1 Behold, the Lord will empty the earth and make it desolate,
and he will twist its surface and scatter its inhabitants.
2 And it shall be, as with the people, so with the priest;
as with the slave, so with his master;
as with the maid, so with her mistress;
as with the buyer, so with the seller;
as with the lender, so with the borrower;
as with the creditor, so with the debtor.
3 The earth shall be utterly empty and utterly plundered;
for the Lord has spoken this word. (Isaiah 24:1-3)
I've recently read a couple different pieces on the Internet that make a claim that because there are a number of different prophecies in the old testament that are unfulfilled, that Old Testament prophecy, and thus the entire Scripture, is wrong! These writers looked at several passages, one writer as many as 20, and jumped to the conclusion that because these passages were not yet fulfilled, that because they were not yet seen as present on the earth, that they never will be and therefore God is a fraud and the Bible is a fake.
But in fact, this POV betrays more about prejudices that the individual that holds it than it does anything about the realities of what the Bible does or does not say. It says more about what is going In their mind and spirit than it does about the truth of God's Word.
Isaiah, here in chapter 24:1-3, has some severe things to say about The coming judgement upon the earth... These verses are bracketed by what the Lord is proposing to do (1) and how the Lord has spoken (3c), and also by the action which the Lord will perform, lay waste … laid waste (1a, 3a). The emphasis is on totality: place and people (1ed), people without exception (2) and every place (3ab). Human sin infects the human environment (2:12ff.), and is the ultimate environmental threat. Every aspect of life—religious (2b), domestic (2cd), and commercial (2eg)—as well as every individual is under judgmental scrutiny. The active (lay waste) of 1 is now the passive, laid waste. What the Lord plans will happen.
These 4 chapters (Isaiah 24-27) give praise to God for His future victory over all enemies and the final deliverance of Israel in the Day of the Lord. It seems clear, then, that the judgments in this chapter (24) look forward to the tribulation as described in Rev. 6ff.
24:1 "empty … waste, distorts … scatters." The prophet generalized and broadened the destruction about which he had written more specifically in chaps. 13–23. The Lord is to deal with the whole earth more severely than He did at the tower of Babel or through the Noahic Flood.
24:2 "people … priest … creditor … debtor." Neither rank, wealth, nor power were able to deliver from God’s judgment.
24:3 "the Lord has spoken." Isaiah used this expression or a comparable one 9 other times to emphasize the certainty of his predictions (1:20; 21:17; 22:25; 25:8; 37:22; 38:7; 38:15; 40:5: 58:14).
It is the nature of man to assume that a thing is false if it as yet unfulfilled. It is the nature of men, unredeemed men to assume that they are the authority over what they see and to believe that "God" is not and never will be returning. That is point of the parable Jesus told in Mark 12:1-9 called "The Parable of the Tenants":
1 And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. 2 When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. 3 And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. 4 Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. 5 And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. 6 He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 7 But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ 8 And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. 9 What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others.
The point I want to make is not one of coming judgment, thought that is good and viable point... The point is that men tend to believe what they wish to believe and tend to interpret their surroundings the way in which they wish to interpret them, suitable to their own needs and desires (keeping in mind that they are unredeemed, sinful and rebellious against the Master and King of their souls).
Let me observe several things about this truth:
1. It serves one's worldview more than being objective about the evidence at hand. Like all of us, we have a skewed vision and we see things "through a glass darkly". The unredeemed, though, do not have the Spirit of God to give them the ability to see and perceive Truth, a desperate handicap, I'm sure you'll agree. Additionally, they have not yet been freed from the bondage to their sin in the first place, as have the redeemed, and so are still slaves to the flesh and to the wickedness of the mind and to to dictates of all that is at enmity with God. If I paint a dark picture, let me simply say that I do not paint one that is dark enough...David spoke of the unsaved state as being in a pit; and there are any other number of descriptions to which we could go.
2. Along this same line, we must note that this perception does not give place (and understandably so) to the place of God's Spirit in understanding the Scriptures. If it were not so irritating, it would be laughable to see people setting themselves up as qualified to comment on what does or does not make Scripture "viable" or "trustworthy" when they lack the single qualification that the Bible itself puts forth as testifying to a redeemed life - the possession of the Spirit of God as demonstrated by the presence of Biblical good works [a love and fervor for fellowship with our Lord, personal holiness, Biblical evangelism, Biblical worship of God, growth in grace, a viable prayer life, submission to and participation in the local church, etc.].
But yet we see people, will other, academic qualifications, steep ones perhaps, or maybe those who offer that they have "studied the Bible" for "a long time" offering to correct and instruct us. But their lives do not show that they posses His Spirit. They do demonstrate the humility and the spiritual fruit that one that is a true servant of God would show were they walking with the Lord of all.
One cannot, simply CANNOT understand the Bible apart from the presence of God's Spirit. It does not matter how familiar one is with the original text, the history or the size of one's library. Except you be a child of the Lord and approach His Word possessing His Spirit, humbly seeking His light in understanding it - you will go the way so many have (and are - look at the current example of Harold Camping his foolishness) you will end up in error, and perhaps leading others into error as well.
3. It confuses Gods' patience with inaccuracy. Simply because a thing has not yet happened does not mean it will not happen. This is especially so when we think of how short lived we are as men. God is a patient God. He deals with men over a long time...ages, not years. Why? You got me! I have my ideas and thoughts on the subject..., but it boils down to the issue of sowing His character and His patience. He has no reason to hurry into judgment. He is not anxious that any should perish, but that all should to come to salvation - right? 1 Timothy 2:4 tells us that God "...desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth." That includes not only all people of a given time, but all people of all ages as well. Why would God be in a hurry to bring time to a close when there are redeemed to bring into the Kingdom?
4. Further, such a POV refuses to acknowledge that there even is such a thing is grace and mercy as portrayed in the Scripture. Most often, these folks are antagonistic God, being atheists, agnostics, etc. to begin with. They are not even seeking to be constructive because they see nothing to be constructive with. In their minds, they are right, this perspective is silly and all that is attached to it wrong.
Some that I have read call themselves past Christians. They say that they were brought up as Christians, in Christian homes, a couple were even ministers and believed. But then, in the name of intellectual honesty, seeing things that troubled them and they could not answer, they moved from a place they understood as faith to the place of non-faith where they are now. Some are antagonistic, some are not. But all feel obligated to voice what they see as the failings of the Bible to voice the truths of life.
All I can say here is that the Bible very clearly teaches that those who leave the faith were never truly a part of the faith to begin with. I know this sounds very "clubish" and self-serving, as if Christians are setting up a set of criteria that only a select few can meet and that excludes any that they choose to exclude. I'm certain, and I surely understand that there are many that see such as merely an attempt exclude disagreement.
Nevertheless, 1 John 2:19 presents to us the principle that
"They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us."
Those who abandon the truths of God do so they never genuinely embraced them to begin with. As hard as that is to swallow, it is the truth. I say it with all sympathy and empathy. I know, personally, a number of folks in this condition, and they would swear up and down that they gave it their all, that they were as real as they could be, and "it just didn't work for them" (the words of one such acquaintance).
But the truth of the matter is that it is not a matter of "trying" or of "effort" at all. It is a matter of God and His Spirit. Seek Him and cry out to Him, bow yourself to Him and the result just may be different. That is a major failing in our churches today - we talk to much about trying...we have even managed to couch the idea of yielding to God in terms of our own effort!
4. The "Not fulfilled yet so Scripture is wrong POV" does not give place to already fulfilled prophecy. It picks and chooses among the the vast array of Biblical texts and selects what is convenient and what serves its' purpose and suits its' need. It ignores all of the rest.
Various books cite different figures for exactly how many prophecies there are in the Bible, depending upon the manner in which one counts the prophecies. For example, one writer may count a single verse as a prophecy, while another may see three or four prophetic elements within the same passage. J. Barton Payne’s Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy lists 1,239 prophecies in the Old Testament and 578 prophecies in the New Testament, for a total of 1,817. These encompass 8,352 verses.
Jesus Fulfilled Over 300 OT Prophecies
Let's think about the issue of Messianic prophecies. A man named Jerry Ballard of the Fisher's Of Men Group cites a study conducted at MIT of this matter. Here are some of their conclusions.
Many of the prophecies concerning the Messiah were totally beyond human control: Birth: Place, time, manner of Death: People's reactions, piercing of side, burial Resurrection: Where did His body go? By using the modern science of probability in reference to just eight of these prophecies, the chance that any man might have lived to fulfill all eight prophecies is one in 100 trillion!
To illustrate this point: If we take 100 trillion silver dollars and lay them on the face of Texas, they would be two feet deep. Now we mark one of these silver dollars and thoroughly stir the whole mass--all over the state. Now blindfold a man and let him travel as far as he wishes, but he must pick only one silver dollar.
What chance would he have of picking the marked one? The same chance that the prophets would have of writing just eight of these prophecies and having them all come true for any one man if they had written them without God's inspiration!
The chance of any one man's fulfilling all of 48 prophecies is one in ten to the 157th power. The electron is about as small an object as we can imagine. If we had a cubic inch of these electrons and tried to count them, it would take us (at 250 per minute) 19,000 times 19,000 times 19,000 years to count them.
Now mark one of them and thoroughly stir it into the whole mass. What chance does our blindfolded man have of finding the right electron?
The same chance as one man of fulfilling 48 of the prophecies about Christ without His being the Son of God!
God is not the only one, however, who uses forecasts of future events to get people's attention. Satan does, too. Through clairvoyants (such as Jeanne Dixon and Edgar Cayce), mediums, spiritists, and others, come remarkable predictions, though rarely with more than about 60 percent accuracy, never with total accuracy.
Messages from Satan, furthermore, fail to match the detail of Bible prophecies, nor do they include a call to repentance.
The Acid Test for identifying A Prophet of God
Recorded by Moses in Deuteronomy 18:21-22. According to this Bible passage (and others), God's prophets, as distinct from Satan's spokesmen, are 100 percent accurate in their predictions. There is no room for error!
1) Some time before 500 B.C. the prophet Daniel proclaimed that Israel's long-awaited Messiah would begin his public ministry 483 years after the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem (Daniel 9:25-26). He further predicted that the Messiah would be "cut off," killed, and that this event would take place prior to a second destruction of Jerusalem. Abundant documentation shows that these prophecies were perfectly fulfilled in the life (and crucifixion) of Jesus Christ. The decree regarding the restoration of Jerusalem was issued by Persia's King Artaxerxes to the Hebrew priest Ezra in 458 B.C., 483 years later the ministry of Jesus Christ began in Galilee. (Remember that due to calendar changes, the date for the start of Christ's ministry is set by most historians at about 26 A.D. Also note that from 1 B.C. to 1 A.D. is just one year.) Jesus' crucifixion occurred only a few years later, and about four decades later, in 70 A.D. came the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus.
(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 105.)*
(2) In approximately 700 B.C. the prophet Micah named the tiny village of Bethlehem as the birthplace of Israel's Messiah (Micah 5:2). The fulfillment of this prophecy in the birth of Christ is one of the most widely known and widely celebrated facts in history.
(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 105.)
3) In the fifth century B.C. a prophet named Zechariah declared that the Messiah would be betrayed for the price of a slave—thirty pieces of silver, according to Jewish law-and also that this money would be used to buy a burial ground for Jerusalem's poor foreigners (Zechariah 11:12-13). Bible writers and secular historians both record thirty pieces of silver as the sum paid to Judas Iscariot for betraying Jesus, and they indicate that the money went to purchase a "potter's field," used—just as predicted—for the burial of poor aliens (Matthew 27:3-10).
(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 1011.)
(4) Some 400 years before crucifixion was invented, both Israel's King David and the prophet Zechariah described the Messiah's death in words that perfectly depict that mode of execution. Further, they said that the body would be pierced and that none of the bones would be broken, contrary to customary procedure in cases of crucifixion (Psalm 22 and 34:20; Zechariah 12:10). Again, historians and New Testament writers confirm the fulfillment: Jesus of Nazareth died on a Roman cross, and his extraordinarily quick death eliminated the need for the usual breaking of bones. A spear was thrust into his side to verify that he was, indeed, dead.
(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 1013.)
(5) The prophet Isaiah foretold that a conqueror named Cyrus would destroy seemingly impregnable Babylon and subdue Egypt along with most of the rest of the known world. This same man, said Isaiah, would decide to let the Jewish exiles in his territory go free without any payment of ransom (Isaiah 44:28; 45:1; and 45:13). Isaiah made this prophecy 150 years before Cyrus was born, 180 years before Cyrus performed any of these feats (and he did, eventually, perform them all), and 80 years before the Jews were taken into exile.
(Probability of chance fulfillment = 1 in 1015.)
Given that the Bible proves so reliable a document, there is every reason to expect that the remaining 500 prophecies, those slated for the "time of the end," also will be fulfilled to the last letter. Who can afford to ignore these coming events, much less miss out on the immeasurable blessings offered to anyone and everyone who submits to the control of the Bible's author, Jesus Christ?
Would a reasonable person take lightly God's warning of judgment for those who reject what they know to be true about Jesus Christ and the Bible, or who reject Jesus' claim on their lives?
The estimates of probability included herein come from a group of secular research scientists. As an example of their method of estimation, consider their calculations for this first prophecy cited:
Since the Messiah's ministry could conceivably begin in any one of about 5000 years, there is, then, one chance in about 5000 that his ministry could begin in 26 A.D.
Since the Messiah is God in human form, the possibility of his being killed is considerably low, say less than one chance in 10.
Relative to the second destruction of Jerusalem, this execution has roughly an even chance of occurring before or after that event, that is, one chance in 2.
Hence, the probability of chance fulfillment for this prophecy is 1 in 5000 x 10 x 2, which is 1 in 100,000, or 1 in 105.
Over 300 prophecies were fulfilled by Jesus Christ
The Bible predicted that Christ would die on the cross and that He would rise from the dead. And guess what? HE DID!!Death could not keep Jesus in the grave.
After three days, He Rose from the dead thus defeating death and thus providing mankind hope and Salvation, to all who Will call on the name of the Lord.
Today, the only way Bible scoffers can explain away this astronomical probability is to discredit the prophecies in one way or another.
This is precisely why our Lord came and yielded Himself on Calvary's cross. It was to avoid the appearance that there was injustice in the manner in which he dealt with sin in the Old Testament. You'll remember that in the Old Testament sin was dealt with by the presentation of a sacrifice at the Tabernacle or Temple. But, in point of fact, that sacrifice was actually not perfect, even though the Old Testament requires it to be "without spot or blemish". Surely, it was as perfect as an earthly sacrifice could be...but it was, nevertheless, still not as perfect as God, in His holiness required it to be.
That is why Christ came and died...Romans 3:25
25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
God "passed over" the sins of those who, in faith, participated in the sacrificial system in the OT. But He could not pass them over forever - they had to be dealt with eventually. the fact of the matter was that the sacrifices themselves were looking forward to the coming of the Messiah - the Lord Jesus. Realized in His work was all that God intended for His people. The OT looked forward, and we look backward; it is fully accomplished in that single, one-time action on Calvary's cross.
Ultimately, this is what the unredeemed are resisting...however unknowingly and however unthinkingly. They are rebelling against their God and against their Master. Some do so "with malice afore thought" and some not so much. But the end result is the same nevertheless.
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