QUESTIONS and ANSWERS

Question: If Jesus was a descendant of King David, how is it then possible for David to call Jesus “Lord,” when He is also called his son (See Matthew 22:45)?

Answer: First, let’s read this in its context. Matthew 22:41-45: “While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying, ‘What do you think about the Christ? Whose Son is He?’ They said to Him, ‘The Son of David.’ He said to them, ‘How then does David in the Spirit call Him ‘Lord,’ saying, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, ‘sit at My right hand, till I make your enemies your footstool?’ If David then calls Him ‘Lord,’ how is He then his Son?’”

This is a quote from Psalm 110:1, which the Pharisees knew quite well. They were always trying to trip Jesus up with their trick questions hoping to catch Him in a mistake. Once again, Jesus turns the table on them by asking them a question that if answered would put them on the spot. In fact, this shut them up as verse 46 tells us, “And no one was able to answer Him a word, nor from that day on did anyone dare question Him anymore.”

The answer is quite simple when we understand that prior to Jesus coming to earth, He was the Logos who existed before David was born. Isaiah’s (11:1-2) prophecy spoke of the coming of Jesus from the root of Jesse, David’s father: “There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.” In this sense, Jesus as a descendant of David was also identified as the “Son of David” (Matt. 1:1).

Like Job of old (see Job 19:25), David recognized the pre-existence of the Messiah who was to come, the Logos, and identified him as “Lord” and whom the “LORD” (Jehovah) was addressing in Psalm 110, promising Him a future Kingdom to rule. In the realization of this, even though Jesus was the earthly descendant of the line of David, he knew Him also to be his Lord, later identified by the Apostle John as “King of kings and Lord of lords” in Revelation 19:16.

What a day that will be when the Lord returns to establish the Kingdom, for which He taught us to pray, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done on earth even as it is done in heaven” (Matt. 6:10).

E. Weeks