Article by Gary DeMar: Original source: https://americanvision.org/22701/50-percent-of-pastors-believe-jesus-will-return-in-their-lifetime/

When will Christians learn? It’s no surprise that less than 25 percent of Christians have a biblical worldview. On Bible prophecy, it’s around five percent. That’s my estimation.

A new study has determined by a new LifeWay Research survey that a “majority of pastors say specific current events are a sign of the End Times and Jesus’ return.”

Of the poll of 1,000 evangelical pastors, 50 percent “believe Jesus will return in their lifetime.”

Pastors were asked if they “consider any of the following types of current events to be the ‘birth pains’ that Jesus was referring to when he was asked by his disciples when he would return,” a reference to Jesus’ prophecy found in Matthew 24 and the parallel accounts in Matthew 13 and Luke 21.

Just so you know, the Olivet Discourse is not describing events that will take place to some future generation. Jesus was describing what was going to happen to the generation to whom Jesus was speaking. It was their generation that would not pass away until all the things He described took place.

Let’s state the obvious. There is nothing new about Christians believing they are living in what Hal Lindsey said was the “terminal generation,” the generation that was supposed to pass away before 1988 because of the same signs that are being touted today as proof that we are living in the final generation before one of the five rapture views takes place. When was Lindsey’s book published? In 1977, more than 40 years ago, seven years after The Late Great Planet Earth.

Here’s the breakdown of the signs and the percent of pastors who believe they are signs of Jesus’ near return:

1. 83 percent, the “rise of false prophets and false teachings.”

There have always been false prophets and false teachings. John said so:

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world (1 John 4:1–4).

There were false prophets in John’s day. There were antichrist’s in John’s day, evidence that it was the “last hour” (1 John 2:18).

There was false teaching during the time leading up to the destruction of the temple in AD 70. Peter wrote the following:

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned;and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep” (2 Peter 2:2–3).

Pastors need to read the Bible rather than the latest headlines, Facebook posts, and podcasts. A little exegesis goes a long way.

• 81 percent, the “love of many believers growing cold” (Matt. 24:12).

Again, such a description is not unique to our day. Jesus is answering a question about when the temple would be destroyed (Matt. 24:1–3), an event that took place before their generation passed away (24:34). The word “believers” is not in the text, only the word “many.” Lawlessness (a word found in the passage) and love growing cold are related: There were problems with homosexuality (Rom. 1:26–31), incest (1 Cor. 5:1), prostitution (1 Cor. 6:15–16), and fornication (1 Cor. 5:1, 11; Rev. 2:20), and general unrighteousness (1 Cor. 6:9–11; 1 Tim. 1:8–11). Paul had warned the Ephesian elders that wolves would enter the church (Acts 20:29). He described to Timothy what was taking place in his day, the “last days” (Heb. 1:1–2) of the Old Covenant (2 Tim. 3:1–7) that was near to passing away (Heb. 8:13).

• 79 percent, “traditional morals becoming less accepted.”

As mentioned in No. 2, lawlessness was a first-century problem. For example, homosexuality was an issue (Rom. 1:26–31). Paul describes the rejection of biblical morality that was prevalent:

Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who submit to or perform homosexual acts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor verbal abusers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God (1 Cor. 6:9–11).

You can find something similar in 1 Timothy 1:6–11. Paul was not describing some end-time decline in morality. He was illustrating what was taking place in his day.

• 78 percent, “wars and national conflicts.”

There have always been wars. Actually, there are fewer wars today than there were in the 20^th century. “In Rome itself, four emperors came to a violent death in the short space of eighteen months. Were one to give account of all the disturbances that actually occurred within the Empire after Jesus’ death, he would be constrained to write a separate book.”

Darrell L. Bock writes, “Matthew 24:6 appears to suggest that these calamities are in the near future by noting that the disciples ‘are about’ μελλήσετε (mellēsete) to hear of wars and rumors of wars.” ^[1]

The Annals of Tacitus, covering the historical period from AD 14 to the death of Nero in AD 68, describes the time with phrases such as “disturbances in Germany,” “commotions in Africa,” “commotions in Thrace,” “insurrections in Gaul,” “intrigues among the Parthians,” “the war in Britain,” and “the war in Armenia.” Wars were fought from one end of the Roman Empire to the other in the days of the apostles.

• 76 percent, “earthquakes and other natural disasters.”

There have always been earthquakes and natural disasters. There were earthquakes in Jesus’ day and the days of the early church. A great earthquake occurred at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion (Matt. 27:54) and another one at His resurrection (28:2). The Bible records “a great earthquake” that shook “the foundations of the prison house” that resulted in the release of Paul and Silas and the other prisoners (Acts 16:26). According to historical accounts, earthquakes were common for that time period, as they are for our time and all time. There were earthquakes in Crete, Smyrna, Miletus, Chios, Samos, Laodicea, Hierapolis, Colossae, Campania, Rome, and Judea. The cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum were almost destroyed by an earthquake in AD 62, seventeen years before the cities were wiped off the face of the earth by a volcanic eruption from Mount Vesuvius.

• 75 percent, the “number of people abandoning their Christian faith.”

John writes, “Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:18–19). Paul notes that “all” had deserted him (2 Tim. 4:16).

Consider how bankrupt Christianity was in the 16^th century and earlier. It was transformed by the Reformation.

• 70 percent, famines.

There have always been famines, like there have always been wars, earthquakes, false teachers, false prophets, tribulation, and lawlessness. Jesus is describing events leading up to His judgment coming against Jerusalem that would take place before their generation passed away. This included famines: “Now at this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them named Agabus stood up and began to indicate by the Spirit that there would certainly be a great famine all over the world. ^[2] And this took place in the reign of Claudius” (Acts 11:27–28).

Christians have been applying the same prophetic passages to current events for nearly 2000 years with the same results. Instead of being preoccupied and seduced with claims of some near apocalyptic event, Christians should be about kingdom work. It’s what Paul was doing in the last years of his life:

And he stayed two full years in his own rented quarters and was welcoming all who came to him, preaching the kingdom of God and teaching concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all openness, unhindered (Acts 20:30–31).

Go and do likewise.

1. Darrell L. Bock, Luke: Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1996), 2:1666.) “Are about to hear” is not an indicator of events in the distant future.[↩]
2. The Greek word is oikoumenē and refers to the political boundaries of the Roman Empire at that time. See Matthew 24:14, Luke 2:1, and Acts 17:6 where the same word is used.[↩]

Article by Gary DeMar “Does the Bible Teach that the Temple Will be Rebuilt?” (source – https://americanvision.org/22629/does-the-bible-teach-that-the-temple-will-be-rebuilt/)

As usual, I found myself dealing with a prophecy expert who assured me that I am wrong because I am not reading the Bible properly. That may be true, but I must be shown from the Bible where I have missed the mark. He assured me that the temple will be rebuilt and many other standard end-time events. Here’s what he wrote:

There is [sic] tons in scripture concerning these things. It may not fit our preferred theological construct, but they are there, nonetheless.

I wrote back and said that I’m not looking for “tons … I’ll settle for an ounce from Scripture.”

I have yet to find one person who can quote one verse from the New Testament that unequivocally states that a physical temple will be/should be built again in Jerusalem.

Some modern-day Jews are preparing for the reinstitution of animal sacrifices and rebuilding the temple:

The Passover sacrifice can only be offered in one place; on the Temple Mount. The sacrifice does not require an actual Temple structure but it does require an altar that is built to adhere to the Biblical requirements. Such an altar was constructed last year and stands ready…. “The Third oath is the Third Temple whose construction will be initiated by the nations, after which the Jews will join in.”  (Breaking Israel News)

If you want to get an idea what the abomination of desolation was (Matt. 24:15), this is it. The religious establishment continued with the sacrificial system in the rebuilt temple, completed around AD 64 and destroyed by the Romans in AD 70, in the place of the true Lamb of God. Those sacrifices were an affront to the redemptive work of Jesus, and in God’s eyes were like the following:

But he who kills an ox is like one who slays a man;
He who sacrifices a lamb is like the one who breaks a dog’s neck;
He who offers a grain offering is like one who offers swine’s blood;
He who burns incense is like the one who blesses an idol.
As they have chosen their own ways,
And their soul delights in their abominations (Isa. 66:3).

There is no need for a temple or animal sacrifice. Those days are long gone. Jesus was that final sacrifice, the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. There is no need for an altar or a temple or the Aaronic priesthood. Jesus fulfills all of these.

Unfortunately, dispensationalists continually insist that for Bible prophecy to be fulfilled, the temple must be rebuilt, the altar constructed, and animal sacrifices reinstitution as part of some unfulfilled prophetic history.

Even dispensationalists admit the NT does not say the temple will be rebuilt. For the dispensational system to work, however, a temple must be built. A doctrine so central to a system must have at lest one verse supporting that system. The temple is mentioned numerous times in the NT, sometimes symbolically (John 2; 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; 2 Cor. 6:16; 1 Pet. 2:4–9) and sometimes physically (e.g., Matt. 21:12; 24:1–2; 26:65; 2 Thess. 2), but nothing is said about it being rebuilt only destroyed.

Dispensational premillennialists need a future “tribulation temple” so their idea of antichrist can take his seat (2 Thess. 2:4), place a statue for people to worship (Rev. 13:14–15), and proclaim himself to be god (2 Thess. 2:4). But what the dispensationalists really need is a verse that states that there will be another rebuilt temple since there had already been one. Rebuilt-temple advocates Thomas Ice and Randall Price admit that “There are no Bible verses that say, ‘There is going to be a third temple.’” ^[1] Having made this revealing concession, they go on to claim, “there will be a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem at least by the midpoint of the seven-year tribulation period.” ^[2]

Don Stewart and Chuck Missler insist, “The crucial issue boils down to how we interpret prophecy. There are two basic ways to interpret Bible prophecy. Either you understand it literally or you do not. If a person rejects the literal interpretation then they [sic] are left to their own imagination as to what the Scripture means…. We believe it makes sense to understand the Scriptures as literally requiring the eventual construction and desecration of a Third Temple.” ^[3] The authors are careful only to say that another rebuilt temple is required. A third temple is required only if you’re a dispensationalist. To repeat, the NT does not mention anything about a rebuilt temple.

Jesus’ completed redemptive work makes the need for a rebuilt temple unnecessary. His ministry begins with the declaration that He is our tabernacle (John 1:14), “the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (1:29), “the temple” (John 2:19–21), and the “chief cornerstone” (Matt. 21:42; Acts 4:11; Eph. 2:20). By extension, believers are “as living stones, … being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5). Those “in Christ” are the true temple of God (1 Cor. 3:16; 2 Cor. 6:16; Eph. 2:21; Rev. 21:22).

Jesus and the people of God are the focus of the only temple that has any redemptive significance. To be “in Christ” is to be in the temple and all it stood for, “the renewed centre and focus for the people of God” ^[4] (Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 1:2, 30; Gal. 3:14, 28; 5:6). The NT references to the temple of stone only refer to its destruction (Matt. 24:1–2), never its reconstruction. It is highly significant that “Jesus never gives any hint that there will be a physical replacement for this Temple. There is no suggestion, either in the Apocalyptic Discourse or elsewhere, that this destruction will be but a preliminary stage in some glorious ‘restoration’ of the Temple.” ^[5]

The writer of Hebrews declares that Jesus entered “through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation” (9:11). Since Jesus completed His redemptive work, any new temple “made with hands” is not much different from a pagan temple that has no inherent life or redemptive value (cf. Acts 17:24; 19:26; 2 Cor. 5:1). “[T]he description of the Jerusalem Temple as ‘made with hands’ … is a strong means of playing down its significance. This had been a way of belittling the pagan idols (e.g. Ps. 115:4; cf. Isa. 46:6); to describe the Temple in such a fashion was potentially incendiary.” ^[6] This is because “the author of Hebrews believed the Jerusalem Temple was but a ‘shadow’ of the reality now found in Christ (8:5).” ^[7]

The “new covenant” had made the “old covenant” obsolete that was ready (near) to pass away (8:13).

Stewart and Missler have made it very simple for us to determine whether the Bible addresses the issue of a rebuilt temple. If the Bible is interpreted literally, the need for a third temple should be explicitly stated. What biblical evidence do they offer to support their claim that “the Bible, in both testaments, speaks of a Temple that has yet to appear”? ^[8] From the OT they use Daniel 9:27, 11:31, and 12:11 for support. Ice and Price can only find only one verse for support—Daniel 9:27.

Since Daniel was written after Solomon’s temple had been destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC (2 Kings 25:8–9; Dan. 1:1–2) and before the second temple had been built by the returning exiles (Ezra 6:13–15), it stands to reason that the “sanctuary” whose “end will come with a flood” (Dan. 9:26) must refer to the second temple that had not been built at the time the prophecy was given. It was this post-exile rebuilt temple that was desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes around 170 BC but not destroyed. After a period of misuse and disuse, Herod the Great restored and enlarged this second temple, a project that started around 20 BC and was completed just a few years before it was destroyed in AD 70 by the Romans, just as Jesus had predicted (Matt. 24:1–34).

It was this same temple that Zacharias served in (Luke 1:9), that Jesus was taken to as an infant (2:27) and later taught in (2:41–52), that had been under construction for forty-six years when Jesus prophesied that He would be its permanent replacement (John 2:20), that Jesus cleansed of the money changers (Matt. 21:12), that He predicted would be left desolate (Matt. 23:38; 24:2), whose veil was “torn in two from top to bottom” (Matt. 27:51), and that was finally destroyed by Titus in AD 70.

Daniel 9:27 is the only verse from the OT that Ice and Price contend supports the need for a third temple. But there is a problem with their reasoning. They argue that “the city and sanctuary” in Daniel 9:26 refers to Herod’s temple that was destroyed in AD 70 (Luke 21:6): “Jesus, seeing Himself as the Messiah, therefore saw the Romans as the people … who will destroy the city and the sanctuary. Knowing that He would soon be cut off (crucified), He likewise knew that the Temple’s destruction would soon occur.” ^[9]

In the span of two verses, these authors find two temples, one in Daniel 9:26 and another in 9:27, separated by 2000 years. As a careful reader will note, the “sanctuary” (temple) that appears in Daniel 9:26 does not appear in 9:27. This means that Daniel 9:27 is describing events related to the already mentioned sanctuary of 9:26 that Ice and Price say refers to the temple that was standing in Jesus’ day.

For Ice and Price to find another rebuilt temple, Daniel 9:27 would have to say something like this: “After an unspecified period of time, he will make a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering in the sanctuary after the sanctuary is rebuilt a second time; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction of the sanctuary after the next sanctuary, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.” Of course, not one word of this is found in Daniel 9:27. ^[10]

1. Thomas Ice and Randall Price, Ready to Rebuild: The Imminent Plan to Rebuild the Last Days Temple (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 1992), 197–198.[↩]
2. Ice and Price, Ready to Rebuild, 198.[↩]
3. Don Stewart and Chuck Missler, The Coming Temple: Center Stage for the Final Countdown (Orange, CA: Dart Press, 1991), 193.[↩]
4. Timothy J. Geddert, Watchwords: Mark 13 in Markan Eschatology (Sheffield, England: JSOT, 1989). Quoted in Peter W. L. Walker, Jesus and the Holy City: New Testament Perspectives on Jerusalem (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996), 9.[↩]
5. Walker, Jesus and the Holy City, 8.[↩]
6. Walker, Jesus and the Holy City, 10.[↩]
7. Walker, Jesus and the Holy City, 208.[↩]
8. Stewart and Missler, The Coming Temple, 194.[↩]
9. Ice and Price, Ready to Rebuild, 68.[↩]
10. For an exposition of Daniel 9:24–27, see Gary DeMar, Last Days Madness: Obsession of the Modern Church, 4^th ed. (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 1999), chap. 25.[↩]

Article “Is Revelation 6 a Prophecy About Today’s Pandemic and Other Apocalyptic-Like Events?” by Gary DeMar (source – https://americanvision.org/22538/is-revelation-6-a-prophecy-about-todays-pandemic-and-other-apocalyptic-like-events/)

Some prophecy writers are claiming that Revelation 6 depicts what’s taking place today with earthquakes (one just hit Utah) and pestilence or plagues. Is the Coronavirus a fulfillment of Revelation 6:8?:

I looked, and behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, “to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence [θανάτῳ] and by the wild beasts of the earth.”

The Greek word translated “pestilence” is θανάτῳ (thanatō) and is translated elsewhere as “death.” The rider of the horse is named θανάτῳ, the same word translated as “pestilence” in some translations.

Similar language is used in Jeremiah 15:2–3 for a local judgment against Jerusalem (15:4–14). The same is true in Jeremiah 24, especially verse 10, where a different Hebrew word is used and is translated as “pestilence” and not just “death.”

The more accurate translation in Revelation 6:8 is “death” that would include pestilence and other effects of war and famine. “The story of Mary of Bethezuba is a story of cannibalism told by Josephus in his Jewish War (VI,193) which occurred as a consequence of famine and starvation during the siege of Jerusalem in August AD 70 by Roman legions commanded by Titus. The tale is only one account of the horrors suffered at Jerusalem in the summer of 70. “

In Luke 21:11, the Greek word λοιμοὶ (loimoi) is used and is translated as “plagues,” the only time the word is used in the New Testament. As I have mentioned in a previous article, pestilences and plagues are not unusual. They can be found in the Old Testament, secular history, and the era leading up to Jerusalem’s judgment in AD 70. For example, the Roman historian Suetonius wrote that there was such a “pestilence” at Rome during the reign of Nero that “within the space of one autumn there died no less than thirty thousand persons, as appeared from the registers in the temple of Libitina.” ^[1]

Wars and rumors of wars, famines, plagues, and earthquakes. These are the biblical signs. All of them are realities of planet earth each days. Is Jesus coming back soon? Did Jesus provide an exact, predictable scenario as so many modern prophecy writers advocate?Buy Now

Now we come to the meaning of Revelation 6. What’s going on in this chapter? James M. Hamilton, Jr., a premillennialist, writes that “the opening of the seals in Revelation 6 corresponds to what Jesus describes in the Olivet Discourse in the Synoptic Gospels.” ^[2] I agree. See my books Is Jesus Coming Soon?, Last Days Madness, and Wars and Rumors of Wars.

The following chart is from Hamilton’s commentary on Revelation:

If the Olivet Discourse is describing events leading up to and including the destruction of Jerusalem that took place within a generation (Matt. 24:34), then Revelation must be given a similar interpretation. Consider how stellar phenomena are depicted.

A verse-by-verse study of the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 that puts it into its biblical and historical context.Buy Now

In Revelation 6:13­–14, we read, “the stars of the sky fell to the earth, as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.” This passage is a partial citation from Isaiah 34:4 using the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, the Septuagint (LXX), which reads, “all the stars shall fall.” ^[3]

If this is a description of physical stars, there would be an immediate end to the earth, and yet we find the earth still intact in Revelation 8:10 where “a great star fell from heaven.” If one star hit the earth, the earth would be vaporized in an instant. In fact, if a star like our sun gets close to earth, the earth would burn up before it hit. How could the earth survive if a “third of the stars of heaven” had been thrown down to the earth (Rev. 12:4)?

Then there’s the description of the male goat in Daniel 8:10 that causes “stars to fall to the earth,” an action that would destroy the earth if Daniel was describing actual physical stars. These fallen stars are then “trampled” by the horn of a goat. It must have been a mighty big goat horn, similar in size to the giant woman in Revelation who was “clothed with the sun,” stood on the moon, and had a “crown of twelve stars” on her head (Rev. 12:1). Most likely the horn refers to a civil ruler and the stars represent civil or religious authorities ^[4] under the ruler’s dominion.

Jesus is using language that was understood by the people of His day. The Hebrew Scriptures are filled with similar symbolic “sign” (Rev. 1:1) language. There is dramatic end-of-the-world language in Zephaniah that is directed at Jerusalem and Israel (Zeph. 1). John Lightfoot makes the point that seemingly end-of-the-world language is a common feature in the Bible and most often points to the end of the social, religious, and political status of a nation:

The opening of the sixth Seal [in Rev. 6:12–13] shows the destruction itself in those borrowed terms that the Scripture uses to express it by, namely as if it were the destruction of the whole world: as Matt. 24:29–30. The Sun darkened, the Stars falling, the Heaven departing and the Earth dissolved, and that conclusion [of] ver. 16 [in Rev. 6]. They shall say to the rocks fall on us, &c. doth not only warrant, but even enforce us to understand and construe these things in the sense that we do: for Christ applies these very words to the very same thing (Luke 23:30). And here is another, and, to me, a very satisfactory reason, why to place the showing of these visions to John, and his writing of this Book [of Revelation] before the desolation of Jerusalem. ^[5]

For many Christians, interpreting Bible prophecy is a complicated task. As a result, they often turn to so-called Bible experts and complicated charts that include gaps in time, outrageous literal interpretations, and numerous claims that current events are prime indicators that the end is near. Many Christians are unaware that the same Bible passages have been used in nearly every generation as “proof” that the end or some aspect of the end (the “rapture”) would take place in their generation.Buy Now

When was this judgment to take place? Jesus had His present audience in view as He made His way to the cross:

“Daughters of Jerusalem, stop weeping for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed’ [Matt. 24:19; Luke 21:23]. Then they will begin TO SAY TO THE MOUNTAINS, ‘FALL ON US,’ AND TO THE HILLS, ‘COVER US’ [Isa. 2:19–20; Hos. 10:8; Rev. 6:16] For if they do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?” (Luke 23:28–31).

When was the tree dry and without fruit? The last days of the generation that was confronted from the judgment sequence prophesied by Jesus.

Even though this virus is not an end-of-the-world sign or event, it should get our attention that we are mortal and almost any unforeseen event could lay us low and even kill us. Eternity is but a heartbeat away.

1. C. Suetonius Tranquillus, The Lives of the Twelve Caesars: Nero, 39.[↩]
2. Hamilton, An Interview with Dr. James Hamilton. For further discussion of this point, see James M. Hamilton, Jr., Revelation: The Spirit Speaks to the Churches (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 166–167. Also, Louis A. Vos, The Synoptic Traditions in the Apocalypse (Kampen, Netherlands: J.H. Kok N. V., 1965), 181–188.[↩]
3. J. Richard Middleton, A New Heaven and a New Earth: Reclaiming Biblical eschatology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2014), 179–210.[↩]
4. James B. Jordan, The Handwriting on the Wall: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel, 2^nd ed. (Powder Springs, GA: American Vision Press, 2007), 426–436.[↩]
5. John Lightfoot, The Whole Works of the Rev. John Lightfoot Containing “The Harmony, Chronicle and Order of the New Testament,” ed. John Rogers Pitman, 13 vols. (London: [1655] 1823), 3:337.[↩]

Article: Is the Dissolution of the Heavens and Earth on the Horizon? by Gary DeMar – source https://americanvision.org/22532/is-the-dissolution-of-the-heavens-and-earth-on-the-horizon/

If there’s one passage of Scripture that is repeatedly brought up as an indictment against people who object to modern-day prophetic speculation it is 2 Peter 3:3–18. If you dispute with those who argue that all the signs around us indicate that we are living in the “last days,” then you are labeled a “scoffer” or a “mocker” (2 Peter 3:3; Jude 18). If this is how the passage is to be understood, then how should Bible students who argued against similar prophetic speculation during the two World Wars and previous periods of social, civil, and moral unrest going back centuries be evaluated? Those who questioned the prophecy speculators were correct in their skepticism that they were not living in the last days!

Every generation has had people who claimed the end was near and others who argued that the end was not near. Appealing to contemporary signs to make predictions of a near end of all things has a long history as Francis X. Gumerlock demonstrates in his book The Day and the Hour. One would think that by now Christians would stop doing it. But they don’t. They know revving people up over the “last days” sells books . . . lots of books.

The people Peter and Jude accuse of being “scoffers” were enemies of Jesus and the gospel and were alive when Peter and Jude wrote their letters. They scoffed at the claims made by Jesus that the temple would be destroyed (Matt. 24:2) and Jesus Himself would be the person to make it happen before their generation passed away (Matt. 24:34; 21:18-46; 22:1-14). Since nearly 40 years—a generation—had passed since Jesus had prophesied about the impending destruction, and the temple was still standing with no indication that it would be destroyed in their lifetime, the scoffers began to mock the words of Jesus. “Where’s the sign of His coming? Your Jesus predicted it with certainty, and it has not come to pass. All is as it has been. Based on the Law of Moses, this Jesus was a false prophet” (see Deut. 18:22).

A similar situation happened regarding the prophecies related to Judah’s captivity in Babylon. Consider the following from 2 Chronicles 36 and compared it to Jesus’ description of the destruction of Jerusalem that was prophesied by Him in the Olivet Discourse in the Synoptic Gospels:

Furthermore, all the officials of the priests and the people were very unfaithful following all the abominations of the nations; and they defiled the house of the Lord which He had sanctified in Jerusalem. The Lord, the God of their fathers, sent word to them again and again by His messengers, because He had compassion on His people and on His dwelling place; but they continually mocked the messengers of God, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people, until there was no remedy. Therefore He brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or infirm; He gave them all into his hand. All the articles of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the Lord, and the treasures of the king and of his officers, he brought them all to Babylon. Then they burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem and burned all its fortified buildings with fire and destroyed all its valuable articles. Those who had escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon; and they were servants to him and to his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until seventy years were complete” (vv. 14-21).

There’s a big difference between a “scoffer” who rejects God’s word outright and someone who argues for an alternative position using sound biblical arguments. A person who disagrees with modern-day prophetic speculation is not a “scoffer,” especially when there have been so many failed attempts at predicting the certainty of the end over the years.

One could just as easily make the case that modern-day prophetic speculators are “scoffers” and “mockers” because they twist and distort Jesus’ clear words that He would return in judgment before that first-century generation passed away (Matt. 24:34; Mark 13:30; Luke 21:32). Some of today’s prophecy speculators try to argue that the Greek word genea—best translated as “generation” (Matt. 1:17)—can be translated “race” or “nation.” When that doesn’t work, some argue that “this generation” (the generation of Jesus’ day: e.g., Matt. 12:41–42; 23:36), should be translated “that generation” (a future generation). For example, Henry Morris, who insisted that the Bible should be interpreted literally on issues related to creation, does not take the same approach when he interprets the Olivet Discourse prophecy:

The word “this” [in Matt. 24:34] is the demonstrative adjective and could better be translated “that generation.” That is, the generation which sees all these signs (probably starting with World War I) shall not have completely died away until all these things have taken place. ^[1] That is, that generation—the one that sees the specific signs of His coming—will not completely pass away until He has returned to reign as King. ^[2] Now if the first sign was, as we have surmised, the First World War, then followed by all His other signs, His coming must indeed by very near ^[3]—even at the doors! There are only a few people still living from that ^[4] generation. I myself was born just a month before the Armistice was signed on November 11, 1918. Those who were old enough really to know about that First World War—“the beginning of sorrows”—would be at least in their eighties now. Thus, we cannot be dogmatic, we could very well now be living in the very last days before the return of the Lord. ^[5]

When Jesus’ clear words don’t suit their prophetic paradigm, words are removed, new words added, and Greek words redefined. “This generation” becomes, “the generation that sees these signs,” as if Jesus was addressing a generation other than the one to whom He was speaking. Jesus made it clear that His present audience (“you”) would “see all these things” (Matt. 24:33).

Second Peter 3 links “scoffers” (v. 3 in KJV; “mockers” in NASB) with “the last days” (v. 3), “the promise of His coming” (v. 4), the “day of the Lord” (v. 10), and the passing away of the “heavens” and the “earth” (v. 10). “Last days” is not code for events leading up either to an event called the “rapture of the church” or a future second coming. Gordon Clark comments:

“The last days,” which so many people think refers to what is still future at the end of this age, clearly means the time of Peter himself. I John 2:18 says it is, in his day, the last hour. Acts 2:17 quoted Joel as predicting the last days as the lifetime of Peter…. Peter obviously means his own time. ^[6]

There are other passages like Hebrews 1:1–2 (note the use of the plural near demonstrative: “in these last days”), Hebrews 9:26 (note the use of “now”), “as you see the day drawing near” (10:25; also 1 John 2:18), 1 Corinthians 10:11 (“upon whom the ends of the ages have come”), and James 5:3 (the storing up of their treasure was in “the last days” not “for” the last days). The question is, the last days of what?: the last days of the old covenant with its stone temple, blood sacrifices, and earthly sinful priesthood, the theme of the book of Hebrews. It’s not only the end of the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants.

Twice in the New Testament an explicit comparison is made between Jesus and Adam. In Romans 5:12–21, Paul argues that ‘just as through the disobedience of the one man [Adam] the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man [Jesus] the many will be made righteous” (Romans 5:19, NIV). In 1 Corinthians 15:22, Paul argues that ‘as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive,’ while in verse 45 he calls Jesus the ‘last/ultimate/final [ἔσχατος/eschatos] Adam.’”

Given that most Christians who make the “scoffer” charge are premillennial, that is, those who believe that after a future seven-year period that includes the Great Tribulation, a thousand-year reign of Jesus on the earth will immediately follow. It’s only after this 1007-year period (the 7-year tribulation period plus the 1000 years of Revelation 20) that the events described in 2 Peter 3 come to pass (the new heaven and new earth). According to the dispensational view, the “new heaven and a new earth” comes into existence after the first physical heaven and the first physical earth passes away (Rev. 21:1). Given premillennial assumptions (which I believe are wrong), this means that the events described by Peter could never be near since more than 1000 years is not near.

How can a person be a “scoffer” or a “mocker” of prophetic events that are about to happen when the supposed dissolution of the cosmos is more than a thousand years away? It doesn’t make any sense. The charge only makes sense if the described events are actually near, near to those living in Peter’s generation and were familiar with Jesus’ prophecy. Those in Peter’s audience were looking “for these things” (2 Peter 3:12). How could they be looking for “these things” if they were at least 1007 years in their future?

Why didn’t Peter say that their math was out of whack, that the “new heaven and the new earth” are more than 1000 years in the future. According to the dispensational way of interpreting prophecy, we have at least 1000 years before there will be a physically renovated cosmos. This can’t take place until after Jesus reigns on the earth for 1000 years.

In fact, once Jesus sets foot on planet earth again, according to premillennialism, it will be quite easy to calculate when the events of 2 Peter 3 will take place—exactly a thousand years later. To silence a “scoffer,” all a person has to say is, “Look, God promised that these events won’t happen for a thousand years.” This means that for the premillennialist, the events revealed and described by Peter can’t have anything to do with our time. They are still far in the future. This means that this section of Scripture can’t be used to club those who reject the notion that we are living in the last days.

Peter specifically says, once again following the premillennial paradigm, the last days are at this moment in time at least 1007 years in the future. So, if the “last days” refers to the period just before the dissolution of the cosmos that is at least 1007 years in our future, then we can’t be living in the “last days” and there are no signs that can be called into evidence to support the claim that a new physical heaven and earth are on the prophetic horizon.

1. Henry M. Morris, The Defender’s Study Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: World Publishing, 1995), 1045.)

Prior to these comments that are found in his Defender’s Study Bible, Morris wrote the following extended comments on Matthew 24:34 in his book Creation and the Second Coming:

In this striking prophecy, the words “this generation” have the emphasis of “that generation.” ((I received the following comment in an email from someone supporting the view held by Morris: “I will admit that the word ‘this’ has ALWAYS presented an obstacle to a full understanding of the Discourse. Have you ever considered [if] this word COULD HAVE BEEN ‘that’ in the original [Manuscript]? I believe from my reading that could have been possible” (November 12, 2007). Almost anything is possible, but there is no indication that the Greek word ekeinos (“that”) was ever used. It’s pure conjecture.[↩]

1. There is nothing in Matthew 24 that says Jesus is going to return to reign as king on the earth.[↩]
2. Why does “near” mean “even at the doors” for Morris in his day, but it did not mean “near” in the first century?[↩]
3. Notice how Morris uses the far demonstrative “that” to refer to a generation in the past. How would he have described the generation in which he was living? Obviously with the near demonstrative “this” to distinguish it from “that” past generation.[↩]
4. Henry Morris, Creation and the Second Coming (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 1991), 183. Morris died on February 25, 2006 at the age of 87.[↩]
5. Gordon H. Clark, II Peter: A Short Commentary (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1975), 64.

Article “Particulars of Daniel 9:24-27” by Gary DeMar (source – https://americanvision.org/21906/particulars-of-daniel-924-27/)

The Particulars of Daniel 9:24–27

1. To finish the transgression (Dan. 9:24): Jesus declared, “It is finished” (John 19:28–30). The transgression is finished because (1) Jesus became the sin-bearer for us. “He was wounded for our transgressions” (Isa. 53:5). Our transgressions are no longer counted against us. “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross” (Col. 2:14). (2) Finish the transgression might be a reference to the transgression of the Jews against God of that generation (Matt. 21:33-45; 23:32, 35-36, 38; Luke 11:47-51; 1 Thess. 2:14-16). “Last of all he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance’” (Matt. 21:37-38; cf. 21:33-45; Acts 7:51-52).”
2. To make an end to sin (9:24): Jesus “but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Heb. 9:26). Jesus was the “lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world” (John 1:29). “Christ died for our sins” (1 Cor. 15:3).
3. To make reconciliation [atonement] for iniquity (Dan. 9:24): “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:19).
4. To bring in everlasting righteousness (Dan. 9:24): If Jesus didn’t bring in everlasting righteousness, then we are still in our sins. This is not describing earthly righteousness so there’s no longer any sin the world. There will still be sin in the premillennial view of Revelation 20.
5. “Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption”—everlasting righteous — “for us” (Heb. 9:12).
6. Seal up the vision and prophecy (Dan. 9:24): Jesus Christ fulfills (and thereby confirms) the prophecy by His atoning work.
7. “Then he took unto himthe twelve, and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished” (Luke 18:31).
8. “And he said unto them, These arethe words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me” (Luke 24:44; Acts 3:18).
9. To anoint the most holy [one or place] (Dan. 9:24). (1) Jesus is described as “the HOLY thing…” (Luke 1:35). Peter referred to Jesus as the “HOLY one” (Acts 3:14), as did John (1 John 2:20). Even the demons referred to Jesus as “the HOLY ONE of God” (Matt. 1:24). Jesus was anointed two, possibly three times in the gospels. The last was after the triumphal entry and just before the crucifixion (Matt. 26:6–13 and Mark 14:3–9). Kenneth Gentry writes: “It was at His baptismal anointing that the Spirit came upon Him (Mark 1:9-11). And this was introductory to His ministry, of which we read three verses later: ‘Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled [the Sixty-ninth week?], and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel’ (Mark 1:14-15). Christ is pre-eminently the Anointed One.” (2) Could refer to the “holy place once for all” (Heb. 9:12), the heavenly sanctuary.

What the Antichrist is Supposed to Do

Then after the 62 sevens, the Messiah [Jesus] will be cut off [excommunicated by the religious rulers of Israel] and have nothing [the cross, Phil. 2:7: “made Himself of no reputation”]; and the people of the Prince [the enthroned Christ] Who is to come will destroy the city [Jerusalem] and the sanctuary [Temple]. And its end will come with a flood [like Noah, like the threats of Deut. 28; like the locust flood of Joel]; even to the end there will be war [the Jewish War of A.D. 66-70]; desolations are determined.

1. Who will “destroy the city and the sanctuary” (9:26)? Jesus or antichrist? This assumes another rebuilt temple if it’s the antichrist, but there’s nothing in the NT that says anything about another rebuilt temple. We know the city and sanctuary were destroyed in AD 70. This was Jesus’ judgment using the earthly agency of the Roman Empire, like the way God used Babylon: “And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand [Nebuchadnezzar]…” (Dan. 1:1–2). See the Parable of the Marriage Feast (Matt. 22:1–14): “But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth: and he sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city” (v. 7). Jesus describes these murderers in Matthew 23:31–36.
2. The “end” of what “shall be with a flood” (9:26)? The end of the city and sanctuary.
3. “Desolations are determined.” Notice that 9:26 does not say that desolations take place in the span of the 70 weeks of years but only that they are “determined.” This is what Jesus says in Matthew 23:38: “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.” That desolation was future to that generation but would take place before their generation passed away (Matt. 24:30): “When ye therefore shall see the abomination, spoken of by Daniel the prophet [11:31; 12:11], stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand” (Matt. 24:15; Luke 21:20: “And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh.”).
4. “Returning to the time of the Maccabees and Daniel 11, we need to ask who were the ‘forces from him’ that desecrated the sanctuary and set up the desolating sacrilege? They were the reigning High Priests Jason and Menelaus, who apostatized to Greek religion, and who invited Antiochus to help them take over Jerusalem for their own purposes (Josephus, Antiquities12:5:1). In the same way, the apostate High Priests between A.D. 30 and 70 cooperated with the Romans in order to suppress the Christian faith and in order to maintain their own Sadducean combination of Greek philosophy and apostate Judaism…. Antiochus defiled the Temple, but this is only the aftermath of what the Jews had already done. Antiochus could not really defile the Temple, because he was not one of God’s peculiar people and he had no legal access to it. His defiling the temple is not the abomination of desolation, therefore.”
5. “And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week” (Dan. 9:27).
6. The “he” is Jesus.
7. Only God makes and confirms covenants. There’s nothing in the Bible about an antichrist making or confirming a covenant.
8. “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1:16; 2:10; See John 11:47–53).
9. “These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel…. But when they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another: for verily I say unto you, Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come. (Matt. 10:5–6, 23). Jesus was confirming His covenant with Israel.
10. “For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Matt. 26:28).
11. “But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15).
12. “Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it is written, For this cause I will confess to thee among the Gentiles, and sing unto thy name” (Rom. 15:8–9).
13. “For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth” (Heb. 9:16–17).