What is Messianic Prophecy?
Messianic prophecy is prophecy pertaining to the coming of the Messiah. The messianic prophecy in the old testament provide an undeniable proof that Jesus was the Messiah that fulfilled the prophecies. Here are some good examples:
Examples of Bible Prophecy that has been fulfilled:
Did you know that the book of Daniel chapter 9 verse 25 predicted to the precise day when Jesus would ride into Jerusalem on a donkey and soon after be killed?
The excerpt below was taken from the following site: http://www.alphanewsdaily.com/mathprophecy1.html
The Prophecy ... Book of Daniel 9:24-25 (written around 500 BC)
"He (Messiah ... the King)
will be revealed
7 weeks + 62 weeks ( = 69 weeks of years)
AFTER the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem
and its walls,
THEN He (Messiah)
will be CUT-OFF (executed!)
but NOT for Himself." (He willingly died on the Cross as the sacrificial "Lamb of God".)
(Daniel 9:24-25)
This is a mathematical prophecy . . .
- A week of years (shabua or shabu’im) = 7 years
- "Cut-off". . . the actual Hebrew word used was karath, literally means "executed!"
- The "70th Week" (the last 7 years) of this prophecy is yet future ... the coming "Apocalypse."
God gave the Jews the most sophisticated calendar on Earth. It is both a Lunar and a Solar calendar. The Jewish calendar uses a 360 day lunar (and prophetic) year and then adds a 'Leap Month' on specific years to accurately coincide with the Solar cycle we use on our 'Julian' calendar ...
The Bible uses 360 day years for prophecies and expects us to add the appropriate 'leap months' on schedule. So, the easiest way to unravel this prophecy is to first convert this prophecy into days ...
1. Add 7 + 62 weeks of years = 69 weeks of years in this prophecy
2. Multiply 69 (weeks) x 7 (to get the total number of years in this prophecy) = 483 years
3. Multiply 483 years x 360 (to get the total number of days in this prophecy) = 173,880 days
So, the prophet Daniel, who lived 500 years before Jesus (Yeshua) wrote that from the day of the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem and its walls, until the coming Messiah would be 173,880 days!
(Note: This prophecy was also translated from Hebrew into Greek in the Septuagint almost 300 yearsbefore Jesus made His prophetic entry into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey.)
To convert the 173,880 days found in this prophecy into our 365.25 day solar years (the .25 adjusts forleap years) . . .
173,880 days ÷ 365.25 (days in a year) = 476 years (our solar 'Julian' calendar)
So, the prophet Daniel told us it would be 476 years from the "commandment to rebuild Jerusalem and its walls" to the time the Messiah of Israel would first be revealed to Israel (and to the world.)
The Commandment ...
This prophecy of the coming Messiah is both remarkable and extremely precise. There were other orders to rebuild the Temple, but, there was only one commandment to restore Jerusalem and its wall. On March 14th, 445 BC, as confirmed by modern archaeology, King Artexerxes I of Persia issued the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem and specifically included its wall (see Nehemiah 2:2-9 ... the book of Nehemiah records this account of rebuilding the city and its wall.)
Prophecy fulfilled ...
Now take the 476 years in this prophecy and simply start counting from March 14, 445 B.C. (when the command to rebuild the city Jerusalem and its wall was given) and you end on the exact year (even thevery day) Jesus (Yeshua) rode 'triumphantly' into Jerusalem (Palm Sunday), being praised as King and Messiah by thousands upon thousands of the Jewish people who had gathered from all over for the Passover Holidays. Honored, yet lowly, riding on a donkey - exactly as another prophet, the prophet Zechariah, said He would ...
"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 ... written around 500 B.C.)
Thus, on the 10th day of Nisan ("Palm Sunday") 32 AD ... 476 years after the command was given to rebuild the city and its wall ... Jesus (Yeshua) made His famous "triumphal entry" into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey. It was the only day that He ever allowed Himself to be honored as Messiah or King (Mark 11:1-12) as the people of Israel cried out and sang "Hosanna to the Son of David (this is a Psalm of the Messiah), blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!" from Psalm 118 ... (and all this took place just a few days before He was "executed" exactly as Daniel's prophecy said He would!)
A remarkable prophecy . . . simply count the years! March 14, 445 B.C. Commandment is issued by Artexerxes I to rebuild the wall
to April 6, 32 A.D. "Palm Sunday", 10th of Nisan - Jesus welcomed as King and Messiah
= 477 years
- 1 year Subtract one for no "0" A.D. or B.C.
= 476 years Exactly!
Who else around 32 A.D. fulfilled all these many prophecies?
No one!!! Only Jesus (Yeshua) of Nazareth (born in Bethlehem in the line of King David) ... the promised Messiah!
Source: http://www.alphanewsdaily.com/mathprophecy1.html
More Examples Below:
Seed of a Woman
Genesis 3:15
And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring (seed) and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.
Isaiah 9:6
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Judges 13:18
Wonderful is the name by which The Angel of the Lord identified Himself while visiting Samson’s parents.
When the phrase “The Angel of the Lord” appears in the Old testament, it’s in conjunction with a pre-incarnate visit by the Lord Jesus. That He’s being referenced in Isaiah 9:6 is confirmed by the title, Prince of Peace.
Jesus called the Holy Spirit the Counselor in John 14:26 , and Mighty God and everlasting Father can only refer to God.
A Descendant Of Abraham
n Genesis 12:1-3 the origin of this redeemer becomes clearer. There God promised Abraham that all the nations of Earth would be blessed through him, and in Genesis 22He had Abraham act this out with the sacrifice of Isaac, Abraham’s “only son” on Mt. Moriah. 2000 years later another Father would offer His only Son as a sacrifice for sin in that same place. Abraham knew this and named the place Jehovah Jireh, saying, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided” (Gen. 22:14).
The Lion Of Judah
Later, as Abraham’s grandson Jacob neared death, he narrowed it down still more by saying that all of Israel’s kings including the ultimate one, “the one to whom it (the ruler’s staff) belongs”, would come from among the descendants of one of his sons, Judah, (Gen. 49:10) giving birth to the title “Lion of Judah” as a Messianic reference.
The Son Of David
In 2 Samuel 7:12-15 we read that David longed to build a Temple for God, but God refused him, saying that it would take a man of peace to build a house for Him. He said that David’s son Solomon would be that man, and during Solomon’s
reign Israel experienced peace as never before or since. But to ease David’s disappointment God promised to build him a “house” and the Davidic Dynasty was founded. Hence forth there would always be a direct descendant of David’s on the throne of Israel.
It was an everlasting promise made in about 1000 BC, and Solomon would be the first fulfillment. But since neither Solomon nor any other Davidic King was flogged by men for “doing wrong” (2 Sam. 7:14) there’s a lot more going on here than meets the eye.
The wording casts shadows of the Messiah.
So through God’s progressive revelation we’ve narrowed things down from learning that the redeemer would be a son of Eve’s, which would exclude no one, to the family of Abraham, then Judah, then David. But we’re not finished yet.
Over the next 400 years the Davidic Kings went from bad to worse with few exceptions. Finally, in the time of the Prophet Jeremiah God had had enough and pronounced a blood curse on the Davidic line, saying that no son of then King Jehoiachin would ever rule over Israel. (Jere. 22:30) The Davidic line, begun with Solomon, was seemingly ended and God’s promise to David broken.
The Branch
However, before the nation was taken to Babylon, while a Davidic King still sat on the throne, God had Ezekiel announce that the line was being suspended and wouldn’t be restored until “He comes to whom it rightfully belongs.” (Ezekiel 21:27) recalling Jacob’s prophecy to mind. In 519 BC, after the Jews had returned from the Babylonian captivity, God said that a man He called The Branch would be the one, and that He would hold the priesthood as well, combining the two.
(Zechariah 6:12).
There are four references to The Branch in the Old Testament and all point to the Messiah.
In Zechariah 3:8 He’s called God’s servant, in Zechariah 6:12 He’s a man, both king and priest.
In Jeremiah 23:5 He’s called a righteous king, and in Isaiah 4:2 He’s the Branch of God.
Born Of a Virgin, Born In Bethlehem
But how was God going to get around the blood curse? For the answer to that, we have to back up to about 750 BC. In that time two of the most specific Messianic prophecies ever given narrowed the field down to just one possibility.
In Isaiah 7:14 the Lord proclaimed that the Messiah would be born of a virgin, and in Micah 5:2 that he would be born in Bethlehem, the City of David.
In order to legally qualify for a seat on David’s throne, the Messiah King would have to be of the house and lineage of David. To be from the house of David means being a biological descendant of David’s. Being of David’s lineage means belonging to the Royal Line. How can this be?
When we read the Lord’s genealogies in Matt. 1 and Luke 3, we can see differences beginning at the time of David. Matthew’s genealogy runs through Solomon, the cursed royal line. But Luke’s goes through Solomon’s brother Nathan. Nathan’s
line wasn’t cursed, but neither were they kings. Further study reveals that Matthew is actually giving us Joseph’s genealogy while Luke shows us Mary’s. Both were descended from David, and in addition Joseph was one of many who were heir
to David’s throne but unable to claim it because of the curse on his line.
So through His mother Mary, Jesus was a biological descendant of David’s. When Mary and Joseph became husband and wife, Jesus also became Joseph’s legal son and heir to David’s Throne. But not being biologically related to Joseph, He didn’t have the blood curse. He was of both the house and lineage of David. To this day He’s the only man born in Israel since 600BC with a legitimate claim to David’s throne. The angel Gabriel confirmed this to Mary when he told her that although a virgin, she would soon give birth to the Son of God, who would occupy it forever. (Luke 1:32-33) Isaiah 9:7 had revealed the same fact centuries earlier. God’s promise to David stands.
Daniel And The Magi
200 years after Micah identified Bethlehem as the Messiah’s birthplace, The Lord told Daniel the time of His death. It would be 483 years after the decree to rebuild and restore Jerusalem following the Babylonian captivity, but before an
enemy army came to destroy it again. (Daniel 9:24-27) This places the Messiah’s death somewhere between 32 and 70 AD according to our reckoning of time.
Daniel formed a group of Persian priests to pass this information down from father to son, and according to tradition set aside the bulk of his personal wealth as a gift for them to present to the Messiah when the time came for His birth. He apparently also gave them a confirming sign to look for from Numbers 24:17, later known as the Star of Bethlehem.
The descendants of these priests, now a very influential political force in Parthia (as Persia came to be known), remained true to Daniel’s commission, and upon seeing the star set out for Jerusalem. Arriving there they sought an audience with King Herod, asking for the whereabouts of the one born to be King of Israel. Summoning the chief priests, Herod repeated the question and was referred to Micah 5:2 where Bethlehem is identified. The Parthian priests, or
The field of candidates for Redeemer of Mankind, the Seed of the Woman, the Descendant of Abraham, the Lion of Judah, the Son of David, the Messiah of Israel, had been narrowed down to one. His name is Jesus.
Faith In Action
By faith, with nothing more than Daniel’s word to their ancestors, the Magi mounted up and undertook a dangerous 800 mile trip into enemy territory to meet the Messiah. (The Parthians and Romans were technically at war.) With 4000 years of fulfilled prophetic scripture in their hands, the chief priests, who no longer took it literally, refused to join them for the last 5 miles from Jerusalem to Bethlehem to see if God’s Word really was true. In so doing, the leaders of the people He came to save missed out on the central event in human history, consigning themselves to eternal separation from the very God they had been seeking.
If history repeats itself like they say it does, then when He comes back many of today’s religious experts, who also don’t take the prophecies literally, will make the same mistake. As you recall the Reason for the Season, take time to thank Him for making you like the Magi instead of like them, because if you listen carefully, you can almost hear the footsteps of the Messiah 12-22-12 - Jack Kelly Bible scholar (his site is http://gracethrufaith.com/)
