This isn't a demonstration that God Exists although in general that's both Obvious and supported by Prophecy which is the subject of this essay. The God that created the Universe gave us by revelation sometimes thousands of years in advance, at just the right times, that He would send the Messiah to Earth by the Jews to save us (all people) from our sins. What other force in the universe can manipulate the entirety of human history and the universe in such a way as to make reality itself fulfill -their- story. God has been speaking since the beginning of Time and like all of us, wants to be heard.
I wrote the basic concepts for this on Facebook on March 21, 2017.
In the law of Moses it says that a matter shall be established by two or three witnesses.
It is not enough that there is only one witness because people are lousy at telling the truth and remembering. American law permits a single witness though in some disputes this ends up in "he said, she said" and a second witness is much better.
But if two people remember separately the same thing, then you can be relatively sure it happened that way.
Now in the case of Jesus, there were several thousand living witnesses to his life, death and resurrection, but the Apostles, Peter, Andrew, John, James, Philip, Matthew, Bartholemew, Thomas, James the Greater, Thaddeus, Simon and Judas who was replaced by Matthew took the time to follow him closely, giving their lives and deaths for the sake of Jesus literally. Several of them having the ability to write, took the time to take careful notes and write down all they could remember and thought was relevant of what Jesus said with the explicit purpose that we too would believe that Jesus was the only begotten Son of God.
Similarly Paul the apostle had witnessed the life of Christ and saw him in a vision while he was persecuting the new church of Christ.
Other notable non-believers also took note of Jesus' life, death and crucifixion, in particular Tacitus and Flavius Josephus extensively record events from the New Testament era of Jesus' life that match up correctly with the account in the Gospel. In addition well known references to Jesus are found in the Q'ran, the Talmud, Suetonius, Mara bar Sarapion, Pliny the Younger, Thallus, Phlegon, Philo and original sources, the Dead Sea Scrolls all make references to Jesus, the Christians and align with the facts as stated in the Synoptic Gospels despite them being nearly all anti-christian sources although not all obviously specifically corroborate the stories, the existence of these many historical sources point to two facts, that Jesus was Baptized by John the Baptist who called him the Son of God and was crucified by Pilate at the behest of the Jews because he claimed to be the Messiah.
These two facts, alone, rule out the possibility that Jesus is a myth, like Hercules or Thor. Thor in particular, was made up in the late middle ages, so also Hercules was invented by Homer explicitly in his Odessy. While many greeks believed in the Gods, few believed in their incarnations on earth as demigods since this was something empirically verifiable and which would have been and could have been recorded by third party sources. In the case of Jesus, we have those third party sources well in hand. That Jesus walked the earth like you and I do now is simply an established historical fact, not unlike the fact that Columbus led an expedition to the New World now called the Americas. And not only does the documentary evidence point this out, but simply history itself makes no sense without Jesus. The persecution and persistance of the Christians under Nero finally led to the fall of the Roman Empire as Roman Ideology was replaced by Christ's teachings finally reaching the emperor Constantine. If there were no Apostles, then where did the Christians come from? If there were no Jesus, then why did the Apostles give up their lives? History makes no sense without Jesus putting his feet on the Earth.
So there were many personal eyewitnesses to Jesus at the time of His Life, people who saw, touched and became disciples of Jesus who instead of starting a cult or trying to take over the world, gave his life as a sacrifice for our sins so that through Him we would have reconciliation with God which each of us of our own works have lost as a result of our sins, as it is written "For the wages of sin are death but the free gift of God is Eternal Life."
And today we have "personal eyewitnesses" in the millions upon millions of lives which Jesus has saved (including my own) as He still lives today and is still God and still performs miracles for those who call upon Him for He is a merciful and kind God who forgives sins, heals and sustains us and gives us His Peace and Joy which can not be had any other way.
But for those who won't accept the testimony of a modern beleiver (including myself, twice I've been dead and God brought me back to life not because I am a "good person" but because of His Mercy and Grace), there is the Bible. Now the Bible is not a single book written by a single person like Moby Dick or Tale of Two Cities, it is a collection of books written over the course of centuries. Moses the author of the Pentateuch apparently wrote that series of 5 books around 3000BC whereas the book of Job was apparently written around 4000BC by a man named Job from Ur of the Chaldeans, meanwhile the Gospel of John has early fragments from archeology from around 76AD indicating it having been written during the lifetime of the Apostle John as it clearly claims itself.
What is commonly called "The Old Testament" by Christians is the collection of the books of Moses, the Torah, the Nevi'im or books of the prophets, and the Ketuvim which were handed down by the tradition of the scribes for centuries by a well-known and verified procedure. This collection of writings is the best attested group of writings in human history - having been put together around 600 BC by Scribes during their exile in Babylon. Fragments from 700BC attest to the existence of the writings prior to the Babylonian exile as well as the contents which attest to the manner and timing of their captivity.
These prophets clearly and continuously attested to the coming of the Messiah who would take away the sins of the World as it is written in Isaiah 53:
10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.
11 After he has suffered,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.
That is, the prophet Isaiah who had foretold the rule of Cyrus and the rebuilding of the Temple of God in Jerusalem after their exile Around 900BC, prophesied of the coming of the Holy One of Israel, a descendent of David of the line of the Kings of Judah, and messiah for the whole World as it is written:
And Earlier, David, around 1000BC prophesied that the Messiah would be God's Son:
(Psalm 2)
7 I will tell of the decree:
The Lord said to me, "You are my Son;
today I have begotten you.
8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage,
and the ends of the earth your possession.
Now these and many more prophecies are found in the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings referenced above. And they are fulfilled in exactly one person, that is Jesus Christ who suffered for our sins in order that they may be forgotten by God.
Now today though, there are two religions which agree on the contents of the holy books of the Torah and the Prophets, the Christians and the Jews who both acknowledge that Yahweh is God, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and that there is no other. But they are DISTINCT religions, even as in the time of Christ. For at the time of Christ there were Pharisees who believed in the afterlife, heaven and angels, and Sadducees who did not, who believed that this life was all there is and then people simply were dead. And this is a unique thing in all the world, that two religions so diametrically opposed should attest to the same prophecies, the same historical facts, and yet still disagree. (Being Jewish and Christian I know about being able to agree on all the facts, but disagree on the substance, believe me, my Children are called the Debater, the Complainer and the Arguer!). (hi Sofia Lindauer, Mimi Lindauer and Nikolas Lindauer 😉 )
But we don't hear of Hindu's recognizing the holy writings of Nicht Than, or of Sikh's acknowledging that Mohammed is the last prophet, nor Buddhists acknowledging Athena. No, Religions are opposed to each other because they have different histories, authorities and even goals in this world and the next. Even religions that attempt to blur them all together (New Age or Universalists) are opposed to each other in various ways about what -are- the holy books and by what manner they are to be recognized.
But in Christianity and Judaism we see that they agree to the letter on the entirety of the the Law, the Prophets, the Psalms and the Chronicles of the Kings in who's substance is the entire prophecy of the coming of the Messiah, in particular the prophecy of Daniel 9:
25 “Know and understand this: From the time the word goes out to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven ‘sevens,’ and sixty-two ‘sevens.’ It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble.
26 After the sixty-two ‘sevens,’ the Anointed One will be put to death and will have nothing.[g] The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed. 27 He will confirm a covenant with many for one ‘seven.' In the middle of the ‘seven’ he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And at the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.”
To put this the short way because the prophecy is in 360-day years (the calendar of the time), Artaxerxes issued an edict to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem in 445 BC, and 483 360-day years brings the predicted date to around 30 AD, the time of Christ the Messiah.
That is to say, Daniel the Prophet of Israel predicted the annointing of the Messiah -to the year- approximately 600 years earlier. And that prophecy could not have been put there by a modern Christian writer since those books had been sealed in the Nevi'im (the books of the Prophets) long before anyone knew of Jesus' crucifixion.
To this day, though, there are Two religions, why!?
Isaiah wrote:
6:9 "He said, "Go and tell this people: "'Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.'"
That is, God purposefully blinded the people of Israel. But not, as many people think, simply because of their transgressions, but also to provide a second witness. For the books of the Torah were handed to us by the Scribes of Israel as an INDEPENDENT witness of the coming and timing and character of the Messiah.
All of this I write so that you may have Eternal Life by Believing that Jesus Christ is the Messiah and as He said, to as many as were given to Him, even to as many as believe in his name, may have Eternal Life.
There are more than 300 prophecies of the Messiah, the Annointed One of Israel, the Redeemer in the books of the Old Testament, each of which attest to Christ's Lordship. May His Holy Name Be Praised!
AMEN!