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Today is the first direct prophecy pointed to the coming Christ. Passage Isaiah 7:13-17: Then Isaiah said, “Listen well, you royal family of David! Isn’t it enough to exhaust human patience? Must you exhaust the patience of my God as well? 14 All right then, the Lord himself will give you the sign. Look! The young woman will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son and will call him Immanuel (which means ‘God is with us’). 15 By the time this child is old enough to choose what is right and reject what is wrong, he will be eating yogurt and honey. 16 For before the child is that old, the lands of the two kings you fear so much will both be deserted. 17 “Then the Lord will bring things on you, your nation, and your family unlike anything since Israel broke away from Judah. He will bring the king of Assyria upon you!” Israel often exhausted God’s patience and always wanted a sign or wonder from him. This prophecy of a coming messiah was held onto my the Israelites as the way to freedom; they still to this day look for the coming messiah not believing Jesus is he. A Jew that believes Christ is the prophesied Immanuel is called a completed Jew. The Hebrew indicates a young woman of marriable age, not necc. a virgin; the Hebrew is ha’almah whereas virgin is betulah. It is just assumed that a young woman of the age of marriage is a virgin. This prophecy was given roughly 700 BC. It is often used to indicate the evidence of a virgin birth, but in actual fact it indicates that God will send someone who God is with fully. A man with the spirit of the God – Christ – inside. Who from a young age will be with God, eating yogurt and honey – or understanding the ways and will of God. Jesus was actually born in a time when the Holy Land found itself under the supremacy of Assyria, when it was looked upon as the universal empire, a condition which went back to the king that reigned after Solomon.
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