior.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_02: And imagine being the Roman Empire.
• 31:44
  You control most of the known world and some guy born in a
• 31:47
  manger in Bethlehem is better than
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_02: laugh at that.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: But that's what Luke is saying.
• 31:56
  He has the audacity to say that and uses the birth story to set
• 31:59
  out those themes
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_02: that we will hear over and over again.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_02: Can't wait.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:09
  Because in the end,
• 32:11
  we'll end with this,
• 32:12
  and this is where it gets a little confusing.
• 32:17
  It's the resurrection that vindicates Jesus as the Messiah,
• 32:21
  not his birth.
• 32:25
  Resurrection,
• 32:26
  the death and resurrection of Jesus that shows him to be the
• 32:29
  son of God.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: We don't really even have any birth stories in Paul's letters.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_02: They were focused on the event of the cross and the resurrection.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's what validated Jesus as the son of God.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_02: And so the birth stories then kind of give a little extra punch to it.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: theological punch to say,
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: well,
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: everything we saw at the end,
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_02: yeah,
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_02: I'm kind of giving you a heads up that this is going to happen.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 33:00
  So next time we read that,
• 33:01
  then we have a chance to sort of see,
• 33:03
  okay,
• 33:03
  what's he up to here?
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: What he's trying to say, what's the contrast going on?
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: And then we'll get to chapter two.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_02: All right, we're good?
• 33:10
  Probably need to listen to that one two or three times,
• 33:13
  right,
• 33:14
  to get the gist of it.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_02: Totally.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, because we just kind of skip over that part.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_02: It was a virgin birth.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_02: And really, one last thing, it's not really even a virgin birth.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_02: It's a virgin conception.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_02: That's the point.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:33
  Obviously,
• 33:33
  she's giving birth and she's a virgin,
• 33:35
  but it's the conception that's miraculous.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 33:40
  Just like it's miraculous that somehow,
• 33:41
  in some way,
• 33:42
  two barren people are able to have a child.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_02: But this goes, this is that story on steroids.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_02: That's it.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_02: Next time we're going to talk about the new Caesar in town.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_02: And he's been born in a stable, not in a palace.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_02: You've been listening to the Deep Grace Diving Podcast.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: Tim Wright, Terry Summers, John Burgess.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_02: See you next time.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_02: Merry Christmas.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: Merry Christmas.
• 34:16
  Thank you.