"We see, in many a land, the proudest dynasties and tyrannies still crushing, with their mountain weight, every free motion of the Consciences and hearts of men. We see, on the other hand, the truest heroism for the right and the greatest devotion to the Truth in hearts that God has touched. We have a work to do, as great as our forefathers and, perhaps, far greater. The enemies of Truth are more numerous and subtle than ever and the needs of the Church are greater than at any preceding time. If we are not debtors to the present, then men were never debtors to their age and their time. Brethren, we are debtors to the hour in which we live. Oh, that we might stamp it with Truth and that God might help us to impress upon its wings some proof that it has not flown by neglected and unheeded." -- C.H. Spurgeon . . . "If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John 8:31, 32 . . . . .

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Wednesday, August 3, 2022

CONSIDERING THE VALIDITY OF “The LAST DAYS”

by James Fire

REPENT! For THE END is NEAR!
Doesn’t this spark an image in your mind of a long haired, bearded, barefoot prophet striding along the streets of New York or L.A., with a placard hanging from his neck and these words painted in bold letters?

Critics of a wide variety have disparaged this notion with no small amount of skepticism, even ridicule. Interestingly enough, the Bible says that this would be the prevailing view in the last days prior to the Second Coming of the LORD Jesus Christ:

2 PETER 3:3-4
3 knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, 4 and saying,
"Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation
."

They point out that Jesus said He would return quickly (REV 3:11; 22:7,12) and it’s been two thousand years already! What they fail to realize is that He was referring to the manner of His arrival, not a time duration.

Quickly as in suddenly, without warning (like a thief in the night; 1 THESS 5:2; 2 PET 3:10), and with the speed of lightning:

MATTHEW 24:27
For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be
. (See also LUKE 17:24).

So why has the church of our LORD Jesus declared throughout these last two millennia His Second Advent with such expectation?
Because He told us to “watch and pray”, because we don’t know when He will arrive for His church (MARK 13:35-37; MATT 25:13); and yet Scripture is quite clear that the LORD Jesus shall return seven years after the Beast makes a covenant with Israel, and in the midst of those seven years, he’ll erect an image of himself in the Temple (at which point, the LORD’s coming will be three and a half years away; see DAN 9:27).

There seems to be a contradiction here: on the one hand the LORD told us to watch and pray because we don’t know when He will return; on the other hand its clear when He will arrive.
There are those who suggest that the LORD’s arrival won’t be exactly seven years (or three and a half) after those specific events of the enforcing of the covenant and the erection of the abomination of desolation, so we won’t know the exact day.

However, an examination of the 70th week prophecy of Daniel reveals when the Messiah would arrive the first time, and that prophecy was fulfilled to the exact day: 173,880 days after Arta Xerxes gave the command to go and restore the city of Jerusalem (or 483 years; see DAN 9:25). If His arrival the first time (to Jerusalem) was exactly to the day, there is no reason why His arrival the second time shouldn’t also be exactly when prophesied in the same context as His First Advent.

I find it difficult to pair together the words “prophecy” and “approximate” where GOD is concerned. Any student of prophecy knows that when GOD mentions time differentials, those prophecies are fulfilled accordingly.

This is why I am pre-tribulational in my eschatology – though I prefer to use the term pre-70th week of Daniel (the great tribulation doesn’t occur until the mid-way point of the seven years, so pre-trib is technically prior to the mid-way point). Both mid- and post-trib scenarios express a specific number of years before the return of Christ. Only a rapture that occurs with no precedent events required, fits the LORD’s warning to “watch and pray, for you do not know when your LORD is coming”.

This is why the church has been looking with expectation for the LORD’s return at any time (this is the doctrine of immanency). Any other scenario, one would have to concede the statement, “Sad day, sad day, Jesus can’t come back today”. Scripture warns us about not expecting the LORD and about the unprofitable servant that says, “My Lord delays his coming” (MATT 24:48).

So then what are the last days? What do we mean by them?
Is it a time when the planet will be destroyed? Not at all; in fact the destruction of this planet can’t happen for at the very least 1,007 more years! Instead of “the end of the world” the more appropriate phrase would be “the end of the [current] age”.

The planet will still be here, but under new management; right now (and ever since the fall of mankind) this world is under the management of Satan (2 COR 4:4; LUKE 4:6); but when the LORD returns, it will mean the end of this evil age, and the beginning of the age of righteousness when the Messiah will rule over Israel, and all the world from Jerusalem!

This is the Millennial age (1,000 years) that follows after the seven years of tribulation. Only after the 1000 year period is up will this old Earth (and heavens) be destroyed, and a new heavens and Earth will be created (ISAIAH 65:17-22; 2 PET 3:10-14).

TWENTY FOUR SIGNS of the LORD’s RETURN from MATTHEW 24 is an article I did a while back, and from that article we have the following:
Two questions:
1) Are we living in the Last Days?
2) What is meant by the expression “the Last Days”?

Note the expression: it’s the last days, plural not singular. There is something called the Last Day as well, and we must understand that the references to such doesn’t refer to a single 24 hr. period, but a specified time frame or period, or an age. The Last Day is different than the last days; it refers to the time spoken of by both Isaiah and also Peter: it's the last age of this Earth which is the Millennial Reign of Christ, prior to the Great White Throne Judgment and then the eternal kingdom in the New Heavens and New Earth and the New Jerusalem!

ISAIAH 65:17
For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.

ISAIAH 66:22
For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain.

2 PETER 3:7-10
But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

Also Paul speaks of this:

2 THESSALONIANS 2:1-4
Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

So the day of Christ, the day of God, the Last Day are all referring to this same time period that starts at the end of this time of the great Tribulation of seven years, and continues through to what’s known as the Millennium period: a thousand year time where Satan is bound, the Earth is restored more or less to its pre-fallen condition, and Christ Jesus rules from the throne of His father David (LUKE 1:32) as absolute Ruler over Israel as well as the whole world. The Last Day has a total of 1,007 years contained in it. It is complete once the new Earth and the new Heavens are created and the eternal Kingdom has commenced.

UPDATE: 10/08/11 Dave Hunt's (of The Berean Call ministry) Commentary on The LAST DAY: Is it a 24 Hr. Period?
The last days as portrayed in Scripture have to do with the time period prior to the return of Christ. Many signs were given that would indicate the climax of human history (MATT 24:3-7, 8-31) and alert those who are watching and praying concerning “the seasons and the times” (1 THESS 5:1-2). Those signs described earthquakes, wars, famines, pestilences – which are common enough events to human history, so what’s the mystery?

MATTHEW 24:8 indicates that these things would come in waves, increasing in intensity and frequency, like a woman in labor pains. But “the end is not yet” because all of the events described in the book of REVELATION has to take place.

There are many passages in the Old Testament that addresses the last days and what they’ll be like, and we find many parallel passages in the New Testament.

For example, we read the following in JOEL:

JOEL 2:30-31
30 "And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the LORD
.

Which corresponds with what the apostle Peter declared in ACTS:

ACTS 2:19-20
19 I will show wonders in heaven above And signs in the earth beneath: Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. 20 The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the LORD
.

And notice the other parallel between these two passages: in JOEL’s prophecy it’s declared that the Spirit of the LORD will come upon “all flesh” – in context, this is speaking of all the nation of Israel. In JOEL’s prophecy, it states that this will occur on the Day of the LORD; and the Spirit of GOD did indeed come upon the disciples of Christ, Jews all, on Pentecost (but this hardly constitutes “all flesh”).

We understand that in the last days the Spirit will come initially upon the 144,000 Jewish evangelists (12,000 from each of the 12 tribes) as described in REVELATION 7 and 14 who will prophesy in the time of Jacob’s Trouble (JER 30:7) aka, Daniel’s 70th week.

But when the apostle Peter was asked about this strange event where those in the upper room were speaking in tongues, he quotes the passage from JOEL that addresses this work of the Spirit.
Why would he quote something specifically meant for the Day of the LORD?

I believe the key is found here:

JOEL 2:23
Be glad then, you children of Zion, And rejoice in the LORD your God; For He has given you the former rain faithfully, And He will cause the rain to come down for you - The former rain, and the latter rain in the first month
.

The heavier latter rain would come before the final harvest, but the moderate former rain would typically arrive before the time of first fruits.
If we follow through with this pattern and lay it over the events of Pentecost and the time of the 144,000, it becomes rather clear that those at Pentecost would comprise the first fruits (the early church that comprised of Jewish disciples – no Gentiles came to salvation at the time of ACTS 2: they came to salvation later in ACTS 10).

One hundred and twenty saints were baptized in the Holy Spirit on Pentecost (ACTS 1:15), but 1200 times that amount comprise those Jewish evangelists in the book of REVELATION, and then subsequent to this “all Israel shall be saved” (ROM 11:26).

How then can we relate these events to the last days?
When did they begin?

One could make the argument that they began at the First Advent of Christ:

HEBREWS 1:1-2
1 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, 2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds
;

The word for “last” in the Greek is eschatos, meaning: a superlative, farthest, final in place or time, ends of the last, the latter end, lowest, uttermost.

The event of Pentecost (“harvest of first fruits”) when correlated with JOEL’s prophecy would confirm that the last days began two thousand years ago, but that we are now in the last of the last days. How do we arrive at this conclusion?

What is the starting point for eschatology? What is the event that must take place even before any conversation of the Second Coming of Christ can happen?
People in the 1930’s thought the LORD was coming back then because Hitler was believed to be the antichrist (for many valid reasons! He was heralded as a Messiah after the occult fashion).

He couldn’t have been THE antichrist – namely the Beast, because there was no national Israel, Jerusalem was not the capital of the non-existent Jewish state, and there certainly was no Temple – all of which is required in order for the last days and the Last Day (the day of the LORD) to take place.

The starting point for the last of the last days is ISAIAH 11:11
It shall come to pass in that day That the Lord shall set His hand again the second time to recover the remnant of His people who are left, From Assyria and Egypt, From Pathros and Cush, From Elam and Shinar, From Hamath and the islands
[coastlands] of the sea.

Scour the Scriptures in search for a fourth recovery of the people of Israel or even a third, and you won’t find it.
Israel was taken captive by Babylon in 597 BC, and they remained captive in the land of the Chaldeans for seventy years as Jeremiah prophesied (JER 25:11-13). In 444-445 BC Nehemiah was used of GOD to restore the city of Jerusalem and the Jews began to trickle back into the land, there to stay when finally the Messiah was born in the city Bethlehem Ephrathah (MICAH 5:2).

During the days of our LORD’s ministry the Jewish leadership proved utterly corrupt and conspired to crucify Jesus, the innocent Lamb of GOD. Not quite one generation later, in 70 AD, the nation was dispersed the second time, and remained so for the better part of two thousand years.

Then the impossible happened on May 14th, 1948 – a nation was born overnight (ISAIAH 66:8)!! Political Scientists admit that if a nation is dispersed from their homeland any longer than two or three generations, it’s unlikely that they will ever regain it. The fact that Israel was gathered back the second time after almost two millennia in exile, is nothing short of an unprecedented miracle.

Even Bible expositors prior to the 1940s had difficulty with biblical passages that spoke of a literal Israel back in the land. The territory was almost entirely desolated by Arabs who ensured that the land would remain waste; malaria infested swamps, bitterly arid deserts, virtually no Jewish population beyond a scant 25,000 (both native and foreign born combined) compared to 43,000 Christians and well over 400,000 Muslims.

Many such expositors allegorized such passages and claimed that these referred to the church (interestingly enough Replacement Theology was very popular in pre-NAZI Germany).
Yet there were some fundamentalists who insisted that Israel would return to the land in the last days according to GOD’s Word and in 1948 the impossible became a reality. In 1967 biblical Jerusalem was taken back by the Jews.

Today Israel’s agriculture feeds Europe; she sells flowers to Holland, tech to Japan and has more recently discovered substantial resources in oil, natural gas and precious mineral wealth estimated to be about $14 billion, with more finds happening regularly.
She has one of the finest in military found anywhere in the world and her Air Force is second to none.

With the nation back in the land, fulfilling ISAIAH 11:11 and a host of other prophecies that have been or are being fulfilled before our very eyes in the 21st century, we can look to Scripture as to what’s next for GOD’s people Israel.

That we find in the book of Revelation

What I find fascinating is that the Jewish people are fervently expecting their Messiah any time now, while the Muslims eagerly await the Mahdi; Buddhists await for the Fifth Avatar of Buddha, the Hindus are looking for another incarnation of Krishna, and there are professing Christians who expect Christ to arrive and establish His earthly kingdom (with no foreboding time of tribulation, viewing such a thing as nonsense) – but by using the church to do so (and in fact, He can’t return until the church subdues all the world to Christ.
With all the major world religions seeking the return of their spiritual founders, this constitutes a perfect satanic set up and seduction for the coming World Leader, the Beast of Revelation who will claim to fulfill all of their expectations!

Even in the secular world, the perceived need of a single man who can take the reins of the world, utilizing governors under his direct control to accomplish this remarkable feat. The number of governors suggested is ten – how very interesting (DAN 7:7-8,19-21; REV 17:12-13).
I have in my possession a document I requested by mail from the WCPA (World Constitution Parliament Association, an NGO of the UN): A Constitution for the Federation of Earth. In this document, the entire globe is divided into twenty regions which are paired up into “magna-regions” which number ten, and for each magna-region a governor to supervise it. Ten “kings”.

So many things are transpiring these days that point to the inevitability of prophecy being fulfilled, even as scenarios are getting set up now for the ultimate fulfillment during the days of the Beast – it’s hard to keep track of it all.

One thing is certain however, we are admonished to “keep our eyes on the skies, and don’t believe the lies, Jesus Christ returns soon, from on high”!

For more on this check out: The LAST DAYS Of LAWLESSNESS as well as this news site PROPHECY NEWS WATCH.

We  have been given permission by the writer, Quek Koh Choon to publish his series of articles, LIVING In The LAST DAYS; here is Part One!

Also check out TTUF's page on END TIMES articles.

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