Did you know that one third of the Bible is prophecies?
GotQuestions.org states:
"One scholar, J. Barton Payne, has found as many as 574 verses in the Old Testament that somehow point to or describe or reference the coming Messiah.
Alfred Edersheim found 456 Old Testament verses referring to the Messiah or His times. Conservatively, Jesus fulfilled at least 300 prophecies in His earthly ministry."
Twenty-seven prophecies about the Messiah were fulfilled by Jesus in one day.
Josh and Sean McDowell’s book, Evidence That Demands a Verdict (2017), quotes Professor Peter W. Stoner, Chairman of the Departments of Mathematics and Astronomy at Pasadena City College.
Out of the hundreds of prophecies, he examined the statistical possibility of one person randomly fulfilling just eight of those prophecies:
-He would be born in Bethlehem. Micah 5:2.
-He would be born of a virgin. Isaiah 7:14.
-He would be a descendant of David. Isaiah 9:7.
-He would be betrayed for 30 pieces of silver. Zechariah 11:12.
-He would be mocked. Psalm 22:7,8.
-He would be crucified. John 3:14.
-He would be pierced. Psalms 22:16.
-He would die with the wicked yet be buried with the rich. Isaiah 53:9.
That one person could fulfill these eight prophecies by random chance is considered a statistical impossibility.
Professor Peter W. Stoner concluded:
“We find that the chance that any man might have lived down to the present time and fulfilled all eight prophecies is 1 in 10 to the 17th power. That is one with 17 zeros behind it."
One chance in 100,000,000,000,000,000 or 100 quadrillion.
The first prophecy in the Bible was God telling the serpent that the seed of woman will crush his head. Genesis 3:15
Prophecies had to be not clear enough so Satan could not figure them out and try to stop them, like Herod tried when he was told the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, he killed all the baby boys;
yet at the same time the prophecies had to be clear enough so that after Jesus rose from the dead the prophecies would confirm He is indeed the promised Messiah.
In Luke 24, after His resurrection, Jesus walked with disciples along the road to Emmaus, and said:
“'How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?' And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself."
Robert Morris Page (1903-1992) was a physicist known as the "father of U.S. Radar" for inventing pulsation radar used for the detection of aircraft. He served with the Naval Research Laboratory, held 37 patents, received the U.S. Navy Distinguished Civilian Service Award, and the Presidential Certificate of Merit.
The son of a Methodist minister, Robert Morris Page wrote:
"The authenticity of the writings of the prophets, though the men themselves are human, is established by such things as the prediction of highly significant events far in the future that could be accomplished only through a knowledge obtained from a realm which is not subject to the laws of time as we know them.
One of the great evidences is the long series of prophecies concerning Jesus the Messiah ..."
Page concluded:
"These prophecies extend hundreds of years prior to the birth of Christ.
They include a vast amount of detail concerning Christ himself, His nature and the things He would do when He came -- things which to the natural world, or the scientific world, remain to this day completely inexplicable."
Sir Isaac Newton wrote in The Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse, published 1733:
"God ... gave ... the prophecies of the Old Testaments ... for the event of things predicted many ages before, will then be a convincing argument that the world is governed by Providence ..."
Newton added:
"Daniel was in the greatest credit amongst the Jews ... To reject his prophecies, is to reject the Christian religion. For this religion is founded upon his prophecy concerning the Messiah."
President John Quincy Adams in his address July 4, 1837, referred to:
"The Redeemer's mission upon earth ... the fulfillment of the prophecies announced directly from Heaven at the birth of the Savior and predicted by the greatest of the Hebrew prophets 600 years before."
President Harry S. Truman stated Christmas Eve, December 24, 1946:
"On a winter's night two thousand years ago the prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled."
In addition to prophecies, many non-Christian ancient sources confirm the details of Christ's passion and the beliefs of the early followers.
Dr. Gary Habermas of Liberty University catalogued over 3,400 sources, many of which are skeptical or even critical of Christians, adding to their veracity, including:
- Josephus 37-100 AD
- Suetonius 70-160 AD
- Pliny the Younger 61-113 AD
- Tacitus 56-120 AD
- Mara Bar-Serapion 72 AD
- Lucian 125-180 AD
- Babylonian Talmud.
"1. Jesus died by crucifixion.
2. Jesus was buried.
3. His death caused the disciples to despair and lose hope, believing that his life was ended.
4. The tomb was empty a few days later.
5. The disciples had experiences that they believed were literal appearances of the risen Jesus.
6. The disciples were transformed from doubters who were afraid to identify themselves with Jesus to bold proclaimers of His death and Resurrection.
7. This message was the center of preaching in the early church.
8. This message was especially proclaimed in Jerusalem, where Jesus died and was buried shortly before.
9. The church was born in Jerusalem and grew rapidly.
10. Orthodox Jews who believed in Jesus made Sunday their primary day of worship.
11. James, the half-brother of Jesus, converted to the faith when he saw what he believed was the resurrected Jesus.
12. Paul was converted to the faith after his experience which he believed was with the risen Jesus."
These key points of the Gospel were attested to as historical facts by non-Christian records.
In fact, Jesus' apostles, disciples and followers were willing to go to their deaths holding their faith that Jesus fulfilled the prophecies proving that He is, indeed, the promised Messiah!
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Image Credits: Public Domain; Description: Icon of the Resurrection; Date: December 11, 2009; Source: Author Surgun100; https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Resurrection_(24).jpg