Messianic Prophecies, Part 2

“God proved His love on the cross. When Christ hung, and bled, and died, it was God saying to the world, ‘I love you.’”

Billy Graham

Kirk Cameron’s Comment

History proves the reliability of the Bible. When you know that you can trust the Bible as historically sound, and you see that history was predicted hundreds of years in advance, you have a solid case for the validity of the Scriptures.

Questions & Objections

Lesson

The Suffering and Death of Christ

One of the most amazing predictions about Christ in all of Scripture is that of Isaiah 53:2–12. This precise description predicts twelve aspects of the Messiah’s sufferings and death, all of which were literally fulfilled (see Matthew 26—27; Mark 15—16; Luke 22—23; John 18—19). Jesus...

1. Was rejected 2. Was a man of sorrow 3. Lived a life of suffering 4. Was despised by others 5. Carried our sorrow 6. Was smitten and afflicted by God 7. Was pierced for our transgressions 8. Was wounded for our sins 9. Suffered like a lamb 10. Died with the wicked 11. Was sinless 12. Prayed for others

Further confirmation of the predictive nature of Isaiah 53 is that it was common for Jewish interpreters before the time of Christ to teach that Isaiah here spoke of the Jewish Messiah. Only after early Christians began using the text apologetically with great force did it become in rabbinical teaching an expression of the suffering Jewish nation. This view is implausible in the context of Isaiah’s standard references to the Jewish people in the first-person plural whereas he always refers to the Messiah in third-person singular, as in Isaiah 53 (“he,” “his,” and “him”).

Predictions elsewhere about Christ’s death include:

The piercing of His hands and feet (Psalm 22:16; cf. Luke 23:33) The piercing of His side (Zechariah 12:10; cf. John 19:34) The casting of lots for His garments (Psalm 22:18; cf. John 19:23, 24)

While it wasn’t recognized until after the fact, one of the most precise predictions in Scripture gives the very year in which the Christ would die.

Daniel was speaking of both the exile of Israel and the atonement for sin when he recorded a prayer of confession for the sins of his people and a vision that the angel Gabriel gave him:

Seventy “sevens” are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy. Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One [Messiah], the ruler, comes, there will be seven “sevens,” and sixty-two “sevens” ... After the sixty-two “sevens,” the Anointed One will be cut off ... (9:24–26).

The context indicates that Daniel knew Gabriel was speaking of years, since he was meditating on the “number of years” God had revealed to Jeremiah that Jerusalem would lay waste, namely “seventy years” (v.2).

God told Daniel that it would be seven “sevens” plus sixty-two “sevens” (years) after the decree to rebuild before the Messiah would come and be cut off (die). In other words, it would be 69x7=483 years to the time of Christ’s death. Artaxerxes ordered Nehemiah “to restore and rebuild Jerusalem” (Daniel 9:25; cf. Nehemiah 2) in 445/444B.C. Adding the widely accepted date of A.D.33 for the crucifixion would be 444+33=477.

Add six years to compensate for the five days in our solar year that are not in the lunar year followed by Israel (5x477=2,385 days or 6+ years): 477+6=483 years. Daniel’s prediction takes us to the very time of Christ.

Christ’s Resurrection

The Old Testament also foretold the resurrection of the Messiah from the dead. In Psalm 16:10 David declares, “You will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay.”

This passage is cited in the New Testament as predictive of the resurrection of Christ. Peter said explicitly of David’s prophecy, “But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay” (Acts 2:30, 31).

Indeed, using passages such as this, “Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the dead. ‘This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ,’ he said” (Acts 17:2, 3).

This would scarcely have been possible unless his skeptical Jewish audience did not recognize the predictive nature of passages such as Psalm 16.

The Ascension of Christ

In Psalm 110:1, David even predicted the ascension of Christ, writing, “The LORD says to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’”

In Matthew 22:43, 44, Jesus applied this passage to Himself. Peter also applied it to the ascension of Christ: “For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said, ‘The Lord said to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”’” (Acts 2:34, 35).

PROPHECY AND THE MESSIAH

It is important to note the unique aspect of biblical prophecies. Unlike many psychic predictions, many of these were very specific, giving, for example, the very name of the tribe, city, and time of Christ’s coming. Unlike forecasts found in tabloids at the supermarket checkout counter, none of these predictions failed.

Since the 191 prophecies of the Messiah were written hundreds of years before Christ was born, the prophets could not have been reading the trends of the times or making intelligent guesses. Many predictions were beyond human ability to fake a fulfillment.

If Christ were a mere human being...

He would have had no control over when (Daniel 9:24–27), where (Micah 5:2), or how He would be born (Isaiah 7:14). He would have had no control over how He would die (Psalm 22; Isaiah 53). He would not have been able to do miracles (Isaiah 35:5, 6). He would not have been able to rise from the dead (Psalms 2, 16).

It is statistically impossible that all these events would have converged randomly in the life of one man. Mathematicians have calculated the probability of just sixteen predictions being fulfilled in one person at 1 in 10^45. For forty-eight predictions to meet in one person, the probability is 1 in 10^157. It is almost impossible to even conceive of a number that large.

But it is not just a statistical impossibility that rules out the theory that Jesus engineered His prophecy fulfillments; it is morally implausible that an all-powerful and all-knowing God would allow His plans for prophetic fulfillment to be ruined by someone who just happened to be in the right place at the right time. God cannot lie (Hebrews 6:18), nor can He break a promise (Joshua 23:14). So we must conclude that He did not allow His prophetic promises to be thwarted by chance.

All the evidence points to Jesus as the divinely appointed fulfillment of the messianic prophecies. He was God’s man, confirmed by God’s signs (Acts 2:22).

Feathers for Arrows

Imagine that you tried to describe the workings of a television to someone who had never seen a TV set. You show him one and say, “This is a television set. When you press this button, a man comes on and reads the up-to-date news to you.” Your skeptical friend says, “How does he get into the box?” You reply, “He’s not actually in the box.” He says, “Is he in there or isn’t he?” You answer, “Well, his image is sent via invisible television waves through the air, to an antenna, down a wire, up a cord, and into the box.” Your friend becomes a little impatient and says, “So this newsreader of yours floats invisibly through the air, slides down an antenna, crawls up a cord, into your set? What kind of simpleton do you think I am?”

Your confidence isn’t shaken because you can prove your claim, fantastic though it may sound. You pass him the remote control and say, “Push the button and see for yourself.”

The claim of the Christian faith is fantastic in the truest sense of the word—repent and trust in Jesus Christ, and the invisible God of creation will reveal Himself to you (John 14:21). Our confidence isn’t shaken in the face of a skeptical world, simply because the claim can be proven. Any skeptic who will push the button of repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ will experience the miracle of conversion.

Questions

1. Name three of the twelve aspects of the suffering of the Messiah that Isaiah mentions in chapter 53 of his book.
2. Why is Daniel 9 considered to be such an amazing prophecy?
3. Where in the Old Testament is the resurrection of Jesus prophesied?
4. How is biblical prophecy unlike psychic predictions?
5. Why were many Bible predictions beyond human ability to fake a fulfillment?
6. How could you explain to someone the mathematical impossibility of Jesus fulfilling all 191 messianic prophecies?

Answers to these review questions are provided in the back of the printed book / source PDF.

Memory Verse

“This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”

Luke 24:46-48

Last Words

Christopher Columbus (1451–1506) made several voyages westward and is credited with the discovery of the West Indies. When he died, the parting message from his lips was: “Lord, into Thy hands I commit my spirit.”

Christopher Columbus