John 5:39 –
You search the Scriptures because you think they give you eternal life. But the Scriptures point to me!
This chapter is unusual as it keeps a common thread in the story. It starts with Jesus healing a man on the Sabbath, which get the Pharisees all riled up. The remainder of the story is Jesus justifying doing what He did and claiming His position as son of God. It must have been difficult for the status quo to accept this radical departure from their beliefs. You must remember that during this time they believed the Messiah was going to be a mighty warrior who would release them from Roman oppression. Jesus did not fit that model at all.
Now Jesus needs to call witnesses to support His claim of being the son of God. One of His main supporting pieces of evidence is the Holy Scriptures. Think about the odds of Jesus fulfilling just a few of the prophecies, all written well before Jesus. Think about in Micah 5:2 where it’s written 700 years before Jesus that His birthplace is Bethlehem. Or Isaiah 7:14 that says he Messiah will be born of a virgin. The 2 Samuel 7 and other scriptures say the Messiah will come from the house of David. Psalm 22 describes Jesus’ death almost identically.
You can go on and on to find more and more revelations of Jesus in the Old Scriptures. Some 45 prophecies from the Old Testament were fulfilled in Jesus. Just to put this in perspective it’s a one in 250 million chance to be hit by lighting on any given day, but only 1 in 9100 over a lifetime and you have a 1 in 175 million chance to win the Mega Millions. But did you know that fulfilling just 8 of those 45 prophecies has a 1 in 100 quadrillion chance of happening. To put that in perspective that’s 100,000,000,000 million or 400 million times less likely that being hit by lighting any given day or 572 million times less likely of winning the lottery.
I know it’s possible and therefore an argument could be made similar to that of evolution. But I am a “numbers” kind of guy and the numbers all point to Jesus being the Messiah. This is actually how I came to the conclusion there IS a God. Things which were highly improbable kept happening to me all pointing to God. You know one “answered” prayer is coincidence, the number that I have had and seen remove coincidence and point to God. Just recently Mama prayed for something to happen to Devon to “wake him up” and let him know God. While that prayer was being made, Devon in California was having an awful nightmare, enough so he called that morning.
Was this coincidence or God? I say God! And the probability of that happening is nothing compared to 8 of the 45 prophecies coming true. So by the “numbers” alone Jesus is the only living person who could have been the Messiah. But I don’t care about the techno-details; Jesus is an experience that is so far beyond anything imaginable that you will know this all to be true once you experience His love.