It was June 2018 and I was giving out invitations to gospel meetings that were being held in the area. I knocked a door and a young man answered. When I told him what I was there for, he told me that a World Cup match was going to start soon and as soon as it started our conversation would finish.
I asked him did he ever give any thought to what happens
after death. He told me he didn’t because there was no way you could really
know. I agreed that left to ourselves we couldn’t really know, but I don’t
think we’ve been left to ourselves. I told him I thought there was good reason
to believe the Bible was God’s word. At that point he jumped in and said, “No
one can prove that.” I told him I would like to have a go, and it would only
take a minute.
I read to him the following verses from Psalm 22:14-18:
I am poured out like water, and all My bones are out of
joint; My heart is like wax; it has melted within Me. My strength is dried up
like a potsherd, and My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the
dust of death.
For dogs have surrounded Me; the congregation of the wicked
has enclosed Me. They pierced My hands and My feet; I can count all My bones.
They look and stare at Me. They divide My garments among them, and
for My clothing they cast lots.
I asked him did he know what this passage was about, and he
had no trouble telling me it was about the crucifixion of Jesus. There’s no
doubt about it, and we looked at some details from the rest of the psalm to
establish this.
“So, what’s the point?” he asked.
“The point is, this passage was written about 1000 years
before the birth of Christ, and hundreds of years before crucifixion was
invented.”
He hadn’t realised this. I told him that this was only one of
the many fulfilled prophecies the Bible contains.
I said to him, “Imagine I told you what the score was going
to be of this match you’re about to watch, and you watch the match and I get it
right. I then tell you what the scores will be of all the group games, and I
get them all right. Then we go to the knockout stages, and I accurately
foretell the score of every match right up to the semi-final. What would you
think then if I told you what the score was going to be in the final?”
He said, “If you got it right at every stage along the way, I
would be a fool to bet against you for the final.”
I couldn’t have put it any better. I told him that the Bible
has got it right at every stage along the way, and so he would be a fool to bet
against it for the final – it tells us death isn’t the end, there is a God to
meet, an eternity to face, a heaven and a hell, and because of the wrong we’ve
done we aren’t going to heaven, and that the only way of salvation was through
the Lord Jesus. We looked at another Old Testament prophecy that tells us not
only how the Lord Jesus would die, but why:
Surely
He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded
for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for
our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep
have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord has
laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
Isaiah 53:4-6
The Bible has proven itself to get it right when it talks
about the future. Don’t bet against it – the stakes are too high.
