The prophecy concerning the birth of Christ comes from Isaiah 7:14: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Immanuel." Why was he then called Jesus?

by R. C. Sproul

That does, on the surface, seem like a flat-out contradiction, doesn't it? The prophecy in the Old Testament is that his name will be Immanuel, and then we go to the New Testament, and they don't name him Immanuel; they name him Jesus. How do we deal with that?

First of all, let's not assume that Isaiah is radically mistaken. If we look at the full import of his prophecy, we stand in utter amazement at the detailed way in which the prophecies of Isaiah do in fact come to pass in the life of Jesus. If we go just two chapters past the "Immanuel" prophecy, we find another familiar passage that we repeat virtually every Christmas during our times of worship. Isaiah went on to say that the Messiah who would be born would be given the name "Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." How many names does he have? In chapter 7 he says his name is going to be Immanuel, and in chapter 9 he says it's going to be Prince of Peace, or Mighty God, or Everlasting Father. So in his own writing, Isaiah was calling attention to the fact that the Messiah would have a multitude of names. He does not reduce Jesus' titles to one, so I don't think he is using the word "name" to refer to the family name or the proper name of Jesus, but he is referring to a crucial title that would be given to Jesus, and in fact it was. Immanuel is one of his titles in the New Testament ~ Immanuel "God with us."

The name Jesus is given to him by God by means of the evangelical messenger who announced the Father's choice to name the Son, and he's called Jesus because that name means "Savior"--one who will save his people. His name indicates his mission, his ministry. I think one of the most fascinating studies is to go through the Scriptures and list the names that are attributed to Jesus.

I attended a convocation at a theological seminary once at which a Swiss theologian gave an address. At an academic occasion like that, one expects to hear a very technical, sophisticated, boring piece of theology. This professor simply got up before the assembly and began to recite the names of Jesus, saying, "Alpha and Omega, Son of Man, Lion of Judah, Lamb without Blemish, the Messiah, the Son of God, the Rose of Sharon. . . " He went on for forty-five minutes and still didn't exhaust all of the names and titles that the New Testament attributes to Jesus.  Jesus, the most titled man in human history.
 


Reprinted by permission of Ligonier Ministries from "Now That's A Good Question" by R.C. Sproul.
This book and others are available at www.ligonier.org.

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