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Chosen no: R-435 b,   from: 1883 Year.

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We want to refer you to a number of prophetic statements, and have you note the connections closely and see that the statements which met a fulfillment in Jesus were so mixed up with other statements not specially applicable to him, that you or I or the Jew might have readily stumbled over them and never have thought of applying them to Messiah, had not the Holy Spirit brought these things to the attention of the Apostles. In fact, we know that the disciples understood not these things and saw not their true application until after Jesus was risen. (See `John 12:16`.)

Turn to `Micah 5:2`, and see how obscurely the birthplace (Bethlehem) is mentioned. The birthplace is mentioned, and the humiliation, yet in so

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disconnected a manner that though the Scribes and Chief Priests understood of his birthplace (`Matt. 2:4-6`), yet they could not see that as the Judge of Israel he would be smitten "with a rod upon the cheek." (`Matt. 27:30`.)

Take another. Turn to `Hosea 11:1` and find the record: "I have called my Son out of Egypt." Nothing about the context would ever lead you to suppose this to apply to Jesus. It altogether seems to relate to Israel as an infant nation brought from Egypt. But when our attention is once called to it, we can see how the name Israel (prevailer) applied well to Jesus; and not only so, but that the coming of the nation Israel out of literal Egypt and the coming of Jesus out of literal Egypt (`Matt. 2:20`) are types of the coming of the entire Israel (the Church) out of the antitype of Egypt, viz., the world.

`Jer. 31:15` introduces Rachel weeping for her children in an entirely disconnected manner, and it could not be understood until fulfilled (`Matt. 2:17`). Rachel was the mother of two of the tribes--Joseph and Benjamin. Bethlehem was in the country apportioned to Benjamin, which tribe, with Judah, occupied Palestine at the time of the first advent.

Look at `Psalm 22`. Any one might read that Psalm throughout and not doubt but that David was speaking of himself. And we doubt not that David thought the same; but Jehovah guided his utterance and made him thus to represent Messiah.

Read `Psalm 118:22,23,26`, about the stone which the builders rejected, etc., which our Lord applied to himself (`Matt. 21:42`); yet these prophetic statements of Messiah evidently stand mixed up with David's own experiences.

Look, also, at `Isaiah 61`. Here the prophet personates Christ, saying: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach," etc. To all appearance the prophet was the person meant, yet when Jesus points out its fulfillment in himself (`Luke 4:18`) we see that in him its conditions were fully met.

See `Zech. 11:12`. Here Zechariah was sold for thirty pieces of silver, and nothing in the connection indicates that he was a type or representative of Jesus, who was afterward sold for thirty pieces.

But we must notice one Scripture which has been cited as specially misapplied by `Matthew in chap. 1:23`, viz., `Isaiah 7:14`, "Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." The objection is made that because this promise had a typical fulfillment at that time, as mentioned in `chap. 8:3`, therefore it could not have a reference to Mary and her son Jesus. We reply that its partial fulfillment at the time is no argument against its application to Mary as made by the Apostle. It would be equally consistent to argue that because thirty pieces were actually weighed out for Zechariah, therefore that prophecy could have no reference to Judas' sale of Jesus.

On the contrary, it was not uncommon for Jehovah to deal in this very way--causing a typical fulfillment of a prophecy to transpire, and thus attract attention for a time away from the actual fulfillment. In this case of typical fulfillment we suggest that the prophet represented Jehovah, the prophetess represented the Virgin Mary, and their child represented Jesus. But is it objected that Mary's son was called Jesus, and not Immanuel? We reply that such shortsighted reasoning would make nonsense of both Old and New Testaments. How about the names given in `Isaiah 9:6`? "His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace." Must we set aside this prophecy also, because the child was called Jesus, or shall we recognize the fact that many names, as well as many offices, are his? In answer we would say--his name has been called Immanuel. We

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call him Immanuel (God with us), and the Church in general has recognized him by that name for eighteen hundred years. And in the incoming Millennial Age, when the knowledge of him shall fill the earth, all shall recognize him by his various and significant titles.

In closing, we want to give one more illustration of a prophecy which has had one literal fulfillment, and is about to have its second or higher fulfillment-- just as Isaiah's prophecy, above referred to, had one fulfillment in his day and another hundreds of years after at the birth of Jesus. Our illustration is Babylon. It was the chief empire of earth in Jeremiah's day, and his prophecy records in strong language its overthrow. It has been overthrown as foretold; but were it not that we see that there is a mystical, "Babylon the great, the mother of harlots," for whom the severest language applied to literal Babylon is intended, we should wonder indeed.

Those who saw the fulfillment of Jeremiah's prophecy in the fall of the city of Babylon, doubtless concluded that a very strong description had been given of so commonplace an event as the overthrow of a nation; and having seen that one fulfillment, few realize that the real force of the prophecy is to mystic Babylon.

We refer you to but one chapter out of many, in which statements once fulfilled are to have a second and larger fulfillment, just as Isaiah's prophecy of Immanuel had a second and complete fulfillment in Jesus' birth. Compare the following:

Jeremiah 51:6` with `Rev. 18:4`.

Verse 7` with `Rev. 17:4` and `14:8`.

Verse 8` with `Rev. 14:8` and `18:2,9,11,19`.

Verse 9` with `Rev. 18:5`.

Verse 13` with `Rev. 17:1,15`.

Verses 48,63,64` with `Rev. 18:20,21`.

We conclude, then, that the New as well as the Old Testament--the writing of the apostles as well as that of the prophets--is worthy of all acceptation as divinely inspired.

W.T. R-435 b : page 7 – 1883 r.