Sermon Notes: End Time Events

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Sermon Notes Sunday 17 June 2007

End Time Events - Part 1
By Brother Joseph Mahele

I. Key concepts to grasp in the study of eschatology

1-    The Principle of Prophetic Predictiveness

This was laid out by the Prophet Isaiah. God said that he declares the end from the beginning. (Isaiah 46:9-10)

This can be construed to mean two things
i.    End time events have been prophetically profiled in the book of beginnings (Genesis)
ii.    Nothing will happen in the end of time unless it has been prophetically declared by God. Everything that will happen has already been profiled in Scripture.

2-    The Solomon Concept

I have borrowed this phrase from Brother Charles Capps. The Solomon concept stipulates that there is nothing new under the sun and that the history repeats itself (Eccl. 1:9).

On the basis of this principle, we can comprehend end time events through study previous events in Scripture.

3-    The Peter’s Principle

I call Peter’s Principle the scriptural notion that one day typifies a thousand years in some prophetic profiles. (2 Peter 3:8)

This is an important principle to keep in mind when studying end time events.

4-    Literality of Prophetic Fulfilment

End time prophecies can be expected to be fulfilled according to the pattern of fulfilment followed by prophecies that have already been fulfilled. That is prophetic fulfilment has a clear tendency of being literal.

Just as prophecies concerning the first coming of the Lord Jesus were fulfilled literally, those pertaining to His second coming will be fulfilled likewise. There is no reason to believe that the fulfilment of events associated with second coming of the Lord should be figurative while his first coming was a literal fulfilment of prophecy.

II. Time Line

timeline

1-    The Church Age

The Church age will close out with the catching away of the Church.

There is a powerful prophetic profile in Exodus 19:10,11, 19 that provides insights into the catching away of the Church.

These three verses prophetically speak of the rapture.

Applying Peter's Principle (2 Peter 3:8) to verses 10 and 11, " to day and to morrow" are 2 days which represent 2 thousand years. The time in which the children of Israel were to sanctify themselves and wash their clothes corresponds to the Church age in which the people of God are sanctified and washed with the water of the word (Eph_5:25-27)

The children of Israel were to purify themselves to encounter the Lord on the 3rd day. The Church is to be purified to be presented a glorious Church before the Lord after 2 thousand years of Church age. The Church is to meet the Lord in the beginning of the 3rd thousand years (3rd day).

The Lord said that He would come down to the mountain to meet the people (Exodus 19:11). Paul says that at the catching away of the Church, the Lord will descend from heaven with a shout and the sound of the trumpet (1Thess 4:16). The Greek word ouranos, which is translated heaven, literally means elevation. This word is derived from the Greek oros which means mountain, thus strengthening the parallel between Exodus 19:11 and the Rapture.

The catching away of the church, which will close out this Church age, will involve corporeal resurrection from the dead and a physical ascension to heaven. (1Thess 4: 16-17). The physical body will be glorified and clothed with immortality. The events of the resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus is also a prophetic profile of what is to come, under the Solomon Concept (What was is what shall be). Jesus rose from the dead on the 3rd day. After 2 thousand years of Church history (2 days), there will be a resurrection, that is, in the beginning of the 3rd thousand years (3rd day).

The time span of the church age is approximately 2 thousand years of human history. These are 2 thousand years as determined by God, who is the master of times and seasons (Daniel 2:21) and the the official time keeper.

Though we do not know the exact time, we do know that we stand in the season of the close of the Church age and we know that the trumpet is about to sound and call the Church home as promised (John 14:2-3).

The end of the Church age will also mark the beginning of the 70th week of Daniel’s prophecy.

2-    Daniel’s 70 Weeks

In Daniel 9:24, the prophecy states that 70 weeks have been determined on Israel and the Holy City. This indicates that Israel and Jerusalem are the centrepiece of this prophecy. This prophecy does not concern any other group people but the Jews, nor any other city but Jerusalem.

The verse continues by saying that the 70 weeks will usher in everlasting righteousness and the anointing of the most Holy. This is to say the 70 weeks will lead up to the Christ’s reign of righteousness on earth.

These weeks are weeks of 7 years, each year being 360 days long.

The 70 weeks begin from the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem (around 454 BC by Artaxerxes, Nehemia 2:1-8).

From the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem to Messiah the Prince, there are 69 weeks (483 years). Messiah the Prince will be cut off on the 69th week (around 29 AD, the year of the death of the Lord Jesus Messiah).

“The people of the prince to come shall destroy the sanctuary”. This speaks of the destruction of the temple in 70 AD by the Roman Empire. This also means that the “prince to come” will rise from the Roman Empire or a modern version of it.

Daniel 9:27 speaks of the 70th week, which is yet to be fulfilled. Why? Because the 70th week is characterised by the manifestation of the “prince who is to come”, who can be identified as the little horn of Daniel 7:8,11), the Antichrist, the “man of sin”. This one cannot be revealed as long as the church is on earth (2 Thess 2-8). The catching away must occur first before the Antichrist is revealed. God’s clock for Daniel’s 70 Weeks prophecy was turned off, as it were, in the 69th week when Messiah the prince was cut off. The period covering the church age is not part of this prophecy as it was clearly stated in the beginning that the prophecy concerned Israel and the holy city, therefore the period of the church age was not computed in the prophecy. It is when the church leaves the earth that the 70th week kicks in.

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