| |
How can we know
that Jesus was the Messiah, as prophesised in the Old Testament?
The Gospels give us several
reports of how Jesus said he was fulfilling a prophecy in the Old Testament.
But there are actually around 60 different prophecies and more than 300
references to the coming of the Messiah in the Old Testament. Here are a few
examples:
- Isaiah 7:14 says that “The Lord himself
will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to
a son, and will call him Immanuel.”
- Jeremiah 23:5 and Psalm 89:3-4 predict that
the Messiah will be a descendant of King David. The gospel of Luke traces
this genealogy via Mary.
- In Malachi 3:1 we read “I will send my
messenger, who will prepare the way before me.” A clear prophecy concerning John the
Baptist.
- Micah 5:2 explained the highly unlikely
location for the coming Messiah’s birthplace: “But you, Bethlehem, David's
country, the runt of the litter - From you will come the leader who will
shepherd-rule Israel.”
- Isaiah 35 teaches us that the Messiah would
perform many miracles, including “Blind eyes will be opened, deaf ears
unstopped.”
- In a prophecy that must have seemed bizarre
at the time (500 BC), the prophet Zechariah said that the King would come
into Jerusalem riding a lowly ass. He also said the Messiah would be sold
for 30 pieces of silver.
- In Psalm 22, King David describes the
crucifixion in considerable detail, including the words: “they have
pierced my hands and my feet”. This prophecy is even more amazing when you
realize that it was written 700 years before crucifixion was even heard of
in Israel!
- Describing the Passover ritual, Exodus 12
says that no bones of the Passover lamb were to be broken. In Psalm 34:20
we read the prophecy that the bones of the Messiah would not be broken.
John 19:33 explains how the Roman centurion did not break the legs of
Jesus to speed up his death, despite this being the custom at the time.
Some people explain the
fulfilment of these prophecies by pointing out that Jesus knew about them
beforehand. But how could he control being born in Bethlehem or his lineage?
How could he control how much money Judas would betray him for ? How could he
make sure that the centurion would not break his legs after his death?
In his seminal book ‘Evidence
that demands a verdict’, Josh McDowell quotes a statistical study. Scientists
worked out the likelihood of just eight such prophecies being written by people
in advance of the events and then coming true in any one man.
The odds of this happening
were calculated to be one in 100,000,000,000,000,000, or ten to the power of
17. Your homework for the week is to work out the chance of 60 prophecies being
fulfilled!
|
|
