Two Mistakes

    I heard an interesting speaker on the radio last weekend. He was teaching some basics about understanding prophecy. Most of the prophecy sermons I have heard pick apart the details of the verses, research current world events, and speculate about how they might fit together. This speaker put the verses back in context, which most Christians know is the number one rule of understanding the Bible. He said there are two main errors believers make regarding Christ's return, date setting and denying imminence.

    Date setting:  Why Christians who believe the Bible and the literal fulfillment of prophecy have such a hard time believing what it says regarding the date is a mystery to me. Mt. 24:36 is very plain, "No one knows the day or the hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." A prophecy speaker at the church we attended in the late 70's taught that since Jesus said day and hour, it meant we could know the month and the year of the return. I don't remember what date he set, probably 1978 since the nation of Israel turned 30 that year, and he interpreted "this generation" in 24:34 to mean 30 years. Besides knowing that this was fulfilled in part by the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., what I should have realized, even as a new believer, is that Jesus was not leaving verbal loopholes, as if He was a lawyer or tax accountant. The obvious meaning is no one knows when. Not the angels, who are privy to heavenly happenings, and even Himself, God's Son. Presuming to set dates implies knowing more than Christ. And since Mt. 24:44 and Lk. 12:40 both say "the Son of Man will come at an hour you do not expect him", trying to schedule His ETA would be counterproductive. Not, in this case, means not.

     Denying imminence:  That one hit closer to home for me. I have a hard time harmonizing the Antichrist desecrating the temple altar in the middle of the tribulation with Christ's imminent return because, even if the temple mount was reclaimed by the Jews and the temple rebuilt tomorrow, it is hard to imagine that the secular, animal loving culture in which I live, would accept Jews practicing animal sacrifice. God does not brain wash people to get them to do what He wants, He changes circumstances until people's wants align with His. (Some examples:  Pharaoh, Jonah, Paul) The speaker also explained that what Paul writes in 2 Thess. 2:3-7 is based, in part, on teaching he gave verbally that we don't have access to.

  "Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness ^a is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. 4He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God. 5Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? 6And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time. 7For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way". 

There is a lot of speculation about who the man of lawlessness is and what needs to occur before Christ's return, but the only ones who really get it are the Thessalonians who heard Paul's prequel and the believers who will be alive when it is fulfilled.

    The purpose of studying prophecy is to validate the omniscience of God, the truth of scripture, to encourage believers to serve faithfully now and trust God with the future. The pitfalls of studying prophecy are believers making the above errors and our natural bent to possess secret knowledge others do not. Some spiritual sounding version of a child's "I know something you don't know". The internet age has given Christians unprecedented access to information about political and spiritual happenings that relate to prophecy. Unfortunately, it also provides unchecked access to false teaching, rumors and outright lies. And our best protection against erroneous interpretation of prophecy, or any other scripture, has always been available to anyone with access to a Bible--context.