When Jesus has just arrived in Jerusalem for the final days leading up to His death on the cross. He was in the temple, healing the blind and the lame, the leading priests and scribes saw Jesus performing miracles and even heard children shouting, “Hosanna! Praise God for the Son of David.” The religious teachers grew irate, questioning Jesus, “Do you hear what these children are saying?” “Yes,” Jesus responded to His critics,
Matthew 21:16 Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him. “Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read, “‘From the lips of children and infants you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?”
The older translations say, “out of the mouth of babes You have perfected praise”
Jesus was quoting
Psalm 8:2 Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.
The idea is that God silences His enemies and puts them to shame by the words coming out of the mouths of babies and infants who tell of the Lord’s strength.
The Jewish leaders could not miss the implications as they observed everything taking place. They witnessed Christ’s victorious entry into Jerusalem, the ecstatic crowd of worshippers, His commanding cleansing of the temple, His miracles of healing, and even children proclaiming His praises. The people hailed Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God, and it was more than these religious hypocrites could handle. They became outraged.
This lead to the anger that caused the crucifixion of the Messiah. Children are not blinded by pride and hypocrisy and are better able to perceive spiritual truth (Matthew 18:3–4.) Jesus accepts their worship because it is untainted and reserved for God alone.
Conclusion
This concludes our series of 24 devotionals on the prophecies of the Messiah. As I said in the begining of these segments.
Some say that The Old Testament contains over 400 prophecies about the coming Messiah. Others place the number at around 300. This number may be correct but I will teach you about the most relevant ones on this series of my evening devotional.
Jesus Christ perfectly fulfilled these prophetic writings and the odds of that happening are just incredible.
Mathematics & Astronomy Professor Peter W. Stoner chances of just 8 prophecies has made the statement that the (like these) coming true by sheer chance is 1 in 10 to 17 (100,000,000,000,000,000). That would be equivalent to covering the whole state of Texas with silver dollars two feet deep and then expecting a blindfolded man to walk across the state and on the very first try find the ONE coin you marked (roughly equivalent to the Province of Ontario being 1.5 feet deep and Quebec about 1 foot deep).
When we multiply this number by 6 it would be like covering 6 feet deep all that is in our province with coins and expect that a blind person would find at first attempt one that we marked and hid in the whole colossal pile. Jesus fulfilled these prophecies and mathematically we can prove He is the Messiah.
Since I was never strong in Math so most people that I know. He will reveal Himself to us with other signs and wonders of His Glory. I hope that through this series you had more than just learning about Jesus but that you may receive Him as your Messiah.
The Messiah would be praised by little children