What Is Next?*
Considering the speed and escalation of world events, what is next on the prophetic timeline? What will we see happen in the future? What should be our role as these events unfold? The prophets, and our Savior, Jesus, gave specific details and warnings for us to know and heed.
The prophet Ezekiel wrote of the restoration of the nation of Israel, not because of the righteousness of its inhabitants, but, as the LORD said, "...I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went. And I will sanctify my great name...and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD...when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes." The LORD also promised to cleanse Israel from its sins and give them a new heart and spirit. This renewal and cleansing will cause Israel to walk in the statutes and judgments of the LORD..."and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God." A former desolate landscape would bloom like a garden and be inhabited. The LORD further promised: "And ye shall know that I am the LORD, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves, and shall put my spirit in you and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the LORD have spoken it, and performed it, saith the LORD." (see Ezek. 36 and 37).
We have seen already that the LORD has miraculously restored Israel as a nation (1948), restored the Hebrew language, and caused the formerly barren landscape to bloom and be abundantly fruitful.
It is when the people of Israel and the nation have been restored, that the LORD prophesies an attack will come from various nations. As Ezekiel records in Ch. 38, enemy nations are named, which include what many agree to be Russia, Persia (Iran), Ethiopia, Libya and others, that join together and invade the land of Israel. This is something that only occurs after Israel has been restored as it is now. We see today that many of these nations are already hostile to Israel.
Jesus prophesied in great detail what the nation of Israel and the world can expect to happen. Three of the Gospels include this prophecy: Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21. Jesus began by prophesying the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, the same temple that was the masterpiece of Israel and the focal point of their worship and sacrifices. This has already happened, and all that is left are the foundational stones of the western wall. Plans are already established now and items prepared for the rebuilding of a temple in Jerusalem. Jesus also described the coming of wars, including wars of ethnic hatred. We have seen many wars based upon ethnic hatred, but the best example is WWII, and the "ethnic cleansing" and extermination planned and carried out by the Nazis mainly against Jews. Jesus also said at this time, deceptions by false christs, or by those deceivers coming in Christ's name, false prophets and false signs and wonders, are coming that will seduce and deceive many, even, if possible, the elect. All could be susceptible to this deception. Jesus mentioned the abomination of desolation that would be committed in the (rebuilt) temple that the prophet Daniel spoke about. There will be disbelief that the Son of man will be returning with judgment, just as those in Noah's day failed to heed the warning given by the building of the ark against the coming flood waters of judgment. Jesus warned that the generation that saw these things shall not pass, "till all these things be fulfilled...But as the days of Noe (Noah) were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be..." Jesus said that no man, and no angels will know the exact hour when all is fulfilled and the Son of man is to return, but the Father in heaven only. We are to be prepared: "Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your LORD doth come." Jesus wanted His disciples then and now to be prepared for what was to come next.
These are some of the things that Jesus prophesied to His disciples about the days that were to come, and our generation has witnessed them. As Jesus also said, there would be people who would ignore the warnings as the people of Noah's time did. Peter also wrote that there would be scoffers in the last days who would choose willfully to be ignorant of the previous flood of judgment and also deny the signs of the pending judgment of God. We see that unbelief today even in the face of scientific evidence of a universal flood.
Can we now see what is coming next? How are we supposed to respond to this knowledge? Jesus told a parable in Luke 19 that began: "A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return. And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy (pragmateuomai - carry on business) till I come." To occupy is also a military term. We need to understand the coming events and what we need to be doing. Distractions of the world, as Jesus warned, mean to keep us from carrying on the spiritual occupation that the LORD has given us to do until His return and to keep us unaware of the coming of the moment. In Luke 21, Jesus said about the cares of this life: "For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man."
The Lord Jesus didn't stop there, however. In the last moments before His arrest and crucifixion, He prayed to His Father regarding how we have been equipped by Him to occupy until He comes. As the LORD acted on behalf of Israel for His name's sake (see Ezekiel above), Jesus prayed to His Father in heaven in John 17 that He had manifested the LORD's name to the men, the disciples, in His care (and to us also). He had given them, and us, the words of His Father, and they had received those words and believed that the Father had sent Him, Jesus. He also prayed: "Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are...I have given them thy word...I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world....Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me." We are not to be divided but united in Christ and in the Father.
Not only did Jesus pray that He had sanctified us and united us in Him with the Father, but also that we would have the same glory as Jesus had in the love of His Father from before the foundation of the world, that we would be unified together and made perfect in this unity of glory that the world may know that the Father has indeed sent the Son, Jesus. Jesus concluded: "And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them."
This is how the world is to know through us that the Father sent His Son. The prophet Daniel, in Ch. 12, also wrote about the glory light with which the people of God would shine in the latter days, in a prophetic word that was to remain sealed until the time of the end, which words we may now receive and understand. This is how we are to occupy until He comes.
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