Concerning this salvation, the prophets sought and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you,
Sought and searched diligently ... What did the prophets search?  The holy Scriptures which they had written, of course!  John Calvin's remarkable pronouncement on this, to the effect that the prophets searched, "not the writing or the teaching, but the private longing with which each was fired!"[30] is likewise totally out of harmony with the passage.  The following verse shows that it was the "testimony" of the Holy Spirit regarding the sufferings and glories of Christ it was that "testimony" which they did not understand (though they had written it), the point of their misunderstanding being the "time" when such things would occur.  Now those testimonies of the sufferings and glories of Christ was not "private longings" of the prophets, but the plain words of the Scriptures which they wrote.  Besides these obvious facts, who ever heard of a man "searching and inquiring into" his private longings!