GodRules

 Prophecies of the

Messiah

"Messiah" is not a name . . . it's a Title.  The Hebrew word "Messiah" is translated "Christ" in English.  Messiah (Christ) is His Title.  As you will see, the Bible clearly says there is, and will be, only one Messiah.  The promised Messiah of Israel . . . 

Every book in the Bible mysteriously points toward Him.  Israel was removed from the Land when they rejected Him.  Israel has been brought back into the Land to witness His return.  He will one day save Israel from her enemies.  His past is our past and His future is our future . . .

The Bible is God’s personal message to Man.  Although written over a vast number of years, it is perfectly integrated and consistent, showing the design of a single Author directing chosen men to write down His words.  To prove that God is who He says He is, and to set the Bible apart from all other books and "religions," God had His prophets write down, in detail, events that were going to happen in the future.  Jesus-Yeshua said, "Search the scriptures, for they testify of Me."  God tells us He will do nothing significant affecting Israel or the world without first providing a warning, or warnings in advance through His prophets . . .

  "Surely the Lord GOD does nothing, unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets." (Amos 3:7)

If this is true (and the Bible tells us that God cannot lie) then God would have prepared Israel for the Messiah and He would have included enough detail to insure that there could be no question as to His identity.  The Bible tells us even though the accounts of Jesus-Yeshua documented in the New Testament were seen by many thousands of eyewitnesses (even the Jewish leaders at the time never claimed the accounts of Jesus-Yeshua were false) it also says, "We have even the more sure word of prophecy," Jesus-Yeshua was in fact the promised Messiah.  What did they mean by that??!!

The ancient Holy scriptures, the Tanakh (sometimes called the "Old Testament,") from which the following prophecies are taken, were all written from 400 years to 2,000 years before Christ (B.C.) and were later translated from the Hebrew into Greek by 72 Jewish priests and scholars who were brought together sometime around 270 B.C. 

 So, these prophecies were in writing and being translated from Hebrew into Greek almost three hundred years before Jesus-Yeshua was even born in Bethlehem ... the city of King David!

This Hebrew to Greek translation of the ancient Holy Scriptures is called the "Septuagint," and is well documented in both Jewish and secular history . . .

So, what prophetic details did God weave into the ancient Holy Scriptures concerning the coming Messiah?

The Messiah would be born of a virgin

 "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son,

   and shall call His name Immanuel"   (Isaiah 7:14)

   [Immanuel means "God is with us"]

   (Note:  The Hebrew word used can be translated both 'virgin' and 'young maiden' ... however, when the 72

   Jewish priests and scholars translated the word into Greek for the 'Septuagint' around 270 BC they used the

   Greek word which can only mean 'virgin' ...  for in Greek there is a different word for 'young maiden.'

The Messiah would be the Son of God

 "For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given,

   and His name will be called Mighty God,

   Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."   (Isaiah 9:6)

(Note:  The word used for the 'Son' of God in the Bible is not the word used in a 'Senior-Junior' Father-Son sense, but a different word is used which would better translate as full 'Heir' of God, denoting an 'equality'...)

The Messiah would be born in Bethlehem . . .

After stepping forth from Eternity ("from old, from everlasting")

 "But you, O 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 have been

   from of old, from everlasting."   (Eternal ... the Bible warns here Messiah would step forth from Eternity.)

   (Micah 5:2) 

The Messiah would ride triumphantly into Jerusalem . . . Luke 19:41+

Meek and lowly . . . riding on a donkey

 "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion [Israel]!

   Behold, your King [Messiah] is coming to you;

   He is just and having salvation,

   yet He is lowly and riding on a donkey."

   (Zechariah 9:9)

He would be betrayed by a friend

  "Even my own familiar friend in whom I trusted, who

   ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me."

   (Psalm 41:9)

They would set a price on Him of 30 pieces of silver . . .

which would then be thrown into the potter's field

 "So they weighed out for my wages thirty pieces of silver.

   And the LORD said to me, ‘Throw it to the potter’ -

   that princely price they set on me."  

   (Zechariah 11:12-13)

People would be attracted to Him through His words and deeds . . . not by His looks

 "He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,

   nothing in his appearance that we should desire him."

   (Isaiah 53:2 NIV)

The Messiah would be despised and rejected . . .

He would deeply feel the pain of rejection

 "He is despised and rejected by men,

   A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief."

   (Isaiah 53:3)

People would turn their backs on Him

 "And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him;"

   (Isaiah 53:3)

The Messiah would be despised

 "He was despised, and we did not esteem Him."

   (Isaiah 53:3)

The Messiah would be despised by the world and rejected by Israel

  "The Redeemer of Israel, their Holy One,

   To Him whom man (the world) despises,

   To Him whom the nation (Israel) abhors."

   (Isaiah 49:7)

He would suffer . . . brutally beaten and bloodied

 "So His appearance was marred more than any man"

   (Isaiah 52:14)

The Messiah would be beaten, bloodied, and would die for our iniquities [sins]

so we could escape the judgment . . . the darkness and torments of Hell

 "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 [whip lashes] we are healed.

   And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity [sin] of us all."

   (Isaiah 53:5-7)

Yet, as the Passover Lamb of God, He would remain silent during His ordeal

 "He was led as a lamb to the slaughter,

   And as a sheep before its shearers is silent,

   So He opened not His mouth."

   (Isaiah 53:7)

He would be Crucified . . . a torturous and agonizing death

 "All My bones are out of joint . . .

   My tongue clings to My jaws;

   They pierced My hands and My feet,

   They look and stare at Me."

   (Psalm 22:14, 15, 16, 17)

He would have stakes . . . nails . . . driven through his hands

 "And someone will say to Him,

  ‘What are these wounds in your hands?’

   Then He [Messiah/Christ] will answer,

  ‘Those with which I was wounded

   in the house of my friends.’"

   (Zech 13:6)

He would be mocked during His time of suffering and death

 "A reproach of men and despised of the people,

   They shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying

  ‘He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him;’"

   (Psalm 22:7-8)

They would divide His garments and cast lots for His clothes

 "They divide my garments among them,

   and for My garments they cast lots."

   (Psalm 22:18)

He who knew no sin would be made sin for us . . .

 "My God, My God, why have You forsaken me?"

   (Psalm 22:1 . . . also see Matt 27:46)

Note:  With these words from the Cross, Jesus-Yeshua was pointing the Jewish leaders to Psalm 22 . . . The Jewish leaders who were gathered around the Cross knew the Scriptures well.  Psalm 22 is a detailed prophecy foretelling the death of the Messiah, Jesus [Yeshua] on the Cross, written a thousand years before the Cross and written centuries before this form of execution was even invented - written when the Jewish form of execution was stoning.

The Messiah's side would be pierced

 "Then they will look upon Me whom they have pierced;

   they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son,

   and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn."

   (Zech 12:10 . . . this is also a prophecy of His Return)

He would be buried in a rich man's grave

 "He was buried like a criminal in a rich man's grave;"

   (Isaiah 53:9)

He was innocent . . . without guilt . . . without sin

 "But he [the Messiah/Christ] had done no wrong,

   and he had never spoken an evil word."

   (Isaiah 53:9)

The Messiah would be quickly resurrected (raised from the dead) . . .

 "For You will not leave my soul in Sheol [Hell],  (King David knew he would one day enter into Heaven)

   Nor will You allow Your Holy One  [the Messiah]

    to see corruption [decompose]."

    (Ps 16:10)

The Jewish Messiah [Christ] would be a savior to all peoples,

including Jews and non-Jews alike . . . thus fulfilling the Abrahamic Covenant

 "I will also give You as a light to the Gentiles [non-Jews],

   That You should be My salvation 

   [saving people from the darkness and torments of Hell]

   to the ends of the Earth."

   (Isaiah 49:6)

The Messiah [Christ] would be the Sacrifice [payment] for all our sins . . .

The only burden He asks us to carry is to accept it and believe it.

 "And He bore the sin of many . . ."

   (Isaiah 53:12)

The Cross was part of God’s Plan ... so all who receive Jesus (Yeshua) as their Lord can be washed clean of all their sins through His innocent blood ... and spared from the darkness and torment of Hell

 "Yet it was the Lord’s good plan to bruise him;

   put Him to grief, make His soul an offering for sin . . ."

   (Isaiah 53:10, KJV paraphrased)

God (Messiah/Christ) would then return to His place in Heaven, until . . .

(remember Messiah is God who placed His Spirit in the form of Man ... inside a living Tabernacle)

 "I [the LORD] will return again to My place

   until they [Israel] acknowledge their offense.

   Then they will seek My face;

   in their affliction [the coming Tribulation]

   they will diligently seek Me" . . .

   (Hosea 5:15)

Note:  For the LORD to return to His place means that He had to have left His place. One requirement that must be met before He can return to Earth is for the children of Israel to "acknowledge their offense."  (Notice that the word offense is singular, not plural, and it is specific.) This means that Israel must acknowledge their rejection of the Messiah and pray, as a nation, for His return. We are told this will be fulfilled at the very end of the Tribulation. God will fulfill all of His covenants with the nation Israel.

Awesome:  When God's Word and the prophecies became one . . .

   "Now when they had fulfilled

  all that was written concerning Him,

  they took Him down from the tree

  and laid Him in a tomb.

  But God raised Him from the dead.

   He was seen for many days by those

    who came up with Him from Galilee to Jerusalem,

    who are His witnesses to the people."

    (Acts 13:29-31)

And Jesus-Yeshua said . . . 

  "These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you,

    that all things [prophecies] must be fulfilled

  which were written in the Law of Moses and the Prophets [the Old Testament]

   and the Psalms concerning Me."

    And He opened their understanding,

    that they might comprehend the Scriptures."

    Then He [Jesus] said to them, "Thus it is written,

    and thus it was necessary for the Christ [Messiah]

    to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day,

  and that repentance and remission of sins

   should be preached in His name to all nations,

   beginning at Jerusalem."     

   (Luke 24:44-47)

The Torment of the Cross.

The first prophecy found in the Bible is spoken by God to Adam, Eve, and Satan

in the Garden of Eden . . .

                "I will put enmity [hatred]

                 between you [Satan] and the woman [Eve],

                And between your seed [the Anti-christ] and her Seed [the Christ];

                He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel."

                (Gen 3:15)

This first prophecy is a prophecy of the Messiah.  It also sets the stage for Satan’s hatred against mankind.

In this prophecy we are told the seed of the woman, the Messiah (the Christ), would have his heel bruised. If you study the physical trauma associated with Crucifixion, you soon find it was designed to cause extreme pain and torment before death. The word "excruciating" comes from the root word "crucify." Crucifixion was a cruel, slow, agonizing, and tortuous form of execution designed to kill through slow suffocation. The shoulders of the person being crucified would dislocate and separate. The only way the person nailed to the Cross could breathe (or speak) would be to gather as much strength as they could and try to stand up on the nail or the spike that had been driven through their feet. The feet were severely bent forward and pressed together in order to nail them to the Cross. When the feet were nailed securely to the Cross, one heel would be pressed tightly against the wood of the Cross. So, in order to breathe or to speak, the person nailed to the Cross had to put all of their weight on the heel and the large spike that had been driven through the feet in order to stand up far enough to gasp for breath. This incredibly tortuous process would painfully bruise that heel. Also, we are told that Jesus was scourged by the Romans before He was crucified. These "stripes" He took on His back were another form of cruel punishment derived by the powers of the day. The Roman "whip" used for scourging was small with pieces of metal and bone attached. The prisoner’s back was stretched tight as He, in this case, Jesus, was tied to a post. The Roman whip was designed to dig into the skin of the back and then tear the skin away from the bone. By the time Jesus was crucified the skin of His back that had been torn from the "stripes" would have been hanging loosely off of the bone like a tattered cloth. Take a moment to consider the amount of pain shooting through the body of Christ as He struggled with dry, parched lips and gasping for breath to stand up by pressing down on that heel which was nailed to the Cross, causing His tattered back with its exposed bone to rub against the roughly hewn wood of His Cross in order to clearly speak those words . . .

"Father forgive them, for they know not what they do."

Note to Christians: It is wrong and a blasphemy against God and Jesus to ever blame the Jews for Jesus’ death. As one pastor put it, "If you are going to blame anybody blame me, for it was because of my sins that the Messiah stepped forth from Eternity and took on the form of Man, as the Son of Man . . . the Son of God, to suffer and die.

Believing Christians are taught in the Bible to help Israel and her people . . .

                "Cursed be everyone who curses you [Israel],

                  and blessed be those who bless you!" 

                 (Gen 27:29)

God has a covenant with Israel that will never be broken. He has revealed a destiny for Israel which will soon be completed.

God has declared a new covenant and destiny for a people to be drawn from the whole world, through His Messiah, including the children of Israel who recognize their Messiah from Scripture. This new covenant is a promise for all who believe in Him and accept Him.

Another ancient prophecy pointing to the Cross . . .

Here, we find another prophetic "foreshadowing" of the Cross in the book of Numbers, one of the five books of Moses . . .

                "So the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people,

                 and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died.

                 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, ‘We have sinned,

                 for we have spoken against the LORD and against you;

                 pray to the LORD that He take away the serpents from us.’

                 So Moses prayed for the people.

                 Then the LORD said to Moses,

                ‘Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole;

                 and it shall be that everyone who is bitten,

                 when he looks at it, shall live.’

                 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole;

                 and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone,

                 when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived."

                 (Numbers 21:6-9)

In the Bible, the serpent is used as a symbol for "sin," and bronze a symbol of "judgment," because bronze could withstand the fire. We find in this verse that once the people acknowledged their sin, they only needed to look upon the serpent on the pole to be healed and saved. We are told Jesus "became" sin, like that "fiery serpent" on the pole, for us . . .

                "For He made Him who knew no sin [Jesus on the Cross]

                 to be sin for us, that we might become

                 the righteousness of God in Him."

                 (2 Cor 5:21)

Jesus (Yeshua) points to this prophetic model of the serpent on the pole . . .

And  Jesus-Yeshua said, 

                "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,

                 even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,

                 that whoever believes in Him should not perish [in Hell]

                 but have eternal life [in Heaven].

                 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,

                 that whoever believes in Him should not perish [in Hell],

                 but have everlasting life [in Heaven].

                 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn

                 the world, but that the world through Him might be saved."

                 [Saved from the second death . . . the agony and torment of hell]

                 (John 3:14-17)

It is interesting that after hearing the story of the serpent in the wilderness, the ancient Greeks adopted this sign of the serpent on the pole as their symbol for healing. The symbol is still used by our medical profession. You might note there is only one serpent on this ancient symbol, not two.

So, as those who looked upon the fiery serpent in the wilderness were saved from their sins, so will all who believe in Jesus on the Cross be saved . . . and welcomed into His Kingdom of Heaven, forever.

The Promise of the Cross is available to everybody.  The offer is extended to all.  The early church included all - Jew, Roman, Ethiopian, Greek, rich and poor, men and women, centurion and rabbi, together, as one. They saw . . . they heard . . . they believed!

It was only after the Jews rejected their Messiah that the good news of this new covenant of God’s grace would be offered to all people around the world. Christ died for all who believe, from Israel and from all the the nations and people of the world.

The Scriptures tell us there are two roles the Messiah must fulfill:

First, as the Passover Lamb of God . . .

The 'Atonement' for sin whose blood shed on the Cross saves us from the utter darkness and torment of Hell

 Second, as the Lion of Judah . . .

As King of kings and Lord of lords ... to save Israel from the armies of the world which will someday soon come against Her ... and then He will restore the Earth in peace and beauty

The Scriptures also tell us the Messiah will return . . . twice:

First, "as a thief in the night" . . . For those who have waited in faith . . . the "Rapture." John 14

[To remove the faithful believers from Earth to shelter them (like Enoch and Lot) ... before the "Apocalypse."]

Second, "every eye shall see" . . . With  those who have waited in faith.

[He will return to establish His just and fair Kingdom over the whole world ... after the 'Apocalypse']