Diary Entry - I dressed proudly in robes of the high profession of Pharisee. Desperate to know truth, yet loathed to realize the profession I love is not at all what it is supposed to be. Do I ignore the truth? Do I hold fast to the robes that took years to obtain? Years and years of sacrifice to be a man of God, wholly God's. Sacrifice of youthful fun, preferring to hold myself to a higher standard, denying myself constantly to please my God. Wanting to give my life for my God. And now, now a man shows up who does the works that can only be of God because no other explanation will do. Some claim Satan is controlling the man, but that's impossible, I heard…with my own ears I heard him rebuke demons from inside a man and those demons left, but only after screaming their fear of the man ejecting them from their human abode. Whole villages of people healed of all disease, diseases my own have claimed for time everlasting were often results of the sins of the people. How can we say Satan gives disease to punish and then say Satan give joys in taking that disease away?! Can he do that, most certainly, but this man, He only speaks God's word, never a word of evil. This man is not evil, even though the older Pharisees and most of my contemporaries and those younger believe he is. I know, I know he is not evil. What do I do? My whole life has been one dedicated to the Holy One, the Holy Word. Our history screams out how we've killed prophets in the past, not once, but many times. We look back to see our errors, why can't we seem to see our errors while they are happening? Why?! Will generations from now look back and witness our failure once again to listen to the prophets? Will they?! Where will I be in that history?
End Diary Entry.
A witness to the unfolding of prophecy. A witness to the opening of the closed book of Daniel. Witnessing the mysteries of Revelation's prophecies revealed. Today we have all the knowledge we need to have before the return of our Savior. Yet, like the majority of Pharisees of old, we don't believe. We don't believe. We will not be God's. We claim there is not a God. We do not believe. Even when we claim belief, we stop short of all the truth. How many in that last day will lament their unbelief?! How many will long to know truth in the last days only to realize their rejection throughout the years is their real testimony, their last testimony?
We can know truth right now! It's not too late! Right now we can know, but that won't always be the case. As with the Pharisees, and the Jewish nation as a corporate body, they had a fixed amount of time to seek truth, to believe. When that time was up, their time as a corporate body to wholly accept Christ and His Way, was up. Someday, all our time will be up, and those who have accepted Christ, will have, and those who won't, will never.
God help us believe, help our unbelief.
All through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, now and forever. Amen!
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CHAPTER XV. BABYLON IS FALLEN
continued…
Between the years of 1832 and 1840, the minds of many Bible students, in different countries mainly in Europe and America, became deeply impressed with the prophecy of Daniel, as
furnishing the evidence that we are in the last days, and that the coming of the Lord is drawing near. Their attention was directed to the declaration of Dan. 8:14, that the sanctuary was to be cleansed after two thousand three hundred days, or years. In chapter 8 there is no explanation of this time--no starting point from which to count; but there is in chapter 9. In chapter 8:16, Gabriel was ordered to make Daniel understand the vision. This he proceeded to do, as far as the beasts and kingdoms were concerned; but of the time he said nothing, and Daniel said (verse 27) that it was not understood.
In chapter 9, Daniel makes a most earnest confession and prayer for his people, and in behalf of the city of Jerusalem, then in ruins. While he was praying Gabriel appeared unto him again, and told him to consider the vision, for he had come to give him understanding. And as he had explained all but the time in chapter 8, he spoke of nothing but the time in chapter 9. Gabriel said to him (verses 24, 25), that seventy weeks were determined (literally, cut off) upon his people, and that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and build Jerusalem unto Messiah the Prince, should be seven weeks and threescore and two weeks; that is, sixty-nine of the seventy weeks should reach to Messiah the Prince. We reckon this to the time when he was made known to Israel as the Messiah, by John the Baptist, which was in a. d. 27.
It is universally agreed that these weeks are weeks of years--seven years to a week. In sixty-nine sevens are four hundred and eighty-three years; counting from the time when John announced Jesus as the Lamb of God, we find that a.d. 26 taken from 483, leaves 457 b. c., which was the year in which the commandment went forth to restore and build Jerusalem--which was the beginning of the two thousand three hundred years of Dan. 8:14. In Ezra 7:11-26, is found the decree of Artaxerxes the king of Persia for the restoration of the temple and its service, and for the complete government of Jerusalem according to the ordinances of God. This decree was given to Ezra 457 years before Christ.
Both Cyrus and Darius had given decrees of like import before this, but the work was not completed until the time of Artaxerxes. And in Ezra 6:14, it is said that the work of restoration was done under the decree (singular) of Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes. Thus what these three kings did was counted but one and the same decree, which was not completed until the days of Artaxerxes. And this date, 457 b. c., is the only one that agrees with the manifestation of Messiah the Prince.
The Messiah came to establish the new covenant, and Dan. 9:27 says that he shall confirm the covenant with many of Daniel's people (see verse 24) for one week, that is, the last of the seventy.
In the midst of the week, or in the middle of the last week of years, he should cause the sacrifice and oblation to cease, which he did when he was cut off, for then all the sacrifices of the Levitical law met their antitype, and were of no further use.
It is wonderful how accurately every item of this prophecy was fulfilled. The ministry of Christ was just three and a half years--half a prophetic week, or week of years. After his resurrection, he told his apostles still to begin their work at Jerusalem, for the seventy weeks in which the covenant was to be confirmed to Judah and Israel were not yet ended.
Now it is always counted great hardness of heart on the part of the Jews to deny that Jesus was the Messiah, when the very time of his crucifixion was so definitely foretold by one of their own prophets. But the prophecies were for all times and all peoples, and let us see that we do not bring of ourselves under the same censure that falls upon them.
The same period--the seventy weeks--that fixes the time of the crucifixion, fixes the date of the two thousand three hundred years, the time for the cleansing of the sanctuary, the closing work of our High Priest for the judgment of his people.
The seventy weeks point out the time when our Messiah should make his sacrifice and begin his priestly work. The two thousand three hundred years point out the time when he should enter upon the closing work of his priesthood. When Jesus began his ministry he said, "The time is fulfilled." Mark 1:14, 15. In like manner it is shown by the prophecy that it must be proclaimed to the world, "The hour of his judgment is come." Rev. 14:6, 7.
The explanation of the seventy weeks is the explanation of the vision of the time given in Daniel 8. And this time reaches to the beginning of the judgment.
Beginning the two thousand three hundred years with the decree of Artaxerxes, we can readily see where they end. This decree was b. c. 457. Subtracting 457 b. c. from 2300 leaves a. d. 1843--the very time when this message of Rev. 14:6, 7 was being so extensively preached to the nations of the earth. If this time were not made sure, how could the message of the judgment ever be given? How could men declare the hour is come unless the time were fixed by prophecy?
Every word of the Scriptures must be fulfilled. As the seventy weeks prove that Jesus was the Messiah, so do they fix the two thousand three hundred years, beginning at the same point, and clearly show us the time for the cleansing of the sanctuary above, where our great High Priest is presenting his precious blood for us.
Here it is necessary to say a few words in regard to the numbering of the year at which the two thousand three hundred years end. At the time when the prophecy was written, they did not begin the year in midwinter, as is now generally done, but in the spring. Therefore while the figures in the above computation always bring a. d. 1843 as the result, the years really ended in 1844 of our year, as theirs began and ended about three months later than ours. But that is a point of little consequence in the settlement of the main fact.
Now we see, not only the importance of the message, as being the gospel, but the certainty of the time of its fulfillment. And we cannot discover any possible reason why professed Christians, with all the light of Bible truth we have in these days, should not incur the displeasure of God if they reject or neglect this gospel proclamation, even as they did who rejected the gospel in the days of the apostles.
The Jews as a nation became a fallen people when they rejected Jesus as the Messiah. They did not fall so that they could not find salvation, for thousands of them repented and accepted the Saviour, and that is their privilege to this day. But they fell from the high position of being the special people of God.
To be continued…
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