The Book of PsalmsSýnishorn

Prophetic Psalms

The Bible is the only religious book in the world that contains hundreds, in fact thousands, of prophecies. At least 300 of them, concerning the Messiah, were graphically fulfilled in detail in the life of Jesus Christ.

Psalms is the most quoted book in the New Testament, with over 400 quotes—especially with allusions to prophecies concerning the Messiah, who we know is Jesus.

More significant than being just a writer of songs, David was a prophet. A prophet is a person through whom God communicates His purposes, His thoughts, His will, and future events. The Apostle Peter said that the Holy Spirit spoke long ago through David. God used him to write what we now know as Holy Scripture. That is why the Apostle Paul said that all Scripture is God-breathed. It is not thought up by the human mind.

A prophet is also a person who foretells or predicts future events. At the close of his Gospel, Luke quotes Jesus saying something that gives Psalms a very unique place in the Bible as one of the three parts that make up the Old Testament.

After Jesus resurrected, He didn’t go directly to Heaven but instead spent forty days with His disciples. The Bible says that during those forty days He gave them further instructions, yet it doesn’t tell us what He taught. There is one important thing that Luke does mention. At the closing of the Gospel of Luke, Jesus said everything must be fulfilled that was written about Him in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms. Then, it says He opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. That is a miracle that can happen in anybody’s life—to understand the Scriptures.

Most of the religious Jews during the times of Christ believed the Messiah would come in their day. The thing that they didn’t understand was that the Messiah must suffer and die and rise again. They hadn’t the vaguest notion that the Messiah would die and be crucified. Jesus tells His disciples that all of what was written in the Scriptures would be fulfilled.

As a prophetic example, a thousand years before Jesus was born, David wrote about Him. He describes in Psalms 22 the attitude, feelings, tears, and sufferings of Jesus on the cross, at a time when crucifixion did not even exist as capital punishment. That was prophecy.

As interested as God was in David’s life, He is just as interested in ours. What He has promised and foretold you and me certainly will come to pass!