Jesus' Prophecied Birth

Introduction

We’re all aware of the fact that we have no control over the circumstances of our birth. All told I think I had a pretty good childhood, but I didn’t pick out my family. I didn’t choose to be born in Saint John and to live in the tiny place called Evandale. Have you ever wondered what sort of life you would have chosen for yourself if you did have control of the circumstances of your birth? If you could choose any time, any place, and any family to be born into, do you know what you would choose?

I’d have to think pretty long and hard about it. Though I think I can say with a significant degree of confidence that if I had any choice I probably wouldn’t choose to be born in a feeding trough in a tiny nowhere town to a poor family.

Yet Jesus is the only one ever born who arguably did have a say in the circumstances of His birth, though perhaps that was all decided by God the Father. It’s sometimes hard to parse out the difference between the choices of the Father and Jesus, probably because Jesus was perfectly submissive to the will of the Father.

In any case, not only did God assign a particular place, time and circumstance for the birth of His son, but He also announced it well ahead of time.

Here we find ourselves at the very end of the “Finding Jesus in the Old Testament” series, and so it’s only appropriate that we come to a few of the most late prophecies in the Old Testament about the Messiah, both of which deal with His birth, which we are about to celebrate for the season of Advent starting next week.

It’s because of their relevance to the birth of Jesus that I’m sure they are quite familiar to most if not all of you. Today we have two main texts from Isaiah 7 and Micah 5, each centering on one particular verse. These are Isaiah 7:14

Isaiah 7:14 CSB

Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign: See, the virgin will conceive, have a son, and name him Immanuel.

and Micah 5:2

Micah 5:2 (CSB)

Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are small among the clans of Judah; one will come from you to be ruler over Israel for me. His origin is from antiquity, from ancient times.

So we will look at both of these prophecies as we always have throughout this series and ask ourselves the question, what does this teach us about the nature of Jesus, and about the nature of discipleship to Jesus?

1. Born of a Virgin

Some people have really amazing birth stories. Some women have almost died giving birth to their children. I’ve heard of women who didn’t even know they were pregnant who went into the hospital for stomach pain and gave birth. Or some women who were told they could never have children who beat the odds and successfully conceived and gave birth. In fact the Old Testament is filled with that last kind of story. A number of women throughout the Old Testament tried and failed for years and in some cases decades to get pregnant until God intervened and helped them to bear their children.

There was Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Manoah’s Wife, and Hannah. They all pleaded to the Lord for a child and He answered their plea. In the New Testament even we get the story of Elizabeth, the mother of John, who likewise was barren until God intervened.

None of these however compares to the birth story of Jesus. Long before He was born God told His people the miraculous way that His Son would be born in the flesh. We read this verse in its context in Isaiah 7:10-17

Isaiah 7:10–17 CSB

Then the Lord spoke again to Ahaz: “Ask for a sign from the Lord your God—it can be as deep as Sheol or as high as heaven.” But Ahaz replied, “I will not ask. I will not test the Lord.” Isaiah said, “Listen, house of David! Is it not enough for you to try the patience of men? Will you also try the patience of my God? Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign: See, the virgin will conceive, have a son, and name him Immanuel. By the time he learns to reject what is bad and choose what is good, he will be eating curds and honey. For before the boy knows to reject what is bad and choose what is good, the land of the two kings you dread will be abandoned. The Lord will bring on you, your people, and your father’s house such a time as has never been since Ephraim separated from Judah: He will bring the king of Assyria.”

I’m sure to many of you verse fourteen is very familiar. Isaiah 7:14

Isaiah 7:14 CSB

Therefore, the Lord himself will give you a sign: See, the virgin will conceive, have a son, and name him Immanuel.

Especially as we get very close now to the Christmas season this verse comes up quite a bit. The context might be a little unfamiliar though, and possibly confusing. See Isaiah spoke this prophecy to Ahaz in a particular situation. Ahaz was facing the threat of military attack from two other kings, and he has decided in his wisdom to ask the King of Assyria to come and help him. God sends Isaiah to basically tell Him “that’s a bad idea, don’t do that. Trust in your God instead.” And that’s where we pick up the story in verse 10.

So you might be wondering, if this is a prophecy about Jesus, why is Isaiah giving it to Ahaz as reassurance about the crisis that He’s currently facing? And what is this talk about the child being too young to know good from evil before the Kings are defeated? This conflict was long over by the time Jesus was born.

It’s these questions that lead some to say that this isn’t about Jesus at all. One prominent theory is that this is actually fulfilled by one of Isaiah’s sons. We read the fulfillment of this passage supposedly in Isaiah 8:1-8

Isaiah 8:1–8 (CSB)

Then the Lord said to me, “Take a large piece of parchment and write on it with an ordinary pen: Maher-shalal-hash-baz. I have appointed trustworthy witnesses—the priest Uriah and Zechariah son of Jeberechiah.”

I was then intimate with the prophetess, and she conceived and gave birth to a son. The Lord said to me, “Name him Maher-shalal-hash-baz, for before the boy knows how to call ‘Father,’ or ‘Mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the spoils of Samaria will be carried off to the king of Assyria.”

The Lord spoke to me again: Because these people rejected the slowly flowing water of Shiloah and rejoiced with Rezin and the son of Remaliah, the Lord will certainly bring against them the mighty rushing water of the Euphrates River—

the king of Assyria and all his glory. It will overflow its channels and spill over all its banks. It will pour into Judah, flood over it, and sweep through, reaching up to the neck; and its flooded banks will fill your entire land, Immanuel!

Of course there’s a couple issues with this. First of all, they don’t name this child Immanuel. They named him Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. Also, the prophecy in verse 14 says that the mother will be the one to name the child, and it’s Isaiah who names the child here. Also, the woman who gave birth to the child was not a virgin. Now the word translated virgin here can mean “young unmarried woman,” in the context of Isaiah’s day most of the time there was an assumption that young women who weren’t married were still virgins. Also, the Septuagint which is the first Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible before the time of Jesus uses the Greek word for Virgin to translate the word. Which ultimately makes sense, because think about it. God is calling this a miraculous sign. In what way is it miraculous for a young woman who isn’t a virgin to give birth? That’s not a very impressive sign. Especially if that woman then goes on to not even literally name her child Immanuel.

Instead we leave the book of Isaiah with this prophecy still feeling at best only partially fulfilled. This paired with Isaiah’s other prophecies about a child to come who would be called “wonderful councelor, mighty god and everlasting father,” and it’s no wonder that many considered this even before the coming of Jesus to be a prophecy about the future Messiah.

Also of great importance is the fact that while this prophecy is spoken in conversation to Ahaz, Isaiah speaks it not to Ahaz but to the entire house of David. You can see this from the use of the plural “you” in the Hebrew of this verse.

More important than those logical cases for the future view of this prophecy is the fact that we believe in the inspiration of the New Testament. For that reason we believe that when Matthew for instance interprets this prophecy of Isaiah He does so under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. God spoke through Matthew when He quotes Isaiah in Matthew 1:20-23

Matthew 1:20–23 (CSB)

But after he had considered these things, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what has been conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: See, the virgin will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they will name him Immanuel, which is translated “God is with us.”

So we can see from God’s own commentary on this prophecy that it applies to the virgin birth of Jesus. But so what? Why is it important that Jesus was born of a virgin? For a couple reasons:

First, to show the hand of God in His birth. The moment that Jesus was born He was proven to be God’s Messiah, the chosen one to save Israel. That’s because Virgin births just don’t happen. So by being born of a virgin we have strong evidence that Jesus is who He says He is, the true coming king of Israel.

Second, it shows who the real father is. Though the Jewish people referred to themselves collectively as the children of God, no one was the child of God the way that Jesus is. He is the “only begotten son,” which is basically a way of saying the only literal son of God. The only human being whose only father is God, except in the case of Adam of course. So this makes sense of the name provided in the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14, that he would be called “Immanuel” which means “God with us.”

Now perhaps most if not all of the Jews were taking this to mean that His name was a reminder of the fact that God was on their side. In the same way that Joshua’s name was a reminder that “God saves.” But instead we find that Jesus is called Immanuel in an amazing and quite literal sense. He is God actually with us in the flesh. He came down to earth to actually walk amognst us.

Colossians 2:9 CSB

For the entire fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily in Christ,

So when we celebrate the birth of Jesus we celebrate God coming down to live among us. The ultimate condescencion. Becoming frail and limited for our sakes and ultimately dying for our sakes.

The virgin birth is just the beginning of this incredible advent, and is the proof of the nature and person of Jesus Christ. Yet the Hebrew Scriptures didn’t just tell us how He would be conceived, but also about where He would be born.

2. Coming from Bethlehem

There were a lot of places that God could have chosen to have Jesus be born. We know it was through Israel that He promised to bless the nations, but He could have arranged for Jesus to be born anywhere. He could have had Jesus born on the front steps of the temple, or in a huge fancy palace somewhere. So the fact that God could have made the place of Jesus’ birth anywhere gives rise to the obvious question; why did He choose Bethlehem?

This brings us to our other main text for the day, Micah 5:1-4

Micah 5:1–4 (CSB)

Now, daughter who is under attack, you slash yourself in grief; a siege is set against us! They are striking the judge of Israel on the cheek with a rod.

Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are small among the clans of Judah; one will come from you to be ruler over Israel for me. His origin is from antiquity, from ancient times.

Therefore, Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor has given birth; then the rest of the ruler’s brothers will return to the people of Israel.

He will stand and shepherd them in the strength of the Lord, in the majestic name of the Lord his God. They will live securely, for then his greatness will extend to the ends of the earth.

Bethlehem was not a big place. Hence why this very verse calls it small, and could be understood in the Hebrew to read “too small to be in the clans of Judah.” Likely because the clans were grouped by thousands, and there wasn’t enough people in Bethlehem to be counted that way. In fact Bethlehem is left out of most of the prominant lists of cities in the tribe of Judah.

So what does it say that God sent His son to be born there? Well it says a great deal about His humility. Jesus was born in a tiny nowhere town to show us what kind of attitude that we should have. Now you might say, hold on a second, Bethlehem was also the birth place of David, so it’s in some sense an honor to be born in the same place as Him. Well the humility of the town of Bethelehem was also important in the story of David. Saul was a large man from a large tribe, and God chose as his replacement the youngest son of a man from a small town in the smallest clan of Judah. Jesus likewise came from humble origins. We see the humble birth of Jesus described in Luke 2:1-7

Luke 2:1–7 CSB

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that the whole empire should be registered. This first registration took place while Quirinius was governing Syria. So everyone went to be registered, each to his own town. Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family line of David, to be registered along with Mary, who was engaged to him and was pregnant. While they were there, the time came for her to give birth. Then she gave birth to her firstborn son, and she wrapped him tightly in cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them.

So not only was He born in a small town, but even in a stable because there was no place available for Joseph and Mary to stay during the census. Imagine, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords sleeping in a manger in the tiny town of Bethelehem, attended by shepherds, the outcasts of society.

Yet even so His birth in Bethlehem is more evidence of His rightful place as King. This is one prophecy about Messiah that was quite widely understood in its application. Consider the response of the chief priests and scribes when the wise men from the east ask them where the Messiah was to be born. Matthew 2:5-6

Matthew 2:5–6 (CSB)

“In Bethlehem of Judea,” they told him, “because this is what was written by the prophet:

And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah: Because out of you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.”

These humble origins joined together with the servant heart of Jesus’ throughout His life and ministry is what inspired Paul to say in Philippians 2:5-8

Philippians 2:5–8 (CSB)

Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited.

Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity.

And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross.

So we should look at this prophecy in Micah and it’s fulfillment in the life of Jesus and use it as inspiration to be the humble followers of Jesus that we’ve always been called to be. So that means that we seek greatness by making ourselves less than others. We seek leadership by service to others. We love God first, others second and ourselves third.

How could we do anything less when the very God who created the universe and everything in it gave up so much for our sakes? In the words of 1 John 4:11

1 John 4:11 CSB

Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.

So we should be like our master, and do as He did. Don’t seek status and wealth but make yourself less for the sakes of everyone else.

However this passage of Micah and its fulfillment don’t JUST show the humility of Christ, but also His majesty. For that we look primarily to the second half of verse 2.

3. Originating from Antiquity

Let’s zoom in on that verse. Micah 5:2

Micah 5:2 (CSB)

Bethlehem Ephrathah, you are small among the clans of Judah; one will come from you to be ruler over Israel for me. His origin is from antiquity, from ancient times.

So the verse starts out talking about the small size of Bethlehem Ephrathah, (which has to be called that because there was more than one Bethlehem) but ends talking about this one to come being a ruler whose “origin is from antiquity, from ancient times.”

The Hebrew word translated here as “ancient times” is:

“ʻôwlâm, o-lawm'; or עֹלָם ʻôlâm; from H5956; properly, concealed, i.e. the vanishing point; generally, time out of mind (past or future), i.e. (practically) eternity; frequentatively, adverbial (especially with prepositional prefix) always:—alway(-s), ancient (time), any more, continuance, eternal, (for, (n-)) ever(-lasting, -more, of old), lasting, long (time), (of) old (time), perpetual, at any time, (beginning of the) world (+ without end). Compare H5331, H5703.”

This is the word best suited to describe eternity past and sometimes even future. So this is a remarkable word to use to describe the Messiah. Now if you were assuming that the Messiah was just an ordinary man you’d have to say that context must limit this word, but now that we know the nature of Jesus we know that it is appropriately used of Him in this passage.

So how do you reconcile the announcement that someone is to be born in Bethlehem, but that He is from the ancient past? What kind of person could be a newborn and ancient at the same time? Well there’s only one man who fits the bill. Jesus Christ of Nazareth. See we believe in a Trinitarian God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit we believe are one in substance, all equally God and indivisibly connected, yet distinctly three persons with their own wills and relationships with each other. Because we believe that the Son is just as eternal as the Father and the Spirit we believe that Jesus has always existed, even before He was born of the Virgin Mary in the town of Bethlehem.

You see something incomprehensibly amazing happened in that tiny town of Bethlehem. For the first time in history God became flesh. The second person of the Trinity became entirely man and yet still entirely God. Joined in one person the perfect holiness and love and justice of God yet in the form of Man, so that He could represent us as the new Adam. So that He could go to that cross as one of us in order that He could die for the penalty of our sins.

It’s not that the atonement just happened to take the form of God becoming man to die for us. It’s the only way that it possibly could have happened. He’s the only one perfect enough to truly be innocent and yet still actually a man so that He could justifiably stand in our place.

Conclusion

So as we bring this “Finding Jesus in the Old Testament Series” let’s remind ourselves of the verse that basically inspired me to spend so much time looking at the Old Testament this year. Luke 24:44-45

Luke 24:44–45 CSB

He told them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.

And elsewhere Jesus talks about how Moses wrote about Him, about how He came to fulfill the law. Jesus believed that the Old Testament was primarily written about Him. So we shouldn’t be surprised at all if we go to the old testament and find that it’s true.

We have looked today and many other Sundays at the prophecies that were written about Jesus. Depending on which sholar you ask there are something between 200 and 400 prophecies in the Old Testament that Jesus fulfills, proving that He is the Messiah.

We have looked at other points at Christophanies, moments when Jesus came to earth as “the angel of the Lord” before He was born. We have looked at multiple types of Jesus in the Old Testament that are people or things that in some way foreshadow who Jesus would be.

I think we have seen pretty clearly that what Jesus said is true. The Scriptures are all about Him. It’s amazing that this book, which was written over the span of thousands of years by dozens of different authors of numerous different backgrounds and contexts and yet testifies to a single amazing gospel in Jesus Christ the Son of God, born of a virgin in Bethlehem who would live to teach us, die to save us, and live again to give us hope in the future resurrection.

Let me remind you of a story that I shared early on in this story about a Christian mathematician named Peter Stoner who decided to test out the probability of Jesus fulfilling the Old Testament prophecies with the help of some of his students.

After examining only eight different prophecies, they conservatively estimated that the chance of one man fulfilling all eight prophecies was one in 10^17. To illustrate how large the number 10^17 is (a figure with 17 zeros), [Peter Stoner] gave this illustration: If you mark one of ten tickets, and place all the tickets in a hat, and thoroughly stir them, and then ask a blindfolded man to draw one, his chance of getting the right ticket is one in ten. Suppose that we take 10^17 silver dollars and lay them on the face of Texas. They’ll cover all of the state two feet deep. Now mark one of these silver dollars and stir the whole mass thoroughly, all over the state. Blindfold a man and tell him that he can travel as far as he wishes, but he must pick up the one silver dollar that has the special mark on it. What chance would he have of getting the right one? Just the same chance that the prophets would’ve had of writing these eight prophecies and having them all come true in any one man, from their day to the present time.

In financial terms, is there anyone who would not invest in a financial venture if the chance of failure were only one in 10^17? This is the kind of sure investment we’re offered by God for faith in His Messiah.

From these figures, the professor concludes the fulfillment of these eight prophecies alone proves that God inspired the writing of the prophecies – the likelihood of mere chance is only one in 10^17. Another way of saying this is that any person who minimizes or ignores the significance of the biblical identifying signs concerning the Messiah would be foolish.

But, of course, there are many more than eight prophecies. In another calculation, the professor used 48 prophecies (even though he could have used Edersheim’s 456), and arrived at the extremely conservative estimate that the probability of 48 prophecies being fulfilled in one person is the incredible number 10^157. How large is 10^157? 10^157 contains 157 zeros!

The professor gives an illustration of this number using electrons. Electrons are very small objects. They’re smaller than atoms. It would take 2.5 TIMES 10^15 of them, laid side by side, to make one inch. Even if we counted 250 of these electrons each minute, and counted day and night, it would still take 19 million years just to count a line of electrons one inch long. With this introduction, let’s go back to our chance of one in 10^157. Let’s suppose that we’re taking this number of electrons, marking one, and thoroughly stirring it into the whole mass, then blindfolding a man and letting him try to find the right one. What chance has he of finding the right one? What kind of a pile will this number of electrons make? They make an inconceivably large volume.

https://empower.global/the-mathematical-probability-that-jesus-is-the-christ/

So at the end of this series what we should be leaving with is first of all immense confidence in the fact that Jesus is in fact the Messiah who was predicted by the Old Testament. Second we should be leaving with immense confidence that this Bible we read, study, and talk about every Sunday is in fact the very word of God. How else could it have so accurately predicted these things thousands of years before they happened?

So go into the world as disciples and disciple makers with confidence in who God is, what His Word is, and in the Jesus of Nazereth who is your Lord and Savior who takes away the sin of the world and makes us a new creation in Him.