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Bible Passage Isaiah 7

Isaiah 7:14 Christmas Prophecies

  • Tony Raker
Date preached December 25, 2022

Isaiah 7:14 Christmas Prophecies

The story of Jesus saturates the entire narrative of the Bible, and prophecies of His first advent are found throughout the Old Testament. Allusions to Him also come up in many ways, as many people and events hint at the work He would accomplish. One scholar, J. Barton Payne, has found as many as 574 verses in the Old Testament that somehow point to or describe or reference the coming Messiah. The story of the New Testament opens with the fulfillment of a prophecy which we refer to as Christmas:

Isaiah 7:14: “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”

  • Grammatical Usage: “sign” or in the Hebrew, “oth” meaning, “a pledge; signal; appearing”; “virgin” or “almah” meaning, “young woman; maiden” (ripe sexually, but not sexually active); “Immanuel” meaning, “with us is God.”
  • Literal Interpretation: Therefore the Lord Himself will make a pledge, providing a signal in an appearing, a maiden…a virgin…will conceive and give birth to a son, and His name will be, “with us is God.”
  • Contextual/Comparison: God keeps His Word: God continually uses His Word. Some key Old Testament Christmas prophecies include:
  • Numbers 24:16-17: “I see him but not now…I see him way out in the distance, but he’s not here. I shall behold him but not nigh.  He’s not near.  He’s in the distance.  There shall come a star out of Jacob and a scepter shall rise out of Israel.” He predicts the fact that the appearance of the star will have something to do with the birth of the king that is coming.  The scepter is the symbol of leadership that the kings would hold in their hands in ancient times.  So Balaam literally was saying: “I see the Messiah coming.  I see the one coming who is destined to be the king of Israel.”  Instead of cursing the nation he is blessing the nation as God literally shows him the one who is coming in the distant future.
  • Micah 5:2: “That thou Bethlehem and the land of Judah are not the least among the princes or cities of Judah but out of you shall come the governor who shall rule my people Israel.” In the second chapter of Matthew’s gospel, Matthew introduces us to the story of the arrival of the wise men in the city of Jerusalem.  They have come from the east, Iran, looking for the one who has been born king of the Jews because they have seen His star in the east.
  • Isaiah 9:6: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Isaiah himself sees the Savior in advance.  In 9:2: a great light will shine in Galilee, in the north, the very place of Jesus’ early ministry.  And then he says those that have walked in darkness will see the light shining on them as God begins to shine down on his people a ray of hope: the Savior has come, He has entered the human race. In Genesis 3 God gives the first prophecy of the scripture: that ultimately the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent; that somebody would enter the human race who could defeat the power of Satan.  As you read the Old Testament, it’s obvious no human can defeat Satan – they are defeated again and again and again.  It takes a divine person to ultimately crush the head of the serpent.  That’s what Isaiah sees in his prophecy of the divine child in Chapter 9.

Besides hundreds of prophecies concerning the coming of the Savior, the God also provided types, or examples of the Savior’s essence and mission through saints of the Old Testament:

Type Given
Fulfilled
Type: Adam is a type of Christ because both their actions affected a great many people. Genesis 3:17-19
Romans 5:14
Type: Jesus is the fulfillment of the Passover Lamb. Exodus 12:1-11
John 1:29-36
Type: The rock that produced water for Israel points toward Jesus and the living water. Exodus 17:6
John 4:10; 1 Corinthians 10:3-4
Type: The tabernacle where God dwelt among the Israelites is a type of Jesus, God with us. Exodus 25:8; Isaiah 7:14; 8:8, 10
Matthew 1:21-23; John 1:14; 14:8-11
Type: The feast of unleavened bread represents the purity of Jesus; Jesus’ burial is like a kernel in the ground, waiting to burst forth in life. Leviticus 23:6
1 Peter 2:22
Type: The feast of first fruits represents Jesus as the first fruit from the dead. Leviticus 23:10
1 Corinthians 15:20
Type: Those who looked up at the snake on a pole were saved. Those who “look up” at Jesus on the cross are saved. Numbers 21:8-9
John 3:14-15
Type: Boaz is a type of Christ the redeemer. Ruth 4:1-11; Ezekiel 16:8
Galatians 3:13; 4:5; Colossians 1:14
Type: Jonah was in the fish for three days. Jesus’ body was in the grave for three days. Jonah 1:17
Matthew 12:40
  • Conclusion: If you’ve never put your faith and trust in Jesus, there is no greater Christmas present that you could give to your family and your loved ones than to turn your life over to Christ right now and invite him to come in and be Lord and King.