Jesus did not command his followers to know the timing of his return and the “end of the age,” nor did he provide them with keys and “signs” by which they can decipher the time of his “arrival” or ‘parousia.’ Instead, he exhorted them to be prepared every day since his return will come just “like a thief in the night.” Only his Father possesses this knowledge.
Continue reading “The Final Season?”
Jesus compared the final years before his return to the period leading up to the Great Flood of Noah. “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be” when the “Son of Man” returns. Some commentators take this saying as a prediction of the return of the same conditions that existed in Noah’s day; that is, a repetition of the moral anarchy and violence that prompted God to send the floodwaters in the first place.
Continue reading “Normalcy or Chaos?”
Christ’s final block of teaching that he gave on the Mount of Olives includes several warnings about coming “deceivers” and “false prophets” intent on misleading the saints, warnings reiterated and expanded in the writings of the apostles. And his discourse began with stern warnings to “beware lest anyone deceive you.”
Continue reading “Howling Imposters”
The application of Joel’s prophecy by Peter on the Day of Pentecost links the gift of the Spirit to the onset of the messianic age following Christ’s ascension and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and the latter signals the arrival of the “last days” and the inevitability if not imminence of the “Day of the Lord.”
The gift of the Spirit is the “promise of Father” based on the covenant of Abraham, and an integral part of the New Covenant prophesied in the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Thus, the arrival of the Spirit among God’s covenant community marks a fundamental change in eras. The age of fulfillment has arrived.
Continue reading “In the Last Days”
Insights into Bible Prophecy 