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(Numbers 24:17)

INTRODUCTION: Today is the second Sunday of Advent, and this Advent season we are taking four Sundays to look at “Four Great Prophecies of Christmas.”

As we mentioned last week, the Bible is full of prophecies that were made centuries before they were fulfilled, and these fulfilled prophecies are one of the key indicators that the Bible truly is God’s word, and that Jesus really is who he said he was. Jesus fulfilled many prophecies at his coming, but we will be focusing on four of the big ones.

   1) A Great Battle (Genesis 3:14-15)
   2) A Great Star (Numbers 24:17)
   3) A Great Sign (Isaiah 7:14)
   4) A Great King (Isaiah 9:6-7)

Last week we looked at the prophecy of a great battle. This week we will look at the prophecy of a great star. Next week we will look at the prophecy of a great sign. And then the fourth week we will look at the prophecy of a great king. Once again, all four of these prophecies were given centuries in advance, and all four were fulfilled when Christ came to earth at Christmas. Today we are looking at the prophecy of the star which is found in Numbers 24:17. (Read Numbers 24:17 and pray.)

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The star of Bethlehem is a fascinating part of the Christmas story. Many of the most recognizable images of Christmas are those which revolve around these mysterious figures from the east traveling across the desert following the star in search of Jesus.

What many people don’t know is that the star is a part of Old Testament prophecy. Why did the Magi come to Bethlehem? How did they know this star had something to do with Jesus’ birth? It all has to do with the prophecy that we will be looking at this morning from Numbers 24.

But in order to fully understand the prophecy, we must first look at the background of the prophecy. In what context was this prophecy given? Who gave this prophecy and why? What were the main events leading up to the prophecy? Once we have explored the background of the prophecy, then we will be ready to look at the actual content of the prophecy in Numbers 24 and finally at the fulfillment of the prophecy in the New Testament.

I. Blessing and cursing (the background of the prophecy)

So, let’s begin with the background of the prophecy. The background of this prophecy is found in the words of blessing and cursing connected with three specific individuals in the Old Testament – Abraham, Balak and Balaam. Now you’re probably more familiar with Abraham than with either Balak or Balaam, but all three are important to the background of the prophecy.

   A. God to Abraham: “I will bless those who bless you, and curse those who curse you. All nations will be blessed through you.”
      – Genesis 12:3

First, we come to Abraham in the book of Genesis. When God first called Abraham, he spoke words of blessing and cursing to him. God told Abraham: “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.” (Genesis 12:1-2) And then he told him: “I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” (Genesis 12:3)

And so, God makes Abraham the dividing line here. We learned last week in the prophecy of the great battle about the godly seed of the woman and the ungodly seed of the serpent. We now learn that the godly seed will continue through Abraham. God will make Abraham into a great nation. He will bless those who bless Abraham and curse those who curse Abraham. All nations will be blessed through Abraham and his seed. So that’s Abraham’s part in this prophecy.

   B. Balak: “Now, come and put a curse on these people.”
      – Numbers 22:5-6

Next, we come to Balak. For Balak’s part in all this, you need to fast forward from the time of Abraham to the time of Moses. By this time God had fulfilled his promise of making Abraham into a great nation. God brings the nation of Israel out of Egypt to the borders of the promised land, where they travel to the plains of Moab and camp along the Jordan across from Jericho.

Balak is the king of Moab, and when he sees all the Israelites spread out along the border of his country, he is terrified, and he sends for Balaam the prophet. He tells Balaam in Numbers 22: “A people has come out of Egypt; they cover the face of the land and have settled next to me. 6 Now come and put a curse on these people, because they are too powerful for me. Perhaps then I will be able to defeat them and drive them out of the country. For I know that those you bless are blessed, and those you curse are cursed.” (Numbers 22:5-6)

Notice the words of blessing and cursing again. Balak wants Balaam to come and put a curse on the people of Israel, because he believes that whoever Balaam blesses will be blessed and whoever Balaam curses will be cursed.

There’s just one problem here. God is the one who blesses and curses. And God has already promised to bless the Israelites! In fact, God has promised to bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse Israel. So, if Balak attempts to curse Israel, not only will the curse fail, Balak will only succeed in bringing that curse back on himself and his own nation.

   C. Balaam: “How can I curse those whom God has not cursed?”
      – Numbers 23:8

All this brings us to Balaam. Balaam is an interesting individual. We mostly remember him for his donkey. God spoke to Balaam through his own donkey to warn him about the reckless path he was taking in going to curse the Israelites.

Balaam is the speaker of the prophecy we are studying today, and yet Balaam is an unbeliever. He is a pagan prophet who was motived by covetousness and greed. (“Show me the money!”) And yet, God still used him to deliver this amazing prophecy about the star. You might wonder how God could use a pagan, unbelieving prophet to deliver prophecy. Well, I think that’s the whole point of the donkey. If God can speak through a donkey, he can certainly speak through Balaam (and hopefully through your pastor, as well!).

Balaam actually gives four prophecies about Israel in these passages. Balak keeps telling Balaam to curse the Israelites, but each time Balaam speaks, God makes words of blessing come out of his mouth instead! In fact, in his very first prophecy, Balaam tells Balak: “How can I curse those whom God has not cursed? How can I denounce those whom the Lord has not denounced?” (Numbers 23:8) The whole scene is pretty comical as Balak keeps moving Balaam around to different locations to see if the curse will work there, but Balaam just keeps blessing Israel instead of cursing them!

Balak keeps getting madder and madder until he eventually tells Balaam to shut up. You know, the old saying, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all?” Well, Balak turns that around and tells Balaam, “If you can’t curse them, then don’t say anything at all! If you can’t curse them, then at least be quiet and stop blessing them instead!”

But Balaam is on a roll now, and he just can’t stop himself. He continues prophesying and blessing Israel, until finally Balak tells him to go home without any pay. Before he leaves, Balaam speaks one final prophecy about Israel, and this is the prophecy we are looking at today – the prophecy of a great star, our second great prophecy of Christmas.

II. A star and a scepter (the content of the prophecy)
   – Numbers 24:17

So, we have looked at the background of the prophecy. Now let us look at the actual content of the prophecy. The content of the prophecy is found in Balaam’s fourth prophecy about Israel – the prophecy of the star and the scepter found in Numbers 24:17 where Balaam prophesies:

“I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near. A star will come out of Jacob; a scepter will rise out of Israel. He will crush the foreheads of Moab, the skulls of all the sons of Sheth.” (Numbers 24:17)

The star and the scepter are both royal terms. Together they speak of a coming ruler or king. This is a Messianic prophecy pointing to the coming of the Messiah. In fact, many of the early Jewish commentators applied this verse to the Messiah and his coming. So, let’s look a little closer at this prophecy together.

   A. A star will come out of Jacob
      – Revelation 22:16

First, Balaam says that a star will come out of Jacob. Jacob is another name for Israel, but when you see Jacob’s name in the Bible, you should automatically think of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And so, this star is a reminder of God’s promise to Abraham that God will make him into a great nation and that all nations will be blessed through him.

Jesus will later identify himself with this star in the book of Revelation when he says: “I, Jesus … am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star.” (Revelation 22:16) The Root and Offspring of David are clear Old Testament references to the Messiah. Here, Jesus combines the messianic prophecies concerning the root of David with the messianic prophecy about the star and says that he is the fulfillment of both.

   B. A scepter will rise out of Israel
      – Genesis 49:10

So first, Balaam says a star will come out of Jacob. Next Balaam says that a scepter will rise out of Israel. This is also messianic language stretching back to the book of Genesis. In Genesis 49 Jacob is old and dying. He calls for his twelve sons in order that he might bless them, and he speaks words of prophecy over these twelve future tribes of Israel.

When he gets to his son Judah, he says this about the tribe of Judah in Genesis 49:10: “The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.” (Genesis 49:10) This prophecy of the scepter here in Genesis 49:10 foretold that Judah would produce a royal line of kings leading to the Messiah who will rule over all the nations.

And so, you can see how God keeps narrowing down the line of the Messiah throughout the Old Testament prophecies. First, we learn that the Messiah will be the seed of the woman in Genesis 3. Then we learn that he will be from the seed of Abraham in Genesis 12, then from Isaac and Jacob. Then we learn that he will come from the tribe of Judah here in Genesis 49. Later prophecies will narrow it down even further telling us that the Messiah will be a descendant of David and that he will be born in a specific town of Judah, the little town of Bethlehem.

   C. He will crush the heads of Israel’s enemies
      – Genesis 3:15

So, Balaam in his prophecy speaks first of the star and the scepter, referring to this coming ruler and king from the tribe of Judah. And then he says that this ruler will crush the heads of Israel’s enemies. “He will crush the foreheads of Moab, the skulls of all the sons of Sheth.” (Numbers 24:17) Remember, God told Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you.” (Genesis 12:3) Moab tried to curse Israel, and so Moab receives God’s curse instead.

Of course, this “head-crushing” language bring us back to the first prophecy of Christmas we looked at last week in Genesis 3:15 where God told the serpent: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” (Genesis 3:15) In trying to curse Israel, Moab shows themselves to be the seed of the serpent, and so they will share in the crushing of the head prophesied back in Genesis 3:15.

And so, bringing together the background and the content of the prophecy, this is what we have so far. The star and the scepter refer to a future king from the tribe of Judah who will bring victory over Israel’s enemies and blessing to the nations.

III. The star of Bethlehem (the fulfillment of the prophecy)

All this now leads us to the fulfillment of the prophecy as found in the star of Bethlehem.

   A. The magi see the star and come to Jerusalem (“the star”)
      – Matthew 2:1-2

We read in Matthew 2 how the magi saw the star and came to Jerusalem: “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem 2 and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.’” (Matthew 2:1-2)

These magi were also known as wise men, astrologers, or magicians. They would have come from the area of Babylon or Persia. By the way, this is also where Balaam came from. In fact, Balaam was an early example of a magi. We see other magi in the books of Exodus and Daniel.

The magi had access to the Old Testament scriptures which were spread to their area when the Jewish people were exiled. This means they would have been familiar with Balaam’s prophecies. Remember, Balaam had been a magi. And as astrologers they would have been particularly interested in his prophecy having to do with a star.

So, when they see this unusual star in the sky, they relate it back to Balaam’s prophecy. They see the star, and they understand from the prophecy that the Jewish Messiah has come into the world. And so, they come to Jerusalem seeking the one who has been born king of the Jews.

   B. They bow down and worship Jesus as king (“the scepter”)
      – Matthew 2:9-11

When they find Jesus, they bow down and worship him as king. We read in Matthew 2: “They went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11 On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.” (Matthew 2:9-11)

These are gifts fit for a king, and this is the fulfillment of the scepter part of the prophecy – the Messiah-King born in the line of Judah who will rule over the nations.

   C. All nations will be blessed through Christ (“the blessing”)
      – Genesis 12:3; Isaiah 60:1-3; Matthew 28:19

And, as we saw earlier when we looked at the background of the prophecy, this all relates back to God’s promise to Abraham that all nations will be blessed through Christ. (Genesis 12:3)

We read an additional and related prophecy in Isaiah 60: “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you…. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.” (Isaiah 60:1-3) The magi are an early fulfillment of this prophecy of people coming from distant nations seeking Christ to worship him.

Both at the beginning and the end of his gospel, Matthew emphasizes that Christ is for all people from all nations. At the beginning of the gospel, the Magi come from a distant nation seeking Christ to worship him. And at the end of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus gives his disciples the Great Commission to go and make disciples of all nations. (Matthew 28:19).

CONCLUSION: This then is the meaning of the star. Jesus the Messiah has come into the world. He is the king who will bring victory over God’s enemies and blessing to the nations. As the angel said to the shepherds out in the fields that first Christmas night: “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.” (Luke 2:10) God’s great promise to Abraham that “all nations will be blessed through you” is ultimately fulfilled in Jesus – as foretold in the prophecy of the star in Numbers 24 and fulfilled in the star of Bethlehem in Matthew 2.

The star is a reminder of both blessing and cursing. Remember when God made Abraham the dividing line? “I will bless those who bless you, and curse those who curse you.” (Genesis 12:3) Now Jesus is the dividing line.

Everyone who comes to Jesus for salvation finds blessing from God. But the star also contains a warning for those who reject Jesus as Savior. Jesus is the dividing line between blessing and cursing. When you put your trust in him, you will be blessed. But when you reject him as Savior, you put yourself in the camp of God’s enemies and place yourself under God’s judgment.

And so, you have a choice this morning. You can choose either blessing or cursing. The Magi saw the prophesied star in the east, and they chose blessing. They followed the star and traveled hundreds of miles to find Jesus and worship him as king.

I encourage you to choose blessing this morning. Come to Jesus and know the blessing and favor of God that come to all who put their trust in him. That is the message of the star. That is the meaning of this second great prophecy of Christmas.

© Ray Fowler

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