BIBLICAL PROPHECY CLEARLY PREDICTS WHAT HAPPENS IN THE FUTURE.

BIBLICAL PROPHECY CLEARLY PREDICTS WHAT HAPPENS IN THE FUTURE. Daniel 9:24-27   (24) Seventy weeks [of years, or 490 years] are decreed upon your people and upon your holy city [Jerusalem], to finish {and} put an end to transgression, to seal up {and} make full the measure of sin, to purge away {and} make expiation {and} reconciliation for sin, to bring in everlasting righteousness (permanent moral and spiritual rectitude in every area and relation) to seal up vision and prophecy {and} prophet, and to anoint a Holy of Holies. (25) Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem until [the coming of] the Anointed One, a Prince, shall be seven weeks [of years] and sixty-two weeks [of years]; it shall be built again with [city] square and moat, but in troublous times. (26) And after the sixty-two weeks [of years] shall the Anointed One be cut off {or} killed and shall have nothing [and no one] belonging to [and defending] Him. And the people of the [other] prince who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood; and even to the end there shall be war, and desolations are decreed. (27) And he shall enter into a strong {and} firm covenant with the many for one week [seven years]. And in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and offering to cease [for the remaining three and one-half years]; and upon the wing {or} pinnacle of abominations [shall come] one who makes desolate, until the full determined end is poured out on the desolator. Amplified® Bible "Daniel the prophet receives an intriguing prophecy from the archangel Gabriel in this passage, known as the Seventy Weeks Prophecy, for Gabriel gives a seventy-week time frame for the coming of the Messiah. He divides the first sixty-nine weeks into two periods, the first of seven weeks and the second of sixty-two weeks. "The prophecy shows that the Messiah would die, "but not for Himself." That is in perfect agreement with the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ! He gave Himself to redeem us from our bondage to sin and death (Galatians 1:3-5; Ephesians 2:1). "Next, the prophecy says He would "confirm a covenant with many." Is this not what He did? Did He not become the Mediator of a new and better covenant (Hebrews 9:15)? When He instituted the new symbols for the Passover, Jesus says about the wine, "For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins" (Matthew 26:28; see Mark 14:24). "Then Gabriel prophesies that the Messiah would bring to an end to the need for ritual animal sacrifices and offerings. The writer of Hebrews plainly states, "For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins" (Hebrews 10:4). Christ's sacrifice was much more effective: "Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption" (Hebrews 9:12). "The angel says the Messiah would accomplish this "in the middle [midst, KJV] of the week." Obviously, its primary meaning refers to the middle of the seventieth week, or literally, three and a half years, the exact length of Christ's ministry. However, as we have seen, God fulfills His prophecies perfectly. Not only did Jesus' ministry last for three and a half years, but He also died on a Wednesday, the exact middle day of a week!" (Richard T. Ritenbaugh, http://www.theberean.org/)