Prophecy

I was doing some research last week on Old Testament prophecy fulfilled in the New testament and came across the following calculation:

Peter Stoner a mathematician, came up with these probabilities in his work titled Science Speaks. The odds of one man living throughout history and up to today fulfilling just eight of the hundreds of prophecies of the coming messiah in the OT are 1 in 10 to the 17th, or 100,000,000,000,000,000. Let me give a visual. Take the entire state of Texas cover it two feet deep in silver dollars, mark one of those silver dollars with a red x, and mix them all up. Blindfold a person, tell them to go as far and wide as they would like, they can reach down and pick up one coin. The odds of coming up with the right coin are the same odds of one man fulfilling just eight of the hundreds of prophecies fulfilled by Jesus. In other words, it’s mathematically impossible for one person to fulfill eight prophecies, Jesus fulfilled hundreds.

The following probabilities are taken from Peter Stoner’s work in Science Speaks to show that coincidence is ruled out by the science of probability. The analysis is concerned with the following eight prophecies:

1. Messiah is to be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2; fulfilled in Matt. 2:1-7; John 7:42; Luke 2:47).

2. Messiah is to be preceded by a Messenger (Isaiah 40:3; Malachi 3:1; fulfilled in Matthew 3:1-3; 11:10; John 1:23; Luke 1:17).

3. Messiah is to enter Jerusalem on a donkey (Zechariah 9:9; fulfilled in Luke 35-37; Matthew 21:6-11).

4. Messiah is to be betrayed by a friend (Psalms 41:9; 55:12-14; fulfilled in Matthew 10:4; 26:49-50; John 13:21).

5. Messiah is to be sold for 30 pieces of silver (Zechariah 11:12; fulfilled in Matthew 26:15; 27:3).

6. The money for which Messiah is sold is to be thrown “to the potter” in God’s house (Zechariah 11:13; fulfilled in Matthew 27:5-7).

7. Messiah is to be silent before His accusers (Isaiah 53:7; fulfilled in Matthew 27:12).

8. Messiah is to be executed by crucifixion as a thief (Psalm 22:16; Zechariah 12:10; Isaiah 53:5,12; fulfilled in Luke 23:33; John 20:25; Matthew 27:38; Mark 15:27,28).

This Easter remember, we worship the Lord of the universe who is all and in all.