Let us just take this week of Daniel and go back through time. As we go back through time, there are two points in history where we can bring this. We can either bring it back to 70 A.D., the time when Jerusalem was destroyed by the Roman army under Titus, and it fell on August 10, 70 A.D., the city was demolished, the temple made ruins, and the remaining Jews were sold to the various nations into slavery. That set in motion a long period of Jewish dispersion that was prophesied in the 1st chapter of Hosea. However if we choose 70 A.D., we now have a question. If we take these 2000 prophetic years and just go back to 70 A.D., here is what we come up with. It means that the week of Daniel cannot start until somewhere around 2035 A.D. That presents a problem. We have a chart fixed up that we will be giving you copies of, showing you how to look at this. The reason I am going to say this next thing is this, The world does not have that much time left. Everything is being moved in place and the world does not realize what is going on. The very fact Israel has now been brought to a precise time factor that she is faced with some kind of ultimatum causes me to ask, What will she do? Will she, in concessions, give up land? Will she back off from land she is supposed to have? We have to realize, as all these other prophecies we have read in other messages feed into this picture, I am convinced that once God gets conditions just right, as He has in the past, He will see that Israel is forced by circumstances to take more land instead of giving up some of what they have already. As they were compelled in 1967 to take land, which they did not even plan to take at that time, then somehow or other, though it may look now that somewhere in the near future Israel could be pressured to give up, on the other hand, if we are looking at a prophetic picture the right way, things are going to be different than that. There are many things we could look at right now; but we have to realize that what appears on the surface, to the natural eye, may look questionable, misgiving, and uncertain; but there are prophecies that point in the last days, and when God does these things in the last days, it is not going to take Him 40 or 50 long years to do them. In the Middle East, things will always work different than the way we Gentiles would expect them to work. When God does something with Israel, it is not spaced out over years of time in respect to certain specific events. Therefore with that in mind, we do not have enough time, the way other things are fitting together, to say the week of Daniel cannot come until around 2035. If we are measuring this two thousand years of prophetic time, back to 70 A.D. then take that span of time, break it down into prophetic time, it will take you through to around 2035 before the week can start. Therefore here is why I say it cannot go that long. These prophecies, as we look at this, through these frames we will call windows, we could go back to 1939, that was a precise year. As I read in the year of 1989 when the Jerusalem Post came out in the month of March and the writer of that article, a headline article, 50 years ago this month the world entered an era of time from which there is no return. When I read that, I said there is a precise time factor in the minds of the Jewish editorial writers, historians, commentators and such, that something was set in motion. Because in Austria Jews began to be rounded up and questioned. That was the beginning of a process of God fulfilling prophecies that will develop in the last days. That is why when you go to Jeremiah 16, verses 14-18, and read there about the gradual restoration and the people of Israel coming back in the last days, first He said He would send fishermen. We see what that is talking about. Naturally it is symbolic language, but the symbolic language has to be understood in earthly events. So when the old Zionist rabbis, philosophers, and leaders began to go to the various Jewish societies scattered through the world and began to say Gentlemen, the time has come we must prepare to go home. I will never forget what that rabbi told me in 1968: that when they did that, many times they were booed. It sounded foolish to a lot of Jews. Then we come to the year 1939. What does the prophecy of Jeremiah say? After that He will send hunters and He will hunt them from the hills and the valleys. If you could read the dark years between 39 and 45 how the Jew looked for every crevice, nook, cave, and cellar, and attic, in every kind of circumstance scattered throughout central Europe and western Europe, to hide from the SS and the Gestapo officers. They were rounded up by truck loads and train loads and shipped through the country to certain points to face death. They were slaughtered in worse ways than animals at the Louisville Stockyard, being carted off to some meat processing factory. That is why we have to see what the hunters were. God was putting pressure, putting a fear upon the Jewish society. Keep in mind, in these last days as these things began to come to an end, we have to make them fit the words of Jesus in Matthew 24; and He plainly tells us there as He refers to the fig tree, the rebirth of Israel, and the rising of Israel in national power and them beginning to climb to world preeminence, Jesus said this, When you see all these things coming to pass, this generation (the generation seeing those things) shall not pass away until all these things be fulfilled. That means the great tribulation, the wrath of God and all of that. All of the things He was speaking of were for the last generation of these last days. Not something that is going to be carried over in the Millennium, but everything that is pointing to the last days, and what constitutes the last days will be fulfilled. This now living generation will live to see it all climax. In other words, When it is all wrapped up, there will still be some left alive that saw the FIG TREE (ISRAEL) start to put on leaves and get ready to produce. Naturally there are a lot of people with different ideas of what a generation is. One will say it is forty years, another will say it is fifty years. Another wants to go to a hundred years. It is not a hundred years. It is true when you study the genealogy of Christ and how they relate that in Matthew or Luke, forty years between this man and forty years between that man, and so on and so forth, it is true that it refers to a generation. However when we look to the advent of Christ and how things were fulfilled in His first advent, from the time Christ was born, which set certain prophecies in motion, and as time progressed and He comes to His baptism, then He is anointed and ministers three and one half years. Then He comes to Calvary. All along through those years certain prophecies that spoke of this were being fulfilled. Then we could sat that from His birth to 70 A.D. we have a span of seventy years at the most, God has exclusively dealt with the Jewish nation that has been restored in the land. Therefore at the end of seventy years, he sent the Roman army and destroys them. They are scattered, never to be dealt with any more until only in the last days. So my point is this, The reason I illustrate that 70 A.D., that is not where we terminate this line. (pointing to chart) As I say, we would have to push the week of Daniel over here to 2035. That is where it figures out to be. On the other hand, if it has to be to a fixed time, the only other fixed time you can find in the Bible, that you could measure that span of time from, and have scriptural, logical, sensible means, you have to take it to 33 A.D.: which is the time when Jesus was crucified. Now if we can see what happened and understand prophetically what had happened, 33 A.D. in the advent of Christ, brings Israel to the end of Daniel's 69 weeks of prophetic time. That was God's measuring stick to them. Now let us study that for a little bit, the measuring stick. That 69 weeks you read about in Daniel 9:25-26, definitely had a beginning point in time, but you will notice that it does not stipulate exactly when this 69 weeks or 483 prophetic years would end, as far as giving them any kind of chart to go by. However, if they would have recognized the decree that came in Nehemiah's day, and they would have been spiritually walking in the light of that, do you know what that yardstick should have told some of those Jewish leaders? If they really had believed their prophet, they should have understood that somewhere as they began to get down in the last 35 or 40 years of this point of time, they could begin to look at one another and say, Gentlemen, I perceive that by the word of God, we must be entering an era of time that we can expect our Messiah. That is how it should have been because they had a fixed point to look at. Remember Gentlemen, the decree that Nehemiah came with to build the walls? They were not ignorant of that. That was recorded in their chronology. It is just that a fixed ending was not written. Nevertheless it was described in a concealed way by showing them that as this 69th week, (the 483 years) is coming to a climax, the Messiah would be cut off. Because of their own spiritual ignorance, they failed to recognize the time they were living in. That very scripture is where Paul, in Romans 11, got his revelation and understanding, that blindness in part had happened to Israel. He did not lay all the blame on to them, because he did say, in part. For how long would this blindness prevail? Until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. Those rabbis, which should have been watching those 69 weeks come about, when they began to hear of this man that began to preach and do miracles, should that not have caused them to go to the writings of the prophet Daniel and investigate more closely? Should that not have caused them to begin to wonder, Could be our Messiah? It had the opposite effect, they began to find all kinds of fault with. Their traditional school of thought would not let them see a thing. I will have to say, The Gentile religious world today is under the same kind of blinding cloud. There are writings in the Bible that have been there for hundreds of years, ever since the prophets of old picked up a pen and wrote them, that should be enough to show a spiritual minded person a few things; but Gentile religious mind's are just as blind as any Jewish Pharisee you can read about in the Bible. They cannot spiritually tell daylight from dark as far as putting together any kind of prophetic picture from the scriptures. As far as the Jews recognizing their time of visitation, if the main body of their leaders had recognized what was happening, where would we Gentiles be today? The gospel was presented to the Gentiles as a result of the Jews rejecting their Messiah, but all of that was in the foreknowledge of the great Creator, so it did not come about because He did not know what else to do. You just have to realize that the plan of salvation and restoration is a very intelligently devised plan that no mortal could have been the author of. Those rabbis had the seventy weeks of Daniel but I am sure they looked at those scriptures the same way Gentiles look at the words of Jesus. Gentiles read those things Jesus gave as signs to watch for: to know the season He would be returning in, but Gentile scholars have spent hundreds of years developing theories about what they mean and they have passed right by the signs along the way that could have been a clue for them, to let them know where we are in time. Naturally they are conscious of some of the signs, but they have no order to them. They observe some of the things we see in the News day by day; and that causes them to say, Time is short: Jesus could come any minute now. Well, time is short, that is sure, but the rapture will not take place before Ezekiel 38 and 39 are fulfilled, so even though we are persuaded that this generation will see the wrap up of all that is written of this dispensation, we still have to realize that God is not going to get in a hurry and bypass something His prophets have been inspired to speak of. It is the same way with those Scribes and Pharisees in the days of the first advent of Jesus on earth: if they had read the writings of their prophets the right way and been ready to receive the Messiah, look what that would have done to all these other prophecies that were to be fulfilled between their rejection of the Messiah and the time when they (Israel) would recognize and accept Him. We have the revelation of Daniel 9:25-26, so it seems as clear as anything could be, "And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for Himself;" and naturally we think they should have realized what was going on when they began to hear all the fussing and false accusation. Jerusalem was in an uproar because of Him. As time approached for the observance of the Passover, people were even asking Jesus, before He left Galilee, Are you going to Jerusalem to keep the Passover? He stayed behind. The rest of the family went ahead. So He went more or less in a concealed way. When He did come to Jerusalem, everybody in Jerusalem was saying, Do you think He will come? What was going on? Jerusalem was in an uproar, they were going to get that man and put Him where they thought He needed to be. We are tired of this devil coming around here, wrecking our tradition, our beautiful religious ceremonial program; and getting the people all stirred up and confused. They were basing their ideas and actions on the Bible, but they were doing it without a revelation. They stood in the streets, there was their Messiah, but they treated Him like an enemy. The man that was to be cut off exactly at the ending of the 69th week, was crucified there between two criminals, and those Jews did not know He was their Messiah that fulfilled those 69 weeks. My point in going through all that is this, (You will have to follow me all the way.) we have got to understand that 33 A.D. when Jesus was crucified, ended the 69th week, and there is an interval of time between the closing of the 69th and the initiating of the 70th one. There is a span of time which the prophet did not know the length of, between those last two weeks of prophetic time. But now that we are coming toward the end of our Grace Age, we have to begin to measure this backward, because we have a fixed point where it ends. The question is, Are we smart enough to take it back through time and come to an understanding of where it began? Just as they did not know how to end their 69th week, we are in the same position with the age of grace. Are we going to be caught sound asleep like they were? That is the point I am trying to illustrate. You take it back to the end of the 69th week, which I say falls exactly 33 A.D. Now if 33 A.D. is the point God had in mind when He had the prophet prophesy the language of these prophecies, and we see that Israel is going to be revived at the end of those two dispensational days, then here is how we can look at this time. From 33 A.D. we come to the year 2000 A.D. Using solar time, that is 1967 years of 365.25 days each. When you multiply 1967 years x 365.25 days, you get 718446.75 days. Then when you divide that by 360, (the number of days to a prophetic year) you come up with a total of 1995.68 prophetic years from the year Jesus was crucified to the year 2000 A.D. calendar time, which means that when the year 2000 arrives, we will still be 4 years and 291 days of prophetic time short of the two days (2000 years) of Hosea 6:1-2. That would mean that those two days of 1000 prophetic years each would expire between 2004 and 2005 A.D., starting of course with 33 A.D. when Jesus was crucified. (This is the year most scholars agree upon as the year of the crucifixion.) If after two days Jehovah is going to revive Israel, that means you can look for the 70th week of Daniel to start between 2004 and 2005 A.D., for in that week is when they are going to be revived; and it will be through the ministry of the two Jewish prophets of Revelation 11: 3-7. Do not be confused by all of these numbers. The 2000 years of calendar time are measured from the time of the birth of Christ, not His death, and they are 365.25 days each. The reason the two days of Hosea's prophecy cannot start before the time Jesus was crucified, is because the 69th week of Daniel's prophecy did not end until Jesus was cut off. Just remember the words of Daniel 9:26, "And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off;" and you will see that Hosea's two days could not start before then. With that in mind, I want you to think seriously: the year 2000 is only seven years away. I know one thing, if we all live another seven years the calendar is going to proclaim boldly 2000 A.D. I am wondering what the calendar publishers, even the world in general, is going to be thinking when that second Millennium is completed and the world is still going about its every day affairs? I cannot help but feel they are really going to put on the dog. Well we made it to 2000 A.D. so let us celebrate. By the calendar, they will be right; but by God's method of keeping time, the world will still be approximately 4 1/2 prophetic years short of 2000 years since the 69th week of Daniel came to an end. Nevertheless if the 70th week of Daniel is to literally start at the ending of the two days, do you know what that would means? That would tell you that by the year 2005, the last week of Daniel should be in place. That is just simple calculation based upon that which the Bible gives us to go by, and it in no way is an effort to try and predict the day and hour of the Lord's return. We will make sure you have the chart to look at as you try to concentrate on the conversion of solar time into prophetic time. I know some will say, Why does it have to be so confusing, but I say this: We ought to thank God that He has enabled us to see what we see. He has not changed His method of keeping time. It is man that keeps changing things. That is why I am so thankful that the Spirit of God caused Daniel and John to specify the exact number of days involved in the prophecy given for this last day wind up. When you see that the word of God has the 70th week of Daniel divided into two equal periods of 1260 days each, you should have no trouble figuring out how God keeps time. When you talk about the first 69 weeks of Daniel's 70 week prophesy, you are dealing with 483 years prophetic time. Bro. Jackson: Why is it so important for us to know all of this? Because we are dealing with events Jesus said would all take place in one generation, and you cannot stretch a generation to the extremes some people's ideas would stretch it to. It is true man measures this time factor from the birth of Christ to where we are now as solar time, but when we begin to look at the grace age, it did not start until the death of Christ Jesus, and if it is to be 2000 years long to harmonize with those prophecies and you use solar time to calculate it by, that would push the climax of the grace age and the fulfilling of that last week of Daniel too far into the 21st century for it to still be in the generation that saw the fig tree (Israel) put forth leaves and start the count down. With all of that in mind, as we begin to recognize the time factor man is living in, then this chart only represents, or illustrates how we perceive these prophecies that are related to it from the year 1939 up until now, and then on to the end. Therefore to state my point again, if the beginning point of measurement goes back to the crucifixion of Christ, as I believe it does, and not to the destruction of the temple in 70 A.D., then this should all work out as we have it portrayed. Simply because, if we move it up to the destruction of the temple, then this week of Daniel cannot come about until around 2035 A.D., and I just have to say, That takes the future and the coming of Christ for His Millennium reign far beyond our generation. There are those sitting here listening to me that belong to the same generation I belong to, and I realize I do not have to be alive to see the wind up of all of this; but some of us have to be: to fulfill the words of Jesus in Matthew 24:32-34 "Now learn a parable of the fig tree; (Israel) When his branch is yet tender, and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh: So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors. Verily I say unto you, This generation (the generation that saw the start of Israel being put back together) shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled." What things? The things He was speaking of just prior to that, the great tribulation being one of them. I do not speak from the standpoint that I have to be alive to see the end of all of this, but I am looking at a generation that people my age represent. I remember 1939 and the years following, when Hitler and his henchmen were determined to do away with the Jews altogether. That is why somewhere right in here is the beginning of a generation factor related to this prophecy, both to the Gentile side as well as the Jewish side. If you were to go to Israel today, you would find Jewish people in their late sixties, who were young children in the concentration camps in Hitler's hour. You could talk to some that survived the holocaust. They lost their parents, they have grown up from childhood, some from infancy, without their parents. They can tell you of the horror they experienced in that hour, how they lost their daddy and mother, and the suffering they witnessed. That is why we cannot push this line representing the grace age all the way over to 2035. That would take all those people out of the picture. It goes beyond the generation that has lived to see these end time things come about. In other words, keep in mind, when time starts that there are certain signs spoken of in the Bible that are to be markers representing the things Jesus spoke of in Matthew 24, that generation that begins to see those markers, at least some of them will live to see the end of it all. Sure there will be a lot of them die off before they get to the end, but some of that generation will be around to testify to what took place that started the end time wind up. Some that saw it, from the Gentile side, will be raptured, but others of that generation will go right on into the great tribulation. Somewhere as this thing is all over, and all these prophecies are fulfilled and everything in place, there will be some of those people still alive. There has always been a living testimony somewhere to bear witness of what God has done. Just like when Jesus was born, I would say there were a few children living in the neighborhood that eventually throughout the country side began to hear the story. Like, There was a woman that gave birth to a strange baby boy down in Bethlehem. Did you hear that story? Yes. Notice, it never went on record as far as the government, but do you think those sheep herders went back out there the next day and herded sheep saying, Oh, forget the whole thing. It is all a hoax. No. Those sheep herders never could forget how they heard the angels sing, and how they were told of the birth of a baby which would be a Savior to them. It is recorded in the 2nd chapter of Luke, beginning with verse 8. "And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us." Yes saints, those shepherds (which were eye witnesses) told that story for as long as they lived. Furthermore I seriously doubt that they were able to sleep that night, after hearing such news. My point is this, From that hour on there was a story that began to spread throughout the countryside. There is a woman in this land that gave birth to an unusual child. Of course if we look at the overall religious society of Israel in that day, it was just like our Gentile society is today. They would hear such a story and say, Oh that is nonsense. I do not believe any of that. Right here in the Jerusalem Post I just received, a writer, here in 1993, discussing his own nation as it exists today, made me think of the Sadducees of old. They claimed to be Abraham's seed but they did not believe in angels, they did not believe in the hereafter, nor did they believe in spirits. Yet they were ready to say, We are Abraham's seed. So what! I would just as soon heard someone say he was an Apache Indian, if that is all the respect he has for Abraham. If Abraham could come back and hear such as that, he would probably run him out of the country with a stick. To think a Jew that wants to lean on his genealogy, has no more revelation than that. Right in the Jerusalem Post yesterday that writer wrote this, Was the birth of the statehood of Israel a miracle? Was it an act of God, or do we associate it only as a process of man's human negotiation?. Any man or woman in their right mind would know that it had to be an act of God. After time had gone on for almost 1900 years since the destruction of the temple and their captivity, and then out of the chaos and disaster, and devastation of a war, the world is literally pressured to do something for the Jews, there is only one logical conclusion: God moved on those world leaders precisely at the right time to set the prophecies in motion. That is why 1948 brings us to a time factor, the time when the nation was reborn. It fulfills Isaiah 66, starting with verse 8. "Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children." Yes, a nation was born in one day, and that certainly caught the attention of a lot of Jew haters. But more than anything else, it established the fact that we were living in that generation Jesus spoke of, that would live to see the climax of all He had spoken of. If we can look at this time factor with a spiritual eye, it will speak for itself the things we have been stressing in this message. As I say this I want to say, For goodness sakes, when we look at this and would perceive that somewhere around the year 2000 A.D. or 2005 A.D. this prophetic time is going to run to an end. By all logical reasons we can perceive that somewhere in that time factor that week of Daniel will be set in motion. It is only seven years to the year 2000. Then it would only be four and one half years more to 2005 and you have the prophetic dispensation in line. Just keep in mind, we are not trying to predict a day, a year, or a month that Jesus Christ is coming. We are Gentiles; and Gentiles have always been foolish people; but we who are Christians know better than to do that. All down through time Gentiles have played with something. They have to have a set time. Last fall, there were characters walking the streets of Louisville, standing in front of bank buildings, airports and all sorts of places passing out tracts which stated, Divine revelation given to an Oriental boy, (which was just a kid) lets us know that October 28, 1992, the end of the world is coming and Jesus is coming in the rapture. Well saints we are still here and I will tell you why. It is not time for that yet. People who project those things are hanging their calculations on something that is unrelated to such a prophetic picture. They will go into certain things of the Law, they pull out certain types and say, according to the type here it must be such and such. You cannot use the Law like that. The type is in the Law, but until the nation of Israel returns to a time factor in which they are offering sacrifice on an altar again, and they have a priestly order functioning in their role, those things in prophecies of the future tense are still hanging suspended: just as though a stop watch had stopped all activity. Sure there are Jews back home, but they are not offering sacrifice. So with that we have to realize for that particular point of type, that would be out of the Law writing, like Leviticus, for it to be actually used as a help in understanding the coming of the Lord, then that portion of the law has to be active, which it is not now. Do you understand what I mean by that? There is no altar yet dedicated. There is no sacrifice on it. Therefore any type pertaining to Leviticus that is pointing to the fall of the year, beginning in the seventh month, is not active at this time. That is the way you have to look at it.

I was given a paper awhile ago that causes me to feel the way I do about some things that are going on.. The reason I am wanting to deal with things like this is because you are going to see in this religious world, another spirit rise up. It is coming from the realm of Roman Catholicism. I read a little sketch of it already. They too, are making predictions. Just this past July 1st, a priest in Portugal, at the place called Fatima, claims he was communicated with for a period of two hours by the virgin Mary. Out of that, he got a forty page sermon, supposedly from her. The predictions and things she informed him of, things that are about to be manifested in the human societies on earth. I tell you saints, some of it will never be because it is of the devil's doings. He is just using it to get a bunch of people that do not know their ABC's as far as the Bible is concerned, to believe in a myth of some kind. That is why I have to look at this Catholic spirit in these last days the way I do. It is coming on the scene, it is hovering over a bunch of spiritually dead Protestant people that no longer know a thing about real salvation. They are just religious. They just have a form of religion in their mind's. What they have is not in their hearts. You are not going to live this Christian life just in your mind. It has to be something that motivates you from within your heart. Catholicism has always been a thing of the mind; and this Catholic spirit is definitely coming on strong. To think that in a nation that was known for centuries as a Protestant nation, you can now buy these magazines on the News stands that make all sorts of claims that any true Christian ought to reject at once. Yet Protestant societies just gobble it all up. This priest that supposedly had this experience was so shook up by what he heard, because certain things were supposed to start in 1995, then 1996, 1997 and right up on to the year 2000. He speaks of devastating things taking place. Well I do not have to read that kind of things from his report: I find it is all in the Bible already. The fact that the Catholic Church now says so, does not mean anything at all to me; nor does it make the Catholic Church anything. I will say this, Everything written in this Book (the Bible) is going to come to pass whether the Catholic Church and apostate Protestantism agrees with it or not. Out of what they project, there may be certain things come about as they predict; and naturally people will rally around it because the world of religion looks to that old system as something special. The point is, This priest was so shook up when he notified Pope John Paul II and told of his experience, the pope was really a very nervous man. This priest related all this to him; and just think, he came to America, knowing all of that, and not one thing was said about any of it in Denver. Nevertheless when he began to downgrade America, and began to look at America's leadership, how America should take the leadership role in helping establish world peace, you have to realize that man was looking at something right down the road. I have said this before, I do not know that this man will actually live long enough to be the antichrist; but let us just say, If he is the man, he is going to be an old man by then. You have to realize, human beings only live so long, and the year 2000 is seven years off. That means that man is going to be in his 80's. Therefore there has to be certain health qualities that he will be beginning to enter into. I believe health wise, I would not see him as a man healthy enough to go through the whole week of Daniel; but if he sets a stage for something, then if God took him off the scene, the next man would step right in his shoes, and he would have a vision to carry out only what Pope John Paul II has started to do in these last days. The religious world will flock around that. Let me get back to our line of thought, looking toward the end through windows of prophecy. We realize that in 1967 the Jewish nation was faced with something she did not plan, but it worked for her good. She was living in a petitioned land, something like this. That was an area that many Jews, from the beginning of the 20th century, from Poland, Russia, different places of the world went back to and slowly bought up acre after acre of land. That was the Zionist movement's original plan: buy it up through centuries of time. They were buying up the waste land from the land owners, which was these Arabs you hear so much about in the News. That was not necessarily God's way. Not that He was against what they were doing: it was the fact that this method was too slow to accomplish all that was written in the scriptures pertaining to the end time. Well you know what happened. The United Nations Assembly was pressured to petitioned the land and grant the Jews a certain area they could come back to. However since the Palestinian Arab in there did not want a statehood, they did not want those Jews to be back there, so their idea was, We will destroy this state. At that time, King Nasser of Egypt was the leader. You know the whole story. In six days time Israel, that had been living in a petitioned land, yet from 1948 to 1967, God had allowed her to grow and prosper from nothing but obsolete weapons so primitive they were barely able to fight and defend themselves, to an hour when she had aircraft that was some of the best in the world, was able not only to defend themselves, but also to attain a great victory over their attackers. Think of it, in six days Israel defended herself, pushed her borders to the Jordan River here, to the Red Sea here, and took the Gaza Strip and old Jerusalem, which lays along right in there. Keep in mind Jesus prophesied in Luke's writing, as He spoke to the disciples concerning the last days, "And Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." It started with the Babylonians. Then it went to the Medes and Persians, then to the Greek, then to the Romans. He said it will be trodden down of the Gentiles until the time of the Gentiles be fulfilled. In June 1967, after almost 2500 years, Jerusalem was once again in the hands of its rightful owners. She had been under the control of some dominating empire all those years; and now Jerusalem was back under the control of the Israeli government. Think of it, the Jewish soldiers successfully drove the Jordanian Arab army out of there. Then when those soldiers stood at the western wall weeping, lifting their weapons in the air they cried, Never again will we see any flag flying over Jerusalem other than the Star of David. May I say this, the world of Gentiles may not have understood what that meant to the Jewish soldiers, but every time they go to school and study their histories, they study them strictly from the standpoint of who they are. That is why it was important for them to free that city. The only thing is, when they came to the holy temple mount area, they stopped short of going right in on that temple mount and running that Islamic bunch of leaders out of there and saying, from now on we will take this over. They stopped short so the Moslem Mosque is still standing there and the Moslems are allowed to go there for worship. The Israeli's knew the world, at that time, would not stand for Israel to go in there and destroy the Moslem's place of worship. That is why they stopped short of taking the whole city. They have lived in this occupied area and they put soldiers there and all this, and they have controlled the Palestinian Arabs; and since 1967 you have read the history of the turmoil and strife and western leaders keep telling Israel, In order to have peace you have got to be willing to give up some of this occupied territory. When they refer to Jericho, positioned along right in here, they are talking about a territory that goes something similar to what it was like before: plus over here is the Gaza Strip, the ancient land of the Philistines. As I said the other night, This is not giving up land. This is a social and political thing. I will read what the Jerusalem Post says. "Peres has said any package with the Palestinians should include Gaza and Jericho, a declaration of principle on self rule in the rest of the territories and the early assumption of authority complete with international economic assistance. (Now here is the sad part. I want to show you something. As Israel allows these Arabs living in this Jericho area and the Gaza Strip area to have self rule within those territories, then it means the western world is going to have to come along with finances and help to stabilize a life style and an acceptable economy within those areas. Do you see what that means? There goes some more of your tax dollars: just to fulfill what our leaders say Israel must do. We are going to have to pay the bill.) At the core of the reported, Peres, Abu ..... agreement would be the redeployment of Israeli forces away from the Palestinian population. (That means Israeli troops will no longer ride through Jericho in jeeps, keeping their eyes on the Palestinian Arabs. It will be Palestinian Arabs who will have to furnish their own police forces. The same way in the Gaza Strip.) We are not talking about total IDF withdrawal from Gaza and Jericho, however the Palestinians would control their internal security. We would be in charge of dangers being posed to Israelis, an official said. Senior officials rejected the idea that Palestinians outside the territories could simply immigrate to Gaza or Jericho. We would control the borders and the sea. We will not allow any right of return, an official said." Now I ask you saints, Do you know what that means? Old Jerusalem, and I am talking about "old" Jerusalem, which is three fourths inhabited by Palestinian Arabs, would not be left in a very favorable position for fulfilling prophecy. Old Jerusalem is the ancient capital of the land of Israel. It is old Jerusalem that fills the prophetic picture, when we get to Isaiah 60. In Isaiah 60 it plainly tells us that the inhabitants that have made it waste, a desolate, run down place through the centuries, will be far removed. Now with that in mind, let me explain what I mean. With three fourths of the population in old Jerusalem being Arabs, (Remember, this is the Jewish capital.) When those Arabs look across and see the Palestinian Arab here in Jericho having their own independence, socially and politically, and they see their counter part here in the Gaza Strip doing the same, that is going to cause the Palestinian Arabs in Jerusalem to say, We want our independence also. They are going to say to the Israeli soldiers, Get out of here! When you see all these uprising, and those children throwing rocks, where do you think that is taking place? That is not in Jericho, that is not in the Gaza Strip. It is in old Jerusalem. Had you thought about that? The reason I brought that in, is because that will no doubt start a time bomb ticking away. I have another part here I want to read. Since we are talking about Old Jerusalem, keep in mind, on the south western slopes of old Jerusalem, they discovered a few months back the ancient ruins of what they perceived is the old palace grounds of King David. When King David took the ancient city of the Jebusites, there was a certain strategic place where he had his palace built. That was known as King David's city. Archaeologically, a few months ago, they began to unearth some of this. There was a little problem that arose between them and the political bunch; but now in that same area they have archaeologically moved things back, and here is what it says about it. "Construction of phase one of David's village, the luxurious residential enclave of the A.... project has been completed. Twenty five owners already possess their homes which face the old city walls and David's citadel. (Right there is where King David was when he was having Israel numbered and they were dying like flies. Then when he looked out the window praying and God gave him the ultimatum to do certain things, and he saw that angel standing there with his sword drawn, that is where King David decided the tabernacle should be moved to. There, is where eventually a temple was to be built.) Joel Hallas, chief executive of the project anticipates that by Rosh Hashana, virtually all the purchasers will have taken delivery of their homes. The first model apartment of David's village was sold shortly after it was opened. With the purchase of that first apartment, having taken delivery at the end of June, chief rabbi Israel Meir Lyle, joined chairman of Ladbrook, Cyril, Stein to affix a me.... to the elegant new apartment which opened at the beginning of July. Ladbrook will soon start the building of phase two of the project which will add 55 more residences to the development phase. Prices are to start around two hundred thousand dollars." Well if you want to retire and move to Jerusalem, and live in David's village, that is what you will be facing. Why did I read that? some may be wondering. Simply because it fits in with one of the prophecies we will bring in a little later.

Before we go into a prophecy given by Zephaniah, I would like to impress upon everyone who hears this message, that time is too short for anyone just to play around with time as though we know when Jesus is coming and nothing else matters. Let us not get our mind's in that frame of thinking. We do not know the day and hour of the Lord's coming, but we do need to realize at the same time that all these types and prophecies in the scriptures were put there to inform someone of something; so let us not become unconcerned about where we are in time. There are some in the religious world that will say, Well, how do you know if so and so means what you say it does? Or, Are you sure that is what that is saying? I can just see this spiritually dead religious world out here, so full of traditional ideas, yet without any idea whatsoever of how to look at time and prophecy the way the Bible portrays certain things. When I say that, there are critics that say, You talk like you know everything. No. I do not claim to know everything; but what I do know, I know it. I am not just guessing about it. Surely anyone who claims to have faith in God, would know that God would not be without some vessels somewhere that knows something; and I just have to say, I am going to be one of them. I refuse to accept this silly idea that it does not matter. A man that talks like that is actually saying God is some senile God that had to write certain things down on paper just in case He would forget that such and such was to be. He already knew what was going to be. He put all of this in here for you and me. I will say also, He put none of it in here for us to just play around with it and come out with a bunch of silly traditions. That is the very thing all down through the ages of time, that has caused sincere people to miss God's plan. Yet at the same time He is not putting things in here to give you and me such accuracy that we will want to define the coming of Christ and put everything on a schedule. Just imagine, if I were going around saying, I know what date He is coming. No saints. He will not allow us to be that accurate. If the angels do not know, do not think you and I, as carnal as we are, are going to know any more than they know. I do believe with all my heart, that He is going to inform His true people of the nearness of His coming. That will be in respect to a particular season of time: not a day and hour. Common sense tells me that when there is snow on the ground, and the ground is frozen, I do not need to look for peaches on a tree. Common sense, in respects to prophecy of the scriptures, tells me that God put those prophecies in the Bible to reveal them to His children in the respective hour when they are applicable. However when I cease to feel that cold air, and I see the grass begin to turn green, and see some buds on the peach tree, I know winter is fleeing and summer is ahead. I can then begin to look for peaches to eventually form on that tree. Common sense tells us that certain things which are laid out in the Bible are there for someone to understand at the proper time. To some people in the religious world, most of these prophecies appear to be so unimportant. That is why they read right over them. They do not mean a thing to them because they do not see them related to anything that satisfies their theological, traditional outlook. Well I have to say, I find plenty in these prophecies that interest me; so let us look at some more of them. We saw in Zechariah 10, how God would set about to restore the nation of Israel in the last days, and how Judah would be first. That is exactly what He did. At the close of WW2, up to the years leading to the 1967 war, it was hard for Jews to get out of Russia or any of the area under Russia's Communistic control. The basic part of Jews were mainly those out of Africa, some from South America and Europe. They were Jews related to the Judah tribe, or to the tribe of Benjamin. According to Zechariah 10, God said He would save Judah first because it was through the restoration of that tribe that actually began the rebirth of that nation. Then after it reached a certain point of time He began to set things in motion to save Joseph, which also is called by the name Ephraim. That of course applies to the other ten tribes of Israel which were taken captive before Judah. Then it says that together they would become a mighty man, meaning a nation. We have to understand how this began to come to pass, especially from the time of the 1967 war. That is why we probably should read a prophecy of Zephaniah first. Here is what took place in 1967. We find it in Zephaniah 2; and there are two parts of it that are applicable, and should be read along with the 10th chapter of Zechariah. In the year of 1967 in the month of June, Israel was faced with defending what little she already had: for her enemies had determined to drive her into the sea. Keep in mind though, that we are looking only at the tribe of Judah, which by then was well represented back in the land. She was living at that time, within the area that had been petitioned for her by the U.N. Israel was content to live within those borders prior to 1967; but the Palestinian Arabs that lived in the land were not content to have them there; so their idea was, We will drive you into the sea. This was not the Jews plan, this was the Arab's plan. King Nasser of Egypt took the lead, followed by Syria, then Jordan. Three countries working together were going to drive a little group of Jews into the sea and be rid of them forever (they thought). When I was privileged in 1968, to talk to that Jewish general, which was one of the commanders of their armored division that went through the Sinai to the Red Sea, I learned a few things. He said, Our strategy, while feeling that we were outnumbered, was that we would hold out as long as possible, then gradually make our retreat and try to make Tel Aviv our Dunkirk. Meaning there is where they would expect some western nations to have sympathy on their plight and bring some amphibious means to rescue them from the beaches and take them somewhere else. However this was God's time to demonstrate that He was still with them; and you every one know the outcome. That little nation Israel, which did not have the number of planes, the number of tanks, neither the number of men that could be expected to be victorious against such odds, astonished the whole world with what they were able to do in that short war. They were out gunned, out numbered in every way. Logistically there was no way they could meet such a force with any hope for victory, but when God took control of it and gave the Jews the master mind in how to set about the strategy, the outcome shocked all concerned parties. Remember the little chorus we sometimes sing, Little is Much if God is in It. That is exactly what that was. God was in that battle with Israel. He gave them wisdom to take the fighter planes they had and by using a strategy that took the Arabs and Egyptians by surprise, in a matter of a few hours they had completely knocked out the Egyptian and Syrian Air Force by destroying the planes on the ground, as well as tearing up the runways so they could not get the rest of their fighters off the ground. That cleared the way and gave the Israeli Air Force supremacy in the air, which in turn gave their ground forces an advantage over the enemy. To think that in six days they fulfilled a prophecy that the world did not even realize was in the picture. You are looking at it in a few verses of Zephaniah 2. (4) "For Gaza shall be forsaken." The Gaza Strip is over here on the Mediterranean, right below Tel Aviv. It runs down toward Egypt. That was one portion of the land of Israel Jews were never permitted to capture, because when God did bring them into this land back in the days of Joshua, and the Jews began to compromise and save certain individuals from different tribes, God saw that He must do something, so He plainly told them there would be seven tribes throughout that land they would never be able to literally subdue; and the Philistine tribe was the major one. God at various times would use them to prove Israel, and we can read all through the years of time, Israel was constantly fighting some of those people. The Philistines were the most wicked, most powerful, fighting type of people they faced. Well here we are at the ending of time we see a different picture. Let us read the entire verse of Zephaniah 2:4, and continue on. "For Gaza shall be forsaken, and Ashkelon a desolation: they shall drive out Ashdod at the noon day, and Ekron shall be rooted up. (5) Woe unto the inhabitants of the sea coast, the nation of the Cherethites! the word of the Lord is against you; O Canaan, the land of the Philistines, I will even destroy thee, that there shall be no inhabitant. (6) And the sea coast shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds, and folds for flocks." That is not talking about Arab goats and sheep. That is talking about the eventuality of Jewish farmers and Jewish herds men that will move into those areas, which at this present time they have not done that. In 1967, from that very region came Egyptian troops: therefore they were compelled to fight the Egyptians from that angle. They drove the Egyptians out of the Gaza Strip, putting Israel in complete control of the land from then until now. Let us notice this next verse. (7) "And the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah; (Remember that Zechariah 10 says God would visit the house of Judah, and that He would save Judah first. That is according to God's process of restoration, to give this region to the tribe of Judah. All of this fits right into the total picture if we can just look at it right. The coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah, which had never been in ancient Biblical times.) they shall feed thereupon: in the houses of Ashkelon shall they lie down in the evening: for the Lord their God shall visit them, and turn away their captivity." Now we are looking at a fixed prophecy: that the Gaza Strip is destined to be eternally, and securely possessed by the tribe of Judah. I read the article in the Jerusalem Post, how Peres the leader, along with Rabin, have agreed with certain Palestinian Arabs, to give them self government in those regions, in the Gaza Strip, as well as over in this other area. Now keep in mind the areas they took in the six day war, when they pushed everything to the sea over here, and to the river over here: that was the old areas of the tribe of Judah. That is why through the years since 1967, the Jewish government has looked upon all that region as belonging to Judaea, and they refer to the whole thing as Judaea. So looking at this prophecy we can see that the Gaza Strip is not only in the hands of Israel, which is basic to the tribe of Judah, but also as they took this in the six day war, all that area is to be under the complete control and possession of the tribe of Judah. There is where that prophecy stops. Now the rest of the prophecy, we notice in verse 8. That is why we have it up here on our chart, Zephaniah 2:8-11. We also have Numbers 24, and Jeremiah 48 to consider; but before we go there, here is what we have to realize. These windows on our chart do not actually represent to you wherein certain scriptures are to be fulfilled. Do not look at it that way. They are only symbolic of a span of time wherein certain scriptures are applicable. That is the way I want you to look at it. My point is, You cannot take one scripture and put it back here somewhere. It will not work there, simply because we see these scriptures are actually talking about what we will read in verse 8. Let us read it and show how it lines up. "I have heard the reproach of Moab, (There it is. What did the Lord have in mind when He said the reproach of Moab?) and the revilings of the children of Ammon, whereby they have reproached my people, and magnified themselves against their border." There is Ammon. Do you realize that both these are descendants of Lot by his two daughters, through an act of incest? You can read that in Genesis. In ancient times the Moabites and Ammonites were tribes Israel had conflict with at times, but we notice also Edom. That is where the descendants of Esau settled. When we look across the river, which Israel does not necessarily possess, the very fact God says He has remembered the reproaches of Moab, when you go back to Jeremiah and you see the Babylonian armies coming to begin their invasion and to take away the children of Israel into Babylonian captivity, the people of Moab heard about it and here is what they did. There began to be a flow of Jews leaving the land of Israel, Jerusalem, trying to escape across the border to get away from the invading Babylonians. You can read about it in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and so forth. Well God was watching the whole thing, and when Jewish people trying their best to flee the invasion of that vast army fled across the River Jordan, hoping to find a bit of refuge in these areas among these people, when you actually go back in the Old Testament and read about that, instead of these people showing the Jews any kindness, they caught them and took them back over and turned them over to the Babylonian army. Their idea was, We will get rid of that bunch of Jews over there and when they are all gone, we will help ourselves to the land. That is a kind of hypocrisy. That is what it all summed up to be. God remembered every bit of it. Therefore Isaiah prophesied against those people. Jeremiah did too. Here we find Zephaniah prophesying. Keep in mind, in the ancient times Israel never did possess those areas where those tribes were. It is true along the coast of the Dead Sea and through here is Benjamin, as well as up in here. There are also portions of the ten tribes that run up into Gilead. Knowing this, we just have to watch as the Israeli government makes this temporary peace pact allowing the Arabs within the Gaza Strip, as well as this area of Jericho to have self rule. Actually it is a social, domestic, and political thing which is actually illustrated like this, The Jews are saying to the Arabs living in those areas, You can now have your own mayor, your own town council, your own police force and if any of you kill one another you are going to have to depend upon your own police force to handle it. We are not going to be there. Yet the Jerusalem Post tells us the Israeli military troops will be positioned along the border areas, always to supervise and see that there is nothing planned or plotted within the ranks of these Arabs to create a danger from those areas, to the Jewish people. So actually the Israeli government is not giving up the land for complete national independence; but only for the people to have autonomy, self government, while they will still patrol the land for security reasons. Therefore knowing that the government has stipulated that she is giving the Gaza Arabs and the Jericho Arabs complete freedom to have their own mayors and such, let us turn our eyes to old Jerusalem. As I said already, the old city is three fourths populated by Arabs. Now the old city is the city that is definitely going to be renovated, rehabilitated, and re-inhabited by Jews to get it ready for the coming of the Messiah, because Jesus will sit in a rebuilt temple in a newly built city as the Millennium starts. That is the way Isaiah 60 brings it out. Now let us look at these prophecies we have up here. We know this, when we come over here and see the week of Daniel, when we read the 11th chapter of Revelation, John was given a reed and told to measure the altar and them that worship therein. What does that mean? Simply this, Somehow, just prior to the time all else is in position for the week of Daniel to begin, Israel somehow or other is going to be given an opportunity to get rid of the Mosque of Omar that stands on the temple mount today. That will face Israel with the responsibility of starting to build the Millennial temple. Therefore as we look to these prophecies, just be aware that the year 2000 A.D., as measured by solar time, is only seven years away. Think of it. Just a little over seven years away. Yet the prophetic time we talked about, and have tried to explain in an understandable way using this chart, comes just a little more than 4 years short of the two prophetic days of one thousand years each the prophet Hosea spoke of. (6:2) "After two days will He revive us: in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight." That is why we have the chart drawn out this way, to illustrate how time is measured, and how time will harmonize with these various prophecies. As I say this, I see no way this world, as it is right now, can continue on for another 35 or 40 years before Jesus comes for His bride Church. If it goes another 35 or 40 years, think of it, the actual generation of humanity that has experienced all these prophecies being fulfilled already, (these prophetic signs that mark a generation Jesus said would live to see it all climaxed) will all be dead. Did not Jesus prophesy that very thing in Matthew 24, that this generation (the generation that saw these end time prophecies begin to be fulfilled) shall not pass away until all be fulfilled? You really have to look at the Jewish side, as well as the Gentile side of this picture. Therefore there has to be an element of that generation around to see the end of this age wrapped up. Therefore without presenting to you anything that would be unscriptural, I just want to impress upon you, that it will all have to wrap up somewhere around the turn of the next century; and not 35 or 40 years into the 21st century. I see it all coming about by the year 2005, which would constitute the full two prophetic days of Hosea 6; because we are looking at a time factor. If it is seven years to the year 2000 A.D. calendar time, and then we look at the end of the prophetic time, which would be around 2005, you are only looking at twelve years. So what does that tell me? The present world society is no doubt looking at a twelve year term of time that it can continue on as it is now. There is no doubt we are going to see great developments, upheavals, fast fulfilling of prophecies brought about by God creating circumstances in the political realm, that will literally startle mankind. Once God starts this thing in the Middle East, He is not going to drag it out over decades. No sir. As I said earlier, we are no doubt looking at a generation of time of 60 to 70 years. No less, and no more. From the birth of Christ, calendar time, by the year 70 A.D., Jerusalem was in ruins, the temple was gone, the Jews were sold into slavery, and Israel ceased to be a nation, and that all took place in a 70 year span of time. Well when you take that 70 years of time and place it over here at the end, and then go to Zechariah 12. To me, this is one of the important keys as to how to look at the time factor. Continued next issue.

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