Every year at Christmas we are reminded of the remarkable prophecies concerning the birth death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and how they substantiate His deity and the faithfulness of God.
We’ve established here, here, here, and here that more than 2500 years ago, the prophets Jeremiah, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezekiel and others like them foretold many events that predict the coming of Jesus Christ and which are ultimately fulfilled by Him.
Jesus clearly reveals that Messianic prophecy points to Him. He said to the Jews, “You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These Scriptures testify about me, yet you refuse to come to Me to have life…if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me, (John 5:39, 46. See also: Matthew 5:17, 21:42; 21:41-45;26:24,31,56; Mark 12:10; 14:27,62; Luke 4:16-21; 18:31-33; 22:37).
Messianic prophecy is one of the many infallible proofs concerning the truth of the gospel and Christ’s claims within it. Messianic prophecy shows us, among other things, the kind of Person the Messiah was to be when He came. It also reveals when and where He would arrive, and how He would be born. Here is a list of twenty-nine prophecies occurring in twenty-four hours in the experiences of Jesus of Nazareth.
- He was to be sold for thirty pieces of silver (Zechariah 11:12; Matthew 26:14-15).
- He was to be betrayed by a friend (Psalms 55:12-14; Matthew 26:47-50; John 13:18).
- The money obtained was to be cast to the Potter (Zechariah 11:13; Matthew 27:3-10).
- His disciples were to forsake Him (Zechariah 13:7; Matthew 26:56; Mark 14:27).
- He was to be accused by false witnesses (Psalms 55:11,109:2; Matthew 26:59, 60).
- He would be struck on the cheek with a rod (Micah 5:1; Matthew 26:67).
- He was to be beaten and spat upon (Isaiah 50:6; Luke 22:64).
- His appearance was to be disfigured (Isaiah 42:14; Matthew 27:29,30).
- He was to be silent before His accusers (Isaiah 53:7; Matthew 27:12-14; 1 Peter 1:23).
- He was to be wounded and bruised (Isaiah 53:6; Matthew 27:26, 29).
- His hands and feet were to be pierced (Psalms 22:16; Luke 23:33; John 20:25-27).
- He was to be crucified with the wicked (Isaiah 53:12; Mark 15:27, 28).
- The people were to ridicule Him (Psalms 22:8; Matthew 27:41, 43).
- The people were to be astonished (Psalms 22:17; Isaiah 52:14; Luke 23:35).
- He was to pray for His persecutors (Isaiah 53:12; Psalm1 109:4; Luke 23:34).
- The people were to shake their heads (Psalms 109:25; Matthew 27:39).
- His garments were parted/lots cast for clothing (Psalms 22:19; John 19:24).
- He was to cry: ‘My God, My God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from helping me, and from the words of my groaning? (Psalm 22:1; Matthew 27:46).
- He was to thirst (Psalm 69:3, 21; John 19:28).
- They were to give Him gall and vinegar (Psalm 69:21; Matthew 27:34; John 19:28).
- He was to commit Himself to God (Psalm 31:5; Luke 23:46).
- His friends stood at a distance (Psalms 38:11; Luke 23:49).
- His bones were not to be broken, yet were out of joint (Psalms 34:20; Exodus 12:46; Psalms 22:14, 17; John 19:31-36).
- His side was to be pierced (Zechariah 12:10; John 19:34-37).
- His heart was to be broken (Psalm 22:14; John 19:34).
- Darkness was to cover the land (Amos 8:9; Matthew 27:45).
- He was to be buried in a rich man’s tomb (Isaiah 53:9; John 10:11, 17-18, Galatians 2:20).
- His death was to be voluntary (Isaiah 53:12; Psalm 40:6-8; John 10:11, 17).
- His death was to be substitutionary (Isaiah 53:4-6,12; Daniel 9:26; Matthew 20:18; 1 Corinthians 15:3; 1 Peter 2:24; Revelation 1:5,6).
These events were all fulfilled in detail in 24 hours in the experience of Jesus of Nazareth. According to the law of compound probabilities, the chance that they all happened together by accident is 1 in 537,000,000.
Messianic Jewish Testimony
During the last hundred years or so many Jewish people have been brought to believe in Jesus as their Messiah as the result of studying Messianic prophecy. Here is just one example:
Mordecai S. Bergmann was brought up in the strictest of Jewish religious sects, the Chassidism. When he was fourteen, he was sent to Breslau to study under the Chief Rabbi there. Returning later to Kalisch, he applied himself diligently to the study of the Talmund. Later in life, he came to live in London, where he organized a small synagogue, and in which he ministered for two years. Taken ill, he entered a German hospital where he remained for six weeks. While there he started to read a German Bible which was on a shelf in the ward.
As a reader in the Synagogue he knew the Pentateuch and portions of the prophecies by heart. The verses in Daniel chapter 9, which record in the first portion of it Daniel’s great prayer, were very familiar to him, for these verses are repeated every Monday and Tuesday by religious Jews; but the later part of the chapter which records the prophecy of the seventy weeks (of years) is never read; in fact, the rabbis pronounce a dreadful curse on anyone who investigates this prophecy. They say, ‘Their bones shall rot who compute the end of time.’
Remembering this anathema, it was with fear and trembling that he went on to read the prophecy. Coming to verse 26, and reading the words, ‘Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself’ he threw the Bible down, thinking it was a Christian Bible and altered from the Hebrew original to favor their view that Jesus of Nazareth was the Jewish Messiah.
But though he did so, he could not put the words out of his mind. They sank deeper and deeper into his soul, and wherever he looked he seemed to see them in flaming Hebrew characters. The result was he was greatly disturbed in mind and heart. After a time, he again took up the Bible, and without thinking of any particular passage opened it at Isaiah chapter fifty-three. He was arrested by the words:
By oppression and judgment He was taken away; and as for His generation, who among them considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living (stricken to His death) for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? (Isaiah 53:8).
This seemed to be the answer to that question he had been asking himself ever since he had read the words, ’Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself, ‘and which seemed to be confronting him everywhere. For whom then, if not for Himself, was the Messiah to be cut off? Here the answer was plainly revealed to him: ‘For the transgressions of my people was He stricken.’
On leaving the hospital he went home, put on his phylacteries and tallith, in order to perform the prescribed prayers; but found he could not utter a single sentence of the prayer book. One message, found in Psalm 119:18 came to his mind, ‘Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law.’ He kept on repeating it for nearly two hours. Then he left the house and walked along the street, still praying the same prayer.
The Lord led him to the home of Dr Ewald, a Jewish believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. To him he unburdened his heart. Here, for the first time, he learned that the Messiah, who was to cut off for the transgression of His people, was the Lord Jesus whom the Christian Gospels proclaimed to be the incarnate Son of God, and only Savior of sinners, and whom the Jewish nation had rejected. After studying the Messianic prophecies diligently with the help of his friend, he accepted the Lord Jesus as his Messiah and personal Savior.
As a result, he suffered much persecution at the hands of his former Jewish friends, but was uncompromisingly steadfast in his new faith, and was greatly blessed and used to win other Jews for Christ.
For all classes, no matter how cultured, or how primitive, there is one Word of truth-the Cross-to the wise, to the barbarian, to Greek and Jew, to everyone. The gospel is the power of God. The gospel preacher is an ambassador demanding surrender to the kingdom of heaven. It is God’s ultimatum. He shows us the way things are. The gospel is neither theory nor an abstraction, but it is the reality behind everything. We either recognise it or perish.
