Have you ever had to track a letter? You know – to find out if and when it was received, who signed for it, etc.? Nowadays the United States Postal Service offers us Proof of Delivery, Delivery Confirmation, and Signature Confirmation. You can pay extra for Certified Mail, Registered Mail, Track and Confirm, and Return Receipts. It’s all very complicated if you ask me. Maybe this is why postage rates keep rising. (Makes me wish it were 1935. Remember? …3¢ Stamps?) Today, it’s all about accuracy and reliability.
It’s not a fact we ponder daily, but grasp this: Any person living anywhere in the world who has mail service can be singled out from the rest of the world’s population by simply addressing an envelope to them with a few identifying details (e.g. first name, last name, street, zip code). Talk about accuracy! There are over Six Billion people in the world! That is a one in 6,481,159,714 chance… not the greatest odds, but the system is reliable. Still, we still take our chances with the mail. Why else would we pay for Proof of Delivery?
Now, let’s look at this whole concept of accuracy, reliability and chance in terms of the Biblical prophecies concerning the coming of the Messiah. There are 333 prophesies in the Old Testament pertaining to the coming of Jesus Christ; and every single one of them comes together and is fulfilled in the New Testament with His Advent. Statisticians have applied the theory of probability to the chances of the fulfillment of only 50 of these detailed predictions (that’s only 15% of them). They tell us that the chances are less than one in 125,000,000,000,000. (That’s twelve zero’s and that’s 125 Trillion.) Forget about chance and probability here! These prophecies are accurate facts!
It is an unmistakable and unparalleled miracle that the birth, life and ministry of Jesus Christ were all foretold and prewritten hundreds of years before they actually occurred. It is no wonder Jesus said, “Search the Scriptures. . . for they testify of me.” (John 5:39) Christianity is not a contemporary, modern-day religion. It is based on the fulfillment of accurate, precise and reliable Old Testament prophecies. Can you imagine someone giving accurate and precise details of – let’s say – Abraham Lincoln or Billy Graham some seven hundred years before they were born? It’s unheard of!
Over the years, co-workers and friends have tried to impress and amaze me with the writings of Nostradamus and others. But after reading a few of these “predictions,” the only thing that impresses me is that they bear neither the uniqueness nor the precision of the Old Testament prophecies concerning Christ. It makes me sad that people are so quick to accept, rely on, and live by the over-simplified and generalized statements of a common man, yet refuse to “search the Scripture” when it comes to Christ. Christianity is an irrefutable fact!
The next time you address an envelope, think about how that envelope will – with great probability – reach its intended recipient at a precise destination. In the same way, the prophets of the Old Testament wrote to us – selecting you and me from all of history – to hear the good News of Jesus Christ. The News is precise and reliable, using identifying details just as we do on envelopes. And if you understand math, you’ll know that the probability of its accuracy and reliability is far greater than that of even the U.S. Postal Service.
- Pastor Mark
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