One of the great proofs God’s Word is true and Jesus Christ
is who He says He is, is the exact fulfillment of His birth from
prophecy.
Jordan reasons, “If you can predict something down to the
exact place and time, and seven hundred years later it takes place . . .
“You know what the world says? ‘Must have been written after
the fact and just made to look like that.’ But you know you can have an
absolute historic certainty that cannot be argued with successfully in that one
verse right there (Micah 5:2).
"Ir reads, 'But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.'
"Ir reads, 'But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.'
“According to every historian—I don’t care if he’s a saved
one or lost one; a Christian or atheist—the general understanding of all of
history is that in about 250 B.C. the Jewish Bible was translated into the
Greek language into a book called by people ‘the Septuagint.’
“The Greek translation of the Bible contained the Book of
Micah and contained that verse exactly as it is in your King James Bible. Every
historical source you could find to document the historicity of the Book of
Micah guarantees you that it was written at least 250 years before Christ (more
probably 700).
*****
“But let’s say you don’t want to take anything Christians
say, so, okay, let’s take what the world says. What does the scholarship of
the University of Chicago say? It says that 250 years before, minimum, the
exact town . . .
“Now you know how improbable that was? Mary and Joseph
didn’t live in Bethlehem; they lived in Nazareth almost 100 miles north.
“How in the world are you going to take a man and his
pregnant . . . ‘she’s great with child,’ as the verse says and I love that
expression. She’s ready to pop and be delivered.
“How’s he going to get her a hundred miles from up there to
Bethlehem?! God uses a pagan ruler to give the decree that all the world has to be taxed and you’ve got to go
back to your hometown.
“What would have motivated Joseph to put his pregnant little
wife on the back of a donkey, or in the back of a cart, and drag her a hundred
miles in that condition? Because she had to go 100 miles for Him to be born where
He’s supposed to be born.
“Everything about it is beyond human calculations. What that
means is that based on the mathematical, statistical laws of probability, the
very science that you use to demonstrate DNA conclusively identifies
someone as guilty or innocent (DNA is all based on statistical probability),
that one verse right there demonstrates!
“There are over 300 verses just like that. If you just took
eight specific verses like that, and there are 300 of them, but if you just
took eight markers like that, you’d have the ability to identify in a court of
law a statistical absoluteness that this is true. That He is who He said He
was.
“To me that’s a fascinating thing, because surrounding the
birth of the Lord Jesus Christ is the scientific, cultural, conclusive proof
that He is who He said He was by the fulfillment exactly on time…how could a
baby prearrange all that to happen? How did a baby pre-stage it?
“When He died on the Cross, and He’s dead, they take Him
down off that Cross and bury Him in a rich man’s tomb like Isaiah 53 said they
would. His body lays there and doesn’t see corruption like Psalm 16 said it
would. He’s raised from the dead like Psalm 2 said He would be. He then ascends
up into heaven like Psalm 110 said He would.
“When He’s stone cold dead on the market, how did He arrange
to be buried where Isaiah said He would be buried? How do you arrange that for
yourself?!”
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