Advent 2025, Week 1--Messianic Birth Prophecies

Christmas Theology: Messianic Birth Prophecies

Advent 2025 Week 1—November 30, 2025

Advent Candel, week 1—HOPE

The first week of Advent’s candle is called “the Prophet’s candle” because it focuses on the hope the prophets of all ages had for the coming of the Messiah. A better English word that more accurately avoids misunderstanding about our contemporary use of the word “hope” might be “expectation.” The prophets expected God to fulfill his promises to send a Messiah that would rescue God’s people and establish His everlasting kingdom.

Luke 2 tells us about a man named Simeon whom the Holy Spirit had told that he would not die until he had “seen the Lord’s Messiah” (2:26). When Mary & Joseph brought the 40-day old baby Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem to dedicate him, Simeon was there waiting. Luke tells us:

27 Moved by the Spirit, he [Simeon] went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, 28 Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying:

29 “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,

you may now dismiss your servant in peace.

30 For my eyes have seen your salvation,

31 which you have prepared in the sight of all nations:

32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles,

and the glory of your people Israel.”

Simeon’s “hope” of seeing the Messiah wasn’t some whimsical notion that allowed him to hang out at home year after year wondering. How many times had that “hope” driven him to the Temple where he knew the Messiah must appear? How big of a surprise was it when, that day, the Holy Spirit led him to a helpless baby rather than a strong, imposing man, and whispered, “Here’s the promised Messiah”?

Simeon’s “hope” became “sight” that day. Just as one generation of the Church’s hope will become sight at Jesus second coming some day soon.

God’s people can be THE most hopeful people on the planet, as long as our hope is in God and our hearts are fixed on His promises. This Advent, don’t let anything steal your hope in the first or second coming of Jesus. Anchor your well-being on the hope of Christ—past, present and future. No matter what happens in this life, never waver in a firm expectation that Jesus will appear at just the right time…in your experience and in this dark world.

Fellowship Question: If a Jewish friend of yours asked you to name one Old Testament prophecy about Jesus' first coming, which one would you choose...and why?

INTRO: Welcome to Advent 2025! This Advent season we’ve decided to do something a little different in our preaching series: we’ll be looking at different theological aspects of the coming of the Messiah. We’ll try doing so somewhat through the lens of some of the more theologically rich Christmas carols.

For instance, this morning we sang, “Come Thou Long Expected Jesus.” As we will see today, the Messiah’s coming was a “long-expected” prophetic event spanning thousands of years. The Old Testament is rich with prophecies that caused the Jewish people to be looking for a Messiah, a Savior, from God.

Here are a few questions I hope we can get to today:

• How long had the people of God 20 centuries ago been “expecting” a Messiah?

• Where had that been prophesied over the thousands of years leading up to Jesus?

• Why did some see Jesus as the fulfillment of those prophecies while so many other Jews did not?

• And what difference can these prophecies about the Messiah make to our daily lives today?

First, let’s talk about the nature of prophecy in the O.T. What can we say about the nature of O.T. prophets and prophecy?

1. O.T. prophets primarily called God’s people to repentance and holy living while secondarily giving pronouncements about the future. I don’t mean that they didn’t speak a lot about future events. They did. But the future was almost always framed by the present need for God’s people to get right with Him so he could bless them. Much of the prophecies about the future had to do with judgment on both Israel and the nations God would use to judge them.

So, when we read any of the prophets of the O.T., a couple of the first/primary things we should look for related to the prophet’s job of calling God’s people to repentance are things like…

• What sins is God pointing out to them and us, His people, and what is God asking us to do about them? (EX: spiritual adultery or disregard for the poor/outcast/ vulnerable/powerless or falling into ritualism and routine in their worship.

• How are God’s people today, the church, like the Jewish people of old the prophets are addressing? (EX: ignoring God’s commands, practicing different forms of idolatry while going through the motions of worshipping God.)

But when it comes to the prophetic pronouncements the prophets make, there are a few other questions to look at:

• What part of a prophecy may have already been fulfilled? (EX: Judgments on nations God used to discipline Israel like Egypt or Moab or Babylon or Assyria.)

• What part of the prophecy may still need to be fulfilled? (EX: Final Temple restoration—Ez.; World-reigning Messiah)

• Might this prophecy have a “double” or “dual-fulfillment”?

Think of a word with two meanings. English provides plenty of these; they’re called homonyms. A homonym is two or more words that have the same sound and often the same spelling but differ in meaning.

EXS: The word arm can mean “the thing attached to your body, holding this book” or “the act of using weapons to defend yourself.”

Or how about the word date? A date can be 1.) a sweet fruit, 2.) a time on the calendar, or 3.) a cute guy/gal who takes you out for coffee. In each instance, the word has meaning but the context determines its meaning.

A dual fulfillment prophecy is kind of like a homonym: in its original historical context, the prophecy has fulfillment and application. But it also has fulfillment in a future, often very different from the original reference.

2. Dr. David Jeremiah describes the prophecies and psalms about Jesus as “double reference prophecy.” This type of prophecy has three distinct characteristics:

o The first fulfillment is found in a person or event close to when the prophet spoke for God.

o This first fulfillment is partial; it has more to come.

o The ultimate fulfillment is found in Christ.

EX: Is. 7:14—“ The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”

O.T.: Given as an immediate prophecy to King Ahaz to assure him that God was in control, some think the immediate fulfillment could have been talking about Ahaz’s wife as the “anonymous “virgin” that would bear a child. Thus that child would have been Hezekiah, Ahaz’s successor. The promise was that the Lord was with Ahaz, would save Judah from their enemies now surrounding them, and enable his son (Hezekiah) to inherit the throne (Is. 7:1-3). But the reference to the child eating “curds and honey” would have been a prediction of Assyria’s eventual domination of Judah.

N.T.: The Gospel writers Matthew and Luke, however, clearly see this as a prophecy about Mary and Jesus Christ when the revelation of a truly “virgin birth” is declared by the angel Gabriel in Matthew 1:22-23 and Luke 1:26-31.

3. This leads us to a third reality about biblical prophecy: dual fulfillment sometimes means we may have incomplete/partial fulfillment. This often applies to how we see Christ fulfilling the Messianic prophecies of the O.T. In his first coming, he often fulfilled part of a prophecy while the whole prophecy will only be fulfilled, we believe, at his second coming.

EX: When, according to Luke 4, Jesus stood up in the synagogue in Nazareth and read from Isaiah 61--

16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

because he has anointed me

to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind,

to set the oppressed free,

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

So, why did Jesus STOP reading at verse 2? Because his first coming would do just what Isaiah had prophesied up to the first part of vs. 2.. But his second coming would complete the rest of the prophecy from vs. 2-9:

…to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor

and the day of vengeance of our God,

to comfort all who mourn,

3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—

to bestow on them a crown of beauty

instead of ashes,

the oil of joy

instead of mourning,

and a garment of praise

instead of a spirit of despair.

They will be called oaks of righteousness,

a planting of the Lord

for the display of his splendor.

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins

and restore the places long devastated;

they will renew the ruined cities

that have been devastated for generations.

5 Strangers will shepherd your flocks;

foreigners will work your fields and vineyards.

6 And you will be called priests of the Lord,

you will be named ministers of our God.

You will feed on the wealth of nations,

and in their riches you will boast.

7 Instead of your shame

you will receive a double portion,

and instead of disgrace

you will rejoice in your inheritance.

And so you will inherit a double portion in your land,

and everlasting joy will be yours.

8 “For I, the Lord, love justice;

I hate robbery and wrongdoing.

In my faithfulness I will reward my people

and make an everlasting covenant with them.

9 Their descendants will be known among the nations

and their offspring among the peoples.

All who see them will acknowledge

that they are a people the Lord has blessed.”

This is why many Jews of Jesus’ day and still most Jews today do not recognize Jesus as their Messiah. They expect, even demand, that the Messiah talked about in the O.T. fulfill ALL the prophecies in one coming. So when we claim that Jesus has fulfilled many of the prophecies about the Messiah, they will respond, “Well, not really. He didn’t fulfill ALL of the prophecies when he came and, in fact, he didn’t fulfill the most important ones to our nation and the world.”

Just what would some of those prophecies be to Jews through the centuries and today? I was wondering the same thing. So I asked a couple of my rabbi friends in Israel.

ILL: Here was my question:

“I've got a quick question that I think may help me understand Judaism and the Jewish people today. It's prompted by a little work I'm doing presently on what Christians see as Jesus' fulfillment of some of the Messianic prophecies of the Bible.

My question is, what would be the primary prophecies/Scriptures Jews look to today that the Messiah will fulfill when he comes? In other words, what specific Messianic prophecies of the Bible are you anticipating the Messiah will fulfill when he comes?”

Here was part of the response I received:

“From a traditional Jewish standpoint, the Messiah is understood through a clear set of expectations rooted in the prophets, and these remain consistent across the classical sources.

The central passages describe a future leader who restores the integrity of the Jewish people and the moral order of the world. Key expectations include: the ingathering of the exiles (Isaiah 11), the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem (Ezekiel 40–48), universal peace and the end of war (Isaiah 2 and Micah 4), and the full recognition of God by all nations (Zechariah 14). The Messiah is also expected to be a righteous, earthly king from the line of David who restores Jewish sovereignty and brings the world into alignment with God’s justice.

In Jewish thought, these are concrete, observable changes in history. They are not symbolic or spiritualized; they mark a transformed world that all humanity can see.”

Do you see the problem? Because they see many Christians rejecting the literal, historical fulfillment of prophetic promises about the Messiah, particularly as they relate to Israel and the Jewish people, and see us effectively replacing the Jews of today completely with “spiritual descendants” of Abraham, i.e. the church (Gal. 3:7) and “replacement theology”, they also fail to see or accept that Jesus’ 1st coming fulfilled some of the Messianic prophecies and that his 2nd coming will fulfill the remainder of them (restoring Israel, reigning as King, bringing peace and prosperity to the world, etc.). But this is a discussion for another day…or days.

Christian scholars differ on just how many prophecies Jesus fulfilled from the O.T. through his first coming. Estimates range from several hundred upwards of 500. Many of them only became clear when the Apostles and N.T. writers identified them as such. Why? Because after Christ came and fulfilled them, their prophetic nature and fulfillment became obvious to 1st century Christians. In effect, the Apostles had to show both Jews and Gentiles how Jesus had fulfilled the O.T. scriptures.

This was a task Jesus began with the 2 on the road to Emmaus hours after his resurrection. But it continued for years as Peter and all the Apostles argued from the O.T. Scriptures that Jesus was, in fact, Christ the Messiah.

[Sheet of 36 prophecies available in back.]

Before we look quickly at 7 of those hundreds of prophecies that point to Jesus as the Messiah, I want us to think for a moment about the mathematical probability of anyone fulfilling multiple prophecies, let alone ones totally outside their control such as their birth, their death and their resurrection.

ILL: Back in the 1950s, Peter Stoner, Chairman of the Departments of Mathematics and Astronomy at Pasadena College, challenged 600 students from InterVarsity Christian Fellowship to look at the mathematical probability of only eight specific Old Testament prophecies about the coming of Messiah. His point was that the probability of one person fulfilling even one of the prophecies is incredibly remote.

To illustrate how unlikely a chance that would be, Stoner gave an illustration that went like this:

Cover the entire state of Texas with silver dollars to a level of two feet deep. The total number of silver dollars needed would be 10 to the 17th power. Now, choose just one silver dollar, mark it, and put it back. Then thoroughly stir all the silver dollars all over the state. Now, blindfold someone and tell them they can travel wherever they want in Texas, but at some point they must pick up one of the silver dollars. The chance of finding that one silver dollar with the mark on it in a pile of coins two feet deep covering the state of Texas would be the chance the prophets had for these eight prophecies coming true in any one man in the future. (Peter Stoner, Science Speaks: Scientific Proof of the Accuracy of Prophecy and the Bible 107, Chicago, Moody Press, 1969).

So, let’s take the remaining few time this morning to look at the O.T. prophecies that have to do just with the birth of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Remember, nobody gets to plan or influence their own birth. These are prophecies that, if you’re just looking at it from a natural perspective, are absolutely impossible to coordinate, design or fulfill. But God!

1. PROPHECY #1: that the Messiah would be born of a woman.

Starting all the way back in the book of Genesis, God told our forefathers, Adam and Eve, that he would remedy the awful problem of sin that had invaded the world under their watch. Before they had an idea what it would cost God to rescue a lost and dying humanity, God had it all worked out. He let them know that even as he pronounced judgment on the world, the Devil and mankind. In Genesis 3:15 God pronounced judgment on that great Deceiver, Satan, when He said,

“And I will put enmity

between you and the woman,

and between your offspring and hers;

he will crush your head,

and you will strike his heel.”

This was a prophetic declaration of God to both Adam & Eve that the Messiah would be born of a woman.

The N.T. picks that up in both Matthew 1 and Galatians 4.

Matthew 1:20-21-- “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

Galatians 4:4-5-- But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.

2. PROPHECY #2: that Messiah would come from the line of Abraham:

Genesis 12:3—God’s promise to Abraham in the Abrahamic Covenant:

I will bless those who bless you,

and whoever curses you I will curse;

and all peoples on earth

will be blessed through you.”,

Genesis 22:18—God reaffirms the covenant after Abraham proves his faith and obedience to God in offering his son Isaac.

“…and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

Matthew 1:1—Matthew tells us why he is starting his Gospel with the genealogy of Jesus. “This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham….”

Romans 9:5 picks this up in the N.T. when Paul is talking about God’s continuing plan for the Jewish people even though they are currently rejecting Jesus. “Theirs [the people of Israel] are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.”

That’s birth prophecy #2.

3. PROPHECY #3: The Messiah would be born of a virgin: Isaiah 7:14 prophesies, "The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel" (meaning "God with us").

As we already saw, this prophecy of Isaiah had a very possible immediate fulfillment in King Ahaz’s wife and their son, Hezekiah. But Matthew lets us know that it had a later, more miraculous fulfillment with Mary and Jesus’ virgin birth.

Matthew 1:18-23-- 18 This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20 But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”). (Quoting Is. 7:14)

See also Luke 1:26-35

4. PROPHECY #4: The PLACE of Jesus’ birth. The prophet Micah, over 700 years before the birth of Jesus, was very specific that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem—a little no-name, insignificant village outside of Jerusalem.

Micah 5:2 states that the Ruler of Israel would come from "Bethlehem Ephrathah".

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,

though you are small among the clans of Judah,

out of you will come for me

one who will be ruler over Israel,

whose origins are from of old,

from ancient times.”

Luke 2:4-7-- So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5 He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7 and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son.

The Magi were aware of this prophecy as were the Jewish chief priests and teachers of the law whom King Herod consulted when the Magi tipped him off that a Messiah had been born in Israel. Matthew 2:1-6

5. PROPHECY #5: this Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem would bring great SORROW and SUFFERING to God’s people according to Jeremiah 31:15. Jeremiah is speaking of the weeping of God’s people under the Babylonian captivity of 586 B.C. Matthew picks up that sorrow in Bethlehem, a town near where it is believed Rachel was buried, as a further fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy in Matthew 2:16-18--16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. 17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

18 “A voice is heard in Ramah,

weeping and great mourning,

Rachel weeping for her children

and refusing to be comforted,

because they are no more.”

6. Prophecy #6: that the Messiah would be from the line of David. This narrowed it down to the very family line, not just the chosen people, the Jews. God promised to David through the prophet Nathan in 2 Samuel 7 that David’s offspring would establish an eternal kingdom.

“‘The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: 12 When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14 I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with a rod wielded by men, with floggings inflicted by human hands. 15 But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. 16 Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.’”

The only “forever throne and kingdom” to come out of David is the eternal kingdom established by Jesus Christ through the redemption of lost sinners.

Isaiah 9:7— Of the greatness of his government and peace

there will be no end.

He will reign on David’s throne

and over his kingdom,

establishing and upholding it

with justice and righteousness

from that time on and forever.

The zeal of the Lord Almighty

will accomplish this.

Two of the four Gospels, both of which contain ancestral genealogies (Matthew & Luke), take great pains to trace Jesus’ lineage directly back to David. (Matthew 1:1, Luke 1:32, 3:31).

Furthermore, the Apostle Paul affirms his Davidic ancestry in Romans 1:3—"…regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David….”

7. Last one today, PROPHECY #7: that the Messiah would be called out of Egypt, i.e. at some point would come out of Egypt: The prophecy in Hosea 11:1, "Out of Egypt I called my son," and is cited in Matthew 2:14-15 when Joseph and Mary flee to Egypt with the infant Jesus to escape King Herod's massacre of children in Bethlehem. It is what moved them out of Bethlehem and eventually took them back to Nazareth in the northern portion of Israel.

I don’t talk a lot about prophecy as your pastor. Perhaps I should do more. But as we’ve seen today, prophecy, while at times is very specific, can be a bit mysterious too. It can be a bit presumptuous, I think, to declare, prior to God’s fulfillment of prophecy, that you know exactly what, when, where and how God is going to move history to keep His prophetic word. The truth stands: God always keeps and fulfills his word…against all odds. As we’ve seen, the odds of just 8 of the hundreds of prophecies Jesus fulfilled is astronomically high, impossibly so. Just the prophecies related to the birth of Jesus alone should be enough to convince the hardest skeptic and the most secular mathematician that God is in, over, under and throughout the Christmas story.

APP: So when we find ourselves singing carols that speak of the virgin birth, of Bethlehem, and of Mary and Joseph as Jesus’ parents, be reminded that biblical prophecy is calling to you.

• If you haven’t given your life to God by putting your faith in Jesus and surrendering your life to Him, God is calling to YOU. He is inviting you to exercise reasonable, reasoned belief in the God who alone could do something so miraculous. Jesus is waiting to return and fulfill all the other prophecies about the Messiah yet unfulfilled because He is waiting for more people like you to join His forever family. Won’t you do that today? (Explain how.)

• If you’re a follower of Jesus, use these Christmas prophecies to increase your wonder at a God who would speak about events hundreds of centuries and millennium beforehand.

Grow in awe of a God who would be so specific about names and places, about family lines and about a humanly impossible virgin birth.

Be encouraged that your faith rests on God’s miraculous intervention in human history 2,000 years ago.

And grow in confidence that yet unfulfilled prophecies of the Bible will come to pass in God’s good time. Let the birth of Jesus we celebrate this Advent grow your faith and certain hope in the soon return of the same Messiah.

BENEDICTION: 2 Peter 3:8-9

8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.