Hi~Tonight's blog is a different format, because we just spent a few hours with the college and carreer group at First Baptist in Bonita. Pastor Kevin answered their questions about a myriad of topics. Their questions reminded me of some research I did for a friend who was skeptical about the Bible. I love the way the Bible answers these questions so clearly. For instance:
The New Testament is proven to be true by the accounts from the Old Testament such as:
In Luke 3:23-38 the genealogy of Jesus is traced through a long line of ancients, including a number of the well known personalities of the Old Testament, along with Seth, who was “the son of Adam, which was the son of God.” Thus clearly does Luke establish that Adam not only was the first man, but that he was the direct creation of God—“the son of God.”
“For Adam was first formed, then Eve.” (I Tim. 2:13; Gen. 1:27) Here again we note the full confidence Paul had in the details of the Genesis account of creation.
In Jude, verse 14, we are informed that Enoch was the seventh from Adam. Surely Jude had confidence in the genealogical record of Genesis.
Jesus believed in the Genesis account of the Flood. When describing conditions in the earth at the time of his return and second coming, he said, “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all.” (Luke 17:26,27) If Jesus was mistaken concerning the Flood, then we could have no confidence in any of his teachings. But Jesus was not mistaken, as archeologists have since confirmed.
Jesus believed in the Jonah and the whale account. "But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonah: for as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”—Matt. 12:38-40
I also love the number of Old Testament Prophecies that Jesus fulfilled. They say if you stack silver dollars three feet deep, across the entire state of Texas; then mark one silver dollar with an X, get up in an airplane and randomly drop it out of the plane over the state of Texas; the likelihood of finding that silver dollar with an X would be the same probability of one man fulfilling all of the dozens of prophecies that Jesus fulfilled by His birth, scourging, crucifixion, death, burial, placement in the tomb, resurrection and ascension into Heaven. Here are just a few of these Old Testament prophecies and their New Testament fulfillment:
He will enter Jerusalem riding a donkey (Zechariah 9:9).
Fulfillment: Matt. 21:5; Luke 19:32-37.
He will be hated for no reason (Psalm 69:4).
Fulfillment: John 15:25.He will be betrayed (Psalm 41:9).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:3-10.More specifically, He will be betrayed by a friend (Psalm 41:9).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:3-10; 26:47-48.The price of his betrayal will be thirty pieces of silver (Zech. 11:12).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:3-10.The betrayal money will be cast onto the floor (Zech. 11:13).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:5.More specifically, it will be cast onto the floor of the Temple (Zech. 11:13).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:3-10.
The betrayal money will be used to buy a potter's field (Zech. 11:13).
Fulfillment: Matt. 27:6-10.He will not open his mouth to defend himself (Isaiah 53:7).
Fulfillment: Matthew 27:12.He will be beaten and spit upon (Isaiah 50:6).
Fulfillment: Matthew 26:67; 27:26-30.He will be“numbered with the transgressors” (Isaiah 53:12).
Fulfillment: Jesus was crucified as a criminal in between two thieves (Mat 27:38).He will be pierced (Zechariah 12:10).
Fulfillment: John 19:34 His hands and feet will be pierced (Psalm 22:16; Zechariah 12:10; Galatians 3:13).His crucifixion was foretold in Psalm 22 , which graphically prophesies the Messiah's manner of death.
At the time the Psalm was written (and long after), the penalty for blasphemy was stoning.
However, at the time Jesus was condemned by the Sanhedrn, it no longer had the legal right to put people to death.
Thus, the case was taken to the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, who crucified Jesus according to Roman custom, and as Psalm 22 prophesied.
Today, so many skeptics scoff at the Christian’s unshakable faith in the truth of the Bible, but when you look at it from the point of view of fulfilled prophecy, it just makes sense!
