Jubilee or Judgment

Introduction

This morning we have a hope-filled, beautiful passage in front of us.

And yet, it is also perplexing for many.

On one hand, it is a this a passage that is incredibly beautiful, giving us a great Messianic promise from the Old Testament.

On the other hand, it is those most difficult passage in Daniel to interpret and even one of the more difficult passages in the whole Bible.

There is plenty of disagreement in how to understand it.

And if you start getting lost in the weeds, you will go a bit cross-eyed—like I did when reading up on the technical scientific terms behind a snowflake.

So let me give us a simple goal this morning:

Let us seek clarity and seek Christ.

Let us strive to understand this passage and to see how these things have come true in Jesus Christ.

Now in order to do this, I will not be able to give you every interpretation of this passage and the reasons I agree or disagree with it.

It would become to muddy and unclear that we would not reach our goal of clarity.

Instead, I will give you my best understanding of the text after much study.

If you disagree, we will all survive.

My goal is not to change your mind about interpretation this morning, but to see your heart fixed on Immanuel.

Context

A reminder of where we are in Daniel this morning.

At the beginning of chapter 9, in the first year after Persia conquered Babylon, we saw Daniel studying the prophecy of Jeremiah.

And then—longing for a return from Exile—Daniel began offering up pleas and petitions.

Daniel saw where Jeremiah the Exile would only last for 70 years.

That time was nearly up.

This caused the old prophet to begin confessing the sin of the nation that landed them in Exile in the first place and asking for God’s merciful forgiveness.

This morning, we see God answer Daniel’s prayer.

Text—these are the very words of God

Daniel 9:20–27 ESV

While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my plea before the Lord my God for the holy hill of my God, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the first, came to me in swift flight at the time of the evening sacrifice. He made me understand, speaking with me and saying, “O Daniel, I have now come out to give you insight and understanding. At the beginning of your pleas for mercy a word went out, and I have come to tell it to you, for you are greatly loved. Therefore consider the word and understand the vision. “Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place. Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time. And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator.”

Outline

What we will see from this passage this morning is that these prophetic words leave us in a place where we are left with a choice:

Will we enter into JUBILEE or will we experience JUDGMENT?

And to get to that all-important questions, we will break this passage up into three sections:

1. Prayer answered (v. 20-23).

2. Purposes announced (v. 24-25).

3. Prophecy fulfilled (v. 25-27).

Prayer Answered (v. 20-23)

We begin with our first section in verse 24:

1. Prayer answered (v. 20-23).

Daniel says that while he is still praying and confessing his sin and the sin of his people, asking God to bring Judah home from exile to Jerusalem—the holy hill of God—a messenger from the Lord comes to him (v. 20-21).

And in verse 21, we see this messenger is the angel Gabriel—the same one who helped him understand the vision of the ram and the goat in chapter 8.

Gabriel comes to him in “swift flight” at the time of evening sacrifice, which would have been 3pm in the Jewish day.

What Gabriel lets Daniel know is that God has mercifully answered his prayer.

In fact, as soon as Daniel began to pray, heaven responded.

“At the beginning of your pleas for mercy a word went out...” (v. 23)

Gabriel is here to deliver that word.

It is a word that will give insight and understanding (v. 22).

And notice that Daniel is receiving this word as an answer to his prayer because he is “greatly loved.”

God is swiftly answering Daniel’s prayer because He loves him.

Take heart that it is no different than us.

If you have ever prayed and God quickly responded, be it a yes or a no, it is because God loves you and has chosen to set His affections and favor upon you.

And we can also say that in those times where we pray and God does not quickly answer, this is also because God loves us and the waiting is for our good.

God answers the prayers of His children in love.

And all of this is made possible by the blood of Jesus Christ.

He has reconciled us to the loving Father and by His blood, we boldly come to the throne of grace seeking answers to our prayers.

We come confident that God the Father loves His Son and all those who are in the Son by faith.

The English bishop Joseph Hall said it this way:

Surely He who feeds the ravens when they cry will not starve His children when they pray.

Joseph Hall

At the end of verse 23, Daniel is told to consider the word and understand the vision.

So let’s get into the word now in our second section of this passage:

Purposes Announced (v. 24)

2. Purposes announced (v. 24).

Heptads

Immediately, Daniel finds out that there is another seventy involved in God’s plan for His people.

We saw the seventy years from Jeremiah’s prophecy talked about at the beginning of chapter 9.

Now we have seventy weeks or seventy sevens.

If you are in the ESV this morning, it says seventy weeks and has a footnote that says “or sevens.”

If you have the NIV, it puts the sevens right in the passage:

“Seventy ‘sevens’ are decreed for your people...

Daniel 9:25a, New International Version

So the question is—why the footnote and why the change in the NIV?

Well what the footnote and the NIV are reflecting is that these 70 weeks are heptads.

Heptad: a set of sevens

And that is what Gabriel is revealing to Daniel here—not seven weeks as in seven weeks from now will be Sunday, September 21st.

Instead, it is being communicated that there are seventy sets of seven decreed about Daniel’s people.

Leviticus Connection

So with that in mind, in Daniel 70 weeks, we have 70 sets of seven weeks.

And I think that we are intended to interpret the weeks as “years”—meaning we would have “70 weeks of years.”

Let me show you why...

Let’s take a look at Leviticus 25:1-4

Leviticus 25:1–4 ESV

The Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the Lord. For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.

So every 7th year, the land was supposed to have a Sabbath rest.

After 7 Sabbath years passed (49 years), there would be the 50th year—the Year of Jubilee.

Leviticus 25:8–12 ESV

“You shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years. Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land. And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan. That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of itself nor gather the grapes from the undressed vines. For it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You may eat the produce of the field.

In the year of Jubilee, slaves were liberated.

Land was returned.

Debts were canceled.

It was really a reset, socially and economically.

This was a command that the people were supposed to be obedient to, like the rest of God’s commands.

Like other commands, failure to obey the Sabbath years and the year of Jubilee would see God’s people cursed and removed from the land.

If they did not give the land its Sabbath, God would give it to the land by removing the people from the land—just as He did in Babylonian Exile.

Leviticus 26:43–45 ESV

But the land shall be abandoned by them and enjoy its Sabbaths while it lies desolate without them, and they shall make amends for their iniquity, because they spurned my rules and their soul abhorred my statutes. Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and break my covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.”

This is one of the major reasons that Judah was in Exile. They disobeyed God.

They did this in number of ways and one of the key points of disobedience was failing to give Sabbath to the land.

If you are still not convinced, 2 Chronicles could not make this more clear in some of its final words:

2 Chronicles 36:20–21 ESV

He took into exile in Babylon those who had escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and to his sons until the establishment 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 that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.

Longing for Jubilee/Literal Symbolic

Going back to Daniel 9, it seems that the 70 weeks should be thought of along the lines of Leviticus 25—seventy weeks of years that we will see divided up into three sections:

The first heptad or the first set of seven weeks of years.

Then sixty-two sets of seven weeks of years.

And then a final set of seven weeks of years.

All together you are dealing with 70 weeks of years or 490 years.

Some want to press these numbers to be taken literally, while others focus on them being more symbolic.

I think it is supposed to be symbolic.

Consider Jesus’ words to Peter in Matthew 18:22

Matthew 18:22 ESV

Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.

No one interprets these words literally.

Jesus wasn’t saying, “Peter—forgive your brother 490 times, but not 491!”

We all recognize that Jesus was saying to Peter, “Your view of forgiveness is too small, brother. Expand it to unending limits.”

Similarly, we should view the numbers in Daniel in this way.

Regardless, the 70 sevens should have the same impact on all of us.

It should leave us all longing for what comes after the Sabbath years—and that is Jubilee.

And not just the usual one year Jubilee.

The number 490 leaves us desiring a tenfold Jubilee.

An ultimate jubilee.

As Duguid said, “...an ultimate victory over sin and evil.”

Six Purposes of the 70 Sevens

In rest of verse 24, we see nature of that Tenfold Ultimate Jubilee in the six purposes of the 70 sevens.

They are about the Jewish people and the city of Jerusalem. They are about how ultimate victory will come about.

They are listed out:

1. To finish the transgression

2. To put an end to sin.

3. To atone for iniquity.

4. To bring in everlasting righteousness.

5. To seal both vision and prophet.

6. To anoint a most holy place.

These six purposes of the 70 sevens are a direct answer to Daniel’s prayer regarding sin, mercy and returning home.

With the first three purposes, God is saying, “I will take of the sin that has put you in sackcloth and ashes.”

Transgression against the Law will be finished.

The sin of God’s people will be dealt with in a final sense—ended.

Iniquity will be atoned for—the punishment for sin and the shame of sin will be removed from you

With the stated purpose of everlasting righteousness, God is saying, “You will be permanently made right with me.”

No more curses—only blessings.

No more distance—just reconciliation.

With the purpose of sealing both vision and prophet, God is saying, “When sin has been dealt with, the prophecies will have been fulfilled.”

This would include Jeremiah’s prophecy of a New Covenant:

Jeremiah 31:31 ESV

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah,

Jeremiah 31:33–34 ESV

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

By sealing up the visions and the prophecies, God is saying that He will see to it that all of the promises of God find their Yes and Amen.

He will put his own seal on them to confirm it.

God is taking action and ownership.

With the purpose of anointing a most holy place, God is saying, “I am bringing One who is most holy—a true and better temple than what you have had.”

Notice again the footnote in the ESV where Most Holy Place can also be translated, “Most Holy One.”

The King James is helpful here:

...to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.

Daniel 9:24b, King James Bible

It is worth taking note that as we read through the last three verses of Daniel 9, that none of these things are taking place in the first 69 weeks.

They are not slowly being accomplished in the first 69 sevens.

Instead, it is all coming to pass in the 70th week, letting us know that the 70th week is truly center stage.

This is where the purposes will be executed.

This is where Ultimate Jubilee will be attained for God’s people.

This is where Jeremiah’s New Covenant will be inaugurated.

Let’s dive in further in our third section of the passage.

Prophecy Fulfilled (v. 25-27)

3. Prophecy fulfilled (v. 25-27).

What happens in the first 69 sevens? (v. 25)

This is where a lot of ink has been spilled. We now get into the 70 weeks and how and when all of these purposes will be accomplished.

The first set of sevens takes place “from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem...”

The second set of 62 sevens says it will be built “with squares and a moat, but in a troubled time.”

The final set of sevens is focused on the Anointed One who is cut off...”

Understanding how all of this works together can be challenging.

But let’s start with what most scholars agree on:

Most understand the Anointed One, a Prince, to be our Lord, Jesus Christ. (v. 25)

And most understand that when the Jerusalem is built again, this is referring to the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, as as the time in between the Old Testament and the New.

That time we discussed a few weeks back where the Greek Seleucid ruler, Antiochus Epiphanes IV, was persecuting God’s people.

The time of the Maccabean revolt against that persecuting power.

But here is what is a bit confusing—v. 25 makes it seem like the coming of an anointed one takes place BEFORE the days of Ezra and Nehemiah and Jerusalem being rebuilt:

It makes it sound like the Anointed One comes in days of the Persian Empire.

I agree with Mitchell Chase who says:

The first “seven” and the next “sixty-two” weeks seem to deal with the whole span of time envisioned in verse 25, which encompasses the “going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince.

Mitchell Chase

SHOW TABLE IMAGE HERE

I even have a little visual for you so that you can see it laid out in a table format.

This may seem confusing because of how it reads, but if we were to read the Hebrew literally here, it would sound like this:

“And you shall know and you shall understand from the going forth of decree to restore and to build Jerusalem until Messiah Prince, weeks seven and weeks sixty and two, it shall return and it shall be built...”

Literal Hebrew Rendering of Daniel 9:25

The King James is helpful to us again:

Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks...

Daniel 9:25, King James Version

The ESV is my favorite translation, but it does no favors to the original text here by separating the 7 and 62 the way it does.

Instead, the first set of 7 sevens and the 62 weeks of sevens should be looked at as one chunk.

It should be seen as the timeframe in which:

Cyrus sent out word for the rebuilding of the temple

2 Chronicles 36:23 ESV

“Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may the Lord his God be with him. Let him go up.’ ”

Ezra and Nehemiah facing trouble as they attempted to rebuild the city and the temple

Something they would accomplish—thus the squares and moat reference in v. 25

God’s people facing trouble as they are persecuted by Antiochus

This timeframe takes us up to the time of the Messiah—the coming of the Anointed Prince, Jesus, the Son of Man.

Let’s put the table up again, so that you can see it one more time:

SHOW TABLE IMAGE AGAIN

What happens in the 70th set of seven? (v. 26-27)

So all of that takes place in the first 69 sevens, but we still are left looking for the purposes of the 70 weeks to be accomplished.

And this is where we turn to v. 26-27.

Some would see some of these verses to be referring to a mixture of past and future events, but I don’t think that is the case.

Instead, what we have is two verses explaining the same thing.

On one hand, we will see how the Tenfold Jubilee comes to the people of God.

On the other hand, v. 26-27 show us how there are consequences for rejecting the Anointed Prince.

Verses 26-27 follow a classic Hebrews ABAB pattern.

In an ABAB pattern, the same truth is communicated twice in a row in order to emphasize its importance.

I’ll give you an example:

Hosea 6:1–3 ESV

“Come, let us return to the Lord; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.”

A: Come, let us return to the Lord—He has torn us that He may heal us...

B: After two days He will revive us; one the third day he will restore us...

So the truth communicated is that if God’s people return to the Lord, He will heal them and restore them.

And watch how that is restated with different language...

A: Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord...

B: His going out is as sure as the dawn, he will come to us as the showers...

The same idea of returning and restoration is communicated twice to emphasize its importance in what is the key passage in the whole book of Hosea.

The same literary device is employed in Daniel 9:26-27.

A: And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and have nothing (26a).

B: And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed (26b).

Then in v. 27, we run it back. Same message communicated in different language.

A: And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put and end to sacrifice and offering (v. 27a).

B: And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolater (v. 27b).

In 26a and 27a, we are seeing how the Anointed One will bring about the purposes of the 70 weeks.

In v. 26b and 27b, we are seeing how there will be desolating judgment when the Anointed One is rejected.

Six Purposes Fulfilled

So let’s break it down and see how the six purposes of the 70 weeks are fulfilled in the Anointed Prince.

First of all, after the 62 weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and have nothing.

This is referring to the death of our Lord Jesus Christ on the Cross.

This is referring to Christ dying as a Substitute for His people as the ultimate sacrifice for sin.

And in this death at Calvary, the Lord Jesus inaugurated a New Covenant—the New Covenant that He says is poured out in His blood, which we remembered at the Supper Table this morning.

This is why v. 27 says that he makes “strong covenant” with many and put an end to sacrifice and offering.

All of this happened in the death of Christ.

This is how:

Transgression is finished.

This is how sin is brought to its end.

This is how iniquity is atoned for.

It is through the Anointed Prince being cut off, putting an end to sacrifice and offering as THE sacrifice for sin to God the Father.

Isaiah 53:8 ESV

By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?

This is how everlasting righteousness is bought for the people of God.

Christ, the righteous, has suffered in the place of His people, the unrighteous.

Now, He has paid for their sin and they receive His righteousness by faith.

2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

This is how the vision and the prophet have been sealed.

For in this Messiah Prince, all of God’s promises and prophecies are fulfilled.

2 Corinthians 1:20 ESV

For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.

This is how the Most Holy Place or Most Holy One is anointed.

While the temple is rebuilt by Ezra and Nehemiah, something more is being talked about in the final words of verse 24.

After all, the temple was never the main event.

It was a building that pointed beyond itself to the True and Better Temple to come.

The temple is the place where God’s people went to be in the presence of God.

The place they went to make atonement.

The place where worshippers went to truly exalt their King

But under the New Covenant that Christ has made, we find the reality of what the Temple pointed toward.

We find that in Jesus Christ, we are ushered into the presence of God.

We find that in Jesus Christ, the all-sufficient atonement has been made.

And we find that in Jesus Christ, we may worship God anywhere in Spirit and in truth.

This is certainly how Christ viewed Himself:

John 2:19–21 ESV

Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking about the temple of his body.

The temple was a Shadow of the true Temple to come in Jesus Christ.

Therefore, in the 70th week, through His death and resurrection, the Anointed Prince proved Himself to be the Most Holy Place for all of God’s children.

He is the Most Holy One.

True Jubilee

Church, this is the tenfold, ultimate jubilee that we have been seeking this morning.

It is found in Jesus Christ and the New Covenant inaugurated by His blood.

Daniel despaired his sin and the sin of his nation. He grieved.

He pleaded with God and made petition.

And God has answered by promising that the Christ would come and deal with sin by being cut off.

He would have nothing on the Cross so that we could have everything forever.

Daniel asked for God’s mercy and God sent out a merciful word about a strong covenant that would end sacrifices and see sin atoned for and put away.

And the righteousness that God’s people would have before Him is not temporary.

It is an everlasting righteousness.

A “forever” right standing before God.

THAT is true jubilee.

True liberation.

True restoration to God’s eternal land.

True rest forever.

True freedom.

A true rest for our sinful souls that will never end

New birth. New life. New Covenant.

This is the Jubilee that Jesus, the Anointed Prince brings to us, if only you would receive Him.

Rejecting the Anointed Prince

But sadly, many did not receive Him.

Many rejected Him.

They saw Christ, the Cornerstone of a New Covenant and they stumbled over Him.

They did not receive Him as the Messiah Prince.

His own people—Daniel’s people—rejected Him.

John 1:11 ESV

He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.

And this rejection culminated in Christ being arrested and put through a kangaroo court by the Jewish leaders.

It culminated in the voices of His own people crying out, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!

The back half of verse 26 and verse 27 is explained what happened as a result.

Those who receive the Messiah by faith will experience the glory of those six purpose of the 70 sevens revealed.

Those who reject the Messiah will not.

Instead, there is judgment—not Jubilee.

v. 26 says “The people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.”

v. 27 says, “An on the wings of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out.”

So the second half of the 70th week is using language of judgment and I believe that judgment is referring to what happened in 70 AD.

In that year, Titus of the Romans, laid Jerusalem to waste.

Thousands of Jewish people were killed and the temple was destroyed.

v. 26 says the “people of the prince” are responsible because even though the Romans held the sword, the judgment comes due to how they rejected Christ as the Messiah.

Consider Jesus’ own words from Matthew 23:37-38

Matthew 23:37–38 ESV

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate.

The rejection of Christ would leave their house desolate.

Same language used by Daniel.

Just as Nebuchadnezzar and Babylon were a tool in the hands of a judging God, so were Titus and the Romans.

Thus, we can truly blame the sin of nation for the destruction that came in 586 BC, as well as the one that came in 70 AD at the hands of Rome.

The end came like a flood in the war with Rome.

v. 27 is talking of the same 70 AD event with different language.

“And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator.”

We don’t have to do guesswork here.

Again, Jesus told us plainly.

In His Olivet Discourse, as He is giving His disciples instructions on what to do during the Roman siege in 70 AD, He says this:

Matthew 24:15–16 ESV

“So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.

I trust Jesus to interpret Daniel more than any of us.

There is no reason to doubt that the end of Daniel 9 is about 70 AD.

Conclusion and Application

So let me summarize and then give a word of application as we close.

Seventy weeks of years are decreed.

The first 69 are about the time from Cyrus to Christ.

The final set of seven is about the coming of the Messiah.

Those who receive the Messiah will have their sin dealt with, will be able to worship God in Spirit and truth with righteous standing before Him, and taste the Jubilee of the New Covenant NOW and FOREVER.

However, those who reject the suffering Prince, left themselves in danger of great judgment, which would come down upon Jerusalem in 70 AD.

But as we go, I want to ask—What do we take away from this?

Well going back to the start this morning, I believe there is a choice before us all:

Will we enter into JUBILEE or will we experience JUDGMENT?

The work of the Messiah in the 70th week has an offer on the table for you this morning.

Believe in Him and experience the restoration of Jubilee forever.

For in the Cross your sins have been paid for.

In the Resurrection they have been defeated.

Turn away from your sin and believe in Christ TODAY.

But if we reject the offer of Jubilee, as so many of Christ’s own tribe did 2000 years ago, we are going to end up experiencing Judgment forever.

And what will come in that Judgment is far worse than what happened in 70 AD.

That was merely a taste.

This is a judgment with no end.

This is a judgment with no way out.

This is a judgment that comes at the hands of our God who is a consuming fire, not just a Roman leader.

Do not reject the Anointed Prince.

God will still deal with your sin, but instead of laying the punishment upon Christ, He will lay it upon you.

Again—TODAY is the day to believe in Christ and reject Him no longer.

I’ll close with these words from Richard Baxter as you consider JUBILEE or JUDGMENT:

After so many convictions, and gripes of conscience, and after so many purposes and promises, are you not yet ready to turn and live? O that your eyes and your heart were opened to know how fair an offer is now made to you.

Richard Baxter

Who wants judgment when you can have jubilee?

The Anointed Prince offers it to you today.