Pathway to Victory

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Hey podcast listeners, thanks for streaming today's podcast from Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory is a nonprofit ministry featuring the Bible teaching of Dr. Robert Jeffress.

And right now your generous gift will have twice the impact, thanks to the Now Is the Time Matching Challenge, active now through December 31st. To give a special year-end gift, go to ptv.org/donate or follow the link in our show notes.

Now here's today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

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Hi, this is Robert Jeffress and I'm.

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Glad to study Word with you every.

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Day on this Bible teaching program on today's edition of Pathway to Victory.

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That lecture on the road to Emmaus was not a dry theological discourse. It means that Jesus of the Old Testament is the Jesus of the New Testament and because of that we can.

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Bank our life and our eternity on.

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What he's promised to us.

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Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress. This Christmas season, you'll likely revisit the famous narrative of Christ's birth in Luke Chapter two.

But the Christmas story didn't begin in Bethlehem. It began thousands of years before Jesus was even born. Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress looks at the birth and life of Jesus through the lens of Old Testament prophecy.

But first, let's take a minute to hear some important ministry updates.

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Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. It's Thanksgiving Day, just four weeks until Christmas, and by now I hope you've taken advantage of the special offer to receive your 2026 Pathway to Victory Daily Devotional. If you get in touch with us right away, you'll have this beautiful leather-bound volume in time for the new year. I've written a devotional for every Monday through Friday in 2026 so that you can begin or end your day with encouragement from the Bible, and a copy will be sent to your home when you include a special year-end gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory.

Plus, because of the matching challenge, every gift received before December 31st will have twice the impact until we reach the goal of $1.7 million. You might be able to give a generous gift of $100 or $200. Perhaps God is moving you to give $500. Whatever the amount, it will be doubled in impact. We've made tremendous strides in 2025, reaching more people than ever before, but our most productive days are before us.

More information is coming later in the program, but right now we have a special treat for you. The church where I serve as Senior Pastor is First Baptist Dallas, and we are a church that loves. So we'd love for you to step inside the worship center right now and join us in giving praise through this wonderful Christmas favorite, "Joy to the World."

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Sure! Here is the text separated into paragraphs:

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World, the Lord is come. Let her receive her king. Let every heart prepare him through and heaven. We sing Joy to the world; all the ladies sing together, Joy to the world, a savior, and the men that live exalt Implo.

Repeat the sounding joy. Repeat the sounding joy. Repeat, repeat the sounding joy. Repeat the sounding; pure he rules the world with truth and grace. He rules the world with truth and grace and makes the nation through the glories of his righteousness and wonders of his love, and wonders of his love, and wonders and water. Love is good.

Heaven and nature see. Lift your voice! Heaven and nature, Heaven and nature see. Heaven and nature see. Heaven and nature, Heaven and nature.

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Let me know if you need any further assistance!

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Thank you, choir and orchestra, for that great rendition of Joy to the World. And now let's give our attention to a fascinating passage in Luke, chapter 24. I titled today's message Christmas on the Road.

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Some years ago, when Queen Elizabeth made a visit to our country, reporters relished telling all of the details, the logistics of her visit. Her visit was accompanied by 4,000 pounds of luggage. She had her own hairdresser and other attendants. A brief visit of royalty to a foreign country ended up costing more than $20 million.

Now, contrast that to when the King of Kings decided to visit our planet. He came with no luggage. He had no attendants. His arrival took place in an animal shelter. There was no room for him, so they actually placed him in a feeding trough. Philip Yancey points out that the event that divides history and still our calendars probably had more animal witnesses than human witnesses to it. The Carroll writer said, "how silently. How silently the wondrous gift is given." But is that really true? Did the arrival of the King of Kings take place in some remote part of the world without any prior warning? If so, how could the Jews or even the Romans be blamed for missing his arrival?

Well, the truth is, the gift of Jesus Christ came wrapped in hundreds of years of prophecy. And there were all kinds of signposts in the Old Testament that should have pointed everyone to that feeding trough in Bethlehem. That's the truth that we're going to see in our passage today. If you have your Bibles, I want you to turn to the Gospel of Luke, and I want you to turn to chapter—now you think I'm going to say two, don't you? I'm not. We're going to turn to the last chapter of Luke, Luke chapter 24.

This story takes place late on a Sunday afternoon. But it wasn't just any Sunday afternoon. It was the Sunday of Christ's resurrection. He had been raised from the dead early that morning. Now it was late afternoon, and there were two travelers, two disciples of Christ who were on their way from Jerusalem back to their hometown, called Emmaus. This hadn't been any weekend. It had been the weekend of the Passover. Hundreds of thousands of Jews had been in Jerusalem. But this wasn't any Passover. This was when the man who claimed to be the Messiah was arrested, was crucified, and was buried. That's the background for what takes place here.

Now look at verse 13 of Luke 24. "And behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which was about seven miles from Jerusalem, about a two-hour walk. And they were conversing with each other about all of the things that had taken place." What things? The things about the one they had been following, Jesus, about how he was unfairly arrested, went through the six mock trials, how he was crucified, and then laid to rest in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.

And it came about that while they were conversing and discussing, Jesus himself approached and began traveling with them. But their eyes were prevented from recognizing him. And so Jesus said to them, "What are these words that you are exchanging with one another as you are walking?" And they stood still, looking sad. And one of them, named Cleopas, answered and said to him, "Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem and unaware of the things which have happened here in these days?" And he said to them, "What things?"

And they said to him, "The thing about Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet, mighty in deed and word in the sight of God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him up to the sentence of death and crucified him. But we were hoping that it was he who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all of this, it is the third day since these things happened. But also some women among us amazed us. When they were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. And some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just exactly as the women also had said. But him they did not see."

And Jesus said to them, "O foolish men, slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?" And beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, he explained to them the things concerning himself in all the Scriptures.

I want us to focus for a few minutes today on that verse, verse 27. Beginning with Moses and all the prophets, Jesus explained to them the things about himself. What was he saying? Jesus was saying, you cannot turn a page of the Old Testament without finding something about the birth, the ministry, the death, the resurrection, or the return of Jesus Christ. And so this unrecognized Jesus spent two hours in the Old Testament showing what the Old Testament revealed about the coming of Jesus Christ.

Today I'd like for us to take just a few moments and look at some of those verses Jesus might have explained to them about himself that came from the Old Testament. What does the Old Testament tell us about Jesus Christ? First of all, it gives us the prediction of his birth. The prediction of his birth. When Jesus said that Moses testified of Christ, what is he referring to? Well, Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament. He could have turned to Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, but I imagine Jesus started at the beginning.

The very first mention of Jesus in the Old Testament is found in Genesis chapter 3. Turn to Genesis 3:15. Remember, Moses wrote Genesis. This is the first mention of Christ in the Old Testament. Now, the setting of Genesis 3 is the fall of man. Adam and Eve had disobeyed God. And because of that, God was pronouncing judgment upon them. He said to Adam, "Because of your sin, you're going to have to work harder than you ever imagined." Work is not a curse from God, but having to work harder than normal is a curse. And there's going to be pain involved in work.

Then he turned to Eve and he said, "Because of your sin, there'll be pain that is associated with childbirth." And then he turns to the serpent who had lured Adam and Eve into temptation. And he spoke not only to the serpent but to the power behind the serpent, Satan himself. And I want you to notice what he predicted. "And I will put enmity," that is strife, "between you and the woman." But then he goes beyond that and says, "I'll also put strife between your seed," he's talking there about the power behind the serpent, Satan, "and her seed," that is her descendants. And he singles out one of the woman's descendants especially. He said, "He, that is a descendant of the woman, shall bruise you on the head." That is, he'll deliver a death blow to you, "but you shall only bruise him on the heel."

This is the first prediction of Jesus Christ. A descendant of this woman would conquer the power of Satan. Jesus, the Messiah, was born to conquer Satan. As soon as evil entered the world, God said, "It won't last forever. One of your descendants, Eve, will conquer Satan, will put an end to evil. He will bruise you on the head. You'll only nip at his heel." That is the first mention. We call it in theology the Proto Evangelon. Proto meaning first, Evangelon, the good news, the gospel that Eve would not prevail.

That's the first thing I think Jesus pointed out. Not only that, the Old Testament predicts that this Messiah would be born to a virgin. Born to a virgin. Turn in your Bibles to Isaiah, chapter 7. Probably no other Old Testament book has more to say about the life, the ministry, the death of the Messiah than Isaiah, the prophet. Now remember, Isaiah was written 700 years before the coming of Christ. And when we come to Isaiah 7:14, we come to perhaps the most familiar Old Testament prediction about the birth of Jesus Christ.

Now, the setting for Isaiah 7 is key to understanding this prophecy. So I want you to stay with me on this, okay? Remember when Isaiah wrote in 700 B.C., the nation of Israel had had a civil war 200 years before, in 922 B.C. A civil war. And in that civil war, the nation of Israel was divided into two parts, the north and the south, just like our civil war divided our country into the north and the south. So it was in 922, there was a civil war that split the country. The northern kingdom was the larger portion. It retained 10 of the 12 tribes. And because it was the larger, more powerful portion of the country, it retained the name of Israel.

Israel referred to the northern kingdom after 922 B.C. Sometimes it went by the name of Ephraim, one of the Ten Tribes, but that was Israel in the north. The southern kingdom was called Judah, which was one of the two tribes in the southern portion of the kingdom. So you had Israel or Ephraim in the north, and you had Judah in the south. That’ll help you understand when you read the Old Testament, the two parts of Israel, the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom.

Now, Isaiah was a prophet to the southern kingdom and one of the kings of Judah. The southern kingdom was named Ahaz. Ahaz heard a rumor that the king of the northern kingdom was making an alliance with the king of Syria, also known as Aram back then. And together they were going to defeat the south King Ahaz. And as you can imagine, Ahaz was very troubled about hearing about this alliance. Isaiah comes to him and says, "Ahaz, don't worry about it. God is going to destroy both of those kingdoms, the northern kingdom and Syria, and you don't have to worry about them allying against you."

And look at Isaiah 7:14. Isaiah said, "God's going to give you a sign that in fact he's going to do that." And what is the sign? It's found in Isaiah 7:14. "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Ahaz, behold, a virgin will be with a child and will bear a son, and she will call his name Israel." The word there for virgin is the word alma, A L M A H. It simply means a young woman of marriageable age. It doesn't mean somebody who's never had sexual experience before. There's another Hebrew word for that, Bethela, that means virgin, somebody who's never had sex before.

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That's not the word he uses here.

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He uses the word "alma." It's a general term for a woman of marriageable age. God says to Ahaz, a virgin will be with a child and bear a son, and you will call his name Emmanuel, and he will eat curds and honey. At the time, he knows enough to refuse evil and choose good. For before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good—that is, before he's age 12 to 14—the land whose two kings you dread will be forsaken. In other words, God said to Ahaz, don't worry about Syria, don't worry about Israel. Before this boy who's to be born is 12 years old, both of those kings will be destroyed.

Now, when we turn to chapter eight of Isaiah, we find the fulfillment of this prophecy. It was fulfilled through Isaiah himself. He married a woman, and they had a child. Before the child was 12 years of age, the northern kingdom was defeated, and Syria was defeated. Now that's the promise of Isaiah 7:14. I remember listening to my religion professor in college say, now given that historical background, why would anybody apply this verse to the virgin-born birth of Jesus Christ? It had nothing to do with the birth of Jesus Christ. Why would somebody make that application?

I'll tell you exactly why we make that application. Because God's Word makes that application. Turn over to Matthew. Matthew, chapter one, records the coming of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. Jesus was conceived with Mary and by the Holy Spirit, not with a human father. When Joseph learned that his betrothed fiancée, if you will, was pregnant with a child, he was obviously disturbed. But God revealed to Joseph that this child was fathered by the Holy Spirit himself.

Now look at verse 20 of Matthew 1. But when he, Joseph, had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus Emmanuel, for it is he who will save his people from their sins."

Then Matthew adds in verse 22, "Now all of this took place that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet might be fulfilled," saying. And then Matthew quotes Isaiah 7:14: "Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel," which translated means "God with us." Matthew applies Isaiah 7:14 to the birth of Jesus Christ.

Now, pop quiz. What language was the Old Testament written in? Hebrew. And I just said to you a moment ago, the Hebrews had a term for virgin. It was "Bethalah." Isaiah didn't use that term; he used "alma," a more general term for a young woman. What language was the New Testament written in? It was written in Greek. So when Matthew penned this and translated Isaiah 7:14 and he got to the word "virgin," you know the word he used? It's the word "parthenos." The word "parthenos" means only one thing: virgin. Somebody who has never had sexual experience before.

Now here is the beauty of scripture. Had Isaiah, 700 years before, used the word "Bethalah," that means virgin. If he had used that word, then that prophecy would have meant nothing to Isaiah or to King Ahaz or the people of his day. It would have only had a far fulfillment 700 years later. But by using that more general term, "alma," that prophecy had both an immediate fulfillment in Isaiah's day, but it had an ultimate fulfillment with Jesus Christ. Isn't that the beauty of scripture? That's why in scripture many times you have a near fulfillment and an ultimate fulfillment. And here, Matthew makes it very clear that this baby born of Mary was virgin born.

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I've only had time to address a few of the prophecies that foretold the coming of Christ. And I invite you to join me again next time for the conclusion of my message, Christmas on the Road.

Well, as I mentioned earlier, a devoted group of families has designated an unprecedented matching challenge right now in the amount of $1.7 million. This is the biggest matching challenge in our history. If it's been a while since you've sent a gift to Pathway to Victory, or maybe you've never reached out to us, now's the time to do so. Every dollar given to Pathway to Victory on or before December 31st is automatically doubled in size today. Your generous gift of $50 becomes $100. A $200 gift becomes $400. Maybe God is leading you to give $1,000 or more.

More important, your gift will be used by God to deliver the truth to someone who's searching to fill a void in their life. Your generosity will ignite a flame of passion for Christ in the heart of someone who has never heard the good news of Christmas and Easter.

Plus, when you respond today with a generous gift toward the Matching Challenge, I'll be sending you the exclusive 2026 Pathway to Victory Daily Devotional. This is one of the most impressive volumes we've ever produced. It's leather bound, and I've written a reflection for every weekday in the New Year.

So let's make this the best year ever by doubling our impact through the Matching Challenge and by walking together each day through the Pathway to Victory Devotional. Here's David to tell you more.

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You give a generous year-end gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory. We'd like to say thanks by sending you the brand new 2026 Pathway to Victory Daily Devotional. To request your copy, call 866-999-2965 or, even easier, simply go online to ptv.org. When your gift is $100 or more, you'll also receive the DVD, video, and MP3 format audio disc set for Celebrate the Savior. It's a great collection of the best Christmas teaching messages by Dr. Robert Jeffress.

Remember, your contribution right now will be doubled in impact through our Now Is the Time Matching Challenge, so be sure to get in touch with us right away. Call 866-999-2965 or visit ptv.org. You could also send your donation by mail. Here's the address: P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222. That's P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222.

I'm David J. Mullins inviting you to join us again next time when we conclude this fascinating message called Christmas on the Road. That's Friday here on Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas. Experience the majesty of America's last frontier on the 2026 Pathway to Victory cruise to Alaska.

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You made it to the end of today's podcast from Pathway to Victory, and we're so glad you're here. Pathway to Victory relies on the generosity of loyal listeners like you to make this podcast possible, and right now, your special year-end gift will be matched and therefore doubled in impact thanks to the Now Is the Time Matching Challenge.

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We hope you've been blessed by today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.