Nobody but Jesus has ever confirmed. So it's either Jesus or nobody. Messiah would be in the lineage of and heir to the throne of David. So in 2 Samuel 7, 12-13, and when David's days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers. I will set up thy seat after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build an house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." And the book we're reading by McTernan goes into some detail. What's it called? Only Jesus of Nazareth can be Israel's King Messiah. King Messiah, yeah. And this in the immediate was fulfilled to some extent by Solomon, but there are things about it that weren't fulfilled by Solomon, and the kingdom then did split after Solomon with his son Rehoboam, and then come down a few generations around 700, 707 BC, the Assyrians came down and destroyed the north, And if you're following along with us in our studies of Isaiah, we're seeing how Isaiah prophesied all of that. And then if you're reading along in our daily Bible reading, you're coming to, you're going to be reading in the next few days in 2 Kings, how all this came about. the northern kingdom Israel with the 10 tribes minus Judah and Levi, because Levi was in Jerusalem. And it was mostly Benjamites in addition to those two tribes, but that northern kingdom taken off by Assyria. And in our studies on Wednesday about Amos, Amos' prophecies are describing what they went through, and it's terrible. And we read about hooks, and we know that that's how Assyria would put hooks in their lips and their nose and even their eyelids and drag them off. Killed 90% of them. That was in our previous study. We saw that in Amos 5. 90% casualty rate. Terrible. Then around 586, beginning in 606 B.C. and culminating in 586 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar brought Babylon in to the south. Totally destroyed everything. Solomon's temple was destroyed. But this prophesies of a time when the temple was built is never destroyed. It says that this king prophesied here, says he'll be beaten with rods. There's no record of Solomon ever being beaten with rods, but there is of Jesus. and he was beaten with fists and beaten with rods and whips and just abused and everything. So then we also need to add that the Messiah would be a prophet like unto Moses. One of the reasons we know not to believe in Muhammad is because Muhammad didn't prophesy anything specific. Muhammad's prophecies were basically, yes, someday there's going to be an end of days and God's going to judge everything and so forth. Well, if that's the prophecy, we're all prophets. I mean, we all know that, amen? But Muhammad never prophesied anything. Deuteronomy 18, 15, the Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet. Now, if you look that up in your Bible, you should have a capital P there on prophet. That's something that a lot of people never could really explain, unless you believe it's prophesying Messiah, and the Messiah is deity. It says, of thy brethren, like unto me, unto him ye shall hearken. And so Moses himself, I've heard, I think Zola Levitt was one I heard say this, he said, you know, I'm just obeying Moses. You know, these Torah Jews claim that they're following Moses. They're not following Moses because Moses told us to follow Jesus. Because Moses just said, there'll be a prophet like unto me and you'll recognize him fulfilling all the prophecies and that he prophesies and never gets it wrong. And so if you're a Jew and you're not following Jesus Christ, you're not following Moses either. There are more than 100 prophecies with more than 300 distinct details of the prophets fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Again, no one ever has done that other than Jesus. And if it weren't for Jesus, no one ever would. There's plenty of prophecies that no one could, to this day, actually fulfill. By the way, we talked about how if a Jew today stands up and says they're the Messiah, when the Antichrist comes, that's part of the deception. He will be a Jew. He will have Jewish DNA. But he won't necessarily be out of Israel. He could be out of Syria. People are looking for somebody coming out of the nation of Syria today. Do you realize every Jew is out of Syria? Abraham came out of Syria, so every offspring of Abraham is out of Syria. So the Antichrist will be a Jew, that's number one requirement for being the Messiah. The only way for the Jews to accept him as Messiah is for him to at least be able to demonstrate he has Jewish DNA, which today is very easily done. That's why it's so crazy when you hear these people teaching that it'll be an Islamic Antichrist, although there have been a few I heard say that they'll find out that the Mahdi has some Jewish blood in it. And that would be a possibility, but I also believe, and we've taught, and you can go back to our Revelation studies in Revelation 17, 18, where we spent a total of about 100 hours of Bible study. Not 100, that was the whole book of Revelation. I mean, 20 hours. 20 hours in Revelation 17, 18. Going line by line, verse by verse, And we believe that the Pope is the office of Antichrist. That's what all Christians used to believe, by the way. You couldn't go anywhere a Bible-believing Christian didn't believe that the Pope was the office of Antichrist. Until about the 60s, and the 70s and 80s, and the new versions crept in, and the ecumenical movement, and the charismatic movement, and all that crept in, and people became Bible-ignorant and history-ignorant, and then they started teaching all kinds of crazy things. what we believe is the final Pope, whoever that will be. Now, I don't believe it's Francis. I always laugh about these people who think that like Francis or before then John Paul, you know, the second. I believe he's gonna be younger. He's gonna be vibrant. He's gonna be well-spoken. I expect him to be in his 30s. He's gonna be a counterfeit Jesus. Well, Jesus was in his 30s when he was crucified. And you've got these popes now, they walk around like... John Paul, the last few years of his life, they put a... Practically slobbering on the thing. I was pretty sure he wasn't going to be the Antichrist. But I think, you know, there's a lot of talk when Francis first came in, he was, comparatively speaking, a lot younger than a lot of the recent popes. But anyway, I do believe that the final Pope will be the Antichrist. And the objection to that is, well, he's Catholic. Catholic is not DNA. And there are a lot of people with Jewish DNA who are Catholics. And there are a number known to be cardinals, which is where they normally pick the pope. Now, they don't have to pick the pope from the cardinals. But there are a number of cardinals with Jewish DNA. That's all they have to have. And you say, well, he's got to be a Syrian. Yeah, as I just said, all Jews are from Syria originally through Abraham. So that's covered. Johnny? And also, isn't it obvious that I mean, what we know about the Catholic Church, it's pretty much the biggest counterfeit ever. Yeah, well that's why we, as Christians, Bible believers, have always said that the Pope is the seat of Antichrist, because all the things you, again, I'm covering some of what we talked about in our studies of Revelation 17-18. Well, so I've told you I'm going to do a retake of, we have a study called, The Pope is Antichrist. And we're going to redo that sometime. The Bible says he'll speak great swelling words and declare himself to be God. Well, every pope is already right there anyway because he accepts being called Holy Father. That's a term only used of God. One time in the Bible, John 17, Jesus calls God Holy Father. And the Pope accepts that title. He's called the Vicar of Christ. Well, what's a Vicar of Christ? He's the counterfeit Christ. He's an earthly replacement of Christ. On and on and on. And there are many times where people have said, the Pope is God on Earth. Catholics say that, not people. They quote, they say that. And in that study, we'll revisit all that. And so you have the Antichrist, Jew, We believe the final Pope is going to do what? He's not going to be able to fulfill these prophecies. He's not going to be able to prove he's of the lineage. Somebody said, well, what if one of these guys were born in Bethlehem? Well, that'd be one, but they're not going to be able to do the others. Yeah, Brian? I learned in Catholic school that the last pope would be the Antichrist. There are all places to learn that. Think about that. Catholic school taught me that the last hope will be the end. Malachi Martin was a well-known Roman Catholic who taught the same thing. So yeah, people accuse me of being anti-Catholic. I'm not anti-Catholic, I'm anti-Antichrist. you know and I'm not against I'm not against people who attend any of these churches that we'd referred to I'm against the false Gospels being preached from the pulpit and so forth we love the people so the best people ever met were Catholic some of the worst people ever met were Baptist all right so the odds of any single man fulfilling just eight messianic prophecies some of you've heard this before But multiplying all of these probabilities together produces a number rounded off at 1 to 10 to the 28th power. And you can sit down sometime and write 28 zeros. All right, listen to me now. I don't want you guys losing this. You write down the number 10 and put 28 zeros after it. I don't even know what that number is. But then you divide the 1 in 10 to the 28th power by an estimate of the number of people who have lived since the time of these prophecies, which is 88 billion, produces a probability of all eight prophecies being fulfilled accidentally in the life of one person, and that probability is 1 in 10 to the 17th power. Again, you sit down with a piece of paper, write the number 10, and then 17 zeros after it. That's what it looks like. And that's one in one quadrillion. Now, granted, our national debt's probably going to be there soon. But otherwise, that's not a number that you see normally. Yeah. So if you go on the internet, you can't hardly find this book for less than $200. But it's called Science Speaks, An Evaluation of Certain Christian Evidences by Peter W. Stoner. And it's in the second half of the book where he gets into these probabilities. And no one's ever accused him of getting it wrong. But it's just a, I think it's a strange thing you see all these classics reprinted among Christians and everything and it's stuff, a lot of it has rank heresy in it. You know, there's stuff by Brother Lawrence, it's all mysticism and puts people into, you know, turns them into weirdos and everything. All these books they call classics and they reprint, they won't reprint this and it's on demand, it's high demand. it says here, all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished. So what we just talked about are things he's already fulfilled, and as we're going through Luke 18, we have reached a place where now he says, behold we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished. So this is a huge turn in our reading of Luke someone told me you could kind of break Luke up into six chapter segments and now we're coming into the last fourth six chapter segment and we'll do a little more we'll show you a couple of charts and things and timelines and in our future studies but the point is that he is now going to set his face toward the cross to fulfill more prophecies and he's going to describe that in the next couple of verses But Hebrews 12 tells us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. is literally the author of the book you have on your lap, or on your phone, or whatever you're reading. If it's a King James Bible, if it's not a King James Bible, you have something that has some of His words, but also has some problems, areas with it. But your King James Bible is accurate, and He, Jesus, is the author of that book. and finisher of our faith. And we were having this conversation again recently, but we are not saved by our own works. You didn't author your salvation, and you're not gonna finish it. You actually have nothing to do with being saved. You didn't do anything to accomplish it, and you're not gonna do anything to keep saved. You're not gonna do anything to ultimately be saved and in heaven forever. You are saved by works, but not your works. You are saved by the works of Jesus Christ. And that's important. I've realized here in the last few years how important, and I always give Doug credit for that. We were talking about this a few years ago. And I said, you know, people will not accept the fact that their works have nothing to do with them being saved. And a lot of our evangelical Christian friends think that they get saved by faith in the gospel. They've repented toward God with faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ, believing how that Christ died for their sins, was buried and rose again, according to Scripture, and yet, then they want to say that they stay saved by their own works. They stay saved, and you can lose it, if you don't do certain things, or you do certain things you shouldn't do, or whatever. That puts your salvation still then in your hands. And then when we get to heaven, I guess a lot of people are going to say, well Jesus saved me and then I battled through and I did this and I did that. No, the Bible says when you get to heaven there will be no boasting. For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. If you did have something to do with being saved or staying saved, you can boast when you get to heaven but you're not going to be able to do that. Who, Jesus, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. And as Brother John mentioned there, Sunday School, he's getting ready to stand up. But one of the most amazing prophecies is found in Isaiah, and I want us to close by going there. And this is kind of a whet your appetite and introduction to our study next week, actually. But in Isaiah 53, This is, if you ever are able to witness to a Jew especially, but even to Gentiles, if you can get them to sit down and read this with you, and then ask them how in the world they could deny that this was a prophecy of Jesus Christ. Verse 53, I want you to read the even with me. Beginning in verse 1 through 12. Who hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness, and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and we hid, as it were, our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation? For he was cut off out of the land of the living, for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death, because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to grief. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied by his knowledge, shall my righteous servant justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out his soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. And another great one we don't have to take time to read a bit is in Psalm 20. Let's do it. Let's just live on the edge here. Go to Psalm 22. David's getting excited and throwing his Bible. It's good stuff. I know. Amen. Psalm 22. Actually more verses but not as many words because some of these are short verses. Psalm 22 verses 1 through 21. Read the odd with me. I'll start with verse 1. My God... I'm sorry, I was wrong. Go ahead, read with me. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring? O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not, and in the night season, and am not silent. But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in thee, they trusted, and thou didst deliver them. They cried unto thee and were delivered, they trusted in thee and were not confounded. But I am a worm and no man, a reproach of men and despised of the people. All they that see me laugh me to scorn. They shoot out the lip. They shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver him. Let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in Him. I want to stop there just for a second. Do you realize how amazing this is? A thousand years before it happened, the very words that you'd find spoken, not just by Jesus, they say, well, He manipulated. He couldn't manipulate the stuff coming out of the mouths of those killing Him. Read verse 9. But thou art he that took me out of the womb. Thou didst make me hope when I was upon my brother's breast. I was cast upon thee from the womb. Thou art my God from my mother's belly. Be not far from me, for trouble is near, for there is none to help. Many bulls have compassed me. Strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round. You remember we studied that in Amos 5. Alright, read verse 13. They gaped upon me with their mouths as a ravening and roaring lion. I am poured out like water. When they put that spear in his side. And all my bones are out of joint. But not one was broken. We'll see that in a minute. My heart is like wax. It is melted in the midst of my bowels. And they say when that water and blood gushed out, it was that spear going right up into his heart. Read 15. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth through my jaws, and thou hast brought me into the dust of death. You remember they offered him to drink. For dogs encompassed me, the assembly of the wicked having closed me, they pierced my hands and my feet. That's a prophecy in a time when crucifixion wasn't even happening yet. It didn't even exist. And that's exactly what they did. Verse 17, read that. I may tell all my bones, they look and stare upon me. Why? Because they didn't break his bones, if you remember. How could they know that a thousand years before it happened? Because almost every crucifixion ended up with them breaking their bones so that they couldn't lift themselves up anymore and they would die. Verse 18, we see this also coming to pass in the Gospels. They part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture. Now read 19 with me. But be not thou far from me, O Lord, O my strength, haste thee to help me. Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling, from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion's mouth, for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorn, and so forth. We'll stop there. Isn't that amazing? You read, not just on the cross. I mean on the cross, what He did. What they did before they put Him on the cross. But also think about Him coming down from heaven. And spending thirty years putting up with this world. So that He could then culminate that 30 years of putting up with the world, and all he put up with being a human being, so that he could then be despised, be rejected, be mocked, made fun of, and then when they took him to the cross, they spit on him, they beat him, crucified him. And the thing is, he wasn't caught off guard. He came, and John will read, he knew. That was why he came. How many of you have seen and heard where they're trying to claim Jesus found out later what this was all about? Because people teach that. No. He said, I came to lay down my life. He knew. When he went into the garden of Gethsemane, he sweat drops of blood with his sweat because of the pressures as a human being of what he knew was about to happen to him on the cross. Consider what Jesus has done to save you. I don't want to get mystical with it, but this one area the mystics do get it right. A lot of times they would spend hours meditating on what Jesus had done for them. I'm not saying to get that deep and dark about it, but you should contemplate. You should, as you're praying, verbalize your appreciation for what Jesus has done for you.