The First Prophecy
The Hebrew word n@buw'ah (neb-oo-aw') is translated "prophecy" in our KJV Bibles. It refers to speaking by inspiration. The person speaking by inspiration was known as a prophet from the Hebrew word naba' (naw-baw'). Although it is common to refer to a prophecy as a prediction, this is not an accurate representation of the word's meaning. The word prediction carries within in its meaning a possibility or probability. A biblical prophecy is God's revelation of details of a future historical event before it actually happens. However, the event will happen exactly as God says it will happen. Therefore, a biblical prophecy is also a surety.
"31 If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true. 32 There is another that beareth witness of me; and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true. 33 Ye sent unto John, and he bare witness unto the truth. 34 But I receive not testimony from man: but these things I say, that ye might be saved. 35 He was a burning and a shining light: and ye were willing for a season to rejoice in his light. 36 But I have greater witness than that of John: for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do, bear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me. 37 And the Father himself, which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape. 38 And ye have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him ye believe not. 39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. 40 And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. 41 I receive not honour from men. 42 But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you. 43 I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. 44 How can ye believe, which receive honour one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only? 45 Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. 46 For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. 47 But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words" (John 5:31-47)?
In John 5:31-47, Jesus refers to three prophets that spoke of His coming. The first reference is to John the Baptist and is the prophecy of two Old Testament prophets of God - Isaiah and Malachi. The second is Moses in the Pentateuch.
"1 Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. 2 Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the LORD'S hand double for all her sins. 3 The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. 4 Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: 5 And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it. 6 The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field: 7 The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the LORD bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. 8 The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever" (Isaiah 40:1-8).
Israel was God's chosen people to be a pure nation, separate from the world and living in holiness before the LORD. God separated them from the world to be the pure line of righteousness through which Messiah would be born and through which He would provide redemption. In most part, national Israel miserably failed regarding their living separated from the world in righteousness. This resulted in her extreme chastisement and her receiving "of the LORD'S hand double for all her sins" (Isaiah 40:2). Her gravest sin was in the way the priesthood of Israel corrupted the Gospel by making Law keeping and Ritualism the means of redemption. This is what Christ referred to in John 5:39-40 -"39 Search the scriptures; for in them {in keeping the commandments of God} ye think ye have eternal life: and they {the Scriptures that teach about redemption and the gift of eternal life} are they which testify of me {the Promised Redeemer}. 40 And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life."
We find the second prophecy regarding John the Baptist in Malachi 3:1. Although God presents John the Baptist as the forerunner of the Messiah in Malachi 3:1, the incarnation of Jehovah is the primary subject of the prophecy. John the Baptist would merely become God's prophetic finger pointing to the Promised One. Almost all prophecy is merely the revelation of the finger of God pointing to the coming of the Promised One with varying increased detail regarding His coming. Although Malachi chapter three gives considerable detail regarding the coming of the Promised One, the central emphasis of the text is upon His second coming at the beginning of the Kingdom Age. God did not reveal the two advents of Messiah in any depth in the Old Testament prophecies. We can see the two advents of Messiah as we look backward from the New Testament revelations, but the Old Testament believer would have understood that the Messiah would fulfill all prophetic events in one advent.
"1 Behold, I will send my messenger {John the Baptist}, and he shall prepare the way before me {the incarnate Jehovah}: and the Lord {'adown - the Sovereign One}, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts. 2 But who may abide the day of his coming {the incarnate Jehovah}? and who shall stand when he {the incarnate Jehovah} appeareth? for he {the incarnate Jehovah} is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: 3 And he {the incarnate Jehovah} shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he {the incarnate Jehovah} shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness 4 Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the LORD, as in the days of old, and as in former years. 5 And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the LORD of hosts. 6 For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed" (Malachi 3:1-6).
Undoubtedly, the "messenger" of Malachi 3:1 is John the Baptist, who preceded and announced the eminent coming of "the Lord." The fulfillment of this prophecy is what took place about 430 years after its proclamation by Malachi in what we commonly refer to as Psalm Sunday recorded in John 12:13. It is equally clear that all the pronouns in the proceeding verses of Malachi 3:1-6 refer to the Messiah and what the Messiah would do at His coming.
Christ was teaching the Jews in John 5:39-40 that all the Scriptures that spoke of the gift of eternal life were Scriptures that referred to His coming and the work of redemption that He would finish at His coming. He is also telling them that the "works of the Law" had nothing to do with procuring their redemption or providing salvation to them. This fact was nothing new to the Scriptures. It is the fact of the Gospel that goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden after Adam's fall into sin and God's curse of death (separation from Him) upon the first creation. Within God's pronouncement of the curse, we also find God's promise of redemption through the Seed of the woman. This promised Seed connects to the promised Redeemer in all of the prophecies of God regarding the coming of the Promised One. Genesis 3:15 is referred to as the Protevangelium. The Protevangelium is the simplest form of the Gospel in the Bible. This was the Gospel of the Promised Seed in which everyone in the Old Testament believed for salvation "by grace through faith." There would be additional details of the Gospel given in later prophecies, but Genesis 3:15 is the Gospel in its most reduced form.
"6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant {pleasant: Heb. a desire} to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. 7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons. 8 And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool {cool: Heb. wind} of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden. 9 And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? 10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. 11 And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? 12 And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat. 13 And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat. 14 And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: 15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel. 16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy {to thy...: or, subject to thy husband} husband, and he shall rule over thee. 17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; 18 Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; 19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. 20 And Adam called his wife's name Eve {Eve: Heb. Chavah: that is Living}; because she was the mother of all living"(Genesis 3:6-20).
God created a perfect world in six literal days. He created a world of unlimited potential with thousands upon thousands of plants and animals existing to help support one another and with a perfect environmental balance. On the sixth day, God created Adam and Eve. When God created them, they were also perfect, sinless, and created for each other so they could live in perfect harmony with each other and in perfect fellowship with Him. Although God knew they would fail and disobey His one commandment, God believed in them. He believed they would repent and accept the gift of salvation offered to them by His grace. What that means is God believed that these created beings would have enough personal integrity to turn from their sin and return to worship Him. This is essentially the subject of the book of Job. God believed in Job's integrity even though Job was fallen.
After God's creation of Adam, God revealed His love for mankind by a remarkable act of giving. God gave the dominion of this wondrous creation into the care (dominion) of Adam and Eve ("let them" - mankind, Genesis 1:26 and "them," Genesis 1:28). He essentially said, "Here Adam and Eve, this creation is yours."
"28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. 29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so" (Genesis 1:28-30).
How much God must have loved Adam. Yet we understand today that God's love for Adam went way beyond the gift of material possessions. Although God gave the whole of the domain of earth to Adam, one domain remained under God's dominion. That domain was the body, soul, and the will or desires.
"15 And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surelydie {literally - dying thou shalt die}" (Genesis 2:15-17).
God did not give Adam dominion of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil." God's retention of dominion of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" reveals God's retention of His dominion over the will of mankind. The "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" was just a boundary for the will of man. Everything in this world obeys the Word of God. The wind obeys. The sea obeys. Every aspect of God's creation always obeys Him. All obey except one part of God's creation - man. The "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" was a line drawn in the sand to test man's willingness to obey God's will (His Lordship) and subject his desires to the dominion of God through obedience to God's will. God is continually repeating that test of dominion as the test of man's personal integrity regarding professed beliefs. When we obey, we prove the reality of our professed beliefs and the integrity of our convictions. When we willfully disobey, we reveal our professed beliefs to be the sham of a false profession and reveal of the lack of integrity of our convictions.
When we read Genesis 3:8, it is easy to imagine God calmly taking the fall of man in stride because of His foreknowledge. Yet we know from other portions of Scripture that God is grieved whenever His children fall in sin and rebel against Him. Yet, those professing faith in Him repeatedly failed to obey His commands.
"How oft did they provoke{to rebel against} him in the wilderness, and grieve him in the desert" (Psalm 78:40)!
God gave these first two humans dominion over all that He had created, except for the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil." The life they had in them was God sharing His life from them. Yet still, they selfishly chose their wills over His will.
"And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" (Genesis 2:7).
God was not grieved over the loss of the material possession of His creation. He could have destroyed and re-created it by the will of His Word. God was concerned about the lost souls of two people whom He loved dearly. They were eternal beings and would spend eternity in Hell if they were not redeemed. Therefore, when we read Genesis 3:8, it is God Who comes seeking the lost. The lost were hiding from God. God's seeking the lost has been His pattern of operations since the Fall.
"For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost" (Luke 19:10).
"10 As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: 11 There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God" (Romans 3:10-11).
Sin always takes a man farther then he wants to go and cost him more than he can afford to pay. Willful sin is the forfeiture of the integrity of our professed beliefs. There is nothing believable about a professed faith that habitually lives an unrepentant lifestyle. Sin costs God something too. Sin is an attack against the dominion (Lordship or sovereignty) of God in that God is holy. Temptation is Satan's attack against the dominion of man's love for God and the dominion of submissive obedience to the will of God. God fights for that dominion because it is the fight for the eternal souls of men, women, boys, and girls.
The seed of the woman is eternal (Genesis 3:15). Eternal souls are born from her womb. Satan's seed is the seed of corruption, death, and condemnation. It is the seed of death and eternal separation from God. That was the seed Satan sowed in the Garden of Eden and into mankind through Adam. When you think of that little Baby born in the manger in Bethlehem, remember He was born to fight to reclaim God's dominion over the bodies, souls, and spirits of lost men. God recovers the dominion of life from the dominion of death when we trust in Jesus for our salvation. God restores our lost integrity through obedient faithfulness to His will revealed through the correct understand of His inspired Words. We maintain our integrity of faith through loving, yielded obedience to God's will.
God told Satan that He would put "enmity" (warfare, hostility) between the Seed of the woman (the coming Messiah, Jesus) and Satan's seed of corruption (the fallen nature).
God promised a Redeemer (a Reconciler). God promised a Deliverer. God loved fallen mankind so much, He promised He would put on a body of flesh and die to redeem their lost souls. The "enmity" (hostility and warfare) God promised was not aimed in the direction of mankind, but at the corruption of sin. The "enmity" was the promise of the Christ child Who would "bruise" (shuwph, pronounced shoof, meaning to crush) the "head" (headship or dominion stolen from Adam) of Satan's corruption. Adam's headship was eternal life. When Satan corrupted Adam's headship, Satan turn eternal life into eternal death, which is eternal separation from God.
Satan would strike at the "heel" of the Redeemer, but the "heel" would crush the headship (dominion) of Satan. Satan's attempt to destroy God's Redeemer would actually be the very act that would destroy his stranglehold on mankind (death).
"55 O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? 56 The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (I Corinthians 15:55-57).
Adam understood God's promise in Genesis 3:15. Adam believed it and was saved just as you and I are saved today (by faith). We know he understood because he named his wife "Eve" in Genesis 3:20 after receiving the promise of redemption and reconciliation God in Genesis 3:15. The name "Eve" is from the Hebrew word Chavvah (khav-vaw') meaning life or living. Adam gave this name to Eve because she would be "the mother of all living." Adam understood by faith that from Eve would be born the Redeemer, the Life Giver, the Promised One, the Messiah, and the Christ of God.
Eve understood the promise of God in Genesis 3:15 as well.
"And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain {Gotten, or, Acquired}, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD" (Genesis 4:1).
The words "I have gotten a man from the Lord" are literally translated, "I have gotten a man, even Jehovah" (referring to Jehovah's Son). Eve understood that God would become a man in order to redeem mankind from the corruption of sin (death). From that day forward, every male child born into this world was the hope of the Redeemer. Every woman hoped that she might be worthy of bearing the Christ-child.
For thousands upon thousands of years, thousands upon thousands of people waited for the fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 and the coming of the Son of God to restore mankind's lost domain. Year after year, they watched for the Holy One to step out of eternity into history. God would continually remind them by the prophets of His coming.
"Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel {meaning with us is God}" (Isaiah 7:14).
"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).
Then one day two thousand years ago, it happened. The Son of God became the Son of man. Jehovah's Son was born in a barn in the city of Bethlehem. His cradle was a manger.
"34 Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man? 35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:34-35).
That little Baby, born of the virgin Mary, was the Seed of the God-life once again sown into the world. Anyone could receive that seed of life by placing faith in what Jesus did on a Cross on a hill called Golgotha thirty-three years later. All men are "dead in trespasses and sin" apart from being "born again. . .by grace through faith." Life is in the Son of God. If you will believe what He has done for you on the Cross, confess Him as Jehovah, call on His Name to save you from your present position of condemnation, and you will be saved from death and Hell.
"11 And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life" (I John 5:11-12).
Thank You for visiting this site. If we can be of help in any way, please do not hesitate to ask. Much Blessings on you and yours, Dr. Joseph A.Carson Northland Baptist Ministries
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