I hope that you have enjoyed this study of the prophecies related to the resurrection. And if many of these prophecies are new to you, let me assure you you're not alone. For me, personally, it's been a slow process of years and even decades of digging and questioning and searching to uncover more and more. And I see more all the time.
It took me many years and a lot of time of reading passages in the Bible over and over again and questioning and digging and asking and asking myself, " What are the apostles really talking about? " And then also learning insights from early Christian writers as well. Question that if there's so many prophecies about the resurrection contained in Scripture, one question is, " Why is it that most Christians don't know these things? Why are these missed by so many Christians and even so many Christian teachers?
" And I think the reason why they're missed is the same reason the apostles missed it when Jesus told them in Luke 18 that He was going to be resurrected in fulfillment of all the prophecies. And it's basically because the prophecies are hidden not only with allegories and types, but they're also hidden in the form of riddles. Let me give you an example. A friend of mine who lives in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Jeffrey Fisher, a young friend of mine.
He lives in a rural farming area and we like to exchange riddles with each other. And one of the riddles that he gave me is, he says, " Why is it a bad idea to tell secrets in a cornfield? " This is a classic Lancaster County Pennsylvania riddle. And the answer is, obviously, because there are too many ears, all right? Now, the riddle is contained in the fact that ears has two different meanings. There's ears, these two things on the side of your head that you hear with.
And then there's ears, the big long yellow or white things that hold the fruit of the corn that you eat. The word has two different meanings. And that's the essence of the word riddle, but also in the Scriptures, that Jesus Himself spoke in riddles. And it wasn't to entertain people. But think about what Jesus said. Jesus said in John 2:19, " Destroy this temple in three days I will raise it up. " They're thinking the building and he's talking about his body. Now he tells Nicodemus, " You must be born again.
" Nicodemus is confused. Wait, I have to go up inside my mother and come out the way I was. In John chapter 11, we talked about this earlier. He tells the apostles, " Our friend Lazarus sleeps, but I go that I may wake him up. " So Jesus is speaking in riddles where a word has more than one meaning and it could be understood either literally or figuratively. And a lot of times, people got it wrong, whichever way he was doing it. And even Jesus ' teaching style.
Jesus ' teaching style was in parables where he would tell a story, but there was a deeper meaning behind it, and you had to think about what it meant. And in explaining why he spoke in parables in Matthew 13, he says, " I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter things kept secret from the foundation of the world. " So we're dealing with mysteries, things that have been kept secret, and things that it takes wisdom to unlock. That's a direct quote there with Jesus quoting from Psalm 78.
So should we be surprised if Jesus is speaking in riddles, that the Holy Spirit would also be revealing things through parables, riddles, enigmas, things that are kept hidden from the beginning, which we must unlock. One of the main takeaways, I think, from this lesson is the word anistemi or raise up, which is used in several key prophecies, has several meanings. It can mean to raise someone up by standing up or by raising them from the dead or to raise someone up figuratively.
And so the question is, while most people took it figuratively, God actually meant it literally. On the other hand, when it says the tabernacle of David will be, which has fallen down in his ruins will be raised up. Most people are thinking of a physical tent or tabernacle, and God is speaking figuratively about the body of Christ. And the words lie down, sleep, rise up, wake up, tabernacle, tent. These words are used that have more than one meaning.
And we need to dig deeper to find out what is the Spirit really trying to communicate here in language that may be putting a lot of people off. Proverbs chapter one, Solomon explains the importance of gaining more wisdom for the young man to gain wisdom and for those who have some to get even more. He calls all men to seek wisdom. And one of the reasons in Proverbs 1:6, it says that the wise man will understand a parable and hidden sayings, both wise words and riddles.
So is God concerned about us just sitting around entertaining ourselves, telling jokes to one another? I don't think so. There are riddles that are contained in Scripture which unlock deep truths for us to understand. So I think God wants us to be seeking wisdom. And this is something I pray for all the time. Pray for more of the Holy Spirit, to pray for more wisdom.
The Holy Spirit in Isaiah chapter 11 is described as first of the seven characteristics there, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, knowledge and guidance, spirit of the fear of the Lord. So the Spirit of wisdom, we need more of the wisdom of the Holy Spirit in order to understand the Scriptures which are inspired by the Holy Spirit where the Spirit has woven in to the text, these wonderful riddles and mysteries.
And also, I think some of them are head fakes so that Satan would not be able to understand and undo the mission of Jesus. And so especially with the resurrection that Satan was involved in inspiring and motivating Judas to betray Jesus and delete him to his crucifixion, thinking this is going to bring about a victory. I think that's one of the reasons why there are so many of the prophecies about the resurrection are couched in riddles so that Satan would fall into the trap and lead to his own undoing.
So we've learned from this study in prophecies about the resurrection, that the Old Testament is filled with prophecies about the resurrection. So next time someone asks you the question as I asked in the beginning of this series, " Do you know any prophecies about the crucifixion of Christ? " Well, yes. Do you know any prophecies about the resurrection of Christ? The answer should be, " Oh, my head's full of them. Where do we begin? " I know so many of them. The scriptures are full of prophecies about this.
Jesus explained these prophecies to the apostles after He was resurrected, as it says in Luke 24. And while we don't have Jesus ' direct explanation, I've done my best at trying to listen to what those who were there later said related to the resurrection and to reconstruct that message. And by looking at the scriptures that they're quoting from and looking at the comments that they made and just digging and asking questions.
I think that this has not just a matter of curiosity for us today, but there's some real practical meaning for us also. The purpose of learning this is not so you can play Bible trivia with your friends or you know can you try to stump somebody at church the next Sunday? What do you think about this? What do you think about that? It's not to impress other people. The goal, I think, is to get us to read the Bible and think the way the apostles did and to spread the faith the way they did too.
If we look through the book of Acts, this is how, as we see in Acts chapter 2, Acts chapter 3, Acts chapter 7, Acts 13 with Paul and Pisidian Antioch. This is how Peter, Paul, Stephen, Apollos, this is how they spread the gospel by using the proof of the prophecies. They proved the faith from the Scriptures. But this was also used to persuade Gentiles, the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts chapter 8. Paul began with Isaiah 53, began with the Old Testament prophecy to convert him.
And even in the conversion of the household of Cornelius, when Peter is preaching, he said in Acts 10:43 to him, referring to Christ, all the prophets witness. So this is the way Peter preached the gospel not only to the Jews, but also to the Gentiles. Paul wrote to the Gentile Church in Corinth in 1 Corinthians 12:2, he says, " You know when you were Gentiles carried away by these dumb idols however you were led. " Obviously he's referring to a Gentile church.
And you look at what Paul said to this predominantly Gentile church. 1 Corinthians 15 verses 1 to 4. I think about this all the time. " Moreover, brothers, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and which you stand, by which you are saved if you hold fast that word which I preached to you unless you believed in vain. " For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received. Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.
He was buried and He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. When he says according to the Scriptures, he means in fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies. That was the foundation that was laid in the beginning to the Gentile Church in Corinth is that this was a fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies. Justin Martyr was a philosopher, one of my favorite early Christian writers, originally from Samaria. He was a convert to the Christian faith. He was originally an unbeliever.
And he tells the story of his own conversion. How did he become a Christian? And it says one day he met an elderly Christian who was a stranger who challenged him. And so he goes on and he explains the story of Justin explains the story of how he became a Christian. He said, " There existed long before this time. Certain men more ancient than all those who were esteemed.
Philosophers both righteous and beloved by God who spoke by the divine spirit and foretold events which would take place and which are now taking place. They are the prophets. These alone both saw and announced the truth to men, neither reverencing nor fearing any man, not influenced by a desire for glory, but speaking those things alone which they saw, which they heard, being filled with the Holy Spirit. Their writings are still extant.
He who has read them is very much helped in his knowledge at the beginning and the end of things. And those matters which the philosophers ought to know. They both glorified the Creator and God the Father of all things and proclaimed His Son the Christ sent by Him. And then Justin continued. He said, " When He had spoken these and many other things. " This was the older gentleman who met Justin said this to him.
So when he had spoken these and many other things, which is no time for mentioning the present, he went away bidding me to attend to them. And I have not seen him since. But straight away, a flame was kindled in my soul and a love of the prophets and those men who were friends of Christ possess me. So after which Justin went on to become a powerful Christian teacher and apologist who ultimately died as a martyr. Martyr was not his last name. It's how he ended his life. That's from Dialogue with Trypho a Jew.
He's having a discussion with a Jew and Trypho's Jewish friends in chapters 7 and 8, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 198. So that's how Justin became a Christian. He was convinced by the evidence of the prophecies. And he loved the prophets and dug into them on his own. And that's what convinced him to the faith.
And he used this approach when he was preaching to the leaders of the Roman Empire, to the Caesar and to the household of the ruler and to the Senate in Rome and all the people of Rome in his first apology. That's how he tried to convert them by using the evidence of the fulfilled prophecies. And he tells the Romans in his first apologies. He's talking about the scriptures of the Jews, which they could read for themselves.
And he said, " In these books, then the prophets we find Jesus our Christ foretold is coming, born of a virgin, growing up to a man's estate, healing every disease and sickness, raising the dead, being hated and unrecognized, crucified, dying and rising again and ascending to heaven and being called to the Son of God. We also find it predicted that certain persons should be sent by Him into every nation to publish these things, that rather among the Gentiles than among the Jews, men should believe on Him.
And He was predicted before He appeared for the succession of generation, prophets after prophets arose. And I've seen this used today. I've seen people who are atheists who had one gentleman who had a PhD in engineering. It was a hardcore atheist who came to faith from as a result of the prophecies. I guess he was a hardcore atheist. He was an open-minded unbeliever. And I've also seen the evidence that the prophecies strengthen those who are weak in their faith or struggling.
Maybe they had a poor spiritual foundation or bad experiences in church. The foundation of the faith is Jesus ' death, burial, and resurrection and fulfillment of scriptures. I've seen this used in Muslim countries. We were living in a predominantly Muslim country years ago, and people would come up to me and they'd say, " Everything in the New Testament was changed by the Christians. " And so we'd use the Old Testament prophecies to prove that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead.
I told the Muslims, I said, " Well, actually, I don't need the New Testament. I can prove the death burial and resurrection of Jesus on the third day from the Old Testament prophecies that were in control of the Jews. The Christians could not have changed these things. " So we see in the prophecies about the resurrection. Think about this, Jacob's blessing of Judah in Genesis 49. That's at least 1,600 years before the birth of Christ.
Moses revealing that God would raise a prophet like himself in Balaam's third oracle. That's 1,400 years before Christ. The man of God who told Eli that God would raise up a faithful priest to administer before him forever. In 1 Samuel, that's 1200 years before Christ. The many prophecies of David that we talked about in Psalm 3, 16, 41, 2 Samuel 7, the prophecy of Nathan. That's 1,000 years before Christ. Ezekiel's prophecy about the one shepherd that God would raise up, that's about 600 years before Christ.
And the Septuagint that I'm quoting from was translated 200 to 250 years before Christ. No way the Christians could have changed any of these things. I was sharing with a friend of mine just this last week, the faith, and he's a Buddhist. He has some interest in the Christian faith. And I challenged him. I said, " Look, Jesus died on the cross and He was buried and He rose again in fulfillment of the prophecies on the third day. " I said, " The entire Christian faith hangs on that.
Let me study these things out with you to convince you, to prove to you based on evidence that these things really happened. " And he had to admit, he said, " Look, this is the foundation of the whole Christian faith. The entire Christian faith hangs on this without this, nothing. This really is it. " And he admitted the fact that this would either prove or disprove the Christian faith, the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. And that is what Jesus said Himself.
When they said, " Show us a sign, " He said, " Destroy this temple. You know What's your authority to do this? " And John 2, " Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up. " In Matthew 12, when the Jews were looking for a sign, he said, " No sign will be given to this generation except the sign of the prophet Jonah.
The entire Christian faith hangs on the resurrection, and the two proofs of the resurrection are the prophecies and the prophecies and the eyewitness accounts, the people who took that message all over the world and were persecuted and died for it. " The apostles were either telling the truth or they're false witnesses.
Either our faith is built on an unshakable rock of the truth or as Paul said, our faith is empty, futile, we're still in our sins and the apostles of all men the most pitiable, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians. So why is this important? The entire Christian faith, the foundation of the Christian faith, is on the resurrection of Jesus on the third day and fulfillment of all of the Scriptures. So I want to challenge you. If you want to evangelize the world like they did in the beginning, study deeply.
Get to know the prophecies. Get to know the prophecies, especially about the resurrection. And consider where we started in this discussion. Jesus said, " All things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses, the prophets, and the Psalms concerning me in Luke 24. " He says, " Thus it was written, thus it's necessary for the Christ to suffer and rise from the dead.
" And now I think we can better appreciate what Jesus was saying there that when he said the law of Moses, the prophets and the Psalms, there are three representative parts of all the Scriptures. And think about the prophecies just about the resurrection that we discussed. From the Law of Moses, Genesis 49, Numbers 24, the great Deuteronomy 18 prophecy that God would raise up a prophet from the law of Moses, the first five books.
From the poetic books, from the Psalms, we looked at Psalm Psalm 2, Psalm 3, Psalm 16, 41. And there's also Psalm 89, 132. We may have hit some other ones in there too. From the major prophets, we looked at Ezekiel 34. From the 12 prophets, the so-called minor prophets, we looked at Amos chapter nine, from the historical books, 1 Samuel 2, 2 Samuel 7, 1 Chronicles 17.
So there we have it, from the law of Moses, the Psalms, the prophets, the minor prophets, the historical books from every single part of the Old Testament prophecies about the resurrection of Jesus. The only thing we haven't covered thus far is prophecies about the resurrection on the third day. I hope to cover that in a segment yet to come. So in closing, think of all the things we've learned about Jesus by looking at the prophecies about His resurrection, all the other things that we learn along the way.
His lineage. He had to be a Jew according to Moses. He had to be from the tribe of Judah according to Jacob in Genesis 49. He had to be descended from David, as it says in 2 Samuel 7 and Amos 9. And he had to be descended from a woman who was a direct descendant of David in 1 Chronicles 17 and Psalm 132. We also learned about his passion and his death. His enemies would conspire against him, Psalm 41. One of those in his inner circle who shared his bread would be deceitful and betray him, Psalm 41.
His soul would descend to Hades but would not remain there. He'd be resurrected, Psalm 16. He'd be raised from the dead within a relatively short interval of time before his body saw decay, Psalm 16. " And he'd be raised up by God because of his innocence because he'd done nothing wrong. " Psalm 41. We also see the mission and the roles of Jesus. The one who God would raise up would fulfill four roles. King, priest, prophet, and good shepherd.
That God would raise up a prophet, a priest, a king, and a good shepherd in fulfillment of all four prophecies. He would be the king who would reign over the throne of David forever. He'd build the temple, the church that would last forever. He would serve forever as a faithful priest over the house of God, one from a new priestly lineage. And we are that faithful house, that church if we remain faithful to him to the end.
And then he would be a prophet like Moses, leading people, God's people out of bondage, bringing in new laws and commands, and anyone who refused to heed him would be called to account and cut off from God's people. He would be the one good shepherd over God's flock, the shepherd who would rule in the midst of the flock, who protect his sheep and bring back the strays. He'd be associated with a covenant of peace. He was the one shepherd who would bring all of God's people into one single flock.
Not only the Jews would look to him, but also the Gentiles, the nations would seek him and put their hope in him. Genesis 49 and Amos 9. " He will be fully human, yet also divine. His brothers would bow down and worship him. And then finally, the one who would be raised up would be known as the lion of the tribe of Judah, Genesis 49, the Christ, the anointed one in 1 Samuel 2, Psalm 2, the Son of David in 2 Samuel 7, and the Son of God, 2 Samuel 7, 1 Chronicles 17, and Psalm 2.
God bless you, and I hope that this has been a blessing to you.