Nena Arias | December 9, 2019
Either Jesus was the greatest lunatic and charlatan that has ever lived, or he was who he said because the mountain of evidence is astonishing. Never has there been so much prophesied about an individual with such minute detail as with Jesus about his coming to earth and his redemptive mission. Not only is there an immense amount of prophesy given in the Old Testament of the Bible, but all of it came to pass and is corroborated in the New Testament.
This is of utmost importance because believing in something or someone without a solid foundation or evidence is a foolish and worthless belief.
When it comes to Jesus, the evidence that sets the rock-solid foundation to believe in him is overwhelmingly in his favor and comes with unspeakable blessing for all those who will believe. Those who take him at his word receive the impact and then become first-hand witnesses of his veracity. We don’t just have to take someone else’s word for it. That is the awesomeness of Jesus, the Son of God, our Savior that we can know him personally not just through what someone else wrote about him.
Down through history, God foretold the coming of Jesus who would defeat Satan and conquer sin and death (Genesis 3:15). God, through his prophets, foretold various signs and conditions through his servants the prophets who announced these landmarks with precision long before they happened. These prophets spoke of things that mankind should watch for so that the Messiah would be recognized and believed when he did appear on the earthly scene. These signs, or prophecies, were given to us in the Old Testament. The Old Testament is the part of the Bible written before Jesus was born. Its writings were completed in 450 B.C. The Old Testament was written hundreds of years before Jesus’ birth, yet it contains over 300 prophecies that Jesus fulfilled through His life, death and resurrection. Mathematically the odds of this coming to pass is impossible. Only God, through Jesus could make this happen!
The passion of Jesus Christ stands alone as the most important event creation has ever known. The Bible tells us that long before the world began, God had planned the coming of Christ and that the crucifixion of Jesus would be the method and payment for sin – the only payment that would reconcile sinners to a holy and loving God. 1 Peter 1:19-20 – “He paid for you with the precious lifeblood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose Him for this purpose long before the world began, but now in these final days, He was sent to the earth for all to see. And He did this for you.”
At the Christmas season, most of the world celebrates the coming of Jesus to earth in human form exactly as the prophecies over millennia. They foretold of the coming of this Messiah/Deliverer, Jesus Christ, to the earth to redeem the human race and all of God’s creation from the deadly effects of sin.
We have every reason to celebrate his life in us. There are 2.1 billion people on earth that claim to be of the Christian faith. We can’t all be wrong! Try him for yourself. Test and see if he is the true Messiah or the greatest charlatan that has ever lived!
