Matthew 2.13-23

This coming Sunday I will be preaching on Matthew 2.13-23. I want to spend some time looking at verse 23, that says: "There he made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, 'He will be called a Nazarene.'" The question that has caused me to spend time with this verse is this: What is the importance of Jesus being called a Nazarene? I think that this has two important aspects: 1) the unclean spirit in Mark 1.24 calls Jesus the one from Nazareth, and then in the same breath describes him as the holy one of God. This has a great deal to do with Numbers 6 ----- and figureheads like Samson, Samuel, John the Baptist and others. 2) This also has to do with the incarnation. For Jesus still introduces himself to Saul as Jesus of Nazareth in Acts 22.8. Why this is important is due to the fact that this is the resurrected Jesus answering Saul's question: "Who are you Lord?" How does this change our understanding of the resurrected Jesus when we confess that he is Jesus of Nazareth?