America herself is falling headlong into an abyss of depravation. Homosexuals have rights most other citizens can only dream of. Anyone disagreeing with the homosexual agenda is a bigot and homophobe and must be "reeducated." Abortion hangs like a black pall over American politics and morality. Millions of unborn children are discarded like so much rubbish each year. Our public schools have become armed camps and SAT scores continue to plummet. Kids are killing kids. Mass murders have become common fare with scarcely a week going by without another bitter person taking their revenge on innocents who are in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Suicide, murder, abortion, drug abuse, crime and other societal ills have increased at an astounding rate over the last 25 years, especially among the youth. News of an incurable disease taking the lives of thousands of people annually has become routine. Predictions of massive starvation are becoming increasingly common. Aside from these political events, volcanic eruptions and devastating earthquakes seem to be increasing at an alarming rate.

Is the world going crazy? What's going on? Nothing can explain the world wrenching changes that have occurred since the late 1980s. They are literally astounding. What is happening? God seems to be intervening in world events at an ever accelerating pace. But why?

Are these the last days that are spoken of in the Bible? Will the improbable events, that are swirling around us at an ever increasing pace, lead to the rapture of the Church, the return of Christ, and Armageddon? If so when, and what and how will it happen?

This study on prophecy will astonish many of you. But don't expect all of your questions to be answered!

Why Study Prophecy?

Volumes have been written about the "latter days", "last days", the "Lords Day," and other references to the days just before the return of Christ. Unfortunately, for the layperson, these studies in eschatology often have as many interpretations as there are authors writing about them. Many come from cults who twist scripture to fit their own ends, claiming, for instance, that they are the 144,000 mentioned in Revelation. Others symbolize by allegory what are obviously clear references to future events and conditions, in order to claim Christ's Kingdom is already here, and that it is up to us to bring peace and prosperity to the world.

Tragically, many of these authors come from evangelical and Pentecostal denominations. Some even claim special 'new' revelation from the Holy Spirit through personal prophecy which they will not permit to be challenged. In doing so, such self-proclaimed prophets put themselves above the Bible (1 Corinthians 4:6; 14:29; 1 John 4:1; and Revelation 22:18-19). Instead they pick and choose only those things they want to accept and believe, often for self-serving reasons. To treat prophecy as allegory or metaphor denies the inerrancy of scripture. Examples abound of such authors writing interpretations that are self-serving.

A cursory, though serious, study of scripture will prove these interpretations to be false, or at least misleading. Yet, even when these obviously false interpretations are put aside, there remains an array of widely divergent interpretations of the same prophecies between serious and respected authors. How can so many biblical scholars seeking God's truth come to such different conclusions? Quite simply, "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the son, but only the Father." (Matthew 24:36). If neither Jesus nor the angels know the days and hours, why do we think we can know? We can't. Only the Father knows.

So, if specific days are not to be known by man, why even bother to study prophecy? Actually, many pastors and laymen incorrectly take this position, but this is as wrong as over-emphasizing prophecy. Quite simply, if God put them in His Word, then they are meant to be studied by us. We are told "to not treat prophecies with contempt", but instead "to pay attention to prophecy, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns..." (1 Thessalonians 5:20; 2 Peter 1:19). No prophecy of scripture comes by man's ideas or interpretation, but rather by God through the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:20-21). Furthermore, all scripture is important to having a full knowledge of God and Christ, and to fully understand His great and precious promises (2 Peter 1:3-4).

Jesus gave us a sign to tell us when the "season" of the last days were upon us: "For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines, pestilence and earthquakes in various places,... and fearful events and great signs from heaven. All these are the beginning of birth pains." (Matthew 24:5-8; Luke 21:8-11). Just as birth pains increase in frequency before birth occurs, false messiahs, wars and rumors of war, earthquakes and disease, and signs in the heavens have been occurring in increasing frequency.

Gurus and others claiming to be the world's messiah are a dime a dozen. Scholars are providing increasing evidence that the New Age Movement is becoming a dominant force within the United States and other non-communist countries. This pantheistic religion (god is everything, everything is god) is providing the needed leadership in everything from the environmental movement to women's liberation and abortion. Satanism is becoming common place everywhere in America. News reports of human sacrifice are beginning to show the magnitude and depth of the occult in our society. It has been estimated that one out of five missing children wind up as a sacrifice on Satan's altar! Wars, civil wars, threats of war are a continuously increasing fare assaulting us each day in the news. Over 25 and 50 million people were killed in World War's I and II alone!

Although the frequency of destructive earthquakes having a Richter scale of over 7.0 has remained static for the past 100 years, those over 6.0 is perceptibly increasing. Reports of massive destruction and death from earthquakes in the Americas, Japan and Southern Russia greet us in the news several times a year. Such occurrences only happened once a decade only a few short years ago. AIDs runs rampant in certain high risk groups, with resulting mortality nearly doubling each year. Entire generations have been nearly eliminated by this disease in certain cities and regions in Africa, and now in Southeast Asia. Cholera outbreaks in various parts of the world greet us in the morning news. Solar flare (sun spot) activity in 1998 is setting new records in intensity, leading some astronomers to predict incredible displays of Aurelia Borealis over much of the world until at least 2002. A devastating famine in Africa in 1991-1992 was barely averted. This famine could have killed as many as 25 to 30 million people through starvation and pestilence.

Unfortunately, there are those today that are making specific predictions of what and how things are going to happen according to prophecy. Some even go so far as to provide dates, even though the Bible specifically forbids it.

The most common predictions concern the fulfillment of Ezekiel 38 and 39; where God graphically describes drawing Russia into battle, along with most Arab nations, against Israel. Perhaps so. Certainly the popular fundamental and evangelical thought today is that Russia and its Arab allies will invade Israel before the Tribulation begins. But there is also overwhelming prophetic evidence that this invasion may occur just before the middle of the tribulation, rather than before the tribulation. If so, it would likely be the event that reveals Jesus Christ as the Messiah to the Jews, if Ezekiel 39:22 is taken literally!

There is room for legitimate disagreement over when this prophecy will be fulfilled. But when an author becomes dogmatic about timing, the result can potentially cause discouragement when his prediction doesn't happen. So don't be discouraged if this prophecy is not fulfilled in the immediate future. One thing we do know; this prophecy will be fulfilled not long after the Jews return to their homeland (Israel)! (Ezekiel 36:8-9) Since Israel became a nation in 1949, the fulfillment of Ezekiel 38 and 39 cannot be too far into the future! Therefore, neither can the Tribulation!

It is necessary to identify possible events that could fulfill prophecy. Unfortunately, there is an overwhelming temptation by many students of prophecy to predict detailed scenarios from current events based on some favorite prophecy, without considering other relevant prophecies. Therein lies the difficulty of interpreting prophecy. Even when other prophecies are considered, there are just too many avenues events can take and still fulfill a specific prophecy.

The point is, God rarely does things the way men think He should. Whenever man attempts to predict specific events leading to the fulfillment of prophecy, he is invariably wrong!

It is clear from scripture that a more or less unified world system of government/economy and religion will develop either before, or at, the time the Tribulation begins. The first step towards this unity has just been taken.

President Bush's "New World Order" may be the first evidence needed to show the world it needs to have a one-world government and/or economy in order to survive. This new world order is now taking shape and is most evident in the evolution of a coalition of nations promising (and enforcing) peace and economic prosperity for the world. The Palestine issue will somehow be resolved. After all, the world is desperate for such promises!

The emergence of a "one-world church or religion" that encompasses all religions "in peace and harmony" is already coming forth in the new age/environmental movement. Matthew 24:4-5, 10-12, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3 and Revelation 17:1-6, as well as others, promise that this "harlot" church will be based on deception, and many will be led astray before and during the first three and a half years of the Tribulation. Finally, we can expect additional wars (to bring peace, of course!), false messiahs, earthquakes, famines and disease. How soon will these occur? Perhaps as early as tomorrow, or perhaps (though unlikely) over the next 20 years or more. According to United Nations documents, the UN Charter will be changed in the year 2000 to make it the World Government, and the Earth Charter will be ratified creating a one-world religion. These plans will be discussed in greater detail in later lessons. We don't know the days nor hours; but we do know we are now in the "season".

Even more telling is the entire book of Revelation. The first three chapters of Revelation John's prophecy focuses on the Church. From that point on, the Church is never mentioned again throughout the rest of Revelation--just as if it disappears! That could only happen if the Church is raptured before the seven year Tribulation (as Rev 3:10 clearly implies), and the balance of the Revelation prophecies focus on the Jews and world during the Tribulation. Is this a correct interpretation? If so, many interpretations claiming that the Christian Church is involved in this or that tribulation prophecy cannot be correct.

A prophecy may have a double meaning, jump hundreds or thousands of years in the same sentence, or go from a distant future event to a mid-distant event and back to the distant event, all within the same paragraph. One of the greatest examples of a break in mid-sentence occurs when Jesus read from Isaiah 61 and proclaimed the fulfillment of verse 1 and the first half of 2 (Luke 4:18-19). But He stopped in the middle of verse two. The balance of verse 2 and 3 is yet to be fulfilled!

Where an author starts with prophetic interpretation will, to a large degree, determine how certain prophecies are interpreted. For instance, if an expositor starts with Revelation and relates all other prophecy to this book, the possible variations to interpretation is endless. Such an approach will lead to a confusing array of possibilities about whom, what, where and when certain things will happen.

On the other hand, if the Book of Daniel is used as the foundation for prophetic interpretation, many possible interpretations of other prophecies, including Revelation, are eliminated. But why Daniel? Why not start with Revelation, or Jeremiah, or Ezekiel? Daniel certainly had supernatural wisdom and understanding of visions and dreams (Daniel 1:17), and certainly demonstrated his faithfulness and humility to God on numerous occasions. But so did the other prophets.

For whatever reason, Daniel was highly esteemed by God (Dan 9:23), and was chosen to give him insight with understanding....of the vision (Dan 9:22-23). Again in Daniel 10:14 he was told by an angel "I have come to explain to you what will happen to your people (the Jews) in the future, for the vision concerns a time yet to come." As Daniel concluded his prophetic life he was told to "close up and seal the words of the scroll until the time of the end." (Dan 12:4). When Daniel persisted, he was again told "Go your way, Daniel, because the words are closed up and sealed until the time of the end." Daniel was given incredible insight into future and end-time events.

The book of Daniel appears to hold the key to understanding all other end-time prophecies. It is believed by many prophetic scholars that this astonishing book literally provides a template upon which to structure other prophecy. And in doing so, it potentially eliminates considerable confusion. The fact that many of the prophecies in Daniel's four visions have already been fulfilled with incredible historical accuracy only adds credibility to this approach to prophetic interpretation.

Therefore, this book will approach prophetic interpretation using a Daniel template with the full understanding that such an approach could still lead to incorrect interpretations. Yet to approach this subject from any other direction leads to a hopeless morass of contradictions and confusion. And God is not the author of confusion.

Prophetic Order from Chaos

Even with the understanding that Daniel is God's key to understanding end-time prophecy, it still leaves many possible ways to interpret prophecy. This problem is one of the biggest sources of interpretation differences between Bible scholars. Since I must make the same decisions, it is only fair that I explain how I decided between one possible interpretation verses another. Again came a conviction that Daniel's "Seventy Weeks of Years" (Daniel 9:20-27) is God's "Rosette Stone" within the Daniel template, against which all prophecy must fit. Viewing prophecy by using Daniel's Rosette Stone begins to bring order out of confusion.

The Book of Daniel provides the template necessary to see how these peaks are oriented relative to one another along the prophetic "mountain range." The valleys are the vague, or missing, information between the prophetic events. A clear understanding is impossible. Hence, we can know the seasons because we can see the "peaks" as they occur, but just as there can be multiple routes to get from one mountain peak to another, so are there many routes current events can take to get to the next prophetic event.

Anyone who tries to force a certain route (i.e. predict how events will exactly unfold to fulfill a prophecy) will invariably be wrong. Yet every expositor dealing with end-time prophecy must judge whether current events are leading to prophetic fulfillment. The key is not to be dogmatic about how a certain prophecy will be fulfilled.

Assumptions

Many hundreds of hours have been spent putting this study together. Many references have been studied that provide a cross-section of interpretations for various prophecies. As with any expositor, assumptions were made in writing this study that ultimately provides the framework for conclusions drawn and information discussed.

In this study each interpretation was tested against the Daniel Template. Did the author place his interpretation in context with the Jews? How does that interpretation fit with other prophetic events. My guide is: 1) to always take the simplest interpretation first using as literal an interpretation as possible, 2) not to symbolize or spiritualize what is clearly an earthly event, 3) not to humanize what are plainly descriptions of demons, etc. and finally, 4) to seek the solution that does not violate or negate other well defined prophetic events.

The result, I hope, is the sequence of prophetic fulfillment having the fewest unresolved conflicts. There are many interpretations that legitimately could be explained a different way, and I am the first to admit my way could be (and in at least some cases probably is) incorrect. Participants in the study are encouraged to discuss alternative interpretations.

However, it is in the best interest of all who participate not to become dogmatic, but rather offer alternative explanations for discussion purposes. Some questions will never be resolved until we have the advantage of 20/20 hindsight. As noted before, however, the interpretation chosen should have the least amount of conflict with other, more clearly defined prophetic events. Like all men, my understanding is limited, and therefore subject to error. I claim no direct revelation from God.

Positions of prophetic events in the charts are only relative, and intended to provide the approximate time and sequence of occurrence. The student is cautioned that although these are based on assumptions that make the most sense, they should only be used as guides to understanding, rather than absolutes.

New International vs. King James Bible version

Much blood was shed during the middle ages during raging battles over Bible translations. Disagreements over translations, while sincere and even sometimes real, cause division and lead people away from the very truth God intends to bring to the reader.

Nonetheless, in an attempt to remove as much controversy over translation as possible, all discussion concerning individual prophecies are checked for consistency with the KJV. Where significant discrepancies exist, the original Hebrew or Greek is used.

The Danger of Ignoring Prophecy

The Church is asleep. Most Christians are nowhere near spiritually prepared for such a shock. Jesus warns us,

Many, if not most, in the Church are not ready for what is about to happen. These things are likely to occur even if we are not in the end times. If this trouble does not occur, or if the pre-tribulation rapture does take us away to Christ so we escape this trouble, we have lost nothing and have gained everything. If we do not prepare ourselves spiritually, and perhaps physically, we could lose everything. We should grieve for those who are asleep, and help them understand the consequences of not being prepared!