The Stump of Jesse

A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from His roots a branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him; the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. Isaiah 11:1-2

I listened to a phenomenal sermon by John MacArthur over the holidays that addressed the miraculous nature of Jesus birth. There was a number of things in there I had never heard before. One being reference to the curse placed on King Jehoiachin (Jeremiah 22:30)in the line of Judah, saying in essence that no other king would arise from that man's line, thus seeming to rule out the prophecy of an eternal King from the tribe of Judah, ie the Messiah. The two "facts" seemed to counter each other. There will be no other king from the royal line of David after Jehoiakim, but at the same time, an eternal King will arise from the royal line of David and of His kingdom there will be no end.

MacArthur went on to explain why this curse was actually part and parcel of what played into the hand of the virgin birth (which was also neccessary for Jesus to retain His dual Godhood and manhood but we won't go there for now.) Basically the premise was that heredity is passed down through the male's biological lineage, and the curse against a King of Judah was also passed down through patriarchal biological lineage. Since Jesus was the "adopted" son of Joseph, not biological, He fulfilled the prophecy of being from the royal line but did not obtain the curse that was passed down through biological heritage. The fact that His mother was also from the royal line of David made Him the only person who could ever again qualify for actual Kingship in Israel. Pretty fascinating stuff. Sheds a whole new light on the "stump" of Jesse. I also love this picture of the "other half" of this stump...


This is the the sawed off trunk from the above stump, now laying back in our apple orchard, dead as a doornail, and yet "sprouting shoots" last summer. Talk about an object lesson *grin*.