Prophecies of Israel

  

We move into prophecies now which have been fulfilled in the lifetimes of people who are still alive today. First, we need to understand something about prophecies. While God has a plan for all our lives, He chose one nation, one people, to be His for the purpose of bringing salvation to all the world. This nation is Israel. And though God knows – has already planned – what will happen to all the other nations and peoples of this earth, the Bible gives us prophecies only as they concern the nation Israel because it was, and continues to be, Israel through which He will accomplish everything else He has planned for all the world.

Many years ago a famous queen of England asked one of her advisors how he knew God existed. He answered, Israel. Surprised, she asked why he said this. He said that if Israel still existed after all the attempts the rest of the world had made to erase it from existence, it could only be because God was/is protecting her.

In Ezekiel 36 we can read a prophecy of God’s protection and restoration of the people. Throughout history there have been other nations which have determined to kill all these people, to wipe them from the face of the earth. We could name Hitler and Stalin and most recently Iran and Hamas, as examples of this. And we see this same hatred gaining ground once more in our world in many other countries, including the United States.

In Ezekiel 36:8, God speaking to the mountains of Israel to begin producing vegetation again in preparation for the return of the people. "But you, mountains of Israel, you will sprout your branches and bear your fruit for my people Israel, who will soon return." For many hundreds of years the land had been barren. Rome destroyed everything they could of civilization in 70 AD, and in the 1100s, during the times of the Crusades, the land itself was destroyed as trees were used for fire and weapons. Then God prophesied the land would again become lush and green as the people of Israel would return to it.

God had prophesied against Israel thousands of years earlier that He would disperse them among the nations if they continued to reject Him. This happened several times, and yet God brought them back again so they had the opportunity again to be faithful. After the nation demanded the death of Jesus, Messiah and Son of God, the Lord dispersed them again until the time would come for the end of what He had called the time of the Gentiles (see Romans 11:25 and Luke 21:24). This time essentially began when Israel was taken captive to Babylon. Then God gave Daniel at least two prophecies about this time – the golden statue and the Seventy Weeks prophecy from Daniel 9:24-27. 

Prayer: Father, we thank You for the mysteries of the prophecies You have given to us – mysteries we can unlock and understand only as we see Your purpose for all people and hear Your explanations through Your Word. Teach us Your Truth. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen. 

From Global Media Outreach 

Daniel's Seventy Weeks

 

 

24 Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place.

25 Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time.

26 And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed.

27 And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator.

Daniel 9:24-27

A prophecy which has been partly fulfilled is found in our verses above. It is important to note from verse 24 to whom this prophecy is given. Since the person hearing this is Daniel, we know this prophecy is about Israel – Daniel’s people.

Verse 25 gives us the starting date for this prophecy to be fulfilled – the date of the order given for Jerusalem to be restored. This was fulfilled, and the date is given, in Nehemiah 2:1-5. The prince named in this verse is Nehemiah who, by the king’s orders, became the governor of Israel and brought the people back to God’s way.

Verse 26 says after this first period of seven weeks (49 years), when Nehemiah was in charge, will come an additional 62 weeks (434 years). At the close of this time the “Anointed One” would be cut off. Counting, then, the 483 years from the king’s decree for Nehemiah to restore the city of Jerusalem, we come to the year of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem – the event we today call Palm Sunday. That was the day Jesus rode into Jerusalem on the donkey’s colt, offering Himself as the King of the Jews. His offer was refused, and a few days later He was crucified – cut off.

Verse 27 gives one additional week as the closing of this prophecy – a final seven years which is broken into two parts. This “week” or seven years begins with a covenant between “Daniel’s people” – Israel, and ends with the return of Jesus to earth. In Daniel 12:11, God tells us the exact number of days from the middle event of this seven-year period – the abomination of desolation – until Jesus steps onto the Mount of Olives, and puts an end to the “desolator” (the antichrist).

Prayer: Father, help us to understand Your faithfulness in completing everything You have prophesied in complete agreement with all You have said. Thank you for warning us ahead of time about things to come. May we keep our eyes always on You Lord Jesus. In Your name we pray, Amen. 

From Global Media Outreach 

Prophecies Given and Fulfilled

 

How do we know that prophecies we are reading about the end times will be fulfilled? All we need to do is look at the Bible and history to see how God’s prophecies have been fulfilled in the past. We will study two specific prophecies here as examples of many more fitting the same pattern of being fulfilled.

First, we look at the prophecy God gave to Daniel in 2:31-45. This is sometimes called Nebuchadnezzar’s Dream. The king dreamed of a huge statue with a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, stomach and thighs of bronze, legs of iron, and feet of iron mixed with clay. 

God gave the interpretation of this dream to Daniel – a kind of world history of great conquerors. Nebuchadnezzar was the head of gold, and the Medo-Persian Empire would be the chest and arms of silver. In Isaiah 45:1, over 300 years before it happened, God told Isaiah the name of the king – Cyrus – who would be instrumental in returning the Jewish people from their captivity in Babylon. 

“This is what the Lord says to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of to subdue nations before him and to strip kings of their armor, to open doors before him so that gates will not be shut"

We can all read history to see how the Greek and Roman empires became the third and fourth great conquerors of the world, and many of the details of these two conquerors are also given as prophecy by God. We find a restatement of these conquerors given in Daniel chapter 7, with some additional details which were also fulfilled in every detail.

Second, we look briefly at a picture-prophecy God gave in the Tabernacle He designed for the people of Israel – Exodus 2 – and the High Priestly role He commanded for Aaron – Exodus 26. While this space is far too small to give all the details, here are some of the ways this building was a prophetic picture of Jesus Christ:

- One entrance – Jesus is the only Way (John 14:6).

- Bronze altar and fixtures – bronze speaks of judgment; Revelation 1:5 shows Jesus with feet of bronze.

- Silver for the foundations – this silver was received as “redemption” payments the people paid for every male (Exodus 30:11-15) – Jesus paid the price of our eternal redemption.

- Curtains of fine linen – linen is a picture of righteousness (Revelation 19:8).

- Colors used in the Tabernacle: purple (Jesus is King of Kings – Matthew); red (Jesus’ blood); white (Jesus’ perfect life); blue (Jesus’ eternal home).

- Porpoise skin as the outer layer for the Tabernacle – this was the source of shoes, and there would have been no more available in the desert, so this becomes a picture of Jesus providing for all our needs.

We continue with the order of furniture in the Tabernacle:

- Bronze altar – Jesus’ sacrifice.

- Laver – keeping our hands and feet (our life) clean from sin.

- Candelabra – Jesus is the Light of the World, and also calls us the light of the world (Matthew 5:14).

- Table of Showbread – fellowship with other believers in Jesus, the Bread of Life (John 6:22-40).

- Altar of Incense – prayer.

- Ark of the Covenant and the Mercy Seat – Jesus gave His life, His blood, so we can come before God.

Third, there are more than 100 prophecies in the Old Testament that Jesus fulfilled when He came to earth as a human. The graphic lists just a few of them. 

Prayer: Father, help us to see the wonderful pictures of Jesus you have given us throughout the Bible and all the prophecies You have given for us to understand. You are so very good and we love you Lord! In Jesus' name, Amen. 

Created for a Purpose (2)

 

The "will of God" is to be "conformed to the image of his Son." This means He wants us to change until we look like Jesus. Have you ever noticed how couples who have been married for a long time start to look like each other? This is what we're supposed to do; be so close, so familiar, so intimate with Jesus that we begin to look like Him. Such intimacy and familiarity is achieved as we are filled with the Spirit – we give God’s Spirit complete control of our life every moment of every day, hearing Him and obeying Him immediately in all things.

Romans 12:2 tells us we are to be "transformed by the renewing of our minds." Some kinds of transformation can become very scary in our world as we watch our cultures being transformed into something we don't recognize.

Transformation for the Christian, however, is not a scary prospect because we know who and what Jesus is. We don't have to be afraid of becoming like Him. In fact, we look forward to it because for eternity "we shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2). Ephesians 5:27 describes in a different way what we will be when we are like Him: “…so that He might present the church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish."

Philippians 2 says: "Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure." 

Prayer: Father God, we know that this kind of change is impossible for us to achieve on our own. But,  it is Your purpose for us through Your Spirit and requires only our willing choice to give You permission to make it true in us. Please help us, this day, to be comforted to the image of Your Son Jesus Christ. In His name we pray, Amen. 

From Global Media Outreach 

Created for a Purpose

 

What does God want me to be? What is God’s purpose for me? These questions are cries of our hearts from the moment we are born again until the moment we die. We yearn to know the meaning of our lives – God's will for our lives. This will be our discussion for the next few lessons.

When we study the Bible we find the phrase "the will of God" or "His will" several times and in several specific connotations. Let's look at them in order of occurrence in our lives rather than in consecutive scriptural order. The first is found in 2 Peter 3:9 where we are told "The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance." God's will for our lives, first of all, is that we should be saved. He wants us to be with Him for eternity.

Once we have been saved, the next "will of God" is our sanctification. This big word is used in the Bible in such places as 1 Thessalonians 4:3 - "For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality." Sanctification means to be set apart. God wants us to be separate and different from the people of this world who are not His. One of the first demonstrations of sin in our life is living for our own pleasure and desire rather than for the good of others. We can see this in very young children who want their own way.

As we grow, the needs of our bodies become our gods so we follow every desire our bodies imagine. God’s purpose for us is that we control our bodies rather than being controlled by them. Sexual immorality is one of our easiest sins to fall into because it is a primary drive in our life – to join with someone to make a family. God created this need in us, but true satisfaction of this need can only come when our drive is controlled to be used only in God’s designed way – one man and one woman dedicated to each other in marriage to a life-long partnership so children can be raised in a safe and loving home. Anything – everything else is sin.

God’s command is for our complete commitment to Him – He wants us to have no other gods in our lives. Addictions are so easily made into gods in our affections and our slavery to them – but God wants us to be free of every slavery to sin. The only way it is possible is to set aside everything else which can keep us from Him. And because God intended the marriage bond to be the strongest relationship we have on earth, the physical relationship is intended to make this bond permanent.

God’s purpose for us is to be pure in our body and mind until our marriage, and then the marriage bed is sanctified by God and used by Him to make the husband and wife into a beautiful picture of how much He loves us as believers, a love giving everything to the other for their good.