Wow - I just read Tony's Post on Jamestown:Tony Ellsworth (4 May 2007) - "Queen Elizabeth visits Jamestown"About Queen Elizabeth visitng Jamestown Thursday on the 400th anniversary of its founding, having also last visited on its 350th anniversay.And said to myself, I was just reading about Queen Elizabeth. But it couldn't have been the same Queen Elizabeth. It isn't. Let me explain. Today, I received some books I had ordered from Still Waters Revival Books and they include with their books these one page sort of advertisements about other books. The "advertisement" I was reading was about the UNABRIDGED version of Foxe's Book of Martyrs. I'll quote part of the ad:In 1563, England was stirred by the appearance of a book dedicated to the reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth. From the halls of royalty to the humblest village, there was no level of English society that escaped the commotion aroused by the work. While the book was spurned by enemies of the English Reformation, it was met with the admiration and approval of many, including the Queen herself. So impressed was she with the work, that she ordered copies to be placed in the hands of every church and college official in the nation, and that a copy also be placed in every parish church for the use of all people.The book immediately found extreme popularity. It served to fuel the zeal of church reformers and soon became a pillar of the Puritan movement and one of the most influential and enduring works produced in the period of the English Reformation. The author was John Foxe. His book came to be known as Foxe's Book of Martyrs. Foxe was born in England in 1517....Sadly, the power of the message that Foxe was attempting to convey in his work is lost in current popular versions which have been greatly abridged. Most only encompass about a quarter of the original text. These versions tend to focus on the details of the various martyrs' sufferings, but largely omit the explanations of the critical reformational truths for which the martyrs were willing to suffer and ultimately die.So, now that my attention was focused back on the ad, what about the numbers? Well, 2007 is exactly 444 years since 1563 when the book first appeared. That's pretty interesting. And 2007 is exactly 490 years or 70 times 7 years since Foxe was born in 1517. Here we had a famous number found in both the Old and the New Testamend. The Old, when Daniel has his vision about the 70 weeks (of years), and the New when Jesus tells how much one should forgive another, (70 times 7). The "Arithmetic of God" lists 70 times 7 as standing for Israel's complete and final restoration. To add in even more sevens, Foxe died in 1587, at the age of 70. The ad also states:It has been accepted that in the centuries following its first publishing, no book apart from the Bible was more generally read by Englishmen; neither did any single volume besides the Bible have more of an influence in shaping the minds of the Englishmen.So this may be one more thing pointing to 2007.-Shalom!