The End Times According to Scripture ... Part 2

70 WEEKS OF DANIEL

Daniel describes 70 prophetic weeks (1 prophetic day equals 1 biblical year-360 days, or 1 prophetic week equals 7 years, so 70 prophetic weeks equals 490 years) as God's timetable for the Jewish people and the city of Jerusalem as described in Daniel 9:24-27: "Seventy "sevens" are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy.  Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven "sevens" and sixty-two "sevens".  It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble.  After the sixty-two sevens, the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing.  The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary.  The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed.  He will confirm a covenant with man for one seven.  In the middle of the seven he will put an end to sacrifice and offering.  And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him."

On March 14, 445 B.C. the decree for the rebuilding of Jerusalem was given by Artaxerxes Longimanus of Persia.  Jesus of Nazareth ended the 69th week by allowing Himself to be proclaimed the Messiah, exactly 173,880 days or 483 biblical years after Artaxerxes's decree.4

This 69 week period ended with Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.  But Israel rejects the Messiah, and 4 days later he is crucified, interrupting the 70 week timetable.  Jerusalem is not destroyed until 70 A.D. by Titus of Rome.  It is clear that the time clock stopped with Israel's rejection of Jesus and with seven weeks to go on the prophetic stopwatch.

This gap in God's dealing with His people Israel is the Church age, the age in which we now live. 

The end of the above scripture quote introduces the last week of Daniel, with the identification of the end times man of sin or the Beast (who comes from the revived Roman Empire), who signs a protective treaty with Israel, then after 3 1/2 years betrays the treaty and sets up an abomination in the reconstructed Jerusalem temple.

Hal Lindsey states:

      It appears that God is again specifically dealing directly with His people Israel.  Therefore it does not seem appropriate that the church, with its distinct calling and purpose could be present, for there would be no distinction between Jew and Gentile as is a characteristic of the church age.5 

THE CHURCH AGE

Before His death, Jesus promised to build His church as described in Matthew 16:18:  "And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it."  The church, born on the day of Pentecost, consists of the twin remnants of Jews and Gentiles who come to trust in Christ as their Savior, as stated in Ephesians 2 and 3. 

God's purpose through the church is to preach, teach, and call out a people to His name.  In addition to world evangelization, the church is commissioned to wait for the Son from heaven as described in 1 Thessalonians 1:10: "They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead - Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath."; and also Acts 1:6-8: "So when they met together, they asked him, Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?  He said to them: It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

The church age closes amid rampant apostasy in an environment that is marked by self obsessed humanists, immorality, violence, and international unrest.  See specifically 2 Timothy 3:1-6: "But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days.  People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.  Have nothing to do with them." and 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3: "Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers, not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us, saying that the day of the Lord has already come.  Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion (note: the greek word is 'apostasia' which is perhaps more correctly translated apostasy not rebellion as in the NIV) occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction.  He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God." 

THE RAPTURE

God concludes His program for the church before the seven-year Tribulation or the 70th week of Daniel begins as stated in 1 Thessalonians 1:10: "They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead - Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath."  The rapture "catches away" or snatches the church.  1 Corinthians 15:51-54 says: "Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed - in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.  For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.  For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality." 

His Church will meet Jesus in the air to "take you to be with me" as stated in John 14:1-6: "Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God, trust also in me.  In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you.  I am going to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you may also be where I am.

Key points of these scriptures are that the Rapture: 1)is a mystery, 2)means no death for some, 3)includes the removal of all believers on the earth at that time, 4)is a transformation, 5)is instantaneous, 6)is a family reunion of all believers of all ages, and 7)results in being taken back to live with Jesus in the place He has prepared for us, His Father's house.

The man of sin or the Beast is then recognized on earth and the Tribulation begins.  Reference 2 Thessalonians 2:3-9: "Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction.  He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God.  Don't you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things?  And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time.  For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back (* the Holy Spirit thru the Church, insertion mine, explanation below) will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way.  And then the lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming.  The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing."

This coming to get the church may take place at any moment, and is the church's "blessed hope" as described in Titus 2:11-13: "For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.  It teaches us to say No to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope - the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,..." 

During the Tribulation, the church is in heaven with Jesus.  Members receive rewards and the church becomes Christ's "bride" and enjoys the "marriage feast of the Lamb."  The church also prepares to return with Him appearing of The Glory as says Revelation 19:7-9: "...For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.  Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.  (Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of the saints.)  Then the angel said to me, Write: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!   And he added, These are the true words of God."

Hal Lindsey summarizes the rapture well with:

  "When we put together the concept of being caught up into the clouds to meet the Lord in the air together with the idea of an instantaneous transformation, the result is spine-tingling.

  "We will suddenly one day just blast off into space.  Faster than the eye of the unbeliever can perceive, every living believer on earth will disappear.6

Think of it for a moment.  Let the magnitude of this sink in.  In the twinkling of an eye, all believers of all time will be with Jesus; and the earth, yes the earth will in an instant only be inhabited by unregenerate humanity! 

No wonder 1 Thessalonians 4:17-18 states: "After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.  And so we will be with the Lord forever.  Therefore encourage each other with these words."

What a hope!  What a blessing!  What a gift from the Lord!

[* I think that Dave Hunt's interpretation of this passage is worthy of merit:

        "A Person is preventing the Antichrist from being revealed.  Quite clearly He is no ordinary person, for He who prevented Antichrist's revelation in Paul's day 1900 years ago is still doing so today.  He is not only timeless but omnipotent, for Satan cannot act until this One is out of the way.

        Paul can only be referring to the Holy Spirit.  But He cannot be removed from the earth because He is omnipresent.  Furthermore, there will be many converted through the gospel of the kingdom during the Great Tribulation, and for that to be possible the Holy Spirit must be present to convince and convict them.  Then what is the meaning of "until he be taken out of the way"?  How could that apply to the Holy Spirit?

        The Church is described as "a habitation of God through the Spirit" (Ephesians 2:22).  The bodies of all Christians are "temples of the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 6:19).  God the Holy Spirit is present in this world in a unique way that was not true before the Church was formed nor will be so after the Church is removed in the Rapture.  When the Church is taken to heaven, that special presence of the Holy Spirit will also be removed, though He will be here as God omnipresent as He eternally is throughout the entire universe."7]

THE TRIBULATION

Daniel's 70th week begins as God officially resumes His program for the Jewish nation.  One purpose of the Tribulation period is to reconcile the nation of Israel to the Messiah.  After persecution by the Beast and isolation among the Gentile nations pledged to its destruction, the Jewish nation confronts Christ at Armageddon and cries in repentance as stated in Zechariah 12:9-10: "On that day I will set out to destroy all nations that attack Jerusalem.  And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication.  They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son."

Events that occur during the Tribulation include:

1)Israel exists as a national entity at peace under the Beast's protection and in unbelief.  Ezekiel 37,38: "The land of dry bones..." and Daniel 9:27.

2)Israel has reinstituted the sacrifices of the Mosaic law (blood sacrifice) and rebuilt her temple.  Daniel 9:27 and Matthew 24:15-20.

3)The world is at peace.  Revelation 13:4.

4)War begins when the northern armies invade Israel according to Ezekiel 38: "...after many days you will be called to arms.  In future years you will invade a land that has recovered from war, whose people were gathered from many nations to the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate.  They had been brought out from the nations, and now all of them live in safety.  You and all your troops and the many nations with you will go up, advancing like a storm; ...You will come from your place in the far north...You will advance against my people...I will execute judgement upon him with plague and bloodshed; I will pour down torrents of rain, hailstones and burning sulfur on him and on his troops and on the many nations with him.  And so I will show my greatness and my holiness, and I will make myself known in the sight of many nations. Then they will know that I am the Lord."  These forces strike at the regathered remnant of Jews who are in the land, as Satan seeks to destroy the Jewish people before they can be reconciled to the Messiah.

5)The Beast appears, first as a political super hero of the West as stated in Daniel 9:27: "He will confirm a covenant with many..."  At the midpoint of the Tribulation, the Beast enters the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem and declares himself to be God or the "abomination of desolation", demands worship, and refuses his "mark" or 666 to all who will not bow down to him.  Matthew 24:15 says: "So when you see standing in the holy place, the abomination that causes desolation spoken of through the prophet Daniel - let the reader understand - then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains."  See also 2 Thessalonians 2:3,4 and Revelation 13.  The latter reference describes the second Beast, the false prophet, who will set up the image of the first beast in the temple.  This act initiates the Great Tribulation, as God pours out His wrath upon a belligerent Gentile world system in a series of disasters that culminates in Armageddon as stated in Revelation 16:14-16: "..there was one like a son of man...with a sharp sickle in his hand...Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe...so he swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested..."

6)Jesus now returns to the earth with His saints to take His throne and judge the nations as described in Revelation 19:11-20:6.

7)Israel's national remnant, about 1/3 of the people, accept their Messiah and experience national reconciliation.  Zechariah 13:8-9 says: "In the whole land, declares the Lord, two thirds will be struck down and perish; yet one-third will be left in it.  This third I will bring into the fire; I will refine them like silver and test them like gold.  They will call on my name and I will answer them; I will say, They are my people, and they will say, The Lord is our God.

… Part 2 published on the night before my major surgery for cancer. May The Lord God who created and sustains all things have mercy upon me. For I believe in Jesus Christ, and look to the Lord God as my Abba (Daddy) Father. On this night Isaiah 41:13 is for me. “For I, the Lord your God, will hold your right hand, saying to you: ‘Fear not, I will help you.’”

… Part 3 to come … The Millennium … if it be His will… Link here