Many years ago a friend of mine who was deeply bound by drugs surrendered his heart to Jesus Christ and was delivered instantly from heroin addiction, alcohol, and nicotine. First, he attended a church service where he made a token commitment to Jesus Christ, but the life-changing miracle had not taken place. Several days later my wife and I invited him to the house for dinner. After dinner I showed him various Old Testament prophecies that foretold the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ hundreds, even thousands of years before he came to the earth. It was at this moment when he was exposed to the marvelous prophecies of God that he was truly born again.

In the Old Testament there are over 300 prophetic references to Jesus Christ. His life, his ministry, his death, and his resurrection are foretold, as well as his second coming, his return to earth at the battle of Armageddon, and more. In this feature we will list a few.

Nearly 1800 years before the birth of Jesus Christ, Genesis 49:10,

“The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.” The word Shiloh means tranquil or secure, and it was where the house of God rested prior to Jerusalem."

The ruling scepter would abide in the Hebrew tribe of Judah until it would be passed onto the Messiah, who himself would be of the lineage of King David, who was of the tribe of Judah. This prophecy was fulfilled in the lineage of Jesus Christ as the Apostle Matthew records in Matthew 1:1,

“A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham:”

The Jewish leadership in the time of Christ was fully aware of his generational connection to King David. This caused concern, for it meant he had at least one of the requirements to indeed be the messiah. The following excerpt is from the ancient (70-200 AD) Jewish, Babylonian Talmud:

(Rabbi) Ulla said, “Would you believe that any defense would have been so zealously sought for him? He was a deceiver,” and the All-merciful says, “You shall not spare him, neither shall you conceal him. It was different with Jesus, for he was near to the kingship.”

Several other New Testament authors record the fulfillment of the prophecy made in Genesis 49:10. Keep in mind that man said God’s prophecies are vague and convoluted.

Approximately 700 years before the birth of Jesus Christ the prophet Isaiah, by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, prophesied in Isaiah 7:14,

“Therefore 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.”

God said He would give us a sign. The sign was a woman who had not known man sexually would conceive and have a son a miraculous sign and a biological impossibility. The Apostle Matthew certifies the fulfillment of this ancient prophecy in Matthew 1:18-25,

“This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”—which means, “God with us.” When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.”

The gospel of Luke also declares the fulfillment of this great miracle in the first chapter.

The Christian claim to Isaiah’s prophecy was well known among the Jewish hierarchy. They did not deny his existence. Their official stand was and is that Jesus Christ was a bastard a fatherless child for if in fact he was born of a virgin, then they would have crucified the Messiah.

Over 700 years before the birth of Jesus Christ, Micah 5:2-4,

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times. Therefore Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor gives birth and the rest of his brothers’ return to join the Israelites. He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth.”

It is of interest to note that Jesse and his sons, which included King David, were from Bethlehem.

God, as one should expect, is the very master of detail. The meaning of the name Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus Christ, is the House of Bread. Jesus Christ is known to the saints as the bread of life. John 6:35,

“Then Jesus declared, ‘I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.’”

Matthew 2:1 announces the fulfillment of God’s prophecy concerning His only begotten son Christ Jesus:

“After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem.”

Luke 2:4-7:

“So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.”

John 7:42:

“Does not the Scripture say that the Christ will come from David’s family and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?”

Are these, as man claims, vague and convoluted prophecies? You be the judge.

Over 500 years BC, the prophet Zechariah speaks of the old covenant being broken at the advent of Jesus Christ and supernaturally foretells of 30 pieces of silver and the potter’s field. Zechariah 11:10-13,

“Then I took my staff called Favor and broke it, revoking the covenant I had made with all the nations. It was revoked on that day, and so the afflicted of the flock who were watching me knew it was the word of the LORD. I told them, ‘If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.’ So they paid me thirty pieces of silver. And the LORD said to me, ‘Throw it to the potter’—the handsome price at which they priced me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the LORD to the potter.”

The Apostle Matthew reports the fulfillment of Zechariah’s prophecy Matthew 26:14-16,

“Then one of the Twelve—the one called Judas Iscariot—went to the chief priests and asked, ‘What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?’ So they counted out for him thirty silver coins. From then on Judas watched for an opportunity to hand him over.”

And then in Matthew 27:3-10,

“When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. ‘I have sinned,’ he said, ‘for I have betrayed innocent blood.’ ‘What is that to us?’ they replied. ‘That’s your responsibility.’ So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself. The chief priests picked up the coins and said, ‘It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money.’ So they decided to use the money to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: ‘They took the thirty silver coins, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me.’”

Around 1,000 B.C., King David prophesied of Jesus Christ in Psalms 22:16, speaking graphically of the crucifixion.

“Dogs have surrounded me; a band of evil men has encircled me, they have pierced my hands and my feet.”

Doubting Thomas speaks in the gospel of John 20:25,

“So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord!’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.’”

Zechariah 13:6 speaks of the results of the crucifixion. When Christ returns to the earth in the Day of Judgment some people will respond as the verse declares,

“If someone asks him, ‘What are these wounds on your body?’ he will answer, ‘The wounds I was given at the house of my friends.’”

Over 1,000 years before Jesus was born in Bethlehem, God foretells the future in Psalms 22:18,

“They divide my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing.”

The Apostle Mark in Mark 15:24,

“And they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get.”

Prophecy is the supernatural foretelling of things that are to come. Society has cheapened the meaning of prophecy. Many people over the history of mankind have made a “prophetic” statement and seen it come to pass. Really what we are talking about in those instances are merely intuition and educated guesses that many average people guess right about a given topic. Then you have self-described prophets that use a parlor trick to give people what they want to hear. These are NOT really prophets at all and their guesses are not prophecy either!

However, within the Holy Bible there are literally hundreds of prophecies concerning the Messiah all written hundreds of years after the prophet’s death. There was no self gratification or pats on the back for their prophecies. True prophecies are supernatural! These were not given for the time of the prophets but for others well after they passed. To see all of the prophetic statements given in the Word of God actually come true in one single person gives credence to the author, God, and validates the claim that Jesus Christ is the REAL MESSIAH!

It is God’s sign to all and His statement to all that we have no excuse to not believe.

The Apostles constantly appealed to fulfilled prophecy to substantiate the claims of Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior, and the Messiah. Prophecy and the Laws of Probability (a statement of FACT in Mathematics) establish the supernatural authenticity of the Word of God. The Laws of Probability show the implausibility that any person or better yet group of people could have made such predictions and actually see them come to pass.

Statistician Dr. Peter Stoner, one of the most famous statisticians in the world, calculated the odds of a man making just 48 of the Biblical prophecies of the coming of Jesus Christ and having them come to pass. The odds of a man making these predictions and having them come to pass are one in one followed by 144 zeroes, a number so huge that language can’t label it. The chance of any man just making eight of the prophecies and having them come to pass is one in a hundred million billion (1 in 100,000,000,000,000,000). If a mortal has one chance in a hundred million billion of successfully making these predictions, then the other side of this equation would simply say that all the numbers in a hundred million billion with the exception of one, confirm that these prophecies were made by a supernatural God. And this is for just 8 prophecies!

In the science of Mathematics, 10^50 (50 zeros) is considered statistically IMPOSSIBLE! The word “impossible” actually has a definition mathematically speaking. So, to put it in a nutshell…GOD IS REAL and Jesus Christ IS THE REAL MESSIAH! It is statistically impossible for it to be any other way.

References:

Authorized (NIV) New International Version 1984

House, W.H., Chronological and Background Charts of the New Testament, Zondervan, 1981, p77

Pavelek, M., The Prophecies, The Odds & The Savior, Sermon

From godsaidmansaid.com article: Prophecies of Christ and Proof that God Is

www.powertochange.com, True Prophecies