Until I make your enemies a footstool

Psalm 110 also speaks of the Father making the Son's enemies a footstool for him. This is again a picture. A footstool is a piece of furniture designed to support the feet of someone who is seated. It can be a separate piece of furniture or it can be built into a seat or throne, as with Solomon's throne, which had six steps “and a footstool of gold” attached (2 Chronicles 9:18). Interestingly, in 1 Chronicles 28:2 the ark of the covenant is referred to as being “the footstool of our God”. Given that the mercy seat or atonement cover is often seen as a throne (1 Samuel 4:4; Psalms 80:1, 99:1) there is perhaps some significance in that. In Isaiah 66:1 God says “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool” which is also quite significant in this context. The picture of the Son's enemies being his footstool is in harmony with the idea of his sitting at God's right hand.

From my book What Jesus is doing now, p  63

Sitting at the right hand?

Obviously we are not to understand God's “right hand” literally. As Augustine points out, that would mean the Father was on Christ's left! God does not actually have a right hand, or a left for that matter. The children's catechism rightly observes that “God is a Spirit, and has not a body like men”. Jesus' own statement in John 4:24 is that God is a spirit. When the Bible speaks of God's right hand it is speaking anthropomorphically. It is using human terms.

Similarly, when we speak of Christ sitting, we are not speaking of bodily sitting. Jesus certainly has a body but we are not to imagine a literal crown on his head or his sitting on a literal throne. Stephen sees him standing not sitting (Acts 7:56). That detail presents no difficulty. No doubt Jesus stood, as it were, resentful at how they were treating his servant. Concerned for Stephen, he was more than ready to help. In Revelation Jesus stands too. Paul and Peter simply say Christ is “at the right hand of God” (Romans 8:34; 1 Peter 3:22). The idea of sitting, or standing for that matter, is picture language.

From my book What Jesus is doing now, pp  62, 63

On the throne/At his right hand

Such passages (Revelation 5:6; 7:9, 17; 22:1, 3) speak of the present glory of Christ in terms of his being on the same throne as the Father rather than on a throne at his right hand but there is no real contradiction. They are simply two different ways of speaking of what is really the same thing. It is the right hand language that is most often used in Scripture and that has led theologians to refer to Christ's session at God's right hand.

From my book What Jesus is doing now, p  62

Great preaching

Those who have preached for many years may not always be considered great preachers but they know what is considered great preaching and they realise that it usually either involves a preacher taking a familiar text and saying something unusual and profound or taking an unfamiliar text and saying something less unusual and profound, Meanwhile most of us preach what is not profound or unusual from familiar texts.