Dear friends:My last message included an article by Reverend Bob Martin with 12 signs of Christ's soon return. This prompted me to excerpt from a similar article I wrote some time back.
Jim
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Evidence from Israel: a key prophetic event
We now know for a fact what those early thinkers and writers only knew by faith. If, like us, they could experience it, they would probably be doubly ecstatic. That fact is this: After almost 2,000 years of dispersion and according to many prophecies, the nation of Israel has been reestablished in this present century. Never in history has a nation been destroyed and the survivors scattered around the world, then have their nation later restored, especially after nearly 2,000 years. In itself, the nation of Israel is a modern-day miracle. And the Bible seems clear -- at Christ's return, Israel will be intact as a nation, something impossible until the last half of this century! (Opinion: as Satan used Herod to kill all the Jewish babies to try to thwart Christ's first mission, Satan used Hitler to try to kill all the Jews to prevent Israel's rebirth, a prerequisite to Christ's return. Now, radical Islamists are trying to do what Herod and Hitler tried.)
Israel is "God's time clock." Jesus expressed such a view. He spoke prophetically of Israel and the future, saying that Jerusalem would be destroyed and the Jews scattered, which actually happened 37 years later in A.D. 70. He said Jerusalem would be trampled down by Gentiles "until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled" (Luke 21:24). He also told a parable of the "fig tree," thought to represent the nation of Israel. He said when it begins to sprout, "you know that the kingdom of God is near" (Luke 21:29-31), and that "this generation (that sees the fig tree sprouting) will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened" (v. 32).
The fig tree began to sprout in the last half of this century. Israel was reestablished in 1948. And in the miraculous 1967 Six-Day War, Israel recaptured Jerusalem from "the Gentiles," fulfilling Jesus' prophecy about "the times of the Gentiles" now being complete. (While world data are not available, it is a known fact that in the number one Gentile nation, America, there has been in a precipitous cultural and spiritual decline precisely since yes, the 1960s. For example, a Heritage Foundation study of 19 leading cultural indicators concluded that, "Over the past three decades we have experienced substantial social regression.")
Evidence from the Prophet Daniel
Daniel chapters 9-12 hold keys to the timing of the Lord's return. In about 550 B.C., Daniel prophesied the time of both Christ's first and second coming, and it can be demonstrated how the prophecy was accurately fulfilled at His first coming. It seems obvious that the passage also would contain the key to the timing of His Second Coming. However, the angel Gabriel, who gave Daniel this information, said that the understanding of the timing of the second coming was "sealed" until the "time of the end"; in other words, it could not be understood until this special period of history. In addition to other clues, Gabriel gave two key conditions that would prevail at that time: "travel and education(knowledge) shall be vastly increased" (chapter 12, verse 5, Living Bible). Travel: World travel, and even between cities and states, was minimal until this century. And it was not until the middle of this century that travel literally exploded. The main factor was the advent of the jet aircraft engine, first used on a commercial airliner in the 1950s! Almost everyone, at least in advanced societies it seems, is now traveling. Without a doubt, travel has "vastly increased" since the 1950s. Education: Education and knowledge also exploded in this century. From the time of Christ until 1900, it is estimated that man's knowledge doubled. In just the next 50 years, from 1900 to 1950, it doubled again. Then it began an extremely rapid doubling; first every seven years, then every two years in the 1960's. It appears that the 1950's marked the time in history when knowledge and education "vastly increased" and literally began exploding. This means that according to Daniel, sometime about 1948 when Israel was reborn, or at least soon thereafter in the 1950s, God unsealed, or is now unsealing, the vision of Daniel to give us understanding of the time of Christ's soon return.
Evidence from divine time cycles
Nothing God says or does is without meaning. In the Bible, He makes a fascinating use of numbers, some of which are repeated intervals, such as 3, 7, 40 and 70. Such improbable patterns are God's authentication that He alone is in control of history, and not random, chance forces.The Third day Restoration. There is a biblical pattern of God's “restoration” occurring on the third day, including Jonah's deliverance from the great fish and, most notably, the Lord's resurrection from the dead. We are now in the third millennia since Jesus' birth. This may bring a fulfillment of Hosea 6:2: "After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight." The "two days" began when the King first arrived on the earth.
The Five year Cycle. God told the ancient Hebrews not to harvest from fruit trees until the fifth year after planting (Leviticus 19:23). If this is a prophetic symbolism, God "planted" Israel (the fig tree) with Abraham about 2000 B.C. We are now in the fifth year (fifth thousand-year period) since Abraham. Is this when the fruit of God's harvest from "Abraham's seed" will come to pass, in the Millennial Kingdom?
The Seven-year Cycle. Under Hebrew law a servant was to serve six years and then be set free in the seventh year without paying anything (Exodus 21:2). Is this a shadow of creation being set free from its bondage of decay after the sixth millennium, with debts (sin) cancelled for those who have placed their faith in the Messiah? Other examples exist of God dealing with His people redemptively where the number seven is significant.
The 70th "Year of Jubilee." Upon entering the Promised Land 3,500 years ago, God told the Israelites to observe a "Year of Jubilee" every 50 years. I do not know the exact year, but on or near the year A.D. 2000 marked the exact 70th Year of Jubilee in history, and also 40 Jubilees from the one in which Jesus began His ministry, which itself was the 30th Year of Jubilee since its inception in the same year when Jesus was believed to have been age 30. The Year of Jubilee was the year of restoration, proclamation of liberty and release from bondage as commanded by God in Leviticus 25: "Count seven sabbaths of years -- seven times seven years -- so that the seven sabbaths of years amount to a period of 49 years . . ." as the passage begins. Will the 70th Jubilee bring a soon restoration and, at last, the release and liberty of God's people from this present bondage and suffering and entry into the Promised Land of the Millennial Kingdom?
Daniel's 70 Weeks of Years. God gave the prophet Daniel a vision of 70 weeks of years (7+62+1 X 7 = 490 years) for Israel into the future (Daniel 9:24-26), including the timing of Christ's coming. Most scholars believe that 69 of those weeks (483 years) have been fulfilled and that the 70th "week" remains to be fulfilled: a seven year period to come in conjunction with Christ's return. Will Daniel's 70th week finally come about the time of the 70th Year of Jubilee and the 7th millennium? A fitting culmination of prophecy!
120 Jubilees. If Solomon’s reign is symbolic of the Millennium, there may be further symbolism in Solomon’s temple, a symbolic picture of God’s perfect temple (the church) which He has been building. The temple was 120 cubits high. There were also 120 priests blowing trumpets (2 Chronicles 5:12), and the queen of Sheba gave Solomon 120 talents of gold (9:9). As mentioned, Jewish history is marked by Jubilee periods of 50-year duration. The 120-cubit height and other 120s may represent 120 X 50 = 6,000, the period allotted for the earth lease. Also, Genesis 6:3 says that man’s “days shall be limited to 120 years,” which Dr. Reginald Cherry says in his book, The Bible Cure, is the full limit of man’s cell duplication capability. This 120 may likewise refer to the full limit of man’s capability to duplicate himself -- 120 Jubilees, or 6,000 years. Israel’s Jubilee celebration (Leviticus 25) was filled with end-time typology: (1) It began with a “trumpet” sound. (2) It was a proclamation of liberty throughout the land. (3) It was a holy time. (4) It was a time of rest. (5) It meant the return of possessions to its owner. (6) It was a time of enjoyment of the harvest. Sounds like the Millennium?
Other Evidence
There are many other biblical signs that we are in the "last days" before the soon return of the Lord. Billy Graham has said that while some signs have appeared in the past, "this is the first time in human history that all the signs are converging."
In 2 Timothy 3:1-5, Paul describes the increased decadence of humanity in the "last days," something we are experiencing today. (See reference to the recent Heritage Foundation study above.) In the past four decades there has been an explosion of immorality, pregnancies out of wedlock, abortions, drug use, spouse and child abuse, and violent crime, which is up several hundred percentage points. Asked what he foresaw as the terminus of civilization, T.S. Eliot (1888 1965) envisioned people shooting each other at random, only a recent, now widespread phenomenon.
There is an explosion of cults and the occult, as well as false Christs (1 Timothy 4:1; Matthew 24:24). And Jesus said that at His return it would be "as in the days of Noah" (Matthew 24:37), when the earth was corrupt and filled with violence (Genesis 6:11). He warned of increased famines and ethnic wars, like birth pangs, with increasing intensity. Today, one of six people on earth suffer from hunger, and a study of wars since 500 B.C. shows a recent, dramatic increase. Of at least 82 world conflicts between 1990 and 1995, all but three were civil or ethnic. An Associated Press report on December 29, 1999 said, “The century is coming to a close with a third of the world's 193 nations embroiled in conflict, nearly twice the Cold War level.”
Also like increasing birth pangs, Jesus also said there would be earthquakes in various places. From official records, scholars have researched the frequency of earthquakes and report an astonishing increase since -- yes, just the middle of this century, when Israel was reborn and all the other signs began. A recent study shows that in the 1940s there were only 51 earthquakes worldwide above Richter 6.0; in the 1950s, 475; the 1980s, 1,085; and in the 1990s at the current rate, a projected 1,540 (Matthew 24:7). (Source: Prophecy in the News magazine, October 1996, quoting data from the National Earthquake Information Center. More recently, Hal Lindsey echoed similar data.)
The increased centralization of world financial and political power into a "New World Order" is a prelude to the soon-coming anti-Christ, who will deceive most of the world (Daniel 7-12; Matthew 24:15; Revelation 13).
Paul also says that in the last days there will be those with "a form of godliness, but denying its power" (2 Timothy 3:5), a condition even in many Christian churches today where the power of the Holy Spirit is not only denied, even His mention is rare and often discouraged, while anti-Christian practices are encouraged, all in the name of "religion."
The Good News. God also says that in the last days, "I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh" (Joel 2:28). People are coming to faith in Jesus Christ all over the world in record numbers. Some individual evangelical organizations are seeing millions of conversions. There is a great outpouring in the former Soviet Union, in China, Africa, and elsewhere. Joel's prophecy began to be fulfilled at Pentecost, nearly 2,000 years ago, but it will greatly intensify just before the return of the Lord. We are seeing it now.
The Great Commission Fulfilled. Jesus tells us: "This gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come" (Matthew 24:14). We are near that time. Hundreds of missions organizations are rapidly closing on that goal. Just one of them, Campus Crusade for Christ, already has over 25,000 full-time staff and up to 500,000 volunteers in 186 countries in areas covering 98 percent of the world's population, plus they are working with thousands of churches and other organizations.
Angel Visits and Announcements. Confirming Scripture, there are verified angel visitations and supernatural revelations saying that Jesus is coming "very, very soon." See http://www.choicesforliving.com/spirit/part3/angels.htm
Internal Witness of the Spirit. God promised that His Spirit would indwell His people and would "guide you into all truth....and declare to you the things that are to come" (John 16:13). Millions of people worldwide who profess receiving Christ and the infilling of His Spirit report an inner witness and expectancy of the Lord's soon return.