The entire Christian faith hangs on one event in history, the truth of the Christian faith. It's the claim that Jesus, after He was crucified and buried, rose from the dead on the third day. Either this happened or it did not happen, one or the other. If it did happen, it changes everything. This is the foundation of the Christian faith. And one of the great proofs of this, according to Jesus, is fulfillment of the prophecies. The fulfillment of many Old Testament prophecies.
I want to start off by reading in Luke chapter 18. This is something Jesus said to His disciples, which they didn't understand before He went to the cross. We'll start reading in verse 31. I'm reading from the New King James Version. " Then he took the 12 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.
For he will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon, and they will scourge him and kill him. And the third day he will rise again. But they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them and they did not know the things which were spoken. So Jesus is explaining here very clearly before he's crucified all the things that are going to happen. He says he's going to be rejected, insulted, killed, and then he will be raised from the dead on the third day.
And he said, " This is all in fulfillment of the prophecies. " And obviously, the apostles heard what he said, but didn't understand the specific prophecies he was referring to and didn't connect until much later on. After Jesus is raised from the dead, let's turn to Luke 24, which ties right in with this. In Luke 24, after appearing to the two on the road to Emmaus, he appears to the apostles.
In verse 44, he says, " Then He said to them, " These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning me. " And he opened their understanding that they might comprehend the Scriptures. Then he said to them, " Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and rise from the dead on the third day.
And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations beginning at Jerusalem. You're witnesses of these things. " So I want to and he says, verse 49, he says, " Behold, I send you the promise of my Father upon you, but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.
" So the 11 of the 12 apostles are Judas, of course, has committed suicide so that Jesus appears to the other 11 apostles and he says, " All the things I told you before, " which I assume is referring to what he says in Luke 18, when he said that all these things had to happen in fulfillment of the prophecies. He says, " All these things that I told you before have been fulfilled. " And then it says, " He opened up their mind.
He opened up their understanding and he says he fulfilled the prophecies from the law of Moses, which is the first five books of the Bible, from the writings of the prophets and from the psalms. " So basically saying these prophecies are from all over the Scriptures, not just one or two isolated prophecies, but the Scriptures are saturated. The law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms represent three major divisions of the Hebrew Scriptures.
And then he tells the apostles to wait in Jerusalem, and then the message will go out to all nations beginning from there. Now, I'm going to ask all of you who are listening the same two questions I ask whenever I read this passage. The first question is, " Where in the Old Testament does it say that the Son of Man will be mocked, insulted, and killed? " So think about that. Where in the Old Testament does it say that Jesus would be crucified and rejected and killed?
And many people, when I ask this question, many will think of, first of all, they'll think of Isaiah 53. They'll think of Psalm 2, " Why do the nations rage and the people conspire against the Lord and against His Anointed? " Psalm 22, which is a detailed prophecy that talks about aspects of the crucifixion, also Psalm 69, which has many elements of the crucifixion.
So many Christians will think of those passages specifically when I ask the question, " Where does it say that the Christ will be rejected and crucified? " Okay? Now, the harder question and also some people will think of even the story of the Passover Lamb in Exodus chapter 12 where there are allegorical style prophecies where Jesus is foreshadowed the passion of Christ foreshadowed in the sacrifice of the lamb. So my second question is, where does it say that the Son of Man will rise from the dead?
Where is a prophecy that says the Christ will rise from the dead, the Son of Man will rise from the dead? Can you think of any prophecies that say that someone is going to rise from the dead? And many Christians are stumped by this second question, which is much harder than the first one. And when I ask this question, typically I get a lot of blank stares. And maybe someone will offer who's read it in the Book of Acts, they might think of Psalm 16, which Peter quotes in the book of Acts.
We'll talk about that in a minute. But beyond that, usually, I get a lot of blank stares that people don't know. But Jesus says here that it's all explained in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms. So what I want to do in this lesson, in this series of lessons, is to take a look at seven specific prophecies about the resurrection that are either quoted or alluded to by the New Testament writers, by the apostles, or by Jesus Himself.
And then I want to look at some other prophecies that early Christians saw as well. And in the process, I think it will become clear why the apostles were so baffled when Jesus first told them all the things that were going to happen in Luke 18, why they didn't get it, and also why so many Christians today miss these prophecies. So when I read this passage here, it says, " Jesus opened their minds. He opened their understandings so they could understand the Scriptures.
" And so I'm wondering, okay, when Jesus explained here finally how he fulfilled all the prophecies, what did he say? I think of this as perhaps the greatest Bible class of all time, that Jesus was there and he finally explains throughout the Scriptures how all of the prophecies pointed to Him. And that's the frustrating thing to me because I read this and they were given all this information, but I don't have it.
So for years, I just scratched my head saying, " Why don't we have the greatest lesson a Bible lesson of all time is given here by Jesus. Why don't we have that? " And so I was just frustrated and wondering, " What did Jesus say? " Now, my profession, I'm an engineer, and that's how I've made my living until I am semi-retired right now, but that's how I've made my living during the course of my career, primarily, is doing engineering as a civil engineer. And so I thought, well, what do I do?
I really want to know, what did Jesus tell the apostles here? And I thought, well, maybe thinking is like an engineer. Maybe I can reverse engineer it. Now reverse engineering is the process where you take a finished product and you take it apart and then logically work backwards to figure out how the product was manufactured in the first place. So you're starting from an endpoint and working backwards to reverse engineer that. And people will do this in the military.
Military history is full of examples where some ship sank and the enemies resurrected the ship and figured out how it was built by looking at the ship and then they launched their own ship. So the military history is full of this. And also commercial history where people will get a product and they'll take it apart in a country where they're not paying attention to the copyright laws and the patent laws and they will reproduce this by working backwards from the final design.
So we don't have what Jesus said in Luke 24, but he told the apostles who were in the room with him to go to Jerusalem and to wait there and that the message would then go out to the whole rest of the world from Jerusalem. So I'm thinking, " Well, who was in the room that I could ask? " And I think with the Apostle Peter. Peter was in the room, so let me start with him. If I want to let me start with Peter, let me take a look at what Peter preached. Peter heard the message from Jesus.
Let me take a look at what Peter preached and then work backwards to try to figure out what Jesus taught the apostles about specifically here about prophecies, about the resurrection. So fortunately, we do have in the book of Acts in Acts chapter 2 and Acts chapter 3, we have two sermons by Peter. We also have in 1 Peter and sorry, in 1 Peter and 2 Peter, we have two letters from Peter.
So first, I decided I want to dive into everything that Peter said to try to understand what did Peter understand from the prophecies about the resurrection to work backwards from that. So let's turn to the Book of Acts where we pick up the story from Luke 24. Its continuation by the same author is in the book of Acts in Acts chapter 1. Jesus told the apostles to go to Jerusalem and they do that. And then Peter who was in the room with Jesus is preaching on the Day of Pentecost.
The Holy Spirit comes down as tongues of fire. And Peter preaches the message of Jesus raised from the dead in fulfillment of the prophecies. I'm going to start reading in Acts 2: 23. Him referring to Jesus being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God. You have taken by lawless hands, have crucified and put to death, whom God raised up having loose the pains of death because it was not possible that he should be held by it.
For David says concerning him, " I foresaw the Lord always before my face. He's at my right hand that I might not be shaken. Therefore, my heart rejoiced and my tongue was glad. Moreover, my flesh also will rest in hope. For you will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption. You have made known to me the ways of life. You will make me full of joy in your presence. Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David that he is both dead and buried.
And his tomb is with us to this day, therefore being a prophet and knowing that God has sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his own body, according to the flesh, you raise up the Christ to sit on the throne. He, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that his soul was not left in Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus God has raised up of which we are all witnesses.
Therefore, being exalted at the right hand of God and having receiving from the Father the promised the Holy Spirit, he poured out this, which you now see and hear. So Peter is preaching that Jesus is resurrected from the dead in fulfillment of the prophecy of Psalm 16. So he's quoting from Psalm 16, a Psalm of David. So this was written a thousand years before the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus.
And the point that he is making here from Psalm 16, David said in verse in Acts 2:27, " You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor you allow your Holy One to see corruption. " This quotation, Acts chapter 2, follows from the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Old Testament that often the apostles are quoting from, and it was used extensively by the early church. So if this is the version that Peter is quoting from here, I will compare what it says in the Septuagint version to what he's saying.
So David said, " You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will you allow my flesh to see corruption. " However, the point that Peter is making is David's long dead. He's been dead for a thousand years, and his tomb is still with them. Therefore, and his body is long since decayed, therefore, the prophecy could not have applied to David himself. It must have applied to the Son of David, the promised Messiah, the Christ. Now the term Hades here in the Hebrew, it's Sheol in Psalm 16.
It's the same term that we find in Luke 16:23 in the story of the rich man and Lazarus. Hades is the place where the souls of the dead go awaiting final judgment. And Jesus uses the term also in Matthew chapter 12. The gates of Hades will not prevail against us. Hades is not the same as Gehenna. Again, it's the lake of fire, the place where the ungodly go on the day of judgment. Hades is a place of waiting.
David Bercot has lessons that are available on the historic faith website, what the early Christians believe about life after death and Christ's descent into Hades, where he goes into more detail on that. But I just want to make the point that he says, " You will not leave my soul in Hades. " So this, the seed of David, one who came from the body of David that this applies to since it could not have applied to David himself, would not remain in Hades. He would go to Hades, but he would not remain there.
He would come out. So where was the Spirit of Christ during the time between the crucifixion and death and the resurrection on the third day? It says right here, he was in Hades. He was not, he was not, he went to Hades, but he did not remain there. And Acts chapter 13 in verse 35, Paul quotes the same prophecy here. He quotes Psalm 16 in his talk to the Jews in the synagogue in Antioch of Pisidia.
And there he notes that the promise that was made to the Christ, he goes back to either Isaiah 55 or to Psalm 88, which is in the Septuagint B which is the same as Psalm 89 in most Bibles today to make the point that the promise that was made to David had to fall to the Son of David to the Messiah. So let's take another look at the text that is quoted by Peter. So I'm going to read from a version based on the Septuagint in Psalm 16 to see what it says.
So this is the first prophecy of seven that are referenced in the New Testament that talks about the resurrection of Jesus. In Psalm 16, which in the Septuagint is Psalm 15. Verse 7, " I will bless the Lord who caused me to understand moreover until night my reins also instructed me. I saw the Lord always before me because he's at my right hand, that I might not be shaken. Therefore, my heart was glad and my tongue rejoice exceedingly and my flesh also shall dwell in hope.
For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption. You made known to me the ways of life. You'll fill me with gladness and your presence at your right hand are pleasures forevermore. This is the point that he makes is that he's been raised up and a seated Peter makes seated at the right hand of God now. In the next segment, I want to take a look at the second Psalm that Peter mentions in this passage in Acts chapter two. He doesn't quote from it, but he alludes to it.
And this is a very rich Psalm that talks about the resurrection also.