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The Old Testament contains a variety of books divided into different categories such as law or history. One important category is prophecy:

• Prophecy in the bible refers to the words spoken by the prophets in the Old Testament.

• The prophets acted as God's spokespeople, conveying God's messages to the Jews.

• Most of the messages related to the time they were spoken, hundreds of years before Jesus was born.

• Often the messages would call people to obey God's law and live just and faithful lives.

• Sometimes the prophets would bring a message of hope that in the future God would send a saviour (a Messiah) to rescue his people.

How does this relate to the birth of Jesus?

Fast forward a few hundred years to the writers of the Gospels in the New Testament.

To confirm that Jesus was the Messiah sent from God, they referred to these Old Testament prophesies.

Some suggest that Jesus fulfilled over 300 prophecies, most of which were written around 500 years before his birth, so the connection between them is important for the gospel writers for several reasons:

They confirm that Jesus is the promised saviour sent from God who the Israelites had been waiting for

• When the gospels were being written, the Jews were trying to figure out who exactly Jesus was.
• Some of the Jews believed he was the Messiah and others thought he was a fraud who made claims to be the Son of God; such a claim meant Jesus was guilty of blasphemy, which was punishable by death.
• The gospel writers are trying to show their readers that Jesus really is the Messiah as he fulfils God’s promises from the Old Testament prophets.

They show that the coming of Jesus was always part of God’s plan

• The gospel writers believed that the life, death and resurrection of Jesus was not a divine afterthought but was always God’s design for dealing with human sin and rebellion.

• Hundreds of years before he was born, the prophecies showed that God had already planned to send Jesus.

The fulfilled prophecies show that God can be trusted. Everyone wants to trust their friends or family, but it is even more important for Christians to believe they can trust God

• The prophecies about Jesus in the Old Testament are God making his promises while the fulfilment in the New Testament is God keeping his word.
• This means that Christians know they can trust God in all things.

Finally, the fact that Jesus fulfils so many of the Old Testament prophecies shows the uniqueness of Jesus.