Christ's Death Prophesied

Christ's crucifixion was a horrible crime against our Savior, yet God ordained it at the hands of wicked men that Jesus might be offered up as our Lamb of sacrifice to take away our sin.

Yet it is not natural for us to think of the efficacy of the crucifixion, for our lives and history teach us that nothing good ever comes from murders. Murders are senseless, useless, and tragic terminations of life and hope.

How can it be that Christ's murder wasn't the end of the Messiah? Indeed, the disciples thought that very thing: that the death of Jesus put an end to all their hopes for His redeeming His people! All their hope was crushed when Jesus died.

Jesus' reply to them was that they were foolish not to believe the Scriptures, which had foretold His shame and death, and the good reasons for it. Indeed, Christ insisted that it was necessary that He should die and rise again, to keep faith with God's Word.

The explanation for Christ's death was all laid out by Old Testament prophets, but it could only be understood fully after He rose from the dead.

Poor saints of old puzzled over the prophecies of Christ's death, but Peter tells us that they wrote those words for us, to prove the Gospel to us who hear it and receive it!

The prophecies both predict and explain how Christ's death would happen to save us, but they also put a hard stop to the false accusation that the apostles made up the explanation for Christ's crucifixion after the fact to cover up His supposed failure as Messiah.

The Scriptures warn us that all of this remains foolishness and weakness to the lost, but to those who believe, Christ's death is God's wisdom and mighty power to save us!