He says to them, How then does David in Spirit call him Lord, saying,
After all their efforts to condemn Jesus, the Pharisees now face a question from Him, drawn from a psalm they agreed spoke of the Messiah. It turns on three words — "in the Spirit" — and on one puzzle: how could David call his own descendant his Lord?
Jesus brought no new evidence against them. He used what they already believed.
These men knew this Psalm and held that it spoke of the Messiah. Yet they would not acknowledge their Messiah... So the very truth that belonged to their own religious creed condemned them and shut their mouths. They were unhappy, miserable, and had turned away from God. After all their efforts to condemn the Lord of glory, they stood silent — condemned, but still not subdued.
Jesus does not treat Psalm 110 as David's own opinion. Two things point the same way here: the Lord's own word, and plain reason.
The Lord stated it as fact: the Holy Spirit guided David as he wrote the Psalms... We have the Lord's testimony, and we have the testimony of common sense too. What did those words mean to David as an ordinary human being? Nothing at all. But if they are inspired, the statement is a perfectly ordinary one.
This was not a one-off. It was Jesus' settled way of handling the Psalms.
The Lord recognizes David as an inspired prophet in this very verse, and He quotes the Psalms as prophecy again and again.
Jesus never denied being David's descendant. The point of His question was that "Son of David" is true but not the whole account of Him.
They could not understand, and would not believe, that Jesus was the Lord spoken of in Psalm 110:1. The truth lay in the incarnation of the Son of God, who was God's Anointed One... Jesus was David's Lord, and that affirms His deity. He was also a Son of David, and that shows His true humanity. Notice that Jesus never hinted that He was not from David's line. He knew He was. The question He put to the Pharisees was a test, and they failed it.
This question did not die with the Pharisees. One writer traces the same failure through every age.
This is the turning point of unbelief at all times, now as then. It is the constant theme of the Holy Spirit's testimony, and man's usual stumbling block. Man is never so foolish as when he wants to be wisest. He either tries to work out the mystery of Christ's Person by his own cleverness — a mystery no mind can reach — or he denies that there is any mystery in it at all.
The psalm settles more than who Christ is. It also says where He was going. Just before they rejected Him, Jesus pointed them to a throne.
He asks the Pharisees to fit two titles together: Son of David, and the Lord — the title David himself gave Him. He ties this to the ascension of this same Christ, to sit at God's right hand until God has made all His enemies His footstool... In fact, to understand that Psalm would have been to understand all God's ways with His Son — and that at the very time they were going to reject Him.
The Pharisees had no answer. Faith has one — not an explanation, but belief in both halves of the mystery.
Jesus is David's Lord and David's Son. And this is the great test for every man, for no man has a right to the name of Christian who denies either one or the other... They were dumb and had no answer to this great mystery. It is a mystery to us also, for we cannot explain it. But what we cannot explain we can believe.
- Inspired — David spoke "in the Spirit." So Psalm 110 carries God's authority, not a king's guesswork.
- Prophetic — the words meant nothing in David's own lifetime. That is the mark of prophecy, and Jesus read the Psalms that way.
- Impossible — the leaders held both truths in their own Scriptures. They could not join them, and their own creed shut their mouths.
- Incarnate — the answer stood in front of them. In His humanity He is David's descendant; in His deity, David's Lord.
- Enthroned — the psalm they could not explain named what came next. The Messiah they rejected sits at God's right hand until His enemies become His footstool.
The Lord said to my Lord, Sit on my right hand until I put thine enemies under thy feet?
The Lord has just silenced every group that came to trap Him. Now He asks His own question, drawn from a psalm of David: how can one man be both David's descendant and David's Master?
The first "Lord" in the quoted line is not the same word as the second. One writer explains what the capital letters in older Bibles mean, and how the two titles fit together.
In the opening words of this psalm, the first "LORD" is printed in capital letters. When it is printed that way, it usually means Jehovah. So we may read the verse as, "Jehovah said to my Lord" — that is, Jehovah said to Christ… How could Jesus be both David's Son and David's Lord? The answer is simple enough. As David's Lord, He was the Creator of David, for God created all things by His Son. But as born of Mary, who was of the house and family of David, He was David's Son.
Another writer counts the speakers in that line.
In the King James Version, the name LORD in capitals stands for God's personal name, Jehovah, and "my Lord" means my Master. So there are two Persons. The God of Israel addressed the Messianic King "Sit at my right hand".
The Pharisees had said the Christ is David's son. The Lord does not deny it.
He was David's son — most true. But was this truth the whole truth? How was He both David's Son and David's Lord? It was the key to all Scripture — the way, the truth, the life — the explanation of His position, and the only hope for theirs. But they had nothing to say.
Another writer weighs what any answer would have cost them.
He turns on them with a question that goes to the bottom of the whole dispute: the question of His Person, of the true glory of Christ. Was He only David's Son? Why then did David, speaking by the Spirit, call Him "Lord"?… No answer was possible that did not admit His higher nature.
The verse names a seat at God's right hand. One writer explains what that place stands for.
The "right hand" speaks of authority, power, and eminence. According to Exodus 15:6, the power to rescue and to subdue belongs to the right hand… Acts 2:32-36 hails His exaltation. It shows God's approval of Him, and at the same time it reverses man's judgment.
At the very time they were about to reject Him, the Lord tells His enemies where He is going and how long He will stay.
He asks the Pharisees to square the title Son of David with the title Lord, which David himself gave Him. And He does it in connection with the ascension of this same Christ, to sit at the right hand of God until God had made all His enemies His footstool… To understand that Psalm would have been to understand all the ways of God with His Son at the very time they were going to reject Him.
The verse reads "until I put your enemies under your feet"; older translations read "until I make your enemies your footstool." One writer weighs who does the work here.
The Holy Spirit points straight to the last clause of this verse. In Hebrews 10:13 He speaks of the ascended Messiah as now "waiting until His enemies should be made a footstool for His feet." The power that will do this is the same power that raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory. It does not say "until they are made," but "until I make."
The word "until" opens a gap in time, and we are living in it. One writer marks what is not happening in it.
This is the time when He is sitting there — doing nothing for Israel, though He is their great High Priest within… This is not the time when He is making His enemies His footstool. He is gathering the joint-heirs while He sits on the throne of God.
Another writer names what kind of day this is.
Jehovah acknowledges Him as Lord and places Him at His right hand — but it is "until…" Something lies ahead of Him. The seat He is to take is very high, yet it is only for a time, until what lies ahead comes. The day of His poverty is over. The day of His patience has begun.
- Two speakers. Jehovah speaks to another Person and calls Him Lord. David's own words prove the Messiah is more than a descendant.
- One question. Was He only David's Son? No answer works unless it admits His higher nature.
- The seat. The right hand is the place of authority and power. Christ seated there is God's approval of Him, and it reverses man's judgment.
- The promise. The words are not "until they are made" but "until I make." The same power that raised Him will put every enemy under His feet.
- The waiting. We live inside the word "until." His day of poverty is over, His day of patience has begun. He gathers joint-heirs while He waits.
If therefore David call him Lord, how is he his son?
The Pharisees had been questioning Jesus; now He asks one of His own, drawn from a psalm of David. Everyone agreed the Christ would be David's descendant. So how could David call that descendant his Lord?
The puzzle rests on how families worked. Rank ran upward, not downward.
The scribes were quite clear that the Messiah was to be the Son of David; yet here is David speaking of Him as his Lord. Among men in those days, a father never spoke to his son like that. It was the other way round: the son called his father lord. How could the Christ then be Son of David? Were the scribes wrong in what they asserted? Or could they explain it?
Their belief was not wrong. It was only half the truth, and the missing half was the one they refused.
The two titles are not in conflict once you see who He is. One belongs to Him as God, the other to His birth.
Man assumes he is competent to judge the things of God. One question still confounds him: "If then David calls Him Lord, how is He his son?" The Deity of the Son is the only answer. He is David's Lord as Creator; He is David's Son as having miraculously become man through Mary. In this way Scripture elsewhere calls Him "the root and offspring of David." It also calls Him "the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David." Who but the Son could truly say, "Before Abraham was, I am"?
Being David's root and David's offspring at once is not a contradiction the New Testament tries to hide. Christ uses it as His own title in the last chapter of the Bible.
To be David's offspring not even an unbelieving Jew could deny to the Christ. But how could He be David's root when He was born more than a thousand years after David? Yet He says so, which is enough; as the Old Testament scriptures said the same, centuries before. Yes, He was David's root just as surely as, if more wonderfully than, He was David's offspring — the Son of David as well as David's Lord.
Their difficulty was not theirs alone. It is the standing difficulty of the human mind about Christ.
They were — indeed, they are — critical questions: If the Christ is David's Son, how is He David's Lord? If He is David's Lord, how is He David's Son? This is the turning point of unbelief at all times, now as then. It is the continual theme of the Holy Spirit's testimony, and the habitual stumbling-block of man. Man is never so vain as when he wants to be wisest. He either tries to sound out the unfathomable mystery of Christ's person by his own wit, or he denies that there is any mystery in it at all.
Jesus did not quote the psalm only to win an argument. The verse He chose maps out where He was about to go.
He asks the Pharisees to reconcile the title Son of David with the title Lord, which David himself gave Him. And He ties this to the ascension of this same Christ, who sits at the right hand of God until God has made all His enemies His footstool and has established His throne in Zion. Now this was the whole of Christ's position at that moment. In fact, to understand that Psalm would have been to understand all the ways of God with respect to His Son at the time they were going to reject Him.
The same words that answer their question also warn them. Peter later pressed that warning on the nation.
The Lord used this great saying in His conflict with the Pharisees. It was a challenge and a warning. By it He gave them a chance to see who He was and to repent of their hostility towards Him. The words declare His Deity, for they tell us that He was David's Lord. They also proclaim His exaltation, which followed His humiliation and rejection by men. Peter takes them up in this way in his appeal to the nation at Pentecost, and his appeal was most powerful. He set two ways before his hearers. One was to surrender to Him whom God had set at His right hand. The other, for those who refused, was to be crushed beneath His victorious feet. And it must be one or the other for every soul of man.
The Lord's question has an answer, but not an explanation. Holding both halves is what marks out real faith.
Jesus is David's Lord and David's Son. And this is the great test for every man, for no man has a right to the name of Christian who denies either one or the other... They were speechless before this great mystery. It is a mystery to us also, for we cannot explain it. But what we cannot explain we can believe, and in the Person of Jesus we see God and Man, the Root and the Offspring of David.
- Question. A son called his father lord, never the reverse. So when David called his own descendant "my Lord," the Pharisees' half-answer collapsed.
- Answer. He is David's Lord as Creator, and David's Son because He became man through Mary. His deity alone reconciles the two.
- Mystery. Both titles are true at once. Faith accepts what it cannot explain, instead of denying either half.
- Throne. The psalm He quoted traced His path: men rejected Him, God seated Him at His right hand, and there He waits until God makes His enemies His footstool.
- Test. That leaves two roads for every person: surrender to the One God exalted, or fall among the enemies beneath His feet.