The Empty Tomb

“... He has risen: He is not here;
behold, here is the place where they laid Him”
Mark 16:6

Central Theme
The resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead is the key part of the Gospel message. See 1 Corinthians 15. If this message is not true it should be rejected, but if it is true it must be accepted. There is no middle ground.

The Empty Tomb
If you have not accepted this message, how would you explain the empty tomb? Consider the facts:

(1) The body was missing. If enemies stole it, they certainly would have produced it on the first Pentecost after the crucifixion. On that occasion the apostles proclaimed a risen Lord. Enemies would surely have produced the body to discredit the message if they could have done so. They stopped short of nothing to prevent the spread of the Gospel, even murdering those who preached.

(2) If the disciples stole the body, they would have known that they were proclaiming a falsehood. Men do not willingly die for a cause they know to be false.

Faith of the Disciples
The faith of those who proclaimed the risen Lord is astounding! Disciples who ran away when Jesus was arrested, later proclaimed the resurrection with great boldness (Acts 2:24-32). They were convinced not only by the empty tomb, but by seeing Jesus alive after His burial; not only once nor twice, but many times over a period of forty days. They saw Him in groups of two, seven, ten, eleven and five hundred!

Hallucination?
Could the resurrection appearances have been hallucinations? Different groups do not continue to see the same hallucination, nor would five hundred people have the same hallucination at once. Hallucinations are usually experienced by individuals who are anticipating some unusual occurrence. The disciples were not expecting the resurrection and tended not to believe the first appearances of the risen Lord.

The Swoon Theory
Was Jesus really dead when they buried Him? Roman soldiers broke the legs of the thieves to insure their deaths before the beginning of the Passover. But they found Jesus already dead. One soldier, in order to be certain, delivered a mortal spear thrust (John 19: 31-37). We may be certain Jesus was dead when Joseph of Arimathea placed the body in the tomb.

Records Latter Expanded?
Were the records later expanded to include the resurrection in an effort to glorify Christ? It is a matter of historical record outside the Scriptures that the first century Christians believed it and preached a risen Lord. The first century historian, Flavius Josephus mentioned Christ and the resurrection (Antiquities, Book 28, Chapter 3). Josephus was not a Christian, yet his writings and the writings of others clearly indicate the first century proclamation of the risen Lord. The Scriptures were not later expanded to accommodate the resurrection.

The Results
If Jesus had remained in the tomb: Peter, James and John would have returned permanently to their fishing nets. There would have been no New Testament record and no church. The evidence for the resurrection is overwhelming. The empty tomb found by the women puzzled them. The only plausible explanation is that given by the angel, “He is not here; He has risen, just as He said. Come and see the place where He lay” Matthew 28:6.

“But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that He raised Christ from the dead. But if He did not raise Him: if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for in this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men,”
1 Corinthians 15:12-19

Please contact me, Dennis Crawford, at BibleTruthsToU@gmail.com, or 253-396-0290 (cell) for comments or further Bible information, or for the location of a congregation belonging to Jesus Christ near you. .

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Jesus the Christ Evidences MENU

04 Feb 2021 A) The Resurrection: Hoax or History? The Case for Christ's Resurrection

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Jesus Christ the Messiah (2 of 2)

Jesus the Messiah:
Prophetic Proof – Part 2
by Brett Hickey


I hope you were able to catch last week’s message as we discussed the major role that prophecy plays, first in pointing to Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah, and consequently, the evidence that fulfilled prophecies give in sustaining the fact that the Bible is not merely a merely human product, but as it claims, the word of God.

We noticed last week that Jesus rested His authority and the authenticity of His ministry largely on His ability to fulfill the prophecies that pepper the Old Testament Scriptures. After the establishment of the church, the apostles followed His lead. Consider this excerpt from the sermon that Peter preached in Acts 3:18-25,

“But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began. For Moses truly said to the fathers, "The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you. And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.' Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. You are sons of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, "And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (italics mine)

Notice the layers of repetition of a common theme of fulfilled prophecy:
“God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets” (v 18)
“Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before” (v 20)
“which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets” (v 21)
“For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me’” (v 22)


“Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. You are sons of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.'” (vv 24-25)



Peter’s sermon, consisting of little more than a string of prophecies regarding Jesus as the Messiah, infuriated the Jewish leaders who locked the apostles up (Acts 4:1-3), but also brought the number of men who believed to five thousand (Acts 4:4). No doubt, this kind of preaching must be duplicated today.

This morning, we want to build on the strong foundation laid last week and notice Biblical, historical, logical, and even mathematical evidence that Jesus is the Christ, the promised Messiah. You will see that your only hope of salvation rests in actively responding to His great work by obeying the gospel and living for Him until His glorious return.

Despite the considerable influence that Buddha, Confucius and Muhammad have had on the world, their impact falls short of the dominant influence of Jesus the Christ. Jesus so changed the world for the better that the calendar of human history has been reset in His honor. No other man can claim this global distinction. We date letters and documents so frequently and thoughtlessly that we often take this for granted, but we speak of history today in terms of AD and BC.

The abbreviation AD stands for “Anno Domini” which is a Latin phrase that means in “the year of the Lord.” The initials BC simply indicate the number of years “before Christ.” This means that Jesus’ birth now represents the fulcrum of history. The days and months linked to the Greek and Roman gods of yore (Thursday for Thor; January for Janus), must settle, even in a largely godless world, for a subservient role to the year of our Lord Jesus Christ, 2011. Every time the Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or Jew dates a letter, they tacitly acknowledge the monumental impact that Jesus has had on the world. In an attempt to soften this admission, some of members of other religions use CE for “Common Era” instead of AD and BCE for “Before Common Era” instead of BC, but that actually draws more attention to the same truth.

Notable Christian scholar and historian, Philip Schaff, speaks to Jesus’ weighty influence on the world (tract on The Person of Christ), “This Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon; without science and learning, He shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and scholars combined; without the eloquence of schools, He spoke such words of life as were never spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of orator or poet; without writing a single line, He set more pens in motion, and furnished themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise than the whole army of great men of ancient and modern times.”

I have always been impressed with the power of the hundreds of Messianic prophecies Jesus fulfilled, but recently I have read more widely on what others have said about them and I’ve been even further amazed. While Jesus himself was a Jew, thousands of Jews responded to the gospel in the early days of the church, and hundreds of thousands of Jews follow Jesus today, the Jewish people are ordinarily not responsive to the truth about Jesus. In ‘The Case for the Real Jesus,’ Lee Strobel quotes comedian and Jewish rabbi Jackie Mason who said, “There’s no such thing as a Jew for Jesus. It’s like saying a black man is for the KKK. You can’t be a table and a chair. You’re either a Jew or a Gentile.”

In light of that, I was fascinated by the fact that Jewish Rabbi, Pinchas Lapide, in his book, ‘The Resurrection of Jesus: A Jewish Perspective,’ actually acknowledges Jesus’ bodily resurrection, qualifying his admission by saying that Jesus is not the Messiah for the Jews, but for everybody else.

Many impressive, highly educated Jews have issued touching descriptions of their conversion to Christianity. Perhaps the most interesting Jew, though, was Alfred Edersheim, author of ‘The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah’ — one of the first books in my personal library. This book (my copy is two volumes in one) is essentially a commentary on the four gospels. For years I’ve benefited from Edersheim’s scholarly writing and unique perspective on the gospel. What was so meaningful to me more recently, though, was his handling of the Messianic prophecies. Edersheim documents 456 Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah. That is not so unusual. What is striking is that Edersheim cites these prophecies as being suggested by over 500 rabbinical writings. The emphasis on these Scriptures pointing to the coming Messiah was first initiated by Jewish rabbis, not Christians.

Lee Strobel cites Rabbi Aryeh Kaplain who says, “Belief in the coming Messiah has always been a fundamental part of Judaism. Thus, for example, [Jewish philosopher] Maimonides counts the belief in the Messiah as one of the thirteen cardinal principles of Judaism. It is a concept that is repeated again throughout the length and breadth of Jewish literature.” This confirming Jewish perspective was news to me.

Consider some of the major Messianic prophecies that Christians use to substantiate Jesus’ as the Christ which are identified by Jewish sources as Messianic (most of these are identified by Edersheim):
Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel."
Genesis 22:18, “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice."
Genesis 49:10, “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, Nor a lawgiver from between his feet, Until Shiloh comes; And to Him shall be the obedience of the people.”
Deuteronomy 18:18, “I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him.”
Psalm 22:15, “My strength is dried up like a potsherd, And My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death.”
Psalm 45:6-7, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom. You love righteousness and hate wickedness; Therefore God,Your God, has anointed You With the oil of gladness more than Your companions.”
Psalm 110:1, “The LORD said to my Lord, "Sit at My right hand, Till I make Your enemies Your footstool."
Isaiah 2:4, “He shall judge between the nations, And rebuke many people; They shall beat their swords into plowshares, And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, Neither shall they learn war anymore.”
Isaiah 9:6, “For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
Isaiah 28:16, “Behold, I lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, A tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation…”
Isaiah 42:1, “Behold! My Servant whom I uphold, My Elect One in whom My soul delights! I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles.”
Isaiah 52:3 "You have sold yourselves for nothing, And you shall be redeemed without money."
Isaiah 52:7 “How beautiful upon the mountains Are the feet of him who brings good news, Who proclaims peace, Who brings glad tidings of good things, Who proclaims salvation, Who says to Zion, "Your God reigns!"
Isaiah 52:13 “Behold, My Servant shall deal prudently; He shall be exalted and extolled and be very high.”
Isaiah 53:5, “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.”
Isaiah 53:10 “Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, And the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in His hand.”
Micah 5:2, "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, Yet out of you shall come forth to Me The One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, From everlasting."

The admission of this testimony on the behalf of the Messiah and acknowledged by neutral, if not hostile witnesses, is a giant step toward convicting the skeptical people of the truth about Jesus.

So, we not only have hundreds of prophecies fulfilled by Jesus, but many of these same prophecies were confirmed beforehand in non-Christian Jewish sources as applying to the Messiah. How seriously should we interpret the fulfillment of scores of such prophecies?

Peter Stoner, science professor of Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, steps forward to offer his input. Stoner investigated the mathematical probabilities associated with Old Testament Messianic prophecies being applied to Jesus of Nazareth (Peter Stoner, Science Speaks: Scientific Proof of the Accuracy of Prophecy and the Bible, 101-109).

Aided and scrutinized by six hundred college students in twelve classes, Stoner then relayed their findings to a Committee of the American Scientific Affiliation for evaluation. They corroborated his calculations as reliable. How meaningful were Professor Stoner's findings? His research determined that the odds of any man fulfilling only ‘eight’ Old Testament Messianic prophecies was one chance out of one with "seventeen’ zeros after it (100,000,000,000,000,000)!

To try to comprehend a number like that, Professor Stoner used the following illustration: “Cover the entire state of Texas two feet deep in silver dollars. Choose and ‘mark’ one silver dollar and drop it from an airplane flying somewhere over Texas. Thoroughly ‘stir’ the silver dollars all over the state. Blindfold a person and let them travel anywhere in the state, stopping only ‘once’ at a spot of his choice to dig into the two feet of silver dollars and pick out the marked’ one. The chance of a person being able to do that in ‘one’ try is the same chance as one man fulfilling only ‘eight’ Messianic prophecies. Professor Stoner concluded, ‘The fulfillment of these eight prophecies alone proves that God inspired the writing of those prophecies to a definiteness which lacks only one chance in ten to the seventeenth power of being absolute.’"

In view of these odds, which would require more faith?: 1) believing that one man (in this case Jesus)—by mere coincidence—just happened to fulfill these prophecies or 2) believing that God, as a part of His plan through the ages, providentially saw to it that each of these were fulfilled by (or in) Jesus the Christ?

That’s not all, though. We have just evaluated the likelihood of eight prophecies being fulfilled in one man. Jesus actually fulfilled over three hundred prophecies. The chances of one man fulfilling even forty-eight prophecies "increases" to 1 out of 1 x 10. Playing the lottery is a pitifully poor “investment.” The odds of winning the lottery are about one in ten million or 1 out 7 of 1 x 10.

A quick comparison shows this to be a “sure thing” compared with the chances of Jesus fulfilling only forty-eight of the predictions made about him. Emil Borel, author of ‘Probabilities and Life,’ and expert on probability theory, says that anytime there is less than one chance in ten to the "fiftieth" power (one with fifty zeros after it), the probabilities are so small that it becomes a logical impossibility. That, mind you, is one with fifty zeroes after it— essentially the equivalent of eight prophecies inadvertently fulfilled in one man. For only forty-eight prophecies being fulfilled, the probabilities go far beyond the realm of possibility. This is incredible evidence in favor of Jesus being everything He claimed to be and the Old and New Testament being what it claimed to be — the Word of God.

This evidence is not cited merely to impress you with the evidence for the identity of Jesus and that authority of God’s word. God expects you to act on it. God expects you to come to Him for salvation. Jesus says in John 8:24, “except that you believe in Me, you shall die in your sins.” Believing that Jesus is the Son of God is not difficult when you weigh all the evidence. We are told, in addition, that we must repent in Acts 2:38, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” You must turn away from your past life and turn toward God.

You must confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. This was the last step prior to baptism for the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8:37. He said confidently, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”

We must also be baptized; it is not optional, as some suggest. Even the apostle Paul could not enjoy forgiveness until he was baptized. In retelling his own conversion, he says Ananias told him in Acts 22:16, “Arise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord.”

Jesus says that baptism saves in Mark 16:16 and John 3:5. Peter says baptism saves in I Peter 3:21. Paul says baptism saves in Romans 6:3-5 and Galatians 3:27. Why would anyone claiming to believe in Christ and the Scriptures diminish the role the Holy Spirit assigned for baptism? Why would anyone support a religious institution that said it (baptism) was not necessary for salvation?

Contact us and we will help you obey the gospel today. Don’t delay!

Please visit our website, letthebiblespeak.com, and watch videos of the program at your convenience. Finally, we echo the sentiment of the apostle Paul when he wrote in Romans 16:16, “the churches of Christ salute you.” Until next week, goodbye and God bless.

Sermon delivered by evangelist Brett Hickey over “Let the Bible Speak” April 27, 2011 Sources:
Edersheim, Alfred. Jesus the Messiah : The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1979.
Edersheim, Alfred. "The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah." Christian Classics Ethereal Library ; NetLibrary,
Lapide, Pinchas. The Resurrection of Jesus a Jewish Perspective. Minneapolis: Augsburg Pub. House, 1983.
Schaff, Philip. The Person of Christ: The Perfection of His Humanity Viewed as a Proof of His Divinity. [with a Collection of Impartial Testimonies to the Character of Jesus]. New York: American Tract Society, 1880.
Stoner, Peter Winebrenner, and Robert C. Newman. Science Speaks ; Scientific Proof of the Accuracy of Prophecy and the Bible. Chicago: Moody Press, 1976.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for the Real Jesus : A Journalist Investigates Current Attacks on the Identity of Christ. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 2007. 1-800-380-LTBS (5827)
http://christianbookshelf.org/schaff/the_person_of_christ/index.html See also:
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/p/philip_schaff.html and citation at end of this manuscript.
http://www.netlibrary.com/urlapi.asp?action=summary&v=1&bookid=2009005.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserve

Are you searching for the truth of God's word and have a sincere desire to learn about the Bible? Do you want to know what the Bible says about salvation and about Christ and His church? If you are looking for Bible Founded discussion on these topics and many others, then please accept this invitation to explore "Let the Bible Speak" and then contact us for additional studies.

We are members of the church of Christ as found in the New Testament. We are not members of a denomination or earthly religious organization. We are a brotherhood of believers, joined by a common bond, Jesus Christ. We try to live and worship following the patterns found in the New Testament.

For manuscripts of other sermons visit: www.LetTheBibleSpeak.com or call 1-800-380-LTBS (5827) A bracket [ ] within quotes is used to note words added that are not in the original quote.

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Jesus the messiah (1

by Brett Hickey, of Let the Bible Speak

One of the fifteen featured physicians in Ruth Rosen’s book, Jewish Doctors Meet the Great Physician, Conservative Jew, Dr. Bernie Cohen, was led to Christ by a college friend who had left Judaism and a family with several generations of rabbis. As they debated their differences, Cohen researched his Bar Mitzvah Bible to dispute her claims that the Hebrew prophets predicted Jesus’ coming. He wrote of his search,

I discovered that the prophet Micah had predicted that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2) and that Jeremiah stated the Messiah would be of the seed of David (Jeremiah 23:5). Isaiah prophesied the unusual circumstances of the Messiah’s birth (Isaiah 7:14) and described his reign (Isaiah 9:1–8). And in one of the most poetic and wondrous passages I had ever seen, that same prophet described the sufferings of the servant Messiah and the revelation of what was to come in the days ahead (Isaiah 52:13–53:12).

Sandy also pointed me to Jeremiah and his prophesy of the new covenant, a covenant based on a change in mind and heart and a new closeness to God (Jeremiah 31:31–34). Ezekiel further elaborated upon the cleansing from sin and the new spirit God would place in our hearts (Ezekiel 36:26ff). I was amazed by these prophesies, and became convinced that God planned to send a Messiah to accomplish these events….

Sandy explained that God did not do away with the sacrificial system even though the Temple was destroyed.…She also explained to me that God had provided his ultimate sacrifice through Jesus. She said that Jesus was the Lamb of God, the final sacrifice for forgiveness of sins, both then and in the future for all those who would accept that sacrifice…. Without him, we were accountable for our own sins, without the Temple, the sacrificial system, and all the things necessary to obtain atonement.

Sandy also explained that the destruction of the Temple in A.D. 70 precluded any future person from claiming they were the Messiah. The genealogical records that could link a person’s ancestry to the tribe of Judah were destroyed.

We want to review compelling evidence that led tens of thousands of first century Jews to make a clean break with the Mosaic rituals practiced by their ancestors for fifteen centuries. The same internal Biblical support has led Dr. Cohen and hundreds of thousands of other Jews (Rabbi Kravitz) to turn their lives over to the Messiah today. If you have not done so, may this data send you to Jesus. If you are already walking with Jesus, may this study be faith building.


“I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” Those are the greatest words that you will ever utter. When Peter makes this very confession in Matthew 16:16-18, Jesus says in response that “flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven” and that on this rock, on this foundation, He would “build His church.”

Then, when Jesus faced his accusers in the Sanhedrin who had exhausted their attempts to elicit compelling testimony against Him from false witnesses, the High Priest struck at the heart of the issue with them in Matthew 26:63, “Tell us if You are the Christ, the Son of God!" And, of course, when Jesus confirmed His identity, He sealed His fate. The High Priest responded dramatically by tearing his clothes and saying in Matthew 26:65-66, "‘He has spoken blasphemy! What further need do we have of witnesses? Look, now you have heard His blasphemy! What do you think?’ They answered and said, ‘He is deserving of death.’" Finally, in the last verse of his gospel (John 20:31), the apostle John explains the purpose of the book, saying it was “written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.”

We zero in on the importance of the “Son of God” part of the great confession, and rightly so, but isn’t it true that we tend not to give the attention to Jesus as “the Christ” that is merited? At one level, I suppose, we simply superimpose our use of a surname, and, in turn, view Christ simply as Jesus’ last name when it is so much more. And perhaps this is related to another oversight. Do we really give the phrase “fulfilled” the kind of emphasis it deserves? The word is found sixty times in the gospels and Acts. Luke begins his gospel with these words: “Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us…” Jesus taught in the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus in Luke 16:31, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead."

The Jews of Jesus’ day believed in Him because of His miracles, His teaching and godly life, but the fulfillment of prophecies provided an objective form of evidence to substantiate their faith in Christ. In John 1:45, for example, we read, “Philip found Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found Him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.’" Jesus emphasized the fulfillment of prophecies as validation that His work was from God.

In Luke 18:31, “He took the twelve aside and said to them, ‘Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished.’” Surely, Paul was referring largely to the fulfillment of prophecies when he reminded Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:15, “that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” During Timothy’s childhood, of course, there was no New Testament, but only the Old. Paul in Acts 13:26-41 and Peter in Acts 2 and 3 preach Christ powerfully through the prophecies.

Well, we have the powerful testimony of the prophets just as they did. No doubt this is one reason, by God’s Providence, that the Scriptures have been preserved in thousands of manuscripts with such amazing harmony for thousands of years.

Christians sometimes say glibly that “Jesus is the answer.” What they say superficially is true on a much deeper level. When we can trace the fulfillment of scores of prophecies to Jesus, we not only establish that He is the Messiah, but we establish the authority of His teachings and the teachings of the Old Testament prophets. This, in turn, legitimizes the teachings of the apostles (John 16:13; Matthew 28:1920) and validates the New Testament. We demonstrate that the Bible is not the product of human minds, but of the mind of God.

Obviously, one of the purposes of the abundance of Messianic prophecies was to enable those looking for him to be able to distinguish the genuine article from the impostor. Jesus warns in Matthew 24:24, “For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.” Critics claim that someone could have recognized the prophecies ahead of time and simply structured his life and activities in such a way where he could have fulfilled the prophecies.

In some instances this is true, but keep in mind this presupposes that the individual would have an insatiable hunger for the word of God. This individual would have to know the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament in and out to identify the prophecies. He would have to recognize the prophecies and then, if he was an honest man, look for opportunities to fulfill them. If he was a godly man and recognized that he could not fulfill any of the prophecies, the project would end.

If an individual recognized that he did not or could not fulfill any of the prophecies and yet continued to promote himself as the Messiah, that would make him among the most evil of men seeking only the attention, fame and glory that would accompany this greatest of all men. Notice how much attention the Messiah would receive among the Jews according to Deuteronomy 18:18-19, “I will raise up for them a Prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him. And it shall be that whoever will not hear My words, which He speaks in My name, I will require it of him.”

It is likely that many Jews lived throughout the centuries who were self-centered enough to seek such a prominent position even though the “glass slipper,” so to speak, “didn’t fit them.” Surely, though the number would be greatly reduced, there were some of this sort who were even thoroughly acquainted with the Messianic prophecies. Those brash enough to desire this kind of attention, however, would not be the type of people who would also be willing to endure the great humiliation and suffering bound on the Messiah. This in itself, insulated the Messiahship from the undeserving and unqualified.

If he believed the prophets, the imposter would know he had a dishonorable death-wish. The prophecy just quoted from Deuteronomy 18 continues this way in verse 20: “But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.”

Matthew Henry lists a series of frauds when he records Jesus’ warning about “false christ’s” in Matthew 24:24, “Josephus speaks of several such impostors between this and the destruction of Jerusalem; one Theudas, that was defeated by Cospius Fadus; another by Felix, another by Festus. Dosetheus said he was the Christ foretold by Moses…. Simon Magus pretended to be the great power of God, Acts 8:10. In after-ages there have been such pretenders; one about a hundred years after Christ, that called himself Bar-cochobas--The son of a star, but proved Barcosba--The son of a lie. About fifty years ago Sabbati-Levi set up for a Messiah in the Turkish empire, and was greatly caressed by the Jews; but in a short time his folly was made manifest.” These names, if familiar to you, are barely so, and like others we will notice shortly could hardly lay claim to the fulfillment of the prophecy that through him “all the nations of the earth would be blessed.” This prophecy is so grandiose that it could not be counterfeited.

Let us consider this prophesy for a moment and notice how limiting it is. God said to Abraham in Genesis 22:18, “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed..." Two essential ingredients of this prophecy are that “all the nations of the earth be blessed” (italics mine) by this individual, not only his immediate family or even those of his own nation. Secondly, we see this individual must be the descendant of Abraham. We learn further in Genesis 21:12, “in Isaac your seed shall be called.” Genesis 35:10-12 further restrict this blessing to the descendant of Jacob.

Then, Genesis 49:10 reads, “The scepter shall not depart from Judah…” A scepter indicates a “…royal or imperial authority.” (Merriam-Webster.com) Judah, of course, was one of the twelve tribes of Israel who carried the name of one of Jacob’s sons. So, we have the prophecy narrowed further. The Messianic line is constricted again by Jeremiah 23:5, "‘Behold, the days are coming,’ says the LORD, ‘That I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness; A King shall reign and prosper, And execute judgment and righteousness in the earth.’” David was a tenth generation descendant of Judah eliminating many other Jews from consideration.

We have many more prophetic details to examine, and yet, this handful of Old Testament prophecies offers remarkable specificity already when you ponder the magnitude of the prophecy. The promised Messiah through whom all the nations were to be blessed was to be a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah and David.

Now we need only ask ourselves what single individual’s existence in under six thousand years of written history, has most blessed the people of all nations? Michael H. Hart wrote and then revised a book in 1992 entitled, The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History. Consider forty of the most familiar names: Muhammad, Isaac Newton, Buddha, Confucius, Paul, Gutenberg, Columbus, Pasteur, Galileo, Aristotle, Euclid, Darwin, Augustus Caesar, Copernicus, Constantine, Michael Faraday, Luther, George Washington, Orville/Wilbur Wright, Genghis Khan, Shakespeare, Alexander the Great, Napoleon, Thomas Edison, Hitler, Plato, Cromwell, Alexander Graham Bell, Locke, Beethoven, Michelangelo, Stalin, Julius Caesar, Voltaire, Kennedy, Lenin, Cyrus the Great, Henry Ford, Queen Elizabeth I, Gorbachev and Charlemagne.

We have not filtered this list by any prophecies other than Genesis 22:18, “In your seed (Abraham) all the nations of the earth shall be blessed…” We have not limited consideration to descendants of Abraham or even to religious leaders. Still, who in this list could even be considered alongside Jesus as the most influential individual in world history? Interestingly, nearly half of these folks would confess, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”

Remember, though, the prophecy was limited to one who was a descendant of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. This man through whom all nations were to be blessed must be a Jew. Let’s look at the twenty most influential Jews of history (adherents.com). Besides Jesus, the most likely candidates would include Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Abraham, Paul, Karl Marx, Moses, Theodor Herzl, Mary, Baruch de Spinoza, David, Anne Frank, Judas Iscariot, Gustav Mahler, Maimonides, Neils Bohr, Mendelssohn, Paul Erhlich and Rashi.

Again, we are working with only four prophecies that restrict the Messiah as a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah and David. After excluding Mary, Jesus’ mother, Moses, Abraham and the Apostle Paul from the ten most prominent Jews, we are left with only Einstein, Freud, Marx, Herzl and Spinoza. Most non-Jews know nothing about the last two, leaving Einstein, Freud and Marx as the best hope for an alternative Messiah. Marx said, “religion is the opiate of the people.” Freud said that "Religion is comparable to a childhood neurosis." Einstein, the closest competitor, removed himself from contention by denying that there was a personal God at all. No Messiah here!

That leaves only Jesus as the only prospective Messiah among the Jews that have ever lived.When you expand the list to the fifty most influential Jews of history that lived before AD 70, you add only Hillel and Philo to Paul, Moses, David and Judas. Outside the world of academia, the last two, Hillel and Philo, are relative unknowns.

Someone might ask, “Well, what if the prophecy is to be fulfilled in someone yet unborn?” That sounds reasonable, but one huge problem. Michael L. Brown, a Jewish convert to Christianity who worked as professor of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Fuller Theological seminary and Regents University, explains, “Keep in mind the second temple was destroyed in AD 70. Atonement for sin had to be made and the divine visitation had to take place before the second temple was destroyed. There are even rabbinic traditions that put the Messiah’s coming around two thousand years ago – right when Jesus came. In fact, Rashi, the foremost Jewish commentator on the Tanakh (OT – BH), put the date at more than 1,750 years ago, but that was based on the most famous chronological error in the rabbinic literature. When the error is corrected, we find ourselves in the middle of the first century, within one generation of the time of Jesus!”

“So, it’s not a matter of maybe there’s another one who’s the Messiah. If it’s not…Jesus, then throw out the Bible, because nobody except him accomplished what needed to be done prior to AD 70.” (Lee Strobel, The Case for the Real Jesus, 197-198)

We have only scratched the surface, but surely you can see how powerfully the prophets testify to the Messiahship of Christ. Join us next week for a closer look. Stay with us and we’ll tell you how you can get a copy of this message, after our song…

Thank you for watching Let the Bible Speak. We pray that you have heard God speak to you through His word. If you’d like a copy of this sermon, #807, “Prophetic Proof,” please write the address on your screen and we’ll be glad to get it out to you. You may also request a free Bible study course you can complete at home. Please visit our website, letthebiblespeak.com, and watch videos of the program at your convenience. Finally, we echo the sentiment of the apostle Paul when he wrote in Romans 16:16, “the churches of Christ salute you.” Until next week, goodbye and God bless.
Sermon delivered by evangelist Brett Hickey over “Let the Bible Speak” April 27, 2011

Source:
1) Hart, Michael H. The 100 : A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History. Secausus, N.J.: Carol Pub. Group, 1992.
2) Rosen, Ruth. Jewish Doctors Meet the Great Physician. Rev. 1998 2nd ed. San Francisco, CA: Purple Pomegranate Productions, 1998.
3)Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ : A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1998.
4) http://jewsforjesus.org/resources/ebooks/archive/jewish_doctors/jewishdoctors.pdf

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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