Preparing for the Apocalypse

Rules of Interpretation

Several people have been asking about what my views are on the end times. And although we will spend the next few weeks covering Hanukkah, we have some time this week to give a brief summary. This will only be a summary and I will go into detail on each of the main areas early next year. My goal is not so much to convince you that I am right, nor that mine is the only view, my hope is that I can show you how I study these apocalyptic (end times) Scriptures and how I came to the conclusions that I did.

I will start by reading 2 Tim. 2:15

2 Timothy 2:15 TLV

Make every effort to present yourself before God as tried and true, as an unashamed worker cutting a straight path with the word of truth.

Golden Rule of Interpretation

Before we go into any specific Scriptural, prophetic texts, we need to refresh ourselves on some basic rules of interpretation.

Like the believers of the first 4 centuries, I hold to a literal, simple interpretation of Scripture. All Scripture should be read with the understanding that God means exactly what He says, and that He says exactly what He means. Everything should be taken literally unless there is specific reason within the text to believe that something is allegoric, symbolic, figurative or even an exaggeration. Simply put, I follow the “Golden Rule of Interpretation” as described by David L. Cooper:

When the plain sense of Scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense; therefore, take every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal meaning unless the facts of the immediate context, studied in light of related passages and axiomatic and fundamental truths indicate clearly otherwise.

The idea that there is a mystical, spiritual and/or allegorical meaning behind all of Scripture was not held until a Christian scholar named, Origen, who lived in the first part of the 3rd century began to add Greek philosophy, specifically Neoplatonism, to his method of interpretation. One of the biggest problem with Origen’s idea is that if there is a spiritual meaning behind every Scripture, then the interpretation of the Scriptures becomes completely subjective. You may have heard the claim that “Your truth is your truth, and my truth is my truth” or that “There are many interpretations to Scripture.” Both of these statements come from this same Neoplatonic ideas.

Instead, we should be looking at the plain simple meaning of the Scriptural text, and seeing if there is a way to apply the principles to our lives. Another way of expressing the Golden Rule of Interpretation is as, Wesley Brainard, my mime Instructor at ORU put it:

Read the Bible like a 3rd grader.

Double-Reference & Recurrence

Two other rules that apply to Scripture, and specifically to prophesy are the Law of Double Reference and the Law of Recurrence. The Law of Double-Reference is where a prophet would start talking about a local or current event and then seamlessly transition into describing a glorious future. We see this in the idea in the following picture, where the prophet (formerly known as a seer) sees a picture of Yeshua’s first coming and His second coming but does not explain the time in between. Or where the prophet Joel start by talking about a plague of locusts in his day, and moved into speaking about the last days, or Day of the Lord, without explaining how much time is in between.

The Law or Recurrence is where we see a second explanation or description of the exact same events but with additional details. A perfect example of this is Gen. 1 vs. Gen. 2 on the history of Creation, or how the Song of Deborah in Judges 5 repeats the narrative in Judges 4.

Compare Scripture with Scripture

When we look at a passage, we should always look at it through the lens of all the Scriptures that come before it. In Islam there is the Law of Abrogation, which says that the later passages over-write the former passages, however this is not true with the Scriptures. Hebrews 13:8 states that:

Hebrews 13:8 TLV

Yeshua the Messiah is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

or in 1 Samuel 15:29

1 Samuel 15:29 TLV

Moreover, the Eternal Glory of Israel does not lie or change His mind. For He is not human that He should change His mind.”

So therefore, one of the most important ways of gaining a correct understanding of Scriptures is to read from the beginning in Genesis to the end in Revelation.

This rule also goes along with the Law of First Mention, which states that the first time that a concept, principal or word is used in Scripture defines that idea throughout the rest of the Scriptures. A great example is that God covered Adam and Eve with the skins of an animal after they had sinned, and from that point on we see that mankind’s sins are atoned (or covered) through the sacrifice of an innocent animal.

Another great way of comparing Scripture with Scripture is where an author quotes from another Biblical author. Did you know that 75% of the New Covenant is either a direct quote of the Hebrew Scriptures or an allusion to them? In all of these cases, and even in the cases where a later Prophet quotes from a former Prophet, we should look at the full context of both places. The New Covenant authors are much more faithful to the original context of the quoted Scripture then are the Rabbis. When Matthew or Paul or John quote from the Hebrew Scriptures, we should go back and read the whole chapter from which they quoted and compare it with the situation that they are addressing.

Poetry, Symbols & Metaphors

Although we take a straight-forward and simple approach to reading and understanding Scripture, we are also well aware that the Scripture does use symbols and metaphors, especially when it comes to Poetry. We would be foolish to think that poetry should be read ultra-literally, but nor should we try to allegorize the entire poem.

John 16:25 TLV

“These things I have spoken to you in metaphors. An hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in metaphors, but will tell you plainly about the Father.

As for symbols and metaphors, in most cases they are explicitly defined in the surrounding texts. We see this often when a vision is given to someone, then the explicit meaning of the symbols in the vision are also given.

I will give you 2 examples. Have you ever heard someone teach from the story of Isaac and Rebekah? Have you heard them say, “Well Isaac represents Jesus, Rebekah represents the bride and the servant represents the Holy Spirit.”? While that might sound nice, it is not actually what the author of the passage intended. And if we take this analogy too far, we might be led to believe that the Holy Spirit (the servant) needs to pray to the Father, which is a concept that you never find anywhere in Scripture.

A second example is when we get to the beasts described in Daniel’s dreams. In these cases, Daniel asks the angel standing next to him, the meaning of these symbols, and the angel explains that the beasts represent kingdoms that would rule on the earth both in Daniel’s time and in the future. We should remember this symbol, especially since we will be studying both Daniel and Revelation, which both use the same symbol of a beast.

Obscure in Light of Plain

One of the final laws of interpretation that we will cover at this time is that: Obscure passages must be interpreted in the light of the plain ones. Basically this means that we start with the simple, easy to understand passages, and we use these as a foundation to understand the passages that are more complex.

What this means is that when we study the end times, we are going to first look at the foundation of the words of Yeshua in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. We will also look at direct words from Adonai through the Hebrew Prophets.

On that foundation we will then look at the teachings given by Paul in his letters, primarily 1 and 2 Thessalonians. We can also look at some of the hints and allusions throughout the Scriptures.

And finally we will look at the visions that were given to Daniel, Zechariah and John.

That means that the Book of Revelation is not the foundation but rather the icing on the cake.

For a more in-depth study of these rules of interpretation, you can go to our website and click on David Cooper under Teachings (https://www.biblicalresearch.info/The_World's_Greatest_Library.pdf).

Basic Timeline

When we look at the timeline of all the events that Adonai foretells, we start to get a picture of what will happen when. This picture is not exact and as I show in this next slide although the events are described the actual time that they will occur is not.

So looking at this timeline, and we will go over where all of this information comes from at a later time, we can be certain of a few things. For instance, Yeshua ascended somewhere between 30-33 AD (as you can see, even that date is not nailed down).

Then we definitely know that the Temple was destroyed in 70 AD, at least that is locked down due to the accurate records of several historians including Josephus. We also can be assured that we are alive today, and that we are living in the last days. How can we say that? Well the author of Hebrews 1:2 “In these last days He has spoken to us through a Son, whom He appointed heir of all things and through whom He created the universe.”

And Peter quoted from Joel in Acts 2:17 “‘And it shall be in the last days,’ says God, ‘that I will pour out My Ruach on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.”

So based upon these 2 verses, this entire timeline is of the last days. There will, of course, be a last day of the last days, but will it happen in our day? I can not be certain. Are there prophesies that are yet to be fulfilled? Yes. But could they be fulfilled very quickly? Yes.

What I will try and help us all to do, is to provide Scriptural references for all the events that are on this timeline, and also populate the timeline with any other events that we can gather from Scripture.

Areas of Deeper Discussion

As you may have seen on the previous slide, I have included the Rapture and the Millennial Reigh of Yeshua. As we go through the Scriptures, we will look a the three different views of the Rapture. The word “rapture” comes from being “caught up” to meet Yeshua in the air. Almost all followers of Yeshua believe that the rapture is an actual event (assuming that they believe in the miraculous at all). The only area of disagreement is when the Rapture will occur.

Will it occur before the Great and final Tribulation? That would be Pre-tribulation,

Will it occur in the middle of the Great Tribulation? That would be Mid-Tribulation, or

Will it occur at the end of the Great Tribulation? Post-Tribulation.

The other area of deeper discussion has to do with the 1000 year reign of Yeshua. There are three different views of this as well. These three views all focus around whether or not Yeshua will literally reign from Jerusalem on this earth for 1000 years. The first view is A-millennialism, which means that the millennium is more of a figure of speech and represents a time of world-wide peace and that there is not an actual 1000 year reign. When Yeshua returns we will simply go straight to the Great White Throne Judgement and then immediately to the New Heaven and New Earth.

The second view is Pre-millennialism, where Yeshua returns before the literal 1000 years and sets up his Kingdom ruling from Jerusalem.

And the third view is Post-millennialism, where the Church reaches the entire world with the message of Yeshua. The entire world comes to faith in Yeshua. Then Yeshua returns after a long time of world-wide peace, and a time where the Church has ruled the world for 1000 years. Now before you get judgmental of people who hold these different views, just know that some amazing men and women of God have been in all three camps. This is an in-house discussion, and we will look at all three and see which has more Scriptural support.

My End Time Views

When I rededicated my life to the Lord at 14 years old, I listened to Chuck Missler and so I became a Dispensational-Premillennialist and I held to a Pre-Tribulation rapture. Basically, I believed that Yeshua was coming back secretly to rapture his followers, and then was returning 7 years later to set up a literal kingdom and reign for a literal 1000 years.

I know that there is a myth that once you accept Yeshua as Lord and Messiah that everything will be great and your life will be full of peace and prosperity....but…for those who do not know my testimony, I will simply say that the next 4 years were the worst in my life.

At 18, I finally humbled myself completely and broke, and then I gave God what was left of my life. The reason I bring this up is that at 19 my world view was confronted when I visited Israel for the first time. There is something about seeing the land that Yeshua walked, and remembering the prophesies throughout the Bible, that wakes you up. I started realizing how “grounded” the prophesies were, and how literally they were fulfilled. This caused me to revisit all of the prophesies that refer to the coming of the Messiah, including the Book of Revelation.

I figured that if I was going to claim to be a follower of Yeshua, then I should match my life as closely as closely as I could to the teachings of the 1st century New Covenant writings and their authors. For this reason, I now hold to the Historical Pre-Millennialism. I do not think that believers will be able to change all the world’s systems to all follow God’s ways (i.e. Post-Millennial), and I do not see the divisions in Scripture that the Dispensationalists speak of. Therefore I also hold to a Post-Tribulation Rapture.

I know that this is just a summary of me and what I believe, but in the new year we will go in detail through all the passages of Scripture that we have mentioned here. For now we will close with words of Yeshua in Matt. 24:4-14

Matthew 24:4–14 TLV

Yeshua answered them, “Be careful that no one leads you astray! For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Messiah,’ and will lead many astray. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must happen but it is not yet the end. For nation will rise up against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. But all these things are only the beginning of birth pains. “Then they will hand you over to persecution and will kill you. You will be hated by all the nations because of My name. And then many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one other. Many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. Because lawlessness will multiply, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. This Good News of the kingdom shall be proclaimed in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.